We Understand How Colin Craig Feels. We don’t necessarily support his politics. We don’t know whether he gives a damn about the harm done to men, though he probably recognizes the harm to families that has resulted from the denigration of men.

However, those who speak up about men’s issues know what it’s like to be treated the way Colin Craig was treated by Russel Norman in a speech to the merry makers who could find spaces between the many politicians ensuring they were photographed at this year’s Big Gay Out. Russell Norman misrepresented Colin Craig, falsely stereotyping him as a hater of homosexuals and repressive of women. For all the reasons one might find fault with Craig’s politics, they do not include such positions and he has not expressed or lived the opinions Norman claimed he held.

In similar fashion, some feminists and their supporters quickly misrepresent and stereotype anyone who expresses opinions or provides facts that disagree with feminist propaganda. Even if everything you say is supportive of gender equality you will get cheap shots claiming you are a mysogynist who wants women to become subordinate to men. You will be subjected to all manner of false debate aimed at ridiculing, belittling, discrediting, disempowering or demonizing you rather than addressing anything you actually said.

Writer John Armstrong’s opinion that Craig should “harden up” rather than “running to mum” was actually more deserving of Norman’s neanderthal man stereotype than was anything said by Craig. Armstrong is saying that male politicians who are abused and harmed should just handle it and it’s not manly to complain, nark or seek support. (Many still believe the same about men who are lied about and ripped off by women in Family Court and the so-called ‘child support’ system; don’t complain, just harden up and take your punishment no matter how unjust.)

Craig believes he has been a victim of the crime of defamation, a seriously harmful dishonesty crime that can ruin a person’s life. Why should that crime be tolerated and what makes it different from other crimes that should not be tolerated? If a female politician is sexually assaulted by an opposition politician, would Armstrong ridicule her for taking action against the offender? Will we hear him tell her to ‘harden up and stop running to mummy’?

We wish Colin Craig all the best in his efforts to stand up for his legal right to be protected from defamation. His victory here may well send an important message to feminists and other ideologically fashionable zeolots that ‘it’s not ok’ to make up lies about individuals just because you disagree with them.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11204339