The Australian government said on Tuesday that it will “carefully consider” the asylum claim of Saudi teenager Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, who fled alleged abuse from her family and is now in the care of the UN humanitarian agency in Bangkok, after she fended off deportation in a gripping, live-tweeted ordeal.
Australia’s Department of Home Affairs hinted at the possibility of granting Alqunun refugee status, saying it was “pleased” the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) was assessing her claim.
“Any application by Ms Alqunun for a humanitarian visa will be carefully considered once the UNHCR process has concluded,” a Home Affairs official told AFP news agency.
Saudi teen detained in Thailand fears deportation
In a separate statement to Australia’s The New Daily, the government said that it is making representation to the Thai government and UNHCR’s office in Bangkok to assess Alqunun’s claim “expeditiously”.
In Geneva, UNHCR spokesman Babar Baloch told reporters the process looking into Alqunun’s “asylum claim has started” and could take several days.
Thailand is not a signatory to a UN convention on refugees, and asylum seekers are typically deported or wait years to be resettled in third countries.
The UNHCR insists anyone with an asylum claim should not be sent back to the country they fled under the principle of non-refoulement.
In a short press release distributed to media outside its embassy in Bangkok on Tuesday, the Saudi government said it had not demanded her deportation, adding the case is a “family affair”, but under the “care and attention” of the embassy.
Alqunun is reportedly the daughter of a high-ranking official of Saudi Arabia. Bangkok Post reported that her father and an elder brother are due to arrive in Bangkok.
Abusive family
Sophie McNeil, a reporter for ABC Australia in Thailand, told Al Jazeera that the teenager said that she lived “in an abusive environment at home” and that “she was punished for saying things”.
“It is very incredible that the Australian government have offered her an asylum, given that the Australian government is not well known for its well treatment of refugees,” said McNeil, who spent hours with Alqunun in her hotel room at the airport in Bangkok.
“Her dream might come true, we just have to wait and see,” she said.
In a statement posted on social media, Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said that the Thai government and UNHCR should deny the request of Alqunun’s father and brother to meet with her.
“Only she can make that choice, she’s an adult woman who can make her own decisions,” Robertson wrote.
Is Saudi Arabia torturing women’s rights activists?
Alqunun arrived at the Thai capital’s main airport on a flight from Kuwait over the weekend, after running away from her family, who she says subjected her to physical and psychological abuse.
Alqunun said she planned to seek asylum in Australia, fearing she would be killed if repatriated by Thai immigration officials who stopped her at the airport.
Her ordeal at the Bangkok airport riveted social media, as she posted videos and constantly updated her followers while barricading herself in her hotel room.
Saudi Arabia’s human rights record has been under heavy scrutiny since the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi late last year.
The kingdom has some of the world’s toughest restrictions on women, including a guardianship system that allows male family members to make decisions on behalf of female relatives.
Sen. Kamala Harris would not be the first Senate Democrat to launch a bid to unseat President Donald Trump in 2020 and she would almost certainly not be the last. | Zach Gibson/Getty Images
Sen. Kamala Harris said Tuesday that she has nothing to announce about a potential run for president — for now, at least.
The California Democrat said in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Tuesday morning that “I’m not going to decide right now” whether to launch a White House bid. But asked by anchor George Stephanopoulos what would set her candidacy apart in a crowded 2020 field, she had an answer at the ready.
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“I think we’re at an inflection moment,” Harris said, pointing to the rise of automation, changing global dynamics and climate change while acknowledging that a large part of the country feels neglected or “rightly” displaced.
“I think it is clear to me that what we need in this country is leadership that has a vision of the future in which everyone can see themselves,” she said.
She also vowed that she would seek to combat a growing distrust in the government and its leaders, making no mention of President Donald Trump — who is at the center of multiple controversies and investigations — except to criticize his role in the current government shutdown.
“We must speak truth and must speak truth about issues that relate to the economic hardship that so many American families are experiencing,” she said. “We must speak truth about issues that relate to civil rights and what we need to do around a real education system in this country that works for all children and all families.”
Harris’ appearance Tuesday kicks off a press tour for her new book, an unofficial prerequisite for almost every presidential campaign, in which she credits her “very strong mother” for informing her perspective and her values. It also comes as she inches towards an official 2020 campaign rollout.
