Good Guys 6

Posted by Verity on March 31, 2025 in film, Human rights, Law, Living today, Politics, society, Women's equality issues | 2 comments

Now more than ever, we need to cling on to the idea – the reality – that there are some good men out there, so it felt like time to revisit damesnet’s Good Guys series.

Nazir Afzal

A few years ago Nazir Afzal, the former Chief Crown Prosecutor for the North West, was often a reassuring presence on our screens, offering a calm and humane perspective on issues that were generating a lot of heat – the grooming scandal in Rochdale being just one of them.

I have just finished reading his remarkable book The Prosecutor. That he became one at all is testament to his determination and his commitment to justice. As one of seven children born to a recent migrant from Pakistan, university and a job in one of the country’s most exclusive professions would probably not have been predicted.

Yet in a sense public service and a social conscience were in his DNA: his father was a ceaseless crusader against organiser of community initiatives to benefit his fellow migrants and his mother, ostensibly a traditional Pakistani wife, was a quiet crusader against forced marriage and for female education. The traumatic death of his favourite cousin focused Afzal’s aspirations.

Way back at the start of his career he had coined for himself the term ‘gender terrorism’ – a concept that only now seems to be getting wider traction. He had seen for himself the impact of sexism within his community, and the most extreme consequences of it in his work as a prosecutor.

His personal challenge was to use the law as it stood as creatively as possible to bring perpetrators to justice and to campaign for changes to address its shortcomings. To do so involved stepping out of the ivory tower of the CPS to forge productive relationships with police, social workers, schools and health professionals. It may not have made him popular in some legal circles, but it worked. We have him to thank for the legislation that made coercive control an offence, among other things.

The Cobbler of Streatham Hill

I’m acutely aware that the Good Guys we have featured so far have by and large been famous and successful people, so here is someone who, by any conventional assessment, is neither of these things.

Picture if you will a small, grimy, cluttered shoe repairers next to a suburban South London station. A few years ago it was spruced up, with a lick of paint , but it didn’t take long for it to revert to its former state.

I’m guessing that’s just the way its owner likes it. The Cobbler of Streatham Hill (C of SH) is something of a wizard, his workshop an enchanted cave in which the variety of shoes awaiting repair shows there is nothing he can’t tackle, from delicate brocade pumps with stilettos a mile high to hobnailed boots.

Twice I’ve taken him shoes in an advanced state of decay (but so beloved I can’t bear to replace them). The first was a beautiful but ancient pair of Camper ankle boots where the leather on the toe had worn through. There was sucking of teeth and frowning, but he said a mate might be able to do something with them. He could, and he did, and the C of SH would not even charge me for them.

The next pair was a pair of John Lewis boys’ ‘Doc Martens-alikes’ so down at heel they were distorting my gait. They had the kind of rubber heel and sole combined that I assumed couldn’t be repaired, but our man devised a clever infill and I’m striding out in them again.

The French philosopher Pascal once said that the world’s troubles were caused by ‘man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.’ Well, the C of SH goes one better: he sits in a room quietly alone and mends shoes – brilliantly.

Jesse Eisenberg

I really only went to see A Real Pain because it was a chance to meet up with a friend before she went up north for a few weeks. (At some level I have continued to associate Jesse Eisenberg with Mark Zuckerberg.) It horrifies me now to think that I nearly missed seeing it.

This film is a still, small voice against the ugliness prevailing in the US at the moment. Described somewhat reductively on Wikipedia as a buddy comedy, A Real Pain explores so many issues: the migrant experience, how to grieve, faith, identity… Jesse Eisenberg is the writer, director and lead actor, and he has pulled off an incredible coup. I had to know more.

His parents have impeccable liberal credentials, and Eisenberg himself was hugely influenced by his mother’s disciplined approach to her work as a clown.  He took refuge in performing as a way of escaping the anxiety he has suffered since childhood. I fear his pain is our gain. His capacity to empathise is the foundation on which A Real Pain rests. Contrast this with Musk’s claim that ‘the fundamental weakness of Western civilisation is empathy.’ (To be scrupulously fair, he did qualify this view in the interview in question, but his actions suggest that he endorses it wholeheartedly.)

It will not surprise you to learn that Eisenberg is heavily involved in philanthropic work, including funding a domestic violence shelter, awareness-raising for UNHCR, contributing his time, money and skills to various arts partnerships – and a lot more.

If you haven’t seen A Real Pain yet, I urge you to do so. I laughed, I cried, I reflected… and I’m still haunted by the closing moments.