In the past 24 hours, the tone of media commentary on the scandal surrounding the former Green MP has shifted with striking uniformity. The focus has conveniently been diverted from the wrongness of her actions – there’s barely a mention of that – to the supposedly cruel nature of a political culture that, we are told, placed her under acute stress.
Ghahraman says she cited her mental health problems not as an excuse but as an explanation. In fact she doesn’t need to use stress as an excuse, because her legion of media sympathisers have obligingly done it for her.
The Greens have copped flak for not front-footing the issue of Ghahraman’s shoplifting, but in reality the controversy has been something of a PR triumph, thanks to the media’s eagerness to justify her conduct. Who needs spin doctors when the commentators are already on board?
The excuse-makers, apologists and hand-wringers are out in force. Ghahraman’s conduct has been explained as the almost inevitable consequence of an oppressive, racist system that’s dominated by white males and seeks to destroy capable but vulnerable women.
For an example, check out Madeleine Chapman’s column at The Spinoff, headlined The dramatic exodus of brown women from Parliament is no surprise. The implication is that Kiri Allan and Elizabeth Kerekere were victims of the same syndrome, although the article makes no attempt to substantiate that claim.
I’ll wager, though, that if an opinion poll were taken today, it would find that women are just as offended as men by Ghahraman’s behaviour and by the media’s eagerness to absolve her of blame. Certainly she won’t get much sympathy from a struggling working mother on the minimum wage who wonders how she’s going to pay the supermarket bill but never thinks of resorting to dishonesty.
For what it’s worth, my own inclination, initially at least, was to feel some sympathy for Ghahraman. That feeling has now almost completely evaporated. I’ve concluded she doesn’t need my sympathy when she has virtually the entire media in her corner.
You have to look very hard in the welter of comment to find any mention of the irony that a woman whose parliamentary salary puts her in the top 1 per cent of income earners resorted to theft. And not theft of everyday essentials, but of high-end fashion items marketed to the elite. It all looks decidedly at odds with the political creed of an MP who has positioned herself as a champion of the poor.
It didn’t help that when the scandal broke, Ghahraman was on holiday overseas; exactly where, we haven’t been told. What has emerged is a picture of privilege and entitlement that sits very awkwardly with Green Party ideology.
Nowhere in all the commentary have I seen reference to the fact that countless thousands of New Zealanders deal with mental stress without feeling tempted to steal. As David Farrar put it, “Trying to excuse what happened as being due to stress from the job is insulting to all the people who are also very stressed but don’t shoplift”.
Nowhere is there any mention that shoplifting is a massive drain on the economy. Research in 2017 put the cost at $1.2 billion a year, and you can bet it’s a lot higher now.
Nowhere does any commentator consider the danger that if Ghahraman is allowed to use mental health as an excuse for theft, anyone else feeling under stress will now consider themselves entitled to steal.
Having a bad morning? Go and pinch something. If a high-profile politician can use stress as an excuse, then so can you.
Karl du Fresne, a freelance journalist, is the former editor of The Dominion newspaper. He blogs at karldufresne.blogspot.co.nz. - where this article was sourced.
The Greens have copped flak for not front-footing the issue of Ghahraman’s shoplifting, but in reality the controversy has been something of a PR triumph, thanks to the media’s eagerness to justify her conduct. Who needs spin doctors when the commentators are already on board?
The excuse-makers, apologists and hand-wringers are out in force. Ghahraman’s conduct has been explained as the almost inevitable consequence of an oppressive, racist system that’s dominated by white males and seeks to destroy capable but vulnerable women.
For an example, check out Madeleine Chapman’s column at The Spinoff, headlined The dramatic exodus of brown women from Parliament is no surprise. The implication is that Kiri Allan and Elizabeth Kerekere were victims of the same syndrome, although the article makes no attempt to substantiate that claim.
I’ll wager, though, that if an opinion poll were taken today, it would find that women are just as offended as men by Ghahraman’s behaviour and by the media’s eagerness to absolve her of blame. Certainly she won’t get much sympathy from a struggling working mother on the minimum wage who wonders how she’s going to pay the supermarket bill but never thinks of resorting to dishonesty.
For what it’s worth, my own inclination, initially at least, was to feel some sympathy for Ghahraman. That feeling has now almost completely evaporated. I’ve concluded she doesn’t need my sympathy when she has virtually the entire media in her corner.
You have to look very hard in the welter of comment to find any mention of the irony that a woman whose parliamentary salary puts her in the top 1 per cent of income earners resorted to theft. And not theft of everyday essentials, but of high-end fashion items marketed to the elite. It all looks decidedly at odds with the political creed of an MP who has positioned herself as a champion of the poor.
It didn’t help that when the scandal broke, Ghahraman was on holiday overseas; exactly where, we haven’t been told. What has emerged is a picture of privilege and entitlement that sits very awkwardly with Green Party ideology.
Nowhere in all the commentary have I seen reference to the fact that countless thousands of New Zealanders deal with mental stress without feeling tempted to steal. As David Farrar put it, “Trying to excuse what happened as being due to stress from the job is insulting to all the people who are also very stressed but don’t shoplift”.
Nowhere is there any mention that shoplifting is a massive drain on the economy. Research in 2017 put the cost at $1.2 billion a year, and you can bet it’s a lot higher now.
