Margaret Comer - a person with incredibly poor judgement

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dejadeadnz

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#199138 5-Aug-2016 23:14

Gallagher spokeswoman apologises for stripper comments

For those unfamiliar (I doubt many will be) with this furore, some senior executive of a major sponsor of the Chiefs rugby team had this to say to a stripper who alleged that some of the players initiated unwelcomed and unconsented-to sexual contact after she was hired to perform at some party.

"Don't take your clothes off, stand in a room of young 20-25-year-old men and not expect something to be annoying, because you've said no".

After being predictably and deservedly demolished in the media and by most people with a modicum of decency, she's come back with this insulting apology:

"I feel terrible that my poor choice of words have caused hurt and alarm. I am even more regretful given that I have always been passionate about championing causes and organisations that improve our communities both professionally on behalf of Gallagher's philanthropic efforts and personally on a number of not for profit boards.

"I most definitely do not condone any kind of mistreatment of women and am extremely regretful that my words yesterday do not reflect the high standard I expect of myself and those I am associated with."

If one didn't know any better, you'd think this was a Donald Trump press release, given the totally excessive narcissism and self-focus. There is no apology to the person concerned; it doesn't apologise for the completely unacceptable sentiments expressed and instead relied on the usual weasel "I misspoke" defence. And goodness me, in an apology this woman can't resist praising herself. Your "high standards" really mean a lot to everybody, lady. The high standards still never quite prevented you from heading down into the gutter and condoning alleged sexual violence! Even more incredibly, this woman is a trustee of the Waikato Women's Refuge, which has refused to cut ties with her.

One also has to question whoever it was that provided PR advice to this woman. Given how badly she shot herself in the foot initially, she almost certainly would have taken advice before releasing the faux apology. If she didn't, then her judgement is even more worthless. Words fail me to describe the nastiness and stupidity of everything here. Incredibly, nobody in the media has bothered to mention that, if the allegations are true, there potentially have been breaches of the Prostitution Reform Act (section 17 - a sex worker may withdraw consent for services at any time) and the prohibition against indecent assault under the Crimes Act.

* I should also say that no one should excuse what the CEO of the Chiefs said initially to these allegations either. But as objectionable as his statement was, it was still quite some ways behind Comer's for objectionability.

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#1605240 5-Aug-2016 23:27

I just don't understand what is going on in that region. If you heard todays interview about this topic from someone else who works with them, it was just bizarre. I suspect these people don't have much media training.

The person said the other woman had been taken out of context, and John then said that the interview hadn't been cut up and it was in full so there was nothing to actually take out of context. Then they tried to explain what they meant by out of context which simply made no sense whatsoever. Basically they are saying that someone says something publicly, but that isn't what they actually mean, and that isn't what they actually believe. That maybe correct and true, but they perhaps shouldn't be interacting with the media unless they have had substantial media training.

John did also ask if the woman had contacted the complainant to apologize, and they didn't know. I mean if you are going to be interviewed for the main nationwide radio program, that should be one of the main things that you should know.

dejadeadnz

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#1605242 5-Aug-2016 23:40

mattwnz:

I just don't understand what is going on in that region. If you heard todays interview about this topic from another staffer, it wasn't much better. The person said the other woman had been taken out of context, and John then said that the interview hadn't been cut up and it was in full so there was nothing to take out of context. Then they tried to explain what they meant by out of context which simply made no sense whatsoever

The interview you are referring to is with some head honcho at the Waikato Women's Refuge. Like you, I was just rolling my eyes in amazement. What I took the fool to have been trying to say was that she basically had a moment where her brain and her mouth disconnected and her mouth uttered things that she didn't think or believe in. Hey, I don't claim to be a psychiatric expert but that kind of involuntariness (from my old days of practising criminal law) is called automatism. Generally speaking, from what I understand from the psychiatrists that have given evidence in court, people tend to have no conscious awareness or extremely low awareness when they are having a genuine episode of automatism. Her original words were pretty coherent to me.

If you haven't (or just plain wish to despair for the state of humanity), go and listen to some of the e-mail feedback on Thursday's afternoon drive show (4-7pm) on NewstalkZB's website. It should be about 10 to 15 minutes into the first hour of that show. You basically just had a bunch of men calling the stripper a "w**re" and saying she deserved it. It literally made me ashamed to share a planet with some of these people.

Sam91

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#1605244 6-Aug-2016 00:09

"A player allegedly pushed her roughly onto the ground in order to perform an indecency on her, which she had earlier agreed for a $50 payment."