Harris would not be the first Senate Democrat to launch a bid to unseat President Donald Trump in 2020 and she would almost certainly not be the last.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) last week became the first Democrat of note to throw their hat in the ring, announcing on New Year’s Eve that she was forming a 2020 exploratory committee and barnstorming across Iowa over the weekend.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who lost the Democratic nomination to Hillary Clinton in 2016, is reportedly also mulling a run, as are Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio).
Chicago rapper CupcakKe has been confirmed safe by police after sending out a pair of distressing social media posts on Monday night (January 7).
A friend of the MC, born Elizabeth Eden Harris, tweeted that she was taken to the hospital after sending out messages declaring she intended to commit suicide. “Police not able to give me anymore details other than Elizabeth is OKAY and at the hospital,” her friend, the comedian Elijah Daniel, tweeted.
Chicago police told BBC’s Radio 1 Newsbeat that the rapper had been taken to the hospital for “mental evaluation” rather than for injuries, as XXLreports.
As Pitchfork points out, CupcakKe has previous shared her struggles with depression on social media. “I try to be as positive as possible but I just want to say I’m at a very low & depressed point in my life,” she tweeted over the summer.
Thousands of fans have flooded CupcakKe’s social accounts with overwhelming love and support, including her past collaborator Charli XCX. “Whenever you walk into a room or onto a stage you exude so much LOVE and the energy in the room turns electric,” she wrote. “You are powerful. People believe in you.”
We’ll update this post as more information becomes available.
If you or someone you know is struggling with their emotional health, head to halfofus.com for ways to get help.
Game controllers have had rumble or vibration since Nintendo created the Rumble Pak for the Nintendo 64, so why doesn’t the rest of your gaming gear have haptic feedback for greater immersion?
Honestly, that’s the big question I wondered myself as I sat in front of Razer’s new 27-inch gaming monitor and shot a bunch of enemies in Overwatch and Doom and felt every gunfire and movement via vibrations tucked within its concept gaming chair, keyboard wrist rest pad, gaming mouse, and Nari Ultimate haptic-feedback headphones.
Cinemas have long tried to convince moviegoers to pay extra for a “4D” or haptic-based experience where the seat vibrates in unison with the action on screen. So why not bring this experience to gamers?
When I asked a Razer product manager during a briefing at CES 2019, he shrugged and said he wasn’t sure why nobody beat them to the idea.
While only concept products at the moment, my brief time feeling vibrations from the haptic motors embedded within the back of a gaming chair, along the wrist rest pad attached to a gaming keyboard, within a gaming mouse, and ear-to-ear across my face convinced me there’s more to upping gaming experience than simply hyping up refresh rates, HDR, higher resolutions, or even more realistic textures.
Once you feel the rumble, you can’t go back.
Image: BRIDGET BENNETT/MASHABLE
VR and 3D aside, gaming is mostly done in in 2D. But an immersive experience can extend beyond the screen into the tangible — actions experienced through the senses — and add new depth.
Besides sight and sound, touch is frontier that can be tapped into to make you feel like you’re inside of the game. (One day some company will no doubt add smell and taste to gaming, but for now touch seem to be the most hygienic.)
The Nari Ultimate gaming headphones teased Razer’s interest in turning sound into haptic feedback. The next logical step is to include this same “Hypersense” haptic tech in all of the other gaming gear, like your chair and mouse to take this tactility to another level.
The wrist rest pad also vibrates every with your gaming action.
Image: BRIDGET BENNETT/MASHABLE
It’s difficult to describe how Hypersense really feels without you actually experiencing the feedback yourself. What I can say is it doesn’t feel cheap or lifeless like the Kor-Fx haptic gaming vest I reviewed years ago.
The vibrations are less of a monotone rumble and more delicate like the sensitive HD Rumble vibrations within the Nintendo Switch’s Joy-Con controllers. This is because the vibrations are all based off the game’s sound effects. A short jump would produce a softer vibration than a deep fall and a shot in the arm with a shot gun would feel harsher than a pistol.
