The way we talk about men

A warning that this post is about the tragedy at Waitārere Beach. I want to write with compassion for all involved, but also be loud and clear: it's time to stop promoting harmful ideas about violence.

Whoever they are and whoever they've lost, a person is allowed their grief. This is the place from which I start.

In the early hours of Wednesday morning, Benjamin Timmins shot three people: a woman, aged 46, and two young men, aged 17 and 21. The victims remain in critical condition. Timmins is dead, having turned the gun on himself. Emergency workers have spoken about the trauma of attending the scene. The trauma of the victims themselves is almost too visceral, too difficult, to imagine.

Police are investigating the shootings, and have been rightly careful about releasing details. Media have turned elsewhere to fill the vacuum, talking to a close family member of Timmins. Before we go on, I ask anyone who's reading not to judge or criticise her. She's speaking as best she can from the bottom of a well of pain.

In any case, it's not a family member's job to know what to say in a situation like this. It's the media's job to know what to publish.

In the experience of his family member, Timmins was a protector. Media picked up her sentiment: an early article by Stuff led with a headline calling Timmins a 'peacekeeper' for the time he served as a private security contractor in the Middle East. But the family member told how Timmins had lost his spark over the years, and in the last year had been under pressure. She said:

Men's mental health should never be ignored, because when a man breaks, it's not just the man who breaks, it's his families, the family he comes from, the family he's created. Men's mental health has been so ignored.

The family member reflected on her positive experiences of Timmins, and added that she didn't want him to be remembered only for his criminal history.

There's a lot going on here. Absolutely: men's mental health continues to be undervalued and underserved. At the same time, too readily blaming violence on mental health can stigmatise people with mental health issues. And mental health is far more likely to be invoked as an excuse for the violence of white men. Their non-white counterparts are simply seen as thugs or even terrorists.

I want to note these important conversations, but I don't want to dwell on them. Instead, I want to turn to the idea that good men sometimes snap. This is deeply problematic, and there are a few reasons why.

First, the idea that good men snap - put them in some situations, and they can't be expected to control themselves - is the oldest excuse in the book for gendered violence. To give a distressing example, Clayton Weatherston used provocation, a version of this idea, to justify his mutilation and murder of Sophie Elliott. The public saw this for what it was, and the revulsion was such that it led to the provocation defence being largely removed from the law.

Second, the idea that a situation can cause a good man to snap denigrates men. It suggests violence is some ugly but inherent part of their make-up, sitting latent until something flares it. I have two sons, barely older than the two young men Timmins shot and who now fight for their lives. And I call bullshit. Our boys and men are born beautiful and gentle, with endless potential to love and be loved. When we remind them of that, all of us do better.

Third, and most importantly, the idea that good men snap ignores a whole lot of reality - and when you ignore reality, you miss critical opportunities to change reality's course.

Timmins' first conviction, for unlawful possession of a firearm, was in 1996 - a conviction he appealed to the High Court decades later, with his appeal eventually dismissed in 2020. In 2019, he was convicted again for cultivating cannabis, unlawful possession of ammunition, and theft, although the ammunition conviction was later set aside on appeal.

Just last Friday, police attended a family harm incident at the property where the shooting took place - with the man they arrested due to appear in court yesterday. In the hours before the shooting took place, the police had again been called to the property, where they'd seized a gun.

All I can see here is an astonishing series of red flags. In the days and weeks to come, questions will be asked about why these red flags weren't heeded. For now, here's what troubles me. To talk about all this as the story of a man who snapped - as if no one was really responsible, including Timmins - is to disregard the experience of those who reached for help because they knew this man wasn't safe. It sends a message to every woman and child who lives in fear and knows what's coming.

At 12:40 on Wednesday morning, the final call to 111 was made by a little girl. She rang from the property where four people had been shot. The call was silent, because the caller could not or would not speak.

Knowing this haunts me, just as it should you.

References

Man's attempt to appeal historical firearms conviction denied | Stuff

Man dead, woman and two teenagers critically wounded in Waitārere Beach shooting | RNZ News

Alleged Waitārere gunman arrested for assaulting two family members days before shooting | The Post