During Key's doubtful reign in NZ politics, a commentator/moderator on the Standard, blip, compiled a very long list of all Key's lies and half truths.
Is it time someone did the same for Luxon's gaffes and walkbacks?
I’ll start the ball rolling, his very first action as LOTO:
1. a 200 metre ride in a hired limo to parliament.
I quite like Morgan Godfrey's writing, though I'm getting serious Piggy Muldoon (or is it John Lithgow?) vibes from his picture. Not a criticism, just an ob. On ya Morgan ❤️
He gets a piece in the Guardian, which drives a lot of righties nuts and he (usually) offers a genuine left wing perspective. And he isn't that mind bendingly smug liberal centrist Danyl Mclauchlan, so there is that.
I quite like him actually, he seems pretty on point most of the time. His commentary comes across as sensible and non-confrontational, a bit like Brian Easton's. I know he gets up Bomber Bradbury's nose, but who doesn't.
The whole TDB schtick is to provide a platform for fringe merchants, perennial protestors and the bitter to indiscriminately target anyone they think is in the "establishment" with the use often of abusive language. If you were to (for example) replace in one of Bradbury's rants "professional middle class" with "Jewish bankers" it would be indistinguishable from hate speech. That is why he doth protesteth too much at hate speech legislation – Bradbury knows he crosses the line into appalling online bullying and abuse all the time and he'd ne totally in the crosshairs of a regulator.
Rather like a unicorn hunt, eh? People think it exists, but evidence seems impossible to find. Perhaps we can see proposed law reforms as akin to the envelope of possibilities used by physicists. In this analogy enacting legislation collapses the wave function.
Hipkins played his tough hand with that purge. Not quite as tough as Stalin's purges of the 1930s, but enough to show that relentless controlling of deviant tendencies remains part of left-wing political praxis. The pc crowd yielded in instant submission, apparently. There's been a noticeable lack of rabble marching in the streets calling for the downfall of Hipkins in consequence.
Give people a focus and a licence to hate, saturate social media with ugly transphobe and 'groomer' and 'mutilator' memes, and this is what happens. Comment under a NZ social media post about the 9yo accused of being trans: 'my daughter's already been hassled in toilets because she has short hair'. Thanks, Posie Parker.
No – that is what you get when aggressive gender ideologists demand the complete removal of all safeguarding for women and children, the removal of any and all of the sex based rights and protections women fought for over the last couple of centuries, deny the very existence of same sex attraction, and promote the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of neurodiverse and same sex attracted children.
If you look at the facts, in the US and UK, GC activists and christian extremists, have advocated against, then stripped away, existing legal rights from the trans community.
[please name the laws that have been changed in the US, and the UK, that remove rights from trans people. Be specific to the laws and provide back up in the form of links. You are possibly right about the US, I don’t think you are right about the UK, but we need the details of what you are meaning so that we can respond meaningfully and not descend into SM tit for tat. Thanks – weka]
The patriarchy rolls on it seems…to paraphrase comedian Ricky Gervais…“are you into old school women with uteruses or the trendy new ones with cocks and balls?…”
Politicised Lesbian women are some of the staunchest allies in class battles I have ever met in a lengthy career, “non men” is blatant misogyny and misuse of language and meaning.
I support all exploited and oppressed people in our capitalist society on a class left basis. I defend the rights of trans people to live their lives unharrassed, and I also support the 50% of the population–women–having their own spaces and hard fought for rights defended.
Some trans activists are playing a classic divisive card politically. In all but a tiny number of people, in terms of chromosomes, Trans women are trans women and women are women. As Scientific American put it in 2021 “An individual should not need to justify their gender identity any more than someone would need to justify their eye color.” It is more realised now that gender is a social construct that is evolving. Back in the 70s it was common for males like me with long hair to get…“what is it…a boy or a girl…” type comments.
Non trans should respect trans rights and vice versa is what it comes down to.
Sorry, but in "terms of chromosomes", "trans women" are XY – they are men. They may state that they have a special identity – an "gendered soul" which makes them not a man, but the truth is still in every drop of their blood.
