Sadder, But Wiser--Part III

An Open Letter to Forty Thousand Facebook Users

The case of the Kahui twins roils on.  It is easy to underestimate the public antipathy towards Macsyna King.  Then every so often we are reminded of how deep this runs.  Forty thousand people signed up to a Facebook page opposing the publication of a book which told her side of the story--almost overnight.  The loathing, hatred, and vituperation expressed there for this one woman--before she even spoke up--is a blot upon our society.

After all, the only way to this point we (the public) had known of her has been through media reports.
  To hold someone in such loathing and contempt solely on the basis of media reports--that is, on the basis of hearsay, rumour, gossip, and sensationalism--tells us that the old traditional Kiwi value of "fairness" has long since departed these shores.  Let's be clear.  Trashing King's public reputation was good for circulation and ratings--and the more lurid light in which she could be painted, the better the commercial and career outcomes for those media involved. Let's never forget that we have all be used.


It is hard to credit that virtually all booksellers in New Zealand have refused to stock and sell Breaking Silence: The Kahui Case.  We cannot recall this ever happening before.  Why?  How can that be?  Having now read the book, we believe in time those booksellers will hang their corporate heads in shame.  They have been gulled. They deserve to go out of business.  They banned a book which at the time none of their PR department heads or senior executives or marketing people had even read.  Not one of them.  Here is how they "explained" themselves.

There have been growing calls for people to boycott the book and Paper Plus and The Warehouse said today they had listened to those calls.  Paper Plus CEO Rob Smith said the company had received a lot of feedback from customers about the book.

"We have also been in close consultation with our franchise holders and staff to understand their position on this subject," Smith said.  "The prevailing opinion is that our stores do not feel comfortable selling this book and our customers do not want to buy it.  "This is certainly not about censorship or Paper Plus taking the moral high ground. We are simply listening to our most important stakeholders and acting in accordance with their feelings."

The Warehouse general manager of merchandise Nick Tuck said the chain had also had a lot of feedback from customers asking it not to stock the book.  "We have listened to its customers and The Warehouse has chosen not to stock the book."

Now bear in mind that none of these "stakeholders" (don't you just love that management psycho-pop-babble) had actually read the book.  It had not been yet released.  The "stakeholders" had to be reacting on gut emotion, hearsay, slander, fear, and hatred.  And the booksellers folded.  Where is a real corporate leader with genuine courage, like Ralph Norris when you need him?

(Whitcoulls was the only book chain to our knowledge whose senior management said they would actually read the book before deciding whether to stock it.  In the end it did decide to stock the book, and donate all proceeds to charity.  Well, then.  Clearly they want to be in the bookselling business--and we wish them every success.  We must make a point of shopping there a bit more regularly.  In the final analysis, the lurid actions of the mob may actually enhance the book's sales.  We have already been asked where it can be bought.  [Incidentally, if you are not near a Whitcoulls outlet, get it direct from the author, Ian Wishart, here.]  The internet is the biggest bookseller on the planet--and will only consolidate its pre-eminence here if NZ booksellers refuse to sell books.) 

Returning to the scandalous public hatred of Macsyna King, someone will say there was a public trial so we learned all the dirty truth about her (via media reports, of course).  There surely was a public trial.  Who was on trial?  Not Macsyna King.  King's de facto, Chris Kahui, father of the twins was on trial.  But the strategy of the defence was to paint King in the worst possible light, deflecting the attention of the jury (and the media) away from Mr Kahui on to an allegedly wicked, and thoroughly despicable mother.  The defence was definitively clear: it asserted Macsyna King was the guilty party.  It effectively put the mother on trial.

The Crown was not there to defend Macsyna King, but to prove beyond reasonable doubt that Mr Kahui was the perpetrator (which, of course, it failed to do to the satisfaction of the jury, since Mr Kahui was acquitted in record time).  So a great deal of rubbish, innuendo, slurs, and falsehoods put out by the defence about Macsyna King went out unchallenged and unexamined, and yet dutifully reported upon.  She, however, was not on trial--except in the court of public opinion which has heard a grossly distorted version of the facts. 

In the Kahui case, the question to which everyone returns is, Who killed the twins?  Amidst all the frenzied attacks and slurs against Macsyna King we suspect some fundamentals have been forgotten.

1.  On the night in which the twins received the injuries which eventually killed them, Macsyna King was not with them all night.  She was out with her sister, Emily.  This fact is beyond doubt and has been corroborated in several ways.  Wishart's book summarises the evidence and corroborations.  The twins were left in the care of their father, Chris Kahui who was in the house with them--all night.  He went in to where they were sleeping to feed them (several times, possibly). 

2. Now this raises a rather perplexing question.  If Macsyna King was not in the house all that night, how on earth could she have inflicted the injuries upon the twins that would eventually kill them?  How, pray tell, could she be guilty?  Maybe she is a demon woman who can kill at a distance by thought waves.  Yup, the baying mob are probably sufficiently dumb and inchoate as to believe something like that.  Well, actually the defence at trial suggested that she snuck back into the house, past the four or five adults who were resident there that night and beat the twins up without anyone being the wiser.  Well, yes she could have done something like that.  We have already made up our minds that she is a Devil Woman, have we not? 

Then there were other subterfuges.  It was suggested that King could have inflicted the injuries hours, or even days before and then suddenly, later that night, the twins stopped breathing.  But the consistent evidence presented at trial was that the babies seemed just fine right up to the time when King left--feeding, contented, in no pain.  Medically trained people had seen, inspected, and handled the babies in the days leading up to their injuries and had pronounced them fit, and doing well. 

Let's be definitive. There is no evidence whatsoever that Macsyna King killed her babies.  None.  Nada.  She was not there at the time they received the injuries which killed them.  That is why she was never charged with the crime.  Read the book to get the evidence and the facts straight.  Might as well charge the Duke of Edinburgh with the twin's murders if lack of evidence is no obstacle.  Prince Phillip--baby killer.  It has a good ring to it.  The republicans amongst us could exploit it to the max.

Yes, Macsyna King has been immoral, drunk, lawless, and a user of drugs.  She has been offensive, rude, bullying, and belligerent.  So has the entire Kahui clan, Mr Kahui, father of the twins, included.  But that does not make any of them murderers or baby killers.

Now we come to something which forty thousand Facebook mobbies must face up to.  If Macsyna King clearly did not harm and thus kill her own babies, why do you hate her so?  Some will say, "Well, I thought she did, and so I hated her for it".  Fair enough.  But you were wrong.  She did not kill her twins.  So either you owe her a public apology--yes a public apology, since you condemned her publicly via Facebook--or there is something else to your loathing which is unrelated to the issue of murder.  What might that be?

We speculate now, but we suspect it would have something to do with the things which King has done and the way she has lived her life.  These have made her hateful in your eyes.  If so, we would simply say this, if you are without any of these sins yourself, you may cast the stones.  But if not . . .?  And if you believe yourself pure and untouched by any such evil, then why focus on just this one person as the object of your loathing.  Surely, to be consistent and without hypocrisy, you would likewise have to hate and loathe your neighbour down the street or, for that matter, most of the population of New Zealand.

No, none of this washes.  We invite you all to apologise publicly to Macsyna and ask her to forgive you--its easy, just get back on Facebook and do the decent thing.  But then again you have refused to read the book, Breaking Silence.  You have not wanted to listen to King. You have rather wanted to nurse your hatred of her, because, let's face it, that somehow makes us all feel better, superior in some odious little way. 

Macsyna King has been gravely wronged.  Decency and fairness means we have got to try to put it right.