This is what an integrated gaming experience feels like — one where all of the gear is synced with RGB lighting to the game and augmented with haptic feedback. I liken it to using a controller with rumble and then just hating your non-rumble controller afterwards. Once you feel vibrations after landing from a jump or the reverb from a rocket launcher, it’s hard to go back to anything else.
You can feel every movement and click with vibrations.
Image: BRIDGET BENNETT/MASHABLE
Razer loves to come to CES and trot out wild concepts like its triple-screen laptop, or a laptop that docks the Razer Phone, or a projector that extends your gaming beyond the TV and onto your walls. Most of these never see a commercial release. But the Hypersense concept products are far more realistic and feasible than past concepts.
Razer already sells the Nari Ultimate headphones for $199 with sound-based haptic feedback. Price out your favorite gaming chair, Razer mouse, and gaming wrist pad and then add a premium to it — a “Razer tax” if you can probably come to a good number for how much these device would cost ya.
The Nari Ultimate is Razer’s the first Hypersense product.
Image: BRIDGET BENNETT/MASHABLE
If these products ever become a reality, they won’t come cheap. Developers will also need to get onboard with adding rumble to all of these accessories and the return might not be very high for adding such functionality in for a niche user base. Razer says it’s already talking to several software developers and programming support wouldn’t be too much of a challenge.
The demand needs to exist first, though. Judging by the huge and loyal cult following Razer has amassed over the last decade, I’d say gamers are gonna want these Hypersense products once they try them.
A long-haired, mini dachshund with the name Remus is frankly adorable enough already.
But when you add a miniature Hogwarts uniform, and a video of the little chap doing tricks in response to Harry Potter spells, the whole thing goes to another level.
Great news! It’s 2019, and that means it’s officially the year when Game of Thrones is returning to our lives.
It also means that for the next four months, the hype is just going to build and build and build until the premiere of the final season of the show in April.
The CEO of HBO himself just shed some light on what we can expect from the final series.
Speaking to Variety, HBO’s CEO Richard Plepler described his experience of watching the six episodes as a “spectacle.”
Per Variety, Plepler had only seen rough cuts of the episodes, but was blown away nonetheless.
“The guys have done six movies,” Plepler said. “The reaction I had while watching them was, I’m watching a movie.”
“They knew the bar was high. They’ve exceeded the bar.”
According to Plepler, the Game of Thrones showrunners, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, have outdone themselves with the six feature-length episodes.
“They knew the bar was high. They’ve exceeded the bar,” Plepler said, adding that he was “in awe” after having seen each of the episodes twice.
Plepler added that “Everybody’s in for an extraordinary treat of storytelling and of magical, magical production.”
In a trailer for its upcoming season, HBO shared a first look at Game of Thrones Season 8: a clip from a snowy Winterfell showing Jon Snow introducing Daenerys Targaryen to a visibly strained Sansa Stark. Exciting!
Can we skip the four agonising months of teasing and just go straight to the premiere, please?
Serrekunda, The Gambia – When Ebrima Chongan was confronted by a cadre of mutinying soldiers near Banjul on July 22, 1994, it was a matter of shoot or die.
A former commander of the Gendarmerie, he knew some of the men coming towards him and what they were capable of – hours before they were his subordinates.
But now they had torn off their berets and joined a mutiny led by another one of his trainees, a young colonel called Yahya Jammeh.
“I opened fire,” he said. “They scattered.”
Chongan recounted on Monday his experiences of the coup that brought Jammeh to power at the first hearing of a commission set up to discover the truth of his brutal rule.
For 22 years, between 1994 and 2016, sexual violence, enforced disappearances, torture, and wholesale massacres became state policy. They were most often carried out with impunity.
Chongan would later endure arbitrary detention, solitary confinement in a mosquito-ridden cell, beatings with rifle butts and a crude mock execution.
Other victims, witnesses and even perpetrators are expected to come forward to testify at the Truth Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC), which has broad powers to administer compensation to victims and, crucially, suggest alleged perpetrators for prosecution.
The 11-member commission drawn from all the major regions, and which includes a bishop and an imam will begin at the causes before taking up Jammeh’s oppression, which included the hunting of alleged witches and wizards, his bogus HIV-cure programme, the persecution of sexual minorities, and the silencing of the media.
A session will be devoted to the “Jugglers” – the shadowy paramilitary group said to be behind many of the atrocities.