Their "gender identity" is certainly a social construct in that it is an identification with a set of sexist stereotypes usually reserved for the opposite sex. They can certainly call themselves what they want – the test is whether or not they are legally entitled to any and every one of the rights which women have gained in society.
I did not make my self clear enough perhaps, yes they are genetically men except in a tiny number of cases contested by various scientists over the internet–but they consider themselves women. Which is why I counterposed trans women to women–two different beings–one self identified, but in reality both able to be confirmed by DNA.
The problem with this is that DSD's (Differences of Sex Development) have nothing to do with transgenderism, and are just variations on male or variations on female. This is demonstrated by the fact that those that are fertile (and many are not) produce either sperm or eggs. There are no additional gametes and therefore no additional sexes.
They fall in to about 40 different medical syndromes which are detectable by a chromosome test.
The weaponisation of these conditions to support gender ideology does nobody any good.
It depended on what circles you moved in really, and geography played a role too. Androgynous people certainly had their fans among teens “in my day”–it’s still my day of course or would not bother commenting!
There were always trans and gays around but it was more an underground and nightlife scene apart from cultural events and maybe widened in the 80s with the gay focused clubs and public fight for Homosexual Law Reform.
I guess the shift from working for mainstream acceptance to the confrontations of recent years with some trans activists has partly been down to…
• the medicalisation and profit motive in gender issues in the 21st century
• Neo liberal individualism–me me me–has trumped collective ways to some extent and emphasised identity
• Post Modernist philosophy where anything can mean anything, as opposed to existentialism and materialism where there can be agreed terms even among opponents
• Social Media–half the world now seems to have brains like busted mirrors and hooked on a massive 24/7 info flow rather than making time for reflection and learning.
weka, why does Visubversa, who does not quote any references to rebut my original links (which are to well balanced and factual media reporting) not get this same moderator comment from you?
CNN give a thorough account of the categories of anti-trans and anti-gay bills presented to US state legislatures in the past 5 years. Over 417 alone, a huge jump, were introduced just this year til April. Of those, 15 States had passed legislation by April.
In the UK, the overide by the UK government of self-id legislation passed by the devolved Scottish Parliament last year is a removal of trans rights. And Kemi Badenoch has signalled she will change the UK Human Rights Act 2010 to remove existing trans rights. As the UK has no self-id law, this will apply to all trans women who have had those rights for more than a decade. Qcic.
I followed that CNN link and it took me down a rabbit hole where I found no explanations of the legislations, or what they do. You also didn’t say. There was this,
Senate Bill 16, which the governor signed a day after it was sent to his desk by the Utah Legislature, prohibits health care providers from “providing a hormonal transgender treatment to new patients who were not diagnosed with gender dysphoria before a certain date” and prohibits them from “performing sex characteristic surgical procedures on a minor for the purpose of effectuating a sex change.”
It also directs the Utah Department of Health and Human Services to conduct a “systematic review of the medical evidence regarding hormonal transgender treatments.”
I did find a reference to Senate Bill 16 (Utah), unfortunately I can’t get the link to load, so I’ll come back to this https://le.utah.gov/~2023/bills/static/SB0016.html On the face of it, I’m guessing that stopping experimental surgeries on teens is good idea, and I will come back to this with explanation and links too.
The second bit in the quote about Utah, “systematic review of the medical evidence regarding hormonal transgender treatments.”, is consistent with many other countries, including NZ. This has been well covered on TS in posts and comments over a long time, links below.
I cannot see a problem with mandating such a review in law, and I fail to see how reviewing medical practice has “stripped away, existing legal rights from the trans community.” It will in fact protect trans people from overmedicalisation and medical negligence, as well as protecting children and teens that have been coralled into a medical model path of gender non-conformity that has already harmed many. Again, links below.
From my perspective, the CNN link is relatively useless. What it does is repeat gender ideology talking points and link to other CNN pages based in the same. It doesn’t name specific legislation, explain what the legislation is, and explain how this negatively impacts on trans people.
