Heather du Plessis-Allan: Posie Parker’s opponents played into her hands

Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, aka Posie Parker, arrives at Albert Park in Central Auckland where she was hit with tomato juice by a protester. Photo / Jed Bradley.

OPINION

Think back to this time last week. Had you ever heard of Posie Parker before?

No, me neither.

Yet here we are, a week later, and many of us now know too much about her.

Too much, because many of us don’t care about what she’s talking about. Not because we’re callous towards trans people or towards women wishing to defend their spaces, but because this isn’t much of a tension in New Zealand.

So far, we’re been lucky. We’ve largely managed to avoid descending into the at-times ugly debates they have had in the UK.

There, the debate got so heated it cost Nicola Sturgeon her job as First Minister of Scotland. That particular debate was about putting a trans woman in a woman’s prison. She had committed two rapes before transitioning.

But that was just the latest flare-up in a shouting match that’s ranged from shutting down the Tavistock child gender identity clinic to cancelling the Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling for her views.

Here, by contrast, we collectively mourned the death of the world’s first openly trans MP and mayor, Georgina Beyer.

Anti-trans activist Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull - aka Posie Parker - arrives at Auckland Airport. March 24, 2023. Photo / Dean Purcell

So, this time last week, there was a very good chance Posie Parker would’ve come to the country, spoken to a small group of upset women and left. Most of us would’ve been none-the-wiser.

But then the critics piped up. The Green Party called for her ban.

They must’ve known the chances of a ban were incredibly slim. She is a British citizen. She doesn’t need permission to come here. Her travel is visa-free.

The Greens were surely performing for a crowd rather than expecting an actual ban. But they called for it anyway. And the media covered it. And the media amplified her message.

And then other critics piled in. They publicly despaired Immigration NZ’s entirely expected decision not to ban Parker. And they accused her of pulling a Nazi OK symbol in her video challenging our PM. And the media covered it.

And then they promised to protest and launched a judicial review in court and attacked the Immigration Minister for not intervening when he could and - as expected - the media covered it. And in the end, all of Parker’s opponents made sure that she was in the news most of the week and that many of us knew exactly what she was saying about women’s rights and trans rights.

For a moment some of them stopped. They talked about whether they were making things worse. But they did it anyway.

They did more harm than good. They helped her spread her message. They played right into her hands. She will not be unhappy about this publicity despite having to cancel her tour of New Zealand after the ugly scenes at Auckland’s Albert Park on Saturday.

But then, maybe they aren’t either. Maybe they’re also happy about the publicity too. The Green Party, Auckland Pride, and RainbowYOUTH will probably tell themselves they’ve done the right thing by lending their solidarity to the trans community.

But there are other ways to express solidarity. A considered statement on a Facebook page. A tweet. An Instagram post. There are ways to say what needs to be said to the people who need to hear it without creating the exact kind of drama the media will rush to cover.

Again, these people are not stupid. They must know they just helped some Kiwis, who will like what they see, discover Posie Parker.

What an own goal.

Heather du Plessis-Allan Drive, Newstalk ZB, 4pm-7pm, weekdays.