Men, whose first reaction to the tragic death of Grace Millane is ‘you shouldn’t travel on your own and use Tinder’ also passionately argue there is nothing special about the Prime Minister having a baby – if you fall into that category, perhaps you need some deep reflection.
It’s as if this death has triggered a cascade of shame.
Shame that this young woman was killed.
Shame that it has taken this to highlight the domestic violence that plagues our community each day.
Shame that this is implicitly a male problem, but that as men we can’t tolerate being called on our shit and tend to become irrationally defensive and so guilty that our own past behaviours haunt the present.
That’s why it’s so important to have a Leader like the current Prime Minister who can articulate empathy when so many can’t.
Jacinda’s apology captured all that guilt and shame and articulated it in a way that was raw and human, we are blessed to have her.
The only way this horror can be made worse is some knee jerk lynch mob reaction that screams vengeance against this young man, vengeance isn’t justice and it can’t heal the wounds that drive so many damaged men.
Brothers – these vigils are not ‘anti-men vigils’, they are anti-male violence vigils, there’s a huge difference and we shouldn’t conflate them – this murder has triggered an enormous anxiety and it’s given voice to a deep anguish and frustration – that’s not anti-male, it’s righteousness.
This is blight on our country having predators like this 26 year old man.
But this also highlight the violent country we are and how women are still more likely to be the victims of male violence. Many kiwis don’t really understand or know how many NZ victims feel about their loved ones being murdered we have come to accept it in our country when it is not acceptable and never should be. There are many victims in our country some have never found their loved ones body. I know what it is like my family have been through it and I have sat alongside many that have suffered and are still suffering so horrendous was their loved ones death they are still carrying it. ( the burden)
Michelle: “…how women are still more likely to be the victims of male violence.”
According to this article, the picture is more nuanced: https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/109251463/most-victims-of-violent-crime-in-new-zealand-are-women
“Males make up the majority of homicide victims.
They were also overwhelmingly the offenders, with 87 per cent of murders and 83 per cent of manslaughters committed by males in the 12 months to September.”
When one looks at family violence and sexual violence, women are differentially the victims.
In the case of the unfortunate young woman in Auckland, it would be misleading to conflate her killing with family violence. We don’t yet know what happened to her.
Just a note, Woman tend to report abuse more than a man would not in pretty much any instance without a HUGE reason to, I’m talking threats or actions to crush testicles here. The actually number is probably closer to 50/50 on male to female and female to male, it’s just that it takes so much more for a man to report it…. or he kills her. ….Yeah. We’re all created equal, regardless of situation we grow up to either be self-adjusted or not, regardless of gender, more often than not, those who are fucked up link with those who are also fucked up. It’s just broken balls (aka way too far and long term physical damage) rather than a slap to the face and hurt ego.
From what I’ve gathered you’ve done a psych major or you’ve taken courses on development, social dynamics and gender issues. You know everything I said already. We are officially in a post truth, post research, post fucking around phase.
The nefs are getting off the couch now. No excuses for a major reduction in demotic violence call outs and other BS.
Who said her death is a result of family violence D’esterre I said my family knows what it is like to experience someone in our family being murdered and at this time of the year by a man who was not our family nor was any sex involved.
Michelle: “Who said her death is a result of family violence…”
I didn’t say that you had said that. However, you did say this: “…how women are still more likely to be the victims of male violence.” And I pointed out this: “Males make up the majority of homicide victims.” And this: “When one looks at family violence and sexual violence, women are differentially the victims.”
Much of the commentary I’ve seen conflates the two issues; it seems to me that, in referring to women being victims of male violence, you’ve also done that, whether or not you were aware of it.
You know there are very long and protracted threads of people grinding thier axes on The Standard over this and other gender taboos ect. We’re supposed to be enlightened or something by now. There’re no winners. You can settle this in one or two comments.
Sam: “You know there are very long and protracted threads of people grinding thier axes on The Standard over this…”
Knock yourself out: go visit them and contribute. Whichever axe it is you’re grinding. Fine by me….
I’m saying you don’t have to do this. This road is well traveled and I can say it always ends in tears.
+100…Great Post Martyn Bradbury and also well said MICHELLE !
‘We are blessed to have her’? What is this? Saint Jacinda now? More drivel from Bradbury. Start doing your job and stop kissing Ardern’s arse.
That arse? Can’t even tell who’s a conservative any more. They’re all whoop Dee shit now.
Big fan of Rodrigo Roa Duterte the eh?
