It’s time to shine the spotlight on a particularly vile specimen slithering through New Zealand’s political underbelly: Rhys Williams, this week’s Arsehole Award winner. Williams is a NZ First party activist (who didn’t renew his membership), and has carved out a niche as a homophobic, defamatory troll, hiding behind the X handle @2ESTEKA to spew venom at anyone who dares challenge his political party or narrow worldview.
His targets? Basically anybody who speaks out against NZ First, but mainly Green MP Benjamin Doyle, Green co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick, and even a 25-year-old student, who had the temerity to criticise NZ First, in his blinkered line of sight. His brand of bigotry is unfortunately a recurring theme among right wing attack dogs. It’s a major problem for them, being that most people in New Zealand aren’t homophobic. In fact Williams’ online campaigns against LGBTQ+ people are a compendium in hypocrisy, cowardice, and malice…qualities that make him a standout for all the wrong reasons and therefore highly deserving of this week’s ignominious Arsehole award.
Let’s start with the homophobia. Williams’ campaign, along with other right-wing propagandists such as Ani O’Brien and Cameron Slater, against Benjamin Doyle, a Green MP who uses they/them pronouns, was a vicious smear fest, falsely alleging misconduct based on Doyle’s private Instagram posts. Williams' anonymous account became a cesspool of slurs and calls for attacks, not just on Doyle, but also on the broader rainbow community. And just like Brian Tamaki instructing his Destiny Church followers to undertake attacks on the LGBTQ+ community, there is no doubt that Tamaki’s associate Rhys Williams has incited further discrimination and crimes of hatred against an already marginalized group of people.
Chlöe Swarbrick, a staunch defender of Doyle, also received Williams’ trade-mark defamatory spite, with Williams’ posts dripping with bigotry and derision. However, his attacks weren’t limited to MPs; he also targeted a student, which included him personally calling a reporter to drum up support for his political vendetta. This is the kind of gutless, personalised nastiness Williams thrives on, while, hilariously, whining about the need to stay anonymous because “attacks can become nasty.” Pot, meet kettle. The hypocrisy is so thick with Rhys Williams that you couldn’t cut it with a chainsaw..jpg)
The similarity with another online troll, Cameron Slater, who was also outed after making defamatory posts, is worth noting. Like Slater, Williams wanted to hide behind pseudonyms and anonymity while conducting his rancid online political campaigns, because they need the freedom to defame, degrade, and incite hatred without consequence, which isn’t really a valid reason for keeping their names secret.
Like most narcissists, Williams is happy to dish out the hatred, but cries foul and tries to minimise his behaviour when the spotlight turns on him. Stuff NZ unmasked him as the puppet master behind @2ESTEKA, revealing a man who not only targeted Doyle and Swarbrick but also slung defamatory insults towards anybody questioning or reporting on his despicable behaviour. If they happened to be female, they’d also receive Williams’ trademark misogynistic bile. This is a insecure man who dishes out abuse but can’t handle the heat when his own name is attached to his actions.
In effect, Rhys Williams is a classic coward, undertaking vile campaigns that typify the right wings’ modus operandi of dishonest underhanded campaigning. When caught out, they act like the victim while using any attention to try and gain support for their political campaigns. Unfortunately for them, attaining the narrative in this way also comes at the cost of their credibility.
Legal experts Steven Price and Graeme Edgeler have weighed in, and their verdict is damning. They’ve flagged Williams’ content as likely to cross into defamation, with false allegations that could cause real harm. Williams’ posts aren’t just offensive…they’re legally actionable, because they potentially endanger the personal safety of Williams’ targets. This isn’t just a case of “free speech”; it’s a calculated political campaign and attempt to ruin people’s lives while hiding behind anonymity.
And what of NZ First, Rhys Williams’ natural home? Initially, they were happy to let his bile flow, following along and amplifying his attacks on Doyle. Winston Peters even echoed some of Williams’ defamatory posts in his media stand-ups. But now, with Williams’ ugliness exposed in the cold hard light of public attention and his campaign against Doyle a complete failure, they’re scrambling to distance themselves. This disassociation is entirely unbelievable as NZ First associates even paid for the Inflection Point meeting that Williams organised, a meeting that was openly hostile, like the Nazis, to trans people. It’s a pathetic backpedal from a party that’s shown time and time and again it’s happy to flirt with divisive rhetoric until it becomes inconvenient.Rhys Williams is the epitome of everything wrong with the right wings’ anonymous online campaigns of hate. He’s a homophobic, hypocritical bully who targets political opponents with lies, then plays the victim when called out. His defamatory campaigns, as Price and Edgeler note, aren’t just cruel, they’re dangerous! NZ First’s attempt to wash their hands of him is understandable, but only underscores their own complicity in such dirty campaigning.
He’s not going to like what it means, but Rhys Williams’ defamatory posts and mainstream media exposure have won him an Arsehole of the Week award, and no secret accounts can hide that fact. Now, it’s time Williams slunk back into the sewer and a life of mediocrity where he belongs.
