Posted by Blogger Name. Category:
David Cunliffe
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Domestic violence
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Quote of the Day
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Rosemary McLeod
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Terrible Thing
Rosemary McLeod has been part of the New Zealand journalistic landscape now for a very long time. She's not afraid to say what she thinks in a pretty emphatic manner.
And it's clear she doesn't think much of David Cunliffe's apology last week, introducing a new phrase to the lexicon in the process:
A man who's sorry for being a man: I'm impressed. That's almost as good as really being a woman. David Cunliffe's apology for his gender could have been a moving moment, even a comedic one, but the Rape Crisis people didn't leap up and give him a standing ovation, and nobody laughed, which was a shame.
Ricky Gervais could have mined it for laughs for long, cringing moments.
Perhaps too many in the audience were women and wondered what on earth he was driving at. It's weird to apologise for having a Terrible Thing in your underpants, so seventies somehow, such a reminder of the cads of that era who bowed to feminists' superiority while sliding a hand up their skirts.
It's not the Terrible Thing that deserves an apology, anyway, but the bullies and sex offenders who never say they're sorry and never change, and a justice system that doesn't take their threats seriously enough to make them stop.
I doubt very much that rapists and violent offenders will respond to Cunliffe's battle cry of "stop this bullshit!", fall to their knees and be better men, but it's the kind of posturing good boys do to remind us that they're not one of the baddies. It's a public pat on the back to themselves.
Bashing and raping women isn't bullshit. It's nasty and brutal and causes lasting pain. It's not, then, the word that more commonly alludes to falsehoods. But Cunliffe was probably aiming to please the voters - women, teachers, and whatever blue-collar workers and trade unionists he imagines remain from the old days, and electioneering hardly brings out the best in anyone.
We don't want to allow our minds to dwell too long on Mr Cunliffe's Terrible Thing, or anyone else's for that matter.
As impassioned as Mr Cunliffe's appeal to violent men was, it was delivered to the wrong audience. It would have been far better delivered to an anger management group or in a prison, without the TV cameras and journalists present. Then there would have been less doubt over its sincerity.