Yes, we are blessed to have her. She’s human and humane and prepared to show it.
pull your fucking head in mate!
Without Martyn Bradbury you and me and the many others who come here would have no where else to go. So fuck off tough little bunny.
Peter Rabbit are you the new rep from the National Party Social Media Team?
Your cherry picking of Bomber’s work is blatant – if you actually read more than a little of his prolific output you would be aware he spends more time calling out the left as much as the right in no uncertain terms! I don’t completely agree with every position he takes but I have no doubt he objectively believes what he says.
TDB in general is trustworthy, not because everyone’s always right, but because no-one has any agenda besides the dissemination of the truth, as per above.
It was totally inappropriate to exploit an individual crime to make collective aspersions defamatory to the wider public. That is the spirit of collective punishment and the sloppiest logic imaginable. And as if any apology could ever be sufficient, especially when not even from the perp, who appallingly gets shielded from public scrutiny whilst public is shamed by the cookie time mascot jacinda just so she feels better and appeases wrong thinking simpletons.
Are we, as the Prime Minister says, collectively responsible for the safety of visitors to this country? I’d like to think so.
we market tourism in this country as clean green and safe sending your guests home in a coffin isnt right. that girl went through south America no problem then gets murdered here just plain wrong .
Of course no apology is sufficient – but the acknowledgement was far better than abject silence.
I’m quite sure the vast majority on NZ men and women feel exactly the same as Jacinda does about this event.
I question though whether this kind of act is really comparable or connected with domestic violence situations. It seems totally predatory and without emotion. Domestic violence I assume is a result of an inability to cope with conflict of interest in an ongoing relationship in another way.
But to ascribe it’s source as from”wounded damaged men” I can’t accept. Men came back from war who saw and experienced things that were damaging, far more so than the challenges of life in peacetime NZ. But that didn’t lead to them behaving like this. Both the occasional random attack agains a stranger like this , and the growth of domestic violence have come out of a time of peace for us. Finding an excuse that such a perpetrator probably had a background of disadvantage doesn’t work for me. I think it much more likely that he is a spoiled brat.
D J S
international media sites have full coverage and details.
Violence towards women can be categorized as either situanal (result of significant social stresses) or characterlogical. By characterlogical I mean part of the persons psychological make up which may include lack of empathy, sadistic tendencies, driven to maintain power and control. Domestic violence can be the result of either
David Stone: “wounded damaged men”
What recent developments in brain science and psychology have shown is the effect on the developing brain of childhood exposure to neglect and domestic violence, as well as maternal alcohol and drug abuse during pregnancy.
I remember the clinical head (I think he was) of Starship, postulating the possibility that frontal lobe damage from being shaken as infants had left many people unable to exercise as much control over their impulses as the rest of us.
Wounded and damaged about sums it up for many people. But not just males, of course.
In my childhood, there was, I think, more widespread prevalence – and acceptance – of violence within the family. I know that there was violence within the previous generation of my own family. I’m guessing that pattern was fairly common.
“Men came back from war who saw and experienced things that were damaging, far more so than the challenges of life in peacetime NZ. But that didn’t lead to them behaving like this.”
Some did, actually, though not necessarily to the point of murder. I was born very soon after the war. During my childhood, I remember other children who went in terror of their fathers, whose rages and violence were extreme and unpredictable. I witnessed some of that. Those fathers were mostly returned servicemen.
I wouldn’t suggest that all returned servicemen were like that, of course. But I wonder if the men most seriously affected by their wartime experiences were those who’d suffered violence and abuse in childhood. And therefore had less psychological resilience than those who hadn’t.
“Finding an excuse that such a perpetrator probably had a background of disadvantage doesn’t work for me.”
Me either. We don’t yet know anything about the circumstances of her killing. All anyone can do is speculate. We don’t even know for sure yet whether the arrested man was the perpetrator, let alone anything about his background.
I was merely pointing out what the facts are. That you’re triggered tells me a lot about where we are as a society.
In essence all I am asking is that women (and men!) do a little risk management when considering going out on the town, just as I would when planning a tramping trip or a sailing voyage. Just as women have the ‘right’ to do as they please when they go out, I have the ‘right’ to go tramping on my own, ill equipped…but it is inadvisable.
There’s a difference between being naive, underprepared and rapped & killed.
The first will get you in over your head.
The secound will get you pregnant or STD’d
The third will just pop up at random with in a population.
I feel shame and disgust and empathise with Grace’s family that this horrific crime happened in my country.
