Former Dunedin singer Marla Kavanaugh says she cannot return to New Zealand because she fears for her life after savage online attacks, hate mail and media coverage following her performance of the national anthem before the All Blacks’ match against Fiji in San Diego last month.
Kavanaugh’s mother, Kathi Craig, and her stepfather, Malcolm Hopwood, yesterday issued a statement saying the "vitriol, hate and accusation" towards their daughter had made her feel so vulnerable she did not return home for a scheduled concert this month.
The concert had been postponed.
"We fear we’ll never see our daughter here again."
"Despite the positive reception she received from the crowd in the stand and New Zealanders at the after-match function, more than 50,000 Kiwis, in the privacy of their own homes, attacked her performance.
"Over the days that followed they continued to attack her personally, her family and then went on to threaten her life and her safety on Facebook, Tic Toc [sic], Instagram and other social media outlets."
Just over a fortnight on, extreme messages continued to be received.
In addition to social media, New Zealand newspapers and radio chose to publicise the criticisms and personal attacks, "even to the extent of running a poll", they said.
They were particularly concerned about a comment made on Three’s 7 Days programme, where Kavanaugh was described by panellist Vaughan Smith as "Dunedin’s most well-known murderer".
The reaction went far beyond expressions of opinion about her classical voice, they said.
Kavanaugh, originally from Dunedin, performed at the Edinburgh Tattoo in 2022 and recently sang at Tartan Week in New York.
Kavanaugh had also performed in concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York and in Europe and Russia.
Mr Hopwood said he had laid a complaint with Warner Bros Discovery regarding the 7 Days comment, and would be referring it also to the New Zealand Broadcasting Standards Authority.
"There is a duty of care from those people who monitor social media, TV3 [Three] and New Zealand Rugby who engaged her and then sat back and let events unfold," Ms Craig said.
"Until Megan Alatini, who we so appreciate, spoke up about the impact that unnamed personal attacks can have on people in the public eye, no-one sought to align themselves with her and what she was going through.
"As a mother I feel for my daughter and the pain and hurt she is experiencing from people who wouldn’t put their name to such loathsome comments."
Mr Hopwood said he hoped NZR would play a recording of the anthem at the All Blacks v Argentina match in Wellington tomorrow "so the blood-letting doesn’t happen again and people can concentrate on the words".
A New Zealand Rugby spokeswoman said the organisation had reached out to Kavanaugh to offer its support and thank her for being involved in the San Diego test.
"NZR also stands firmly against abuse of any kind. It does not meet the values of rugby.
But Mr Hopwood told the Otago Daily Times it had taken a week before a member of the rugby union contacted his stepdaughter and she should have received a call to ask after her wellbeing "much earlier" than that.
He would have expected the chief executive to personally become involved.
"I also believe they could have championed her, which they never have.
"She was engaged by them and when the hate mail arrived, there was little involvement by them — and still there is little involvement."
A spokeswoman for Warner Bros Discovery, which owns Three, said 7 Days was a comedy show that discussed the previous week’s topical affairs.
"In the week this episode aired, Kavanaugh’s performance was discussed at length across multiple media platforms.
"While panellists take part in this show and express personal opinions, we assessed it to be unlikely the general public would have interpreted Mr Smith’s comments as an accusation that Ms Kavanaugh is a murderer.
"Three does not condone hate speech or threats to individual safety and we wish Ms Kavanaugh all the best in her career."
Mr Hopwood said what Smith said had no qualification to it, and people could take from it the literal truth of his words.
"It just came out as an ugly statement ... there was no comedy about it. Yes, it was a comedy programme, but there was no humour in what he said."
