Paul Thomas: Penny drops for Henry and his employer

Paul Henry has become overconfident in his role as shock jock. Photo / Greg Bowker

The debate over our national identity took an interesting turn this week with the suggestion that real New Zealanders are those who think Paul Henry is funny, daring and outrageous in an 'Ooh you are awful, but I like you' way when he channels for ordinary folk too timid to say what they really believe.

This puts me in a tricky position. I'm in the true-blue box seat by virtue of looking and sounding like a New Zealander even though I was born 20,000 km away, but I fear I'd struggle with the Henry test.

Let's start with funny. Henry humiliates a guest on his show over her facial hair.

He calls a rather brave Scottish lady from a humble background a "retard". He giggles like a schoolboy as he riffs inanely on a foreigner's name.

I don't think I'm easily offended or lacking a sense of humour. I laugh my head off over Peter Cook and Dudley Moore's notorious Derek and Clive dialogues which some people would find puerile, disgusting, and reprehensible. To me they are proof that you can get away with just about anything as long as it's completely original and very funny.

But Henry's stuff doesn't crack me up.

Nor do I get what TVNZ chief executive Rick Ellis is on about when he says Henry "pushes the boundaries and that's important in a country that values freedom of speech".

Does Henry engage in cutting satire at the expense of the rich and powerful? Does he champion unpopular causes? Does he challenge middle-class New Zealand's complacent assumptions? Is he a subversive figure like the American comedian Lenny Bruce who suffered police harassment and blacklisting?

Henry's such an anti-establishment gadfly that he has a weekly audience with the Prime Minister which is apparently a laugh a minute.

And when he found himself under the media blowtorch this week he reacted like every other wealthy, well-connected bully, telling reporters to "get off his land" and threatening to sue.

We shouldn't be surprised that TVNZ entertains the laughable notion that Henry is a torch-bearer for freedom of speech since its initial handling of this controversy revealed a self-satisfied, self-indulgent organisation incapable of seeing itself as others see it.

Its spokeswoman has retracted her defence of Henry's slur on Sir Anand Satyanand but the cat is out of the bag: his audience love it when he sneers at people who aren't like them - Greenpeace activists, homely Scotswomen, gays, Indians.

That raises some questions: is Henry just doing what comes naturally or is he encouraged to pander to prejudice? Is the lowest common denominator approach an appropriate philosophy for the state broadcaster of a multi-cultural country? How representative of the community are these viewers who say over and over that they love the way Henry says what they quietly think?

Media organisations value feedback because it affirms that people are reading or watching or listening; they particularly like it when people feel strongly enough to email or phone in a response.

But there's a risk attached to extrapolating from this response to draw conclusions about what the public really thinks.

Many people in the community have never written a letter to the editor and never will.

There are others, though, whose collected letters to editors would create a volume thicker than the Oxford Dictionary. Some of these prolific correspondents have bees in their bonnets; some are cranks; some are racists without knowing it, and some are proud of the fact.

While I'd probably fail the Henry test, I did feel some solidarity with him when I saw various groups demanding his sacking and John Minto screeching into his bullhorn as if it was 1981.

Talk about living in the past: when all's said and done, the downtrodden wretch on whose behalf he'd taken to the streets is the Governor-General.

Why is it that the broad left, led by the union movement, which is so resistant to people being sacked for non-performance or incompetence, is so quick to demand the dismissal of people who say things they don't like?

Henry didn't get away with it. He couldn't brush it off with a smirk and a throwaway line.

The apologies, the hasty retreat, and the suspension indicate that the penny's dropped.

From here on he's going to have to tread more carefully, particularly when it comes to matters of race.