Byline Times Suspends Producer Over Outburst At Author JK Rowling
Author JK Rowling is best known for her fiction series Harry Potter. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis)
Byline Times suspended producer Caolan Robertson Monday pending investigation after the Byline TV founder unleashed on Harry Potter author JK Rowling in an explicit outburst.
The newspaper’s directors, Stephen Colgrave, Peter Jukes and Hardeep Matharu, released a joint statement on X, distancing the publication from the producer’s remarks, for which he apologised Friday. Although the statement did not name Robertson, the outlet said that the comments were “misogynistic and deeply unacceptable” and that some Byline TV content was under review.
The statement continued: “We apologise that this has fallen far short of our journalistic, professional and ethical values.”
Robertson referred to Rowling as a “c*nt” in a tweet in response to an indirect jibe from the writer after he offered her an interview.
The outburst followed Rowling’s dismissal of statements made by transgender broadcaster India Willoughby in an interview with Robertson in which she claimed she’d reported Rowling to the police for “misgendering” her. Rowling, openly gender critical, objected to Willoughby’s accusations and said that she, in turn, had a case against the broadcaster for “defamation” and “harassment.”
Robertson offered the author the same opportunity to voice her perspectives, promising Rowling the same kind of “balanced interview with exactly the same journalistic integrity” before she snubbed him, prompting his explicit reply.
On Friday, without request from the writer, Robertson issued an apology which the writer accepted:
In the fallout, however, more sceptical internet users are calling attention to Robertson’s documented past producing “extreme” viral anti-migrant content for right-wing activists and personalities like Tommy Robinson, but also, reportedly, Stateside figures like Lauren Southern and Alex Jones.
A 2021 profile in the New York Times details how Robertson, who is gay, said he became radicalised by anti-Muslim content online after the 2016 shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando by a terrorist who pledged allegiance to Islamic State. Robertson reached out to Robinson in 2017 and produced provocative political social media content for him for two years.
Robertson, however, had a “change of heart” in 2019 after attending a conference held by Byline Times, which is a left-leaning publication. He distanced himself from his previous work and within a year he was founder of a new online video-based project by the newspaper, Byline TV.