I can only assume that this is the kind of material you are reading and that you too don’t know the answers to those things but have just adopted a general, vague opinion that all these Bills are bad for trans people.
I have no doubt that some of the legislation is. I also believe that the US is in a conservative backlash against trans people.
However for robust debate here we need facts to work with not ideological position statements. Myself, I want to know what’s in the legislation so that I can understand both the nature of the backlash, but also the central dynamic of why so many people are joining the the conservatives on this, almost surely because they don’t agree with minors transitioning in the way that is currently happening (overmedicalisation, surgical experimentation), and they don’t agree with the kind of material being taught to kids (age inappropriate).
The links in the next comment are akin to your CNN link and require you do the reading and parsing and figuring it all out. I want to demonstrate just how disrespectful that is to TS and mods here. I’ll let you out of premod, but I will make a note in the back end, because my patience isn’t limitless on this. Next time you make an assertion of fact I will expect specific details. That means an explanation by you, and then quotes and links to back that up. It doesn’t mean dropping links and expecting others to do a lot of reading to try and parse your point.
Did you even bother to read the entirely factual CNN article, weka? It factually enumerates ALL categories of anti trans and antigay legislation proposed in the US.
To cherrypick a single aspect that you want to emphasise and to ignore the many other elements of anti-trans laws: the anti-education, anti-drag in public, and removal of affirming medical care for all trans people, not just children? That doesn't negate the facts in the CNN article.
I provided factual articles as requested. When will you chase up Visubversa? Qcic.
Trans people are moving out of Florida and Texas because they rightfully fear for their safety and future.
[you made the claim of fact that existing legal rights from trans people had been stripped away in the US and the UK.
The onus is on you to make your argument and provide evidence for that when asked.
Links are insufficient on their own.
It’s not up to me as a moderator to use my own time to read a lot of material in order to parse your points. Or other comnenters. I’ve already explained the problems with the CNN link (it doesn’t appear to support what you claimed).
In order to back up your claim that existing legal rights from trans people had been stripped away in the US and the UK you need to do three things,
explain in your own words what the legislation is ie name the Bill and describe what it does
provide quotes to back that up
link to where you got the quotes from.
If that information is in the CNN link, you can use that, but you still have to explain, quote as well as link. Otherwise, please do the work to find the material and bring it to the table.
In the UK, the overide by the UK government of self-id legislation passed by the devolved Scottish Parliament last year is a removal of trans rights. And Kemi Badenoch has signalled she will change the UK Human Rights Act 2010 to remove existing trans rights. As the UK has no self-id law, this will apply to all trans women who have had those rights for more than a decade. Qcic.
So no existing rights of trans people have been removed in the UK.
The first example was to prevent self-ID law that would remove women's sex based rights.
Re the second example, what rights specifically will be removed.
Please explain because all you are doing is still making vague declarations and expecting others to read your links and parse what you mean. You've been here long enough to know that's not how it works.
Totally agree. My point is that the reason this is so prevalent and encouraged online, is that when people hate each other they want to spend more time (and money) in their alt worlds, online. And when people hate themselves enough, they'll opt for a world where they can escape and be anything they want.
We may think we are immune, but the mighty algs affect us too.
The Biden administration said transgender activist Rose Montoya will not be invited back to the White House following her decision to go topless during the Pride Month event on the South Lawn.
…
Among the attendees was Montoya, a transgender rights activist who rose to prominence in 2021 for her educational social media content about transgender issues. On Monday, Montoya posted a video to her Instagram and TikTok accounts, recapping the White House picnic. One of the clips showed Montoya holding her bare breasts on the South Lawn.
"[Y]our feckless topless stunt has set us back further! Those of us who have been clawing and fighting for equality will not forgive you," one Instagram user commented under the video.
Of course in a country like the US, with a large religious and conservative population, actions like this are going to prompt a backlash. But it's not just a type of conservatism, lots of people would find it inappropriate socially and politically to do what the TW did. So in addition to the conservatives who hate trans people and want them not to exist, there is another, large group of people who are probably ok with trans people but will absolutely push back against the excesses of gender identity activitism. This is clearly happening in the area of sport, women's spaces, and child social and medical transition.