Nowhere does any commentator consider the danger that if Ghahraman is allowed to use mental health as an excuse for theft, anyone else feeling under stress will now consider themselves entitled to steal.
Having a bad morning? Go and pinch something. If a high-profile politician can use stress as an excuse, then so can you.
Karl du Fresne, a freelance journalist, is the former editor of The Dominion newspaper. He blogs at karldufresne.blogspot.co.nz. - where this article was sourced.
15 comments:
If Ghahraman couldn't take the heat, she shouldn't have been in the kitchen
It is remarkable how such people only get 'mental health' once they have been fingered for (allegedly) crashing the car, nicking the dress, etc.
It seems that, despite us being told for years that women are better leaders than men - more empathetic, kinder, able to multi-task (that old chestnut),etc etc - there is a rash of women in politics and public life who just seem to keep stuffing it up.
Ardern, Allen, Kerekere, Gharaman, Liz Truss, the dean of Harvard, Nicola Sturgeon, Sooooooozeeeee Wiles...the list goes on.
What do all these women have in common?
They're mostly WOKE and FAR-LEFT. Which, by definition means they exude virtue and hypocrisy in equal measure - a recipe for disaster. And those that aren't are just not competent.
What I'm saying is that women aren't any better...or worse leaders than men. It all comes down to the individual. Their strength of character and their skills and judgement. That's what makes a good leader. Nothing to do with gender, so please stop feeding us this BS that one sex is better than the other at it.
And it's nothing to do with sexism in politics either. There are plenty of well-balanced, capable and assertive women politicians who don't rush out and nick stuff or threaten their lover's employer when things don't go their way.
I hope we can soon add Chloe Swarbrick to this list. Now that is one lady I really can't abide.
I totally agree. Joe Bloggs pinches something and he's hung out to dry but when some elite m.p. does all the far left woke people come to her defense. . There is no excuse!
She's a self entitled greedy bitch!
Is it not interesting that " when a woman, who has moved her life to achieve better, is involved in an incident, that a woman and/or women come 'out' and bash the poor dear for ineptitude and or bringing their gender into disrepute".
There are two instances, in this comment, in which that occurs, like her similar comment, under another posted article, the same sentiment was stated - she "slam dunks Chloe Swarbrick". I wonder what she will think of the replacement - Celia Wade-Brown, former Mayor - Wellington City 2010 -2016?
I followed the link to Madeleine Chapman’s column at The Spinoff - what an incredible load of rubbish! It’s hard to believe thoughtless stuff like that gets published.
I'm stressed from driving on Auckland's Southern Motorway today - I think that I am entitled to steal a case of beer from a supermarket to resolve my problem...........
I do not disagree with all to live in the comments , however for me Golriz Gharaman was given the privelege of being a refugee to New Zealand in a safe nation.
GG defecated on all New Zealanders from a height she believed she was worthy of .
I say deport her immediately. Forget the faux excuses and pitifall apology.
The MSM have found their scapegoat. Blame toxicity. With that excuse in place, why are we not criminals?
Stealing from luxury shops can be justified as an act of sticking to the racist, capitalist oppressors
Can you imagine the media reaction if luxon had gone into rodd & gunn and pinched a few business shirts and then said; "sorry I couldn't help it, it had been a stressful day. Rodd & gunn staff were.amazing in their kindness towards me nicking their shirts though"
Do you think he would get the same response?
The fact that the shoplifting cost to this country is $1.2B annually was confirmed by the CEO of Retail NZ a couple of days ago.
This should be a focus for NZPolice. Reducing retail crime would help with the cost of living crisis we are experiencing. All retailers build in a % for theft. Reduce the theft and we are all better off.
As for GG. Begone, you have insulted the generosity of this nation.
Why are MSM not asking questions about Chloe Swarbrick's role in all this. There was a NZ Herald CCTV image of both Golriz and Chloe in Scotties. I understand that Chloe was also the one that returned the clothes back to Scotties. When did Chloe know that Golriz had stolen items? To me it seems Golriz has very quickly fallen on the sword, is that to save a more senior Green MP?
The Green Party have a distorted idea of honesty. James Shaw dishonestly acquired a BA from Victoria University. Climate change from CO2 is a fraudulent claim, transgender ideology is destructive and men / women changing sex is biologically false and Maori are not victims of historical racism, GG is not a victim of stress more than many other people. They are not a Green party at all but bright Scarlet from all their dishonesty and deception..This party needs an injection of a truth serum.
As some one close to the issues around shoplifting and retail crime, there’s an acronym used in the industry for the common steps a perpetrator goes through when apprehended, it’s called DARVOS. Deny; Attack; Reverse Victim Offender Status. While Golriz didn’t initially deny anything, her silence suggested that she may have believed the whole thing might blow over if she stayed silent, a form of denial. When that didn’t work, her pet media sympathisers went on the attack and immediately followed the final step by reversing the offender status into that of a victim. Text book stuff. And as someone who has faced down very real challenges and threats towards my physical safety, not something typed out on Twitter, I have never then felt compelled to shoplift as a response to those relatively frequent events. Golriz’s own alleged actions appear to be opportunistic with a high degree of self entitlement driving the underlying motives behind her decisions to commit these acts. Some people actually believe that they are above the law. Until they get caught out. She appeared to be one of them.
Post a Comment