As Jacinda said, Grace along with everyone else should have been safe in NZ. As we all know now, Grace was far from safe.
However, the person accused of the murder of this young woman has not admitted guilt, or been to trial yet to establish his guilt or otherwise, so to begin name calling, insults and finger pointing is ignorant and inappropriate at this time. As ghastly as this crime is, let’s allow the NZ justice system to do its job.
RIP Grace. Sincere condolences to the Millane family. I’m so sorry for the outcome of Grace’s OE.
Our PM needs to take the same stand for the many kiwis who are suffering and are victims of heinous violent crimes in our country and many have not received proper or fair justice nor have they received the support and acknowledgment of other kiwis just as this young British women and her family are receiving we all deserve to be treated with the same level of respect, dignity and sympathy.
” Righteous and blessed. ” ?
Right E oh then.
Moving on…
Personally, I’d prefer to ponder the machinery that manufactures sociopaths, people suffering from ( unknowingly ) narcissistic personality disorders and what mechanisms collude to induce and release such insanities in people once they grow up to become, in some cases, terrifyingly dangerous and damaging.
And, in this instance, I don’t feel ‘deep shame’ as a NZ/AO person and not as a ‘male’ either so I don’t need adern to apologise for me or on my behalf, thanks all the same.
What I’d like to see, hear and read is of an initiative to go back in time and study, then remediate, the sets of circumstances that’ve built the monsters, like the monster that killed Grace so as we’re able to spot them a mile away then nab, chip and analyse as necessary to protect those of us left who’ve not yet been driven mad by even madder bastards in power or who influence people in power who warp our lives and realities usually through crushing debt, emotional hardship and a vacuum where art, love and empathetic peace should be from my observations.
Actually? Thinking of it. If adern must apologise, she must surely apologise to us for the several generations of politicians prior who threw us under that particular bus beginning with, from about the late 1960’s.
My heart, as black and battered as it is, goes out to her family.
Her mum , dad and brother. Their lives are ruined. Tainted. That madman stole the beauty from their lives.
Sound familiar? What stole the beauty from the madman’s life?
What monsters make more monsters? That’s where the bud needs to be nipped.
I like to see the All Blacks play sublime rugby. I like to see our sailors beat the best at the Americas Cup. I like to see our netball players beat Australia. These tell me that my countrymen/women are capable of high performance.
However, if I’m to reflect positively on these things and feel part of some reflected glory then when we do shitty things then I have to own them as well.
On a world scale our murder rate is pretty low. Collectively taking ownership for that will hopefully keep it that way. If there’s a conversation that men can have about taking responsibility for limiting sexual violence then we should have it.
Unfortunately, the very body that is authorised to deal with sexual violence itself has a very poor record and culture.
This poor girl has paid dearly for the last 20 years of feminist propaganda.
All that BS about ‘strong capable women’. All those women in Hollywood movies kickboxing their way through innumerable baddies.
It’s all lies.
The fact is women are shorter, weaker and slower than men by a large margin and in nearly all conflicts will come off very second best.
This is why traditionally it was seen as sensible for women to go out either with their partners or with their girl friends as a group. Travelling the world on your own, going out on the town drinking on your own and then picking up random men may be your ‘right’, but it also exposes you to enormous risk.
The only good that can possibly come out of this mess is that other women may take note of how the world really works and act accordingly.
To sum you up – it is women’s fault that they are victims. With that attitude you are part of the problem but no doubt that reality is lost on you.
It’s wrong that it is like that. But it is like that, so it is right to say so.
If you look what happens in war, where “women are ever the spoils” as is going on everywhere there is war and always has done, it reveals how a large proportion of men will treat women when there is no law or societal censure to restrain them.
Sorry girls but Andrew has said what needs to be said. No excuse for it, but it has to be recognised.
D J S
David Stone: “…reveals how a large proportion of men will treat women when there is no law or societal censure to restrain them.”
I’m sure that you’re aware that what happens in wartime isn’t analogous to contemporary circumstances in NZ. We have both laws and societal opprobrium, which ought to restrain such behaviour. Yet it does not. So what is going on here?
“Sorry girls but Andrew has said what needs to be said. ”
Hmm… I think you’re talking about women. To address such a comment to girls is even creepier, if I may say so, than directing it at women.
“No excuse for it, but it has to be recognised.”
So: what you’re saying here is that men will be men, and there is nothing to be done about it. And no doubt in the next breath, you’ll be saying that it’s not all men. Yet your wartime analogy says otherwise; as, of course, does our situation here in NZ. Which rather reinforces that radical feminist meme “all men are rapists”. Doesn’t it?