The elephant on the White House South Lawn of course is autogynephilia, the sexual fetish of some males who get aroused from thinking of themselves as women (or a stereotype of women). I have no idea if Montoya is AGP, and if that was a motivation in their actions, but the fact that AGP is both known to exist, is demonstrated in transgressive ways frequently, and is largely denied by the rainbow community and allies as well as most liberals, politicians and the media class, means that it's always going to be in question.
Once we get to have an open and frank conversation about AGP, things will change. The irony here is that liberals seem conservative in their thinking in their refusal to even acknowledge the existence of AGP. Which means the narratives about AGP are left to the right and to the GC people who think its disgusting and thus tar all trans people with the same brush.
The Right , of course makes absolute hay over that sort of thing. It is not politically sustainable and has real world electoral consequences.
The West Virginia Governors' race was a lot closer until voters were confronted with the sight of a father being dragged out of a School Board meeting for protesting that the Board had lied about the sexual assault of his daughter in a school bathroom by a trans identified male student. The student was later convicted of that assault, and a later one at the next school he was sent to.
The Republican candidate made a lot of noise about it, as did the right wing Press.
liberals don't want to talk about those assaults though. Only some sexual assaults are deemed worthy of consideration. They're literally divvying up which rapists are ok. Nothing to do with the women affected.
And yep, of course conservatives, centrists and quite a few lefties are going to react to that.
Autogynephilia is an antitrans hate word
coined 40 years ago by a researcher whose current twitter feed is pretty gross. His 40 yo theory that transwomen become so by uncontrollable fetishisation of the female body has been elegantly proved to be wrong. The term does have a current narrow meaning. How do I know? I read his paper and downstream research.
Good grief…..that's what you get when you put into legislation some thing that has got no popular support or need, fail to publicise it, then meet any genuine submitters with the most profound rudeness from within the Select Committee, take SUFW to court ot try to stop them having a meeting by calling them a hate group etc etc. Multiply this a 100 times around the world to sell this ideology largely through stealth and outpouring of money by the merchants of sale of drugs & ideology……
Only after all of that above when the women who may be affected finally become aware of the rights they may have lost, and the likes of PP and Sal Grover come along does your 'story' start tWiggle.
I'm fairly certain that debate won't happen – a new entitled autocratic "nobility" have decided the issue is none of our business, and events have proven they are perfectly happy to resort to violence over it.
Our government is in cahoots with them, having ridden roughshod over the greatest number of submissions ever made to an NZ select committee to demonstrate unequivocally that they are accountable to no-one.
And I'm afraid that thuggery is the most generous interpretation applicable to a twenty-year old man breaking an elderly woman's skull to shut her up. The police have a lot of explaining to do.
As does tWiggle – who asserted that we should wait for the outcome of the legal proceedings. Well, the results are not edifying.
We are nursing a generation of vipers. Our Police have forgotten their duty. And the government is away with the fairies.
Incognito will do the moderation on this, but I will explain as well. It's nothing to do with the politics or issues in the world. It's to do with yourbehaviour on TS today.
You seem to think you can be aggressive to someone who you disagree with. You can't. It's really that simple. I'm saying this in part because I want people to see that moderation here isn't partisan on this particular issue. I disagree with tWiggle, but you cannot treat them on TS like you did.
tWiggle isn't responsible for the man who assaulted the elderly woman in Albert Park, anymore than GCFs are responsible for men who attack trans women. It's a bullshit argument on both sides. But here on TS, it's anti social as well. When you do short comments like that that tie a commenter to someone else's violence it's a form of flaming and it's nasty.
I'm pretty sure you've been pulled up on this kind of thing before, so I'm asking you to stop because if you keep doing that kind of behaviour you will get banned. If you don't understand what the issue is here, please ask either of the main mods.
I'm fairly certain that debate won't happen – a new entitled autocratic "nobility" have decided the issue is none of our business, and events have proven they are perfectly happy to resort to violence over it.