This quote is interesting because it suggests there was possibly some mutually agreed contact at some point in the evening. So it contradicts what people have been saying about there being a zero contact rule. Obviously this doesn't change anything, their actions were deplorable.

dejadeadnz

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#1605245 6-Aug-2016 00:19

Sam91: "A player allegedly pushed her roughly onto the ground in order to perform an indecency on her, which she had earlier agreed for a $50 payment."

This quote is interesting because it suggests there was possibly some mutually agreed contact at some point in the evening. So it contradicts what people have been saying about there being a zero contact rule. Obviously this doesn't change anything, their actions were deplorable.

Yep. I think the stripper concerned has acknowledged elsewhere that she did accept money for a "sex act". But the media has been very poor in not highlighting the fact that she is entitled to withhold consent for any other contact that she did not welcome.

MikeB4

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#1605266 6-Aug-2016 08:06

Some people seem to open their mouth only to change feet.

dejadeadnz

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#1605280 6-Aug-2016 09:05

Things are just getting better and better for this dumb woman. The head honcho at the Waikato Women's Refuge has apologised to the stripper concerned. And there is still no evidence anywhere that she has apologised to the stripper herself. What a dreadful human being.

networkn

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#1605288 6-Aug-2016 09:44

dejadeadnz: Things are just getting better and better for this dumb woman. The head honcho at the Waikato Women's Refuge has apologised to the stripper concerned. And there is still no evidence anywhere that she has apologised to the stripper herself. What a dreadful human being.

I think it would be against your own standards to call a woman dumb, when it's more accurately her actions (I hope) you don't like.

Also would also think it would be worthy of holding judgement of the whole thing, until ALL the facts are known.

There have certainly been some extremely poorly chosen communications on the part of the Chiefs team and sponsors though, surprising really given the oversight NZRU has on many of these Franchises.

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dejadeadnz

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#1605326 6-Aug-2016 10:39

networkn:

I think it would be against your own standards to call a woman dumb, when it's more accurately her actions (I hope) you don't like.

Also would also think it would be worthy of holding judgement of the whole thing, until ALL the facts are known.

There have certainly been some extremely poorly chosen communications on the part of the Chiefs team and sponsors though, surprising really given the oversight NZRU has on many of these Franchises.

I am quite comfortable with admitting that based on her conduct, I find Margaret Comer nothing short of a thoroughly unlikeable human being. And I think I've laid out a pretty substantial case for her profound lack of judgement, lack of moral character (for refusing to apologise sincerely and to the person she has harmed the most), and rush to judgement. Remember this: none of the outrage against what she initially said requires anybody to have a view on the substantive allegations made by the stripper. What more facts do you require vis-a-vis the comments made by Margaret Comer initially? She essentially said the woman deserved it based on her occupation and that the Chiefs players did nothing wrong when the allegations had yet to be investigated.

I am all for social decorum and being charitable where appropriate but I see no reason to grant Comer any charity for her behaviour.

networkn

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#1605329 6-Aug-2016 10:49

dejadeadnz:

networkn:

I think it would be against your own standards to call a woman dumb, when it's more accurately her actions (I hope) you don't like.

Also would also think it would be worthy of holding judgement of the whole thing, until ALL the facts are known.

There have certainly been some extremely poorly chosen communications on the part of the Chiefs team and sponsors though, surprising really given the oversight NZRU has on many of these Franchises.

I am quite comfortable with admitting that based on her conduct, I find Margaret Comer nothing short of a thoroughly unlikeable human being. And I think I've laid out a pretty substantial case for her profound lack of judgement, lack of moral character (for refusing to apologise sincerely and to the person she has harmed the most), and rush to judgement. Remember this: none of the outrage against what she initially said requires anybody to have a view on the substantive allegations made by the stripper. What more facts do you require vis-a-vis the comments made by Margaret Comer initially? She essentially said the woman deserved it based on her occupation and that the Chiefs players did nothing wrong when the allegations had yet to be investigated.

I am all for social decorum and being charitable where appropriate but I see no reason to grant Comer any charity for her behaviour.

There is a difference between questioning someones moral behaviour, and someone's lack of judgement in a situation, and calling them (blanketly) stupid (Which is the context in which you used Dumb).

People make dumb decisions all the time, without themselves being stupid.

You not liking her, also doesn't make her stupid.

For the record, I think she (Comer) displayed pretty poor judgement in making those comments, and I was surprised considering how strongly she came out against Alardice with his homophobic comments (Which I don't believe for one second was him talking to his "friends").