Survivors and victims’ families from the Gambia Center for Victims of Human Rights Violations [Amandla Thomas-Johnson/Al Jazeera]
With Jammeh now gone and with him the excuses and cover-ups that had left victims and their families in the dark, they now feel it is time for truth and justice.
“We demand that light be shed, that they really have to give us facts and do their homework,” said Baba Hydara, whose father, journalist Deyda Hydara and cofounder of The Point newspaper, was killed in December 2004.
Deyda Hydara was pursued by two taxis after a late night at work while he was dropping off two colleagues. As he drove down a quiet back street, one of the taxis drew close. Shots rang out. Hydara slumped over on his steering wheel as his car veered off into a nearby ditch.
Baba blames the regime’s Junglers for the killing of her father, whose vociferous newspaper columns denouncing regime excesses earned him the ire of state authorities.
Hydara, who now copublishes The Point, said he wants the full chain of Jammeh’s command to be held accountable.
“Everyone, even the drivers that drove the taxis, must face justice,” he said.
Ambitious programme
The TRRC forms just one part of an ambitious attempt by Jammeh’s successor, President Adama Barrow, to transform The Gambia‘s political culture and society in a way that makes a return to violence and dictatorship all but impossible.
Under the slogan of “Never Again”, human rights workshops at schools, town hall meetings, and listening exercises in far-flung villages will run parallel to the TTRC.
“The idea is that if you empower the people to know their rights and responsibilities as citizens, then it will be difficult for governments to violate their rights with impunity,” said Baba Jallow, executive secretary of the TTRC, an academic and journalist who recently returned to The Gambia after 17 years in exile.
Zainab Lowe cofounder of the Gambia Center for Victims of Human Rights Violations [Amandla Thomas-Johnson/Al Jazeera]
Women’s issues are a salient feature of this strategy. Women-only listening circles will provide a safe space for victims to recount their experiences, while sexual violence training will help communities to understand the needs of victims.
Such training is needed, said Zainab Lowe, cofounder of the Gambia Center for Victims of Human Rights Violations, because “a culture of silence” prevents victims of sexual violence from coming forward.
“Women suffered most when the men were arrested and they had to take responsibility for the children,” added Lowe, whose brother has been missing since 2006.
As victims at the hearing looked on at Ebrima Chongan swearing an oath on the Quran before giving his testimony, some are hoping to see Yaya Jammeh do the same in a court of law.
Since 2017, he has been hosted in Equatorial Guinea by ruler Toedoro Obiang, who stands accused of a similar record of atrocities.
Equatorial Guinea has never signed the statute of the International Criminal Court, making Jammeh’s extradition dependent on Obiang. A video circulated online last week of Jammeh dancing beside Obiang at a lavish ball on New Year’s Eve, wearing his customary billowing white robe and matching kaftan, could be a sign that he is there to stay.
Holding Jammeh to account
That’s unless lawyer Reed Brody has his way. Dubbed the “dictator hunter” for his part in the successful prosecution of Chadian leader Hissene Habre, Brody has been collecting witness testimonies as part of the Jammeh2Justice campaign.
“I think that the TRRC can lay the groundwork for holding Jammeh and his henchmen to account. When it is finished we’re going to have a much more complete picture of not only the abuses that were committed but also what was Jammeh’s personal role in those abuses.”
With The Gambia still going through the transition process, Brody has sought to bring a case against him in Ghana for the murder of a group of 54 West African migrants en route to Europe, of which the majority were Ghanaian.
“We’ve been working with the government of Ghana to investigate that massacre and to consider the possibility of Jammeh’s prosecution in Ghana, not as an ultimate solution, but as a way of beginning the accountability process while The Gambia gets ready to do that.”
As much as victims support the TRRC process there is some unease the Gambian government has left open the possibility for perpetrators to receive amnesties.
While the commission has agreed to consult families on this, Baba Hydara already knows that he wants those responsible for his father’s death to feel the full force of the law.
“Amnesty can only encourage further impunity,” he said.
“I’m not here to give amnesty to someone who made grandchildren never meet their grandad, who made a wife lose her husband, and who made kids lose their fathers.”
