J. K. Rowling, sometimes dubbed as the most powerful author, has always been a force to be reckoned with in social media. She is a strong voice most especially on Twitter, and while that has mostly been a good thing, the author recently fell into the trap of misinformation that is abounding in online media.
Her reaction upon seeing the president 'ignore' a disabled child
What sparked a series of criticism against J.K. Rowling were her recent tweets that accused U.S. president Donald Trump of knowingly ignoring Montgomery Weer. Weer is a 3-year-old who just visited the White House last month in a wheelchair, suffering from a disability called spina bifida.
Apparently, Rowling saw footage of Trump deliberately ignoring the boy's outstretched arm, perhaps in an attempt to shake the POTUS' hands. In her tweets - which are now deleted - Rowling said, "How stunning, and how horrible, that Trump cannot bring himself to shake the hand of a small boy who only wanted to touch the President."
Rowling shared that her mother used a wheelchair, and she always saw people uncomfortable around her mother's disability. She added, however, that these people usually got over it quickly "if they had a shred of decency." Seeing the incident with the boy in a wheelchair being ignored touched the author in a different way - "raw," as she puts it.
An inaccurate representation
However, according to the New York Times, Rowling made a false assumption based on incomplete footage.
Marjorie Kelly Weer, Montgomery's mother, said on Facebook that Donald Trump did not snub his son — the kid was not even trying to shake the POTUS' hand! Rowling apparently misinterpreted the footage and her tweets were based on an incomplete video.
What actually happened is that Trump crouched to try and shake Monty's hand, brushed the child's elbow, and the boy lifted his left hand in turn.
J. K. Rowling caught on quick, saying that multiple sources informed her that the footage was not an accurate representation of the interaction that had taken place. She apologized to the Weer family for any discomfort or distress her tweets might have caused, adding that she might have projected her own sensitivities as she saw the video.
It should be noted that while she apologized to the Weer family, no apologies were addressed for Donald Trump. Rowling has expressed her distaste openly for the president, anyway, even calling him "worse than Voldemort."
She also deleted the tweets concerned, and a representative for Rowling said that the author will not comment further on the issue.