All the more reason to maintain the TS robust debate ethic where we argue the politics strongly sans personal attacks.
Indeed, tWiggle cannot be held responsible for those actions of violence nor for the Government, Select Committees, NZ Police, or the outcomes of legal proceedings – you have quite a list there. By creating this imaginary link, you effectively try to make her guilty by association.
Unfortunately, you’re not the only one who behaves this way and it has a negative effect on the discourse here on TS.
I know it can be hard, especially with controversial topics, to separate and disentangle the commenter from their comment(s) and address the contents of their comments in a civil, constructive, and respectful manner. If we cannot do this then we might as well terminate TS, all join SM (or TDB) and yell and blame each other for all societal ills, and what have you.
I don’t believe you no longer believe in healthy debate, so please put your best foot forward or simply take a detour and scroll past if/when you have nothing constructive to add. I don’t think that’s asking too much, is it?
The matters are complex, but holding a position in a debate may require one to defend one's position. tWiggle has been supportive of the person who received diversion up until now. This is inconsistent with an ethical argument that contemporary trans activism deserves support because of victimization, as events have shown that they are aggressors.
tWiggle chooses not to acknowledge that he or she has forfeited the moral high ground. Successful progressive activism is usually careful to distance itself from violence. Trans activism has evidently chosen a different path. Shaming them for such a position is entirely proper.
[I really didn’t expect this needing any more litigation, but apparently you found a piece of rope 🙁
tWiggle has been supportive of the person who received diversion up until now.
Link & verbatim quote required as evidence for your accusation.
tWiggle chooses not to acknowledge that he or she has forfeited the moral high ground.
Nobody here is required to answer any question from another commenter – this is not a Court of Justice. Nobody in their right mind should respond to pig-fucker tactics, as Lprent calls it. tWiggle was wise enough not to take the bait and I’d already modded you 14 min after your comment had appeared and nipped it in the bud.
Comply with this Mod note or retract everything and apologise to tWiggle – Incognito]
Sorry Incog – I have principles – I'll take a year off or whatever while you defend the indefensible.
[I’m sorry too to read your antagonistic response, but I have to uphold the rules & principles of the site.
I was going to give you a medium-short ban for your attack on another commenter, also because you have form with this. I think it would have been easy enough to link & quote to the alleged offending comment by the other commenter if indeed it exists.
However, by adding those last words you implied that I had sided with the other commenter. This is a stupid doubling-down on a baseless and unproven accusation and dragging a Mod through the mud too.
If you change your mind on the latter aspect of your comment I’d consider halving your ban – I can read your comments in the Trash folder after you’ve been banned – the systems dumps them there fully automatically.
Well Stuart not answering your question but I am pondering this…..the Police refused to police, for breaches of the peace, the gathering as everyone was expecting they would, and has happened at protests since Adam was a cowboy.
So they made a choice not to police. Then being confronted with something that could not be ignored they were more or less forced to act to charge a person. According to what I recall on Twitter the police did not actually do the work to identify this person. It was done by a group of citizens and I think Leo Molloy was one.
So having to deal with an issue they did not want to police in the first place, then having the protestor identified by the work of others they then have given diversion. Diversion is not classed as a punishment and is not subject to appeal, as I understand.
'Diversion usually won’t be offered for the following types of offending:
…
other violent offences'
As this was the most serious of the two cases, the other the sauce tipping incident I wonder if the Police are getting out the wet bus ticket for this one also.
On viewing the distinct lack of policing at the time I wondered if the word had gone down somehow from above, it would not have been done in any traceable manner as that would breach the (so-called) independence of the police.
So with the whole incident being an example of the Thugs/Hecklers veto we now the individual thuggish behaviour being excused as well.
I wonder when the Police will take their diversion roadshow to South Auckland where there are families whose sons also commited a one off incident and who will forever face the consequences in job applications and travel? I'm picking never…..
How the pet thug got diversion* and I specifically said I was not answering it…..as it was addressed further up the page to tWiggle, I think, who has not answered.
