J.K. Rowling harasses African soccer player for not being womanly enough

March 29, 2022: J.K. Rowling attends “Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore” World Premiere at The Royal Festival Hall in London, England.

Transphobic billionaire author J.K. Rowling is attacking yet another cisgender African female athlete for not being feminine enough. This time, Rowling’s target is Barbra Banda, a 24-year-old Zambian professional soccer player who plays on the National Women’s Soccer League’s (NWSL) Orlando Pride team and serves as the captain for Zambia’s national team.

After the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) recently awarded Banda the honor of Women’s Footballer of the Year, Rowling wrote on X, “Presumably the BBC decided this was more time efficient than going door to door to spit directly in women’s faces.” Rowling wrote this amid allegations that Banda had levels of testosterone that got her banned from competing in the 2018 and 2022 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations.

Banda was reportedly found to have naturally occurring elevated levels of testosterone, exceeding the permissible level set by the Confederation of African Football (CAF), according to iNews, which wrote, “The nature of the gender eligibility test she has taken is unclear.”

The CAF allegedly blamed the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ) for Banda’s exclusion, and vice-versa, the aforementioned news outlet reported. The BBC reported that Banda took hormone suppression medication to reduce her testosterone levels, but “these did not decrease sufficiently, and Zambia pulled her from the tournament.”

Despite this, the Banda has been declared eligible to play soccer in transcontinental and professional matches by both FIFA (the international body governing professional soccer) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Banda has competed at a World Cup and two Olympic Games, as well as in domestic leagues across four continents, iNews noted.

Even if Banda has elevated testosterone levels, that doesn’t mean that she’s transgender or intersex.

The feminist website The Mary Sue noted that another X commenter pointed out that the current BBC Director of Sport is an out gay man named Alex Kay-Jelski who had his children via surrogate. Rowling wrote in response to this, “Yep, femaleness is just post-modern performance art until they need an incubator.”

Executive director of the NWSL Players’ Association, Meghann Burke, defended Banda, writing, “The lowest form of discourse is personal insult cloaked with racism and lies, on X no less. Barbra Banda is a proud member of @nwsl_players. She is the best of us. Just so we’re clear, @jk_rowling: you come for her, you come for all of us. Me first. Let’s go.”

Out women’s soccer champion Megan Rapinoe also defended Banda on Instagram, writing, “We’re with her.”

The Orlando Pride wrote of Banda’s BBC award, “We are incredibly proud that Barbra has been voted as the BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year, one of many outstanding achievements she has accomplished during this historic 2024 season … Barbra is an incredible role model and advocate for soccer in Africa, and we have seen firsthand the influence that her achievements and philanthropy have had on young girls in Zambia, as well as the instant impact she has made on Orlando’s soccer community.”

This isn’t the first time Rowling has publicly harassed an African athlete for not being feminine enough for her tastes. During the 2024 Olympic Summer Games, Rowling falsely claimed that Algerian gold medalist boxer Imane Khelif is transgender. Khelif is not transgender, but she is now suing Rowling for making false statements about her, resulting in a wave of cyberbullying and threats.