Sandra Oh pretty much won the entire 2019 Golden Globes. She co-hosted the show with Andy Samberg, took home an awardand moved everyone with her acceptance speech, and she killed it on the red carpet with her Killing Eve co-star Jodie Comer.
And now, she’s also won big in the category of “Best Morning After Pic”. Oh posted a photo of herself lying on the floor wearing a onesie and the diamond necklace she wore to the Golden Globes afterparty.
Former Vice President Joe Biden’s PAC ran an online contest for small-dollar donors to win a trip to one of his campaign stops this fall and advertised on Facebook throughout the fall and after Election Day. | Jeff Roberson/AP Photo
The former vice president’s PAC gave Democratic candidates just a quarter of the more than $2 million he raised and spent during the midterms.
Former Vice President Joe Biden raised more money for a PAC that supports Democrats in 2018 than any of his likely White House competitors did. But unlike many of them, he spent the lion’s share of that haul on himself.
Biden’s PAC gave Democratic candidates just a quarter of the more than $2 million he raised and spent during the midterms. At the same time, he spent half a million dollars on websites and digital ads that could help him bolster his online presence and raise money from small donors for a 2020 primary campaign, and more of his PAC funds went to travel and other expenses.
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POLITICO analyzed the midterms activity of seven PACs affiliated with likely 2020 Democratic contenders to see how they used these groups, which face few restrictions on how money is raised and spent, to quietly lay the groundwork for potential White House runs.
Some in that cohort — including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who has never run a nationwide campaign— curried favor within the party by giving six and seven figures to candidates or state parties, disclosures with the Federal Election Commission show. Biden, who already has a national profile but has not run for office in years, put less emphasis on earning chits and more on investments in digital infrastructure that he would urgently need to take on President Donald Trump in 2020.
“It’s been fascinating to watch some of these candidates testing the waters without making too big a ripple,” said Mike McCauley, an Obama campaign and administration alumnus and Democratic strategist in South Carolina. “Whether it’s through their PAC dollars and time and attention, or their early outreach, the different methodologies each of them has relied on has been very telling.”
A national Democratic strategist who is not involved with any of the would-be presidential contenders broke the candidates’ PAC strategies into two broad categories: “No. 1, those who are using it to further and build political structures, candidates and the party. And No. 2, others who are simply using it to fund travel, staff and research for their anticipated campaigns.”
The strategist said candidates who spent 20 or 30 percent of their PAC cash on other Democrats were using the groups as “basically a slush fund” for early campaign activities.
While so-called leadership PACs are ostensibly formed with the goal of supporting other Democrats, Biden spent the smallest percentage of his funds on others out of the seven would-be contenders POLITICO analyzed. (Biden’s group did not register as a leadership PAC but described itself similarly, saying it was “dedicated to electing people who believe that this country is about dreaming big.”)
Warren gave out the most, about 85 percent of the total amount she spent, to other Democrats, followed by Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey. They were followed by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti (56 percent), Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont (46 percent), California Sen. Kamala Harris (37 percent) and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (36 percent).
Aides to many of the politicians said that their PAC activity covers only a slice of their total midterms efforts, which in most cases also included direct contributions from their campaign committees to candidates, as well as fundraisers and emails on behalf of others. Most of the politicians provided internal numbers that could not be independently verified. Including these internal numbers, Warren’s total spending on other candidates’ behalf was the highest.
Spokespeople for Biden didn’t provide any comment on his 2018 PAC activity, but he has the highest name identification with voters and the strongest relationships within the party of any potential 2020 contender. Federal disclosures show he focused heavily on a different priority: building a profile online. Democrats expect the 2018 surge in small-dollar donations to continue in the presidential race, giving an advantage to candidates who can capitalize on it.
Biden reported expenses marked as “digital consulting,” “website development” and “email services.” Much of that business went to Blue State Digital, a firm founded by former campaign staff to President Barack Obama.
Biden’s PAC ran an online contest for small-dollar donors to win a trip to one of his campaign stops this fall and advertised on Facebook throughout the fall and after Election Day. Some of the ads promoted events that Biden headlined for candidates such as Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and featured photos of a smiling Biden. Many of them promoted Biden-themed T-shirts with slogans such as, “The malarkey stops here.”