I seem to recall that we have been over these,
don't answer others posts
no requirement to answer the queries of others
in the Robert G process and, for the first, several times before that.
I don't think we can expect only the person whose comment is being responded to to answer the query. Indeed by only allowing one person to answer one person we would hold up the free flow.
I do not want to traverse the RG issue but you did advise that people were not obliged to answer queries.
I had a view on the thug person and I wanted to express it.
I see tWiggle has exercised their ability not to answer.
I have a fairly good set of ideas about how/why this person got diversion:
high powered lawyers, wealthy family, knowledge of the system, pedastal-puttting of those going to Uni who might be in either the law, med or commerce streams and who might have a reasonable presumption of travelling, or of having to meet good character requirements for post Uni registration……'Just a young person who did not know what he was doing'…..There are other reasons but privilege is a reason this person has got diversion, and stereotyping is the reason that his age peers in South Auckland do not have it offered to them.
Stereotyping is probably why an elderly woman won't get to see justice:
silly issue she was going to see PP about ie rights of women is a silly issue
silly woman anyway…she deserved to have people shouting and assaulting her as she went to Albert Park on a silly issue (similar to when she/her peers were 50 years younger and blamed for wearing clothes, any clothes, and walking at night and being assaulted
Karen a combo of ageism and sexism
PM has/had uttered against PP
Shaneel Lal has/had uttered for the ambush by noise of people attending PP
Firstly, there was no question as such; it was an instruction, an imperative, and a rather problematic and rude one at that. I moderated it yet you completely ignored this and decided to pour more fuel into the flames anyway.
Your references to the other commenters, who are and have been on the receiving end, are misplaced & misguided.
You mention some previous advice and then continue to ignore and even litigate this. Go figure!
The second half of your comment is biased, highly speculative, and merely another reiteration and load of your bilious opinions that add no particular insights nor anything constructive or respectful to the conversation.
If you have views that you want to express here then start a new thread without hijacking one that’s already going up in flames of fury (from another commenter).
This conversation is over and I don’t want to waste more time on it!
This morning I posted two fairly clear examples of news stories, reported factually, in a balanced way, of how transphobic messaging has permeated US and Canada culture (and anectodally NZ culture) to directly affect innocent children. I appear to be under attack about unrelated issues from at least four people because of that post.
The argument seems distill down to 'trans people are responsible because they started it'. Really? Is that even an argument? That completely sidesteps my main point, that transphobic 'free speech' has serious real world consequences, mostly for innocent bystanders.
Does this include speech about the rights of women
to safe spaces, eg prisons, hospital wards
to play sport against peers
I ask as I have seen many responses saying 'thats transphobic' because someone had a different view or wanted to explore how the rights of women can be protected or wanted to be sure that children were protected.
I would have thought these are not transphobic but evidence of a different viewpoint or concern for the rights of others.
To be honest I don't think I have read actual transphobic speech on the Twitter or blogs or columns I read….perhaps we're too good mannered? I've read unmentionable stuff/name calling on the links that Weka has provided a couple of times but that is transpeople name calling others.
These are your examples of "The inevitable end product of stoking anti trans ideas":
Two fairly mild events from the US? (I only mention the US, because you often seem quite preoccupied on location.)
1. A non-recorded, incident of a badly behaved parent at an athletics meet? (I did competitive club athletics from 4 years of age to my early teens, then went back for volunteer work in my twenties. This was a common occurrence in competitions.) This strangely ignores the many emerging stories of women and girls leaving their sports codes because of the intrusion of men, and the distress and direct harm caused to them.
2. Children being children providing their own version of pronouns – "“USA are my pronouns,”?
Do you really blame Kellie Jay Keen (Posie Parker) for these disconnected incidents?
Is she also responsible for the death threats sent in the last couple of days to female MP's in the UK talking about ensuring that sex in the Equalities Act is confirmed as sex NOT gender identity?
LGBT+ acceptance has been trending downwards for the first time in history, for consecutive years now and it's because of radical gender ideology not homophobia.