Andrew most of that is bullshit.
I agree that women are not as physically strong, but we are vulnerable to attack anywhere. A significant amount of violence towards women occcurs in our own home. Many women goes out on tinder dates or have one night stands are fine…..
Most of us are very careful of our personal safety and take obvious precautions. Someone attempted to assault me in broad daylight in a change room. It would be impossible for all women to avoid male violence.
We need to do something different so men learn not to carry out any violence towards women
What a bunch of weak dribble. We don’t have slaves any more. We have a free country. Woman can wear what ever they want. Do, go where ever they want. Hang with ever they want. It’s as simple as that.
In my experience woman don’t enjoy the brutally of sex. I’d suggest little boys quit freaking out every time they see boobies.
Andrew: “This poor girl has paid dearly for the last 20 years of feminist propaganda.
All that BS about ‘strong capable women’.”
Hmm…. Firstly, she was a woman, not a girl. Secondly, you do know, don’t you, that feminism is much older than the last 20 years? And that it was never about strength in that sense?
“The fact is women are shorter, weaker and slower than men by a large margin and in nearly all conflicts will come off very second best.”
Yeah. Sexual dimorphism. But: so what? As I pointed out elsewhere, males make up the majority of homicide victims. I take it that you wouldn’t be proffering sexual dimorphism as an explanation for that statistic?
“Travelling the world on your own….”
My late mother did that perforce, given that she was widowed. She’d have said what I’ll say: what you’re suggesting here – that women should go about in groups or with partners – is equivalent to the Muslim notion that women should cover themselves to avoid tempting men. In other words, it’s women’s fault when they’re attacked, because they’re asking for it, and men are too weak to resist the temptation.9 I’d add that – at least in NZ – the family violence stats suggest that many women would not in fact be safer with their partners.
Know this: the problem isn’t women. It’s men; at least those men who, it seems, are unable to control themselves.
“…other women may take note of how the world really works…”
Or – let’s be blunt – how NZ works. I remind you that Grace Millane had travelled safely through south America.
Showtime in the media circus.
Call for sanity and perspective: a good call from The Daily Blog
Having passed by everything but the headline, I don’t know what this has got to do with anything. Supremely easy talk-the-talk of humanity. Why doesn’t she bawl for the weak, sick and poor of our country, or better, do something about it.
E-clectic we don’t have a low murder rate in NZ, when self-murder (suicide) is so high.
What?!?!
self murder?
this equates the two when they are vastly different.
I may have missed it, but do we know if the guy who has been arrested for this murder is actually a NZ born citizen. By asking this I’m not saying that born and bred kiwi’s are not capable of this shameful crime just think it makes a difference.
try the over sea news sites we cant really talk about his name or background or what we have read let google find the information its there but we cant paste the connection
Sam: “The actually number is probably closer to 50/50 on male to female and female to male”
That may well be so. But deaths and serious injury are the evidence that women are differentially affected by partner violence.
Life after 40 shouldn’t be so rough. People shouldn’t have to explain the pain or face incarceration but every one learns that life is miserable. Young people aren’t trying to hear this stuff, they just want to be accepted. One is the loneliest number you’ll ever hear. Teenagers have things that are highly regrettable, if you let it go they’ll listen and they can tell when people mean it when people can explain to them the math because they ain’t in it to lose.
Given the man is before the courts it was thoroughly inappropriate for the Prime Minister to make any comments. All she has done is given his lawyers an opportunity to make a successful claim for any potential jurors to be baised and to claim, with some justification of not being able to get a fair trial. Given his identity is now known this has descended into a farce. Does this mean our Prime Minister will apologise for every murder from now on or will it only apply to attractive young white women? In Jacinda’s rush to emote she’s set a prescedence that is unseemly in a leader.
Michael Wynd: “Given the man is before the courts it was thoroughly inappropriate for the Prime Minister to make any comments.”
I heard the PM’s comments. She didn’t mention the arrested man. She said that the young woman ought to have been safe here in NZ, but she was not, and for that she, the PM, was sorry. Nothing exceptionable about it.
I prefer a PM who makes a comment of this sort, rather than some of her predecessors, who’d have worried only about it affecting the tourism economy.
Of course, it’d be good if our political leaders publicly deplored every instance of violent crime in NZ. But then they’d be doing almost nothing but that, wouldn’t they?
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