I'm no Chiefs fan, but I'm reserving judgement until the investigation is concluded.

dejadeadnz

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#1605331 6-Aug-2016 10:54

networkn:

There is a difference between questioning someones moral behaviour, and someone's lack of judgement in a situation, and calling them (blanketly) stupid (Which is the context in which you used Dumb).

People make dumb decisions all the time, without themselves being stupid.

You not liking her, also doesn't make her stupid.

For the record, I think she (Comer) displayed pretty poor judgement in making those comments, and I was surprised considering how strongly she came out against Alardice with his homophobic comments (Which I don't believe for one second was him talking to his "friends").

I'm no Chiefs fan, but I'm reserving judgement until the investigation is concluded.

We agree to disagree. Her behaviour so far suggests to me that she's, to put it quite charitably, rather stupid. And for the last time, nobody has made any judgement about the Chiefs and their players here, so please stop diverting the issue.

Also, I don't know about you but there's (to borrow President Obama's words) a difference between episodic behaviours of minor idiocy and actually condoning sexual violence or strongly giving the apperance of doing so. Perhaps I am lucky or simply have narrow social circles -- I have never personally known anyone who condones sexual violence with such unmistakable words.

Fred99

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#1605366 6-Aug-2016 11:55

dejadeadnz:

nobody has made any judgement about the Chiefs and their players here,

Here you go:

It was a very dumb move to have a stripper perform:

a) "Stripping" isn't some higher cerebral art-form, but aka striptease - has the specific purpose to sexually arouse - with a moral/social expectation that the audience should behave themselves. Some don't.

b) Individuals in groups don't behave the same way as they do when they're not in groups. I believe one of the strippers made comments about it being "worse than stripping for a gang". Doh - it was a gang.

c) Alcohol is a disinhibitor.

Combine above, and the organisers created or tolerated creation of an unsafe situation. Absolute freaking morons IMO - if anybody was "asking for it" it was the organisers failing to realise that what might have been tolerated in 1970 something won't cut in in 2016 if something quite likely to go wrong (IMO) does go wrong (as it did).

dejadeadnz

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#1605375 6-Aug-2016 12:01

Fred99:

Here you go:

It was a very dumb move to have a stripper perform:

a) "Stripping" isn't some higher cerebral art-form, but aka striptease - has the specific purpose to sexually arouse - with a moral/social expectation that the audience should behave themselves. Some don't.

b) Individuals in groups don't behave the same way as they do when they're not in groups. I believe one of the strippers made comments about it being "worse than stripping for a gang". Doh - it was a gang.

c) Alcohol is a disinhibitor.

Combine above, and the organisers created or tolerated creation of an unsafe situation. Absolute freaking morons IMO - if anybody was "asking for it" it was the organisers failing to realise that what might have been tolerated in 1970 something won't cut in in 2016 if something quite likely to go wrong (IMO) does go wrong (as it did).

I agree with you completely. What I was trying to say (and probably didn't achieve) is that nobody in this thread has taken the stance that the substantive allegations by the strippers (now another one has emerged accusing the players of questionable behaviour last year) are definitely true. But the choice of having a stripper in an alcohol-fuelled environment (given their public profile) is, as you say, dumb.

Rikkitic

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#1605388 6-Aug-2016 12:29

It is the difference between titillation and invitation. Some just don't understand that distinction, especially when dulled by alcohol.

I do completely agree that Comer's remarks seem exceptionally unintelligent and insensitive.

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dejadeadnz

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#1605390 6-Aug-2016 12:31

And dragging this slightly off-topic...

Apologies to the mods for having to help me edit the posts. I got lazy and forgot to link the posts properly.

jmh

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#1605403 6-Aug-2016 13:28

Fred99:

dejadeadnz:

nobody has made any judgement about the Chiefs and their players here,

Here you go:

It was a very dumb move to have a stripper perform:

a) "Stripping" isn't some higher cerebral art-form, but aka striptease - has the specific purpose to sexually arouse - with a moral/social expectation that the audience should behave themselves. Some don't.

b) Individuals in groups don't behave the same way as they do when they're not in groups. I believe one of the strippers made comments about it being "worse than stripping for a gang". Doh - it was a gang.

c) Alcohol is a disinhibitor.

Combine above, and the organisers created or tolerated creation of an unsafe situation. Absolute freaking morons IMO - if anybody was "asking for it" it was the organisers failing to realise that what might have been tolerated in 1970 something won't cut in in 2016 if something quite likely to go wrong (IMO) does go wrong (as it did).

True

Invite a stripper to an end of year sports event? Sounds like we're back in the dark ages. The club is assuming the 'boys' are dumb animals - throw a piece of meat at them and they'll be happy. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea.

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