Traditionally LGBT+ allies and many in the LGBT+ itself are really, really uncomfortable with the radicals and their changes to sexuality and sex.
I've seen more homophobia from the radical trans brigade than I've ever seen from the hard right or the god squad, and unlike the hard right and God squad, the radial gender brigade have the support of media, academia and major political parties.
We've reached a place where despite an onslaught on women's reproductive rights, left wing political leaders won't say the word woman, healthcare providers (apparently too lazy too look a patients notes) call women "birthing parents" "bleeders" "gestational parents" "uterus havers"
As for sexuality, Jesus Christ, out attractions are not just bigoted, we're not same sex attracted anymore we're same gendered, that's why gay men and lesbians are increasingly calling themselves "homosexual", and very quietly, when noones looking most gay and lesbian cis men and women are hurt, upset,angry and increasingly uncomfortable with being attached to a radical group with opposite goals to us, but afraid to say it publicly because we what happens to others who do.
If I was a young person, in a generation with based on test scores, mass illiteracy, I'd be smashing those signs down too and I'd be demanding the teachers teach us how to f***ing read, write and count instead of giving us constant positive vibes and affirmation.
I'm surprised these kids know what a pronoun is!
How can you have Pride month in school when kids cant spell pride or month.
Bravo. Lots of older lesbians are at the forefront of this resistance because we know what a woman is – and what one is not. We will not be force teamed with a bunch of straight people telling us to relearn our sexuality.
But gender ideology is everywhere, and people are forced to give it lip service if they want any public $$$ for their organisations, or to keep their jobs. People are required to signal their fealty to the belief by using the right language, to the point where it is almost instinctive.
If you read the article, the display was produced by students in the local LGBTQ support group, not teachers. I would expect that they put this material together in their out of class time, like any other club, eg, Jewish students club might.
Ben Roberts-Smith is expected to fly into Australia as soon as Wednesday night, where he will face intense scrutiny, after being spotted at a New Zealand airport.
The former SAS corporal was seen in the holiday getaway town of Queenstown on Wednesday afternoon, captured alongside his girlfriend Sarah Matulin checking into a business class flight.
Roberts-Smith was spotted in Wanaka in recent days. A witness who testified in support of the former Seven Network executive in the defamation trial owns a property near the town.
A simple test: here's a story about a gang member in NZ …
He had committed murder … by pressuring a newly deployed and inexperienced [member] to execute an elderly, unarmed [person] in order to “blood the rookie”.
He committed murder by machine-gunning a man with a prosthetic leg, and then took the leg [home] and encouraged his fellow gang members to use it as a novelty drinking vessel.
Outrage and condemnation everywhere, and a very long jail sentence. Deservedly so, I think we can agree.
Caught in a trap of his own devising. Roberts-Smith tried to scare the journalists involved into backing down with the threat of a ruinous defamation case. Instead, a parade of witnesses convincingly confirmed most of the well-researched allegations of the press.
But a bit small-minded to stop him having a holiday. Nothing to do with NZ.
Have been reading about the case for months, thanks. Just making the point that it's an Aussie issue, he's not our problem. I'm sure he's a pos too, but I believe even a pos has a right to a peaceful holiday in a country where his actions have zero relevance.
A civil defamation case is not a court-martial or a criminal case. As I understand it, there was a review in 2020 by the Australian Defense Force of war-crimes by SAS units in Afghanistan, which is when RS was first named in the media.
That review didn't seem to have any consequences for RS, but he took offence at being named, hence the defamation case.
As neither the Defense Force nor the government sanctioned him as a result of that report, it is likely there will only be further consequences for RS, pos (as became very evident in the trial), in the court of public opinion. He has lost money from cancelled appearances, and costs awarded from his trial could be as high as $23mi.
Paul Johnson
@PJTheEconomist
Staggering statistics. Real average weekly earnings are same today as in November 2005.
A completely unprecedented period with no earnings growth. Hard to compare but likely this has not happened over any comparable period since Napoleonic wars.