Biden’s post-Labor Day campaign swings took him from the congressional battleground of Orange County, Calif., to Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Parma, Ohio, concluding in Pittston, Pa., — for a total of 18 stops in the midterms home stretch.
Harris, too, placed a focus on fundraising, spending double the amount any other politician did on consultants who help politicians raise money and build relationships with big donors. Harris’ campaign did not elaborate on the spending.
On multiple occasions, Harris’ PAC spent big on fundraisers and hotels, too: She spent $21,000 in May 2017 for a fundraiser at The Lodge at Torrey Pines, a luxury hotel in La Jolla, Calif., overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and $7,700 paid to Martha’s Vineyard-based caterer Kitchen Porch following an event on the island Harris headlined last summer.
Harris contributed $680,500 from her PAC to other politicians and committees, roughly a third of the money she spent from her leadership PAC. Harris took 26 trips to 17 states on behalf of candidates during the midterms, traveling for a slew of House and Senate hopefuls and to early primary states including Iowa, Nevada, South Carolina and her home state of California.
Others used their cash more for outreach within the party in 2018.
Garcetti, whose biggest challenge over the coming year will be to increase his name recognition, mounted one of the biggest leadership PACs during the 2018 midterms, raising more than $2 million.
Ahead of a fall private dinner with 10 state-party chairs, Garcetti loaned his city’s star power to a glitzy event featuring late night host Jimmy Kimmel and hip-hop producer DJ Khaled. There, he cut $100,000 checks to each of the party leaders from the first four primary states — Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina — along with a carefully cultivated list that also included Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Minnesota.
New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckley called the money “an invaluable contribution to many of the state parties,” while Nancy Patton Mills, chairwoman of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, said it went to fund a successful state Senate race, as well as other down-ballot candidates who lost but plan to run again because of the party’s support.
“It’s really helped us build out our bench,” Patton Mills said.
Garcetti wasn’t the only one to shower parties with money. In October, Warren donated $50,000 to state parties with competitive midterm races. She also contributed $175,000 to top-target state legislative campaigns in Florida, Georgia, Maine, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin, including $30,000 each to the National Democratic Redistricting Committee and the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee. Another $460,000 went to the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee and $105,000 to its House Democratic counterpart.
Booker paired $837,000 in midterms contributions to Democrats with 39 trips to 24 states, including Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. He made three trips each for Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida and Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who lost their races, and Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada and Ohio’s Brown, both of whom won.
Booker was also the keynote speaker for the Iowa Democratic Party’s fall fundraising gala in Des Moines, and he cut checks to a host of candidates and state parties, ranging from Wisconsin to Arizona, in hopes of helping Democrats retake the Senate.
He also helped another, less-expected fundraising effort: the legal defense fund for Robert Menendez, the senior senator from New Jersey, whose corruption trial ended in a mistrial a year ago.
Booker’s PAC gave Menendez’s legal defense fund $10,000 in the fall of 2017, before the trial was over, and another $10,000 three months after it finished.
J.K. Rowling’s last few tweets may have been fairly light-hearted and dog-themed, but that doesn’t mean she’s left her troll-destroying ways completely behind her.
Oh no. Judging by her latest exchange, the Harry Potter author won’t be backing down from the occasional Twitter dual in 2019.
It started on Tuesday, when Rowling tweeted a link to some writing advice she’s recently posted on her website.
The advice is spread across two posts, and — if you’re a budding writer, or someone fascinated by Rowling’s own journey — it’s certainly worth a read.
After she’d shared it, Rowling responded to a couple of fans on Twitter.
Thank you! From talking to other writers I know that we all have very different processes. The only thing that works is what works for you. https://t.co/adgSBP7oDr
This being Twitter, though, not all the responses were positive. It wasn’t long before a troll had popped up, calling Rowling’s writing “shit” and describing her as “politically delusional”.
Needless to say, Rowling expelliarmus’d them into oblivion.
Question 1: I do the best I can with the talent I’ve got, but I know my writing isn’t to everyone’s taste. Question 2: my politics probably spring from my life experience and my temperament, like everyone else’s. Question 3: (unwritten but implied) Try being less of an asshole. pic.twitter.com/K1QDqnTazB
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(@hypnowad) 
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Daily Trends Hunter 