Weird men are driving people out of politics

The Spinoff

2 days ago

Their smear campaigns are ham-fisted and grotesque. They're also working.
Ray Chung seemed more annoyed than apologetic in what he'd billed as his ' unequivocal apology ' to Wellington mayor Tory Whanau. The Independent Together mayoral candidate said he regretted sending a florid email full of false rumours about the sitting mayor's sex life to several of his council colleagues, but stopped short of actually saying a word widely considered to be a key ingredient in an apology, 'sorry'.
Perhaps he needed to save space in his video statement for bitter recriminations. Chung was annoyed at an as-yet unidentified councillor and journalists for collaborating in a scurrilous Dirty Politics-style campaign to accurately report his, and the Independent Together team's, real words and actions. 'Over the last week there's been a concerted campaign against me and my campaign for the Wellington mayoralty,' he said. 'This attack on me and our team of Independent Together candidates is designed to undermine our campaign.'
Chung may have been befuddled at the chorus of boos he's been hearing, given previous attempted smears have met with a far warmer reception. Just 18 months ago, Whanau was seen going for drinks with friends at Havana Bar in central Wellington. Her night out became the subject of a digital chain letter from social media's pulsating swarm of weird men, who managed to churn out a rumour about her being videoed performing a sex act in public. The clamour got so loud and insistent, the alleged video was reported by RNZ and Stuff.
Whanau was forced to release a statement based on the limited information put to her by the media. On The Platform, Sean Plunket described the alleged contents of the video in detail, before getting councillor Nicola Young to weigh in on why Whanau should resign for bringing the mayoralty into disrepute. Auckland councillor Maurice Williamson was overheard phoning a friend to gossip about the video during a council meeting.
Whanau didn't resign, partly because the video didn't exist, and those who insisted it did were, to use the scientific term, 'full of shit'. But Young's career didn't suffer. Neither did Williamson's. More recently, Green MP Benjamin Doyle was the subject of a similarly toxic and defamatory chorus of accusations after posting what amounted to a joke caption on their private Instagram account. A group aligned with Chung's Independent Together ticket later gave the businessman behind that campaign, Rhys Williams, the task of finding someone to put together an opposition dossier on their left-wing rivals.
These high-profile incidents are flare-ups against a background radiation of abuse. Just about every woman or gender diverse person in politics will tell you their job requires an ability to multitask between deleting insulting emails and blocking dehumanising social media posts. The noise from the weird men is relentless. It's so loud and vehement, it's hard to believe it's simply the product of a heady mix of fevered imagination, unalloyed prejudice, and easy access to the internet.
Perhaps that's why the media keeps taking the bait. RNZ never saw the footage of Whanau's night out in 2023. That didn't stop it stating its existence as fact. 'RNZ learned of footage circulating and put the allegations to her office,' its reporter wrote of the non-existent video, under a headline dubiously asserting that the mayor had engaged in 'drunken antics'. Doyle was the subject of dozens of media stories and misleading opinion pieces from people determined to misconstrue a caption that was clearly more about themself than about their child. When Doyle finally fronted the media about being 'attacked in such a baseless, personal and violent way,' nearly all the questions were about whether they'd admit to political misjudgement. Rather than step down for their own safety, Doyle committed to staying in politics.
These flimsy scandals were egged on by a braying online crowd which urged journalists to conflate sound with substance. The weird men online have endless reservoirs of psychological dysfunction and large expanses of time to marshall their obsessions into people's mentions. More often than not, they win. Several former politicians have admitted that being subjected to monotonous daily abuse was a factor in their public breakdowns. Former prime minister Jacinda Ardern has moved to the US and still requires security escorts when she re-enters the country.
Whanau isn't running for re-election. She's unequivocal that smear campaigns motivated her decision which will likely allow Labour's Andrew Little to sweep to office on a tidal wave of resigned shrugging. 'This harassment has been the main cause of me stepping aside from the mayoralty,' she says. 'I'm just glad it's now visible for others to see and we can make changes to ensure this doesn't happen to others. I'll commit to doing that in my role as a councillor.'
At the end of his apology video this week, Chung vowed to fight on. 'I look forward to seeing you on the campaign trail as we build the momentum to take back our city,' he said. Despite the brave posturing, it seems his campaign is most probably over before it's begun. Not only is it unlikely he'll win the mayoralty; some now believe his ticket could cede winnable races to the left. If that's the case, it'll be a notable departure from the norm. For once, the consequences of a false, sexist rumour will fall primarily on the person spreading it and his allies, rather than the woman on the receiving end.