Tom Clark
@prospect_clark
Long view on today's labour market stats is price-adjusted average pay is down £35/wk since Feb 2008
A drop from £532 to £497 over 182 months' of data
Few would have guessed possible (without a revolution!) — except those who knew the US horror story
After months of National claiming local government spending is the cause of our inflation (when it is worldwide), Callum Purves of the Taxpayer Union now claims it is causing our recession (now we have one with a second negative quarter, albeit only 0.1.)
Why should anyone takes these buffoons seriously?
They want smaller government and more of the economic activity in the private sector (including wealth acquisition by asset purchase), but their misdiagnosis of cause end effect is in the territory of those who blame earthquakes on government social policy.
Today we have yet another example of National saying very different things to different audiences. While Luxon panders to those who grumble about the uppity Mowrees, a National party candidate is just fine with "co-governance":
If we do end up with a National/ACT government, it is inevitable that there will be a major internal row, both within National and between the two right-wing parties. Sadly, few commentators can be bothered to look beyond the horse race and actually consider what happens after the election.
There will be more popcorn days and nights than for any government since the Shipley/Peters bloodbath in 1997-98.
Last year, the Government introduced the Natural and Built Environment Bill to replace the Resource Management Act.
The Bill creates a new framework for how New Zealand manages its natural environment including freshwater, bio-diversity and resources.
Fish & Game is extremely concerned about this Bill and its implications for the sustainable management of our natural environment and the future of game bird hunting and freshwater fishing.
… The Bill also removes the habitat protection of trout and salmon, which has long been safeguarded by the Resource Management Act.
This will fundamentally strip Fish & Game’s ability to carry out our statutory duty to provide for the interests of anglers and hunters, and to ensure freshwater habitats, including wetlands, are healthy and support trout, salmon and game bird populations.
As one of the only remaining independent environmental voices, Fish and Game has stepped into the void created by Forest & Bird swallowing the 1080 Kool-Aid. No good deed goes unpunished, and the government will stamp out dissent by defunding their critics instead of addressing their concerns – shameless autocrats.
Fish and Game are copping it from both sides of the political spectrum.
Forest and Bird aren't too keen on them because F&G are all about protecting introduced predators (trout and salmon) and introduced birds that displace native species.
The agricultural lobby hate F&G's guts because they object to every irrigation consent and have a well funded and professional organisation to do that. In the recent Lindis hearing the farmers went full F&B, arguing that F&G were protecting introduced predators, and harming, not protecting the environment. The judge agreed and pretty much ignored F&G's arguments, so the Lindis continued to get trashed and F&G got no environmental gain for their efforts.
F&G did sfa about preventing the arrival and spread of didimo when it was well identified as a potential threat to our freshwater environment after wreaking havoc in North and South America. It was beyond sad when it turned up in a river frequented by overseas anglers, and then got spread throughout the country. All by F&G members.
F&G got grandfathered into the RMA, and Conservation Act before, to get rid of the old Acclimatiastion Societies, and really their time is well in the past. Freshwater fisheries should be managed the same as saltwater, (but the ideal would be a bit of both current regimes) and come under a government department.
Politically F&G don't seem to have many friends, Labour don't want to know them, National and ACT have to be careful of upsetting farmers, which leaves F&G with Sue Grey's lot.
Can't see this ending well for F&G, it's all their own work.
Labour should bear in mind that F&G have a paid up membership that dwarfs both major parties.
The management of our saltwater fisheries essentially amounts to chronicling their demise – not a good model for anything.
If they munt it, as it seems they would love to do, it will make appreciable holes in both domestic and foreign tourism – one of the only industries to survive the neoliberal putsch of the 80s.
Most of that 'paid up membership' would rather they didn't have to fork out $100+ just for the privilege of going out for few cast occasionally in the vain hope of actually catching a fish. We don't pay to be members of F&G, we pay so we can go fishing and not end up in court. F&G seem to put more effort into checking you've paid your licence than doing anything to enhance the fishery.
DOC administer the Taupo fishery and do a pretty good job, would probably be more efficient if DOC took on the rