There is no excusing the deputy prime minister’s unfounded attacks on Benjamin Doyle, but the Green Party should have done more to protect its newest MP.

This morning I listened to Sean Plunket ask the deputy prime minister Winston Peters if he believed an opposition MP was promoting paedophilia.

Such a question, in a timeline less cursed than the one we’re currently inhabiting, would be the final jab in a longform, sit-down interview on a primetime current affairs show. It would have come after months of investigations, background conversations and police involvement. There would be multiple sources, expert input and legal considerations. It would be huge and breaking news.

Instead, Plunket asked Peters point blank if he thought Green MP Benjamin Doyle was promoting paedophilia because Peters had just tweeted suggesting as much after looking at three screenshots of Instagram posts from Doyle’s private, personal account.

What have we come to?

There are two separate stories at play here. The first is the story of Peters, New Zealand First and their obsession with gender-affirming care. Peters is publicly opposed to the use of puberty blockers and has said as much on a number of occasions. He is also, in a very general sense, anti-trans, as illustrated by various NZ First policies. Benjamin Doyle is non-binary and is a vocal advocate for the availability of puberty blockers and increased access to gender-affirming healthcare.

In going after Doyle, Peters is conflating the subject and wording of some Instagram posts with his view that anyone who promotes safe access to puberty blockers has nefarious intentions. (Note: there is a conspiracy theory that trans people pose a risk to children. This false fear was most recently displayed in the storming of a drag event at Te Atatū library by Man Up and Destiny Church members.)

Stripped of context, the posts that all your favourite X lurkers are salivating over are pretty bloody boring. In one from 2020, Doyle kisses their young daughter on the mouth and says nice, parental things about her in the caption. A parent kissing their toddler on the mouth is not news, nor is it a reason to call the police. But Peters, both in speaking to Plunket and in his social media posts, is always keen to include the fact that Doyle is a supporter of safe access to puberty blockers. It appears that to Peters, such views means Doyle’s otherwise ordinary actions around their own kid are now suspect.

It is deeply concerning that the deputy prime minister is able to cast suspicions on another MP in such a serious manner without providing anything by way of evidence beyond some generic photos of the MP’s own child and the word “bussy” being used. There is also an irony in Peters – he of the “war on woke” – clutching at his pearls because an MP used a word he finds offensive. As for throwing out the idea of a police investigation… if saying “bussy” is the presence of a child is a crime then lock up RNZ and throw away the key.

What will happen now? The suggestions Peters has made and the frenzy it has kicked up (death threats sent to Doyle and online conspiracy mongering about every mundane detail in Doyle’s private Instagram posts) are arguably defamatory – they are certainly harmful to Doyle. It would not be surprising if the Greens or Doyle’s family took legal action against Peters and others for their assertions, though a surprisingly meek statement from the Greens today suggests they won’t.

The other, much less dangerous but still relevant story at play here is Benjamin Doyle’s naivete in assuming that one’s behaviour and online presence as a regular citizen will be warmly accepted, or not even noticed, once they become an MP. And, more concerning, the Green Party’s apparent lack of process in educating or, at the very least, warning potential candidates of how their behaviour may or may not be interpreted once they are a member of parliament. When Doyle was announced as an incoming MP following the removal of Darleen Tana in October last year, I knew about their personal account and its handle (biblebeltbussy). “They’ll need to get rid of that handle,” I said at the time, and was surprised to see it still there months later.

The Greens pride themselves on presenting their whole selves and being whole people as MPs. I admire it and think as a broad approach it has worked exceptionally well for them politically. In fact, they’ve either maintained high polling or even grown in popularity following a string of internal issues the past 18 months so something must be working in the approach.

But sifting through your online footprint before becoming a member of parliament isn’t reducing yourself, it’s just common sense. In the past, it has been candidates with outdated views defending or apologising for old social media posts. But just because potential Green MPs are probably less likely to have an old racist or sexist tweet lying around doesn’t make them immune from assessing their activity and viewing it through a damage control lens.

Doyle has done nothing wrong in having a personal and private account with photos of their child on it. And the assertions made about those photos are disturbing. But a simple “hey, maybe don’t have ‘bussy’ in your publicly viewable username because people won’t get it” should’ve been floated early on from a senior Greens staffer. Sometimes protection means pointing out the horrible facts of life and politics. Instead, co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick today said those conversations were currently happening.

What Peters is doing is vile, unprovoked and dangerous to the whole rainbow community, especially to Doyle and their family. Let me make that clear. It’s a horrifying progression of dangerous ideas straight from the second most powerful person in the country and it will likely have lasting effects long after Peters is out of parliament. The airing of private social media activity in order to attack an MP also sets a dangerous precedent and suggests that anything is fair game if you can get your hands on it.

But the fact that the Greens held a press conference today to condemn Peters’ vile actions and instead found themselves having to explain, with much exasperation, what bussy means suggests they should have seen this coming from the likes of Peters. And they did a disservice to their newest MP by pretending otherwise.