I can see how being personally affected would change the outlook on things like this.

It just seems to me that often people that are politically still "somewhat close" (Rowling) catch more flak than politicians that associate "transgender" with something inbetween "subhuman" and "delusional", but don't talk about it too much (because their whole electorate coulnd't care less about the topic anyway).

I had a similar impression with political fragmentation on the non-Trump side in the last US election.

But maybe the behavior is even net-beneficial in some cases, and you gain more as a movement by pushing against a Rowling instead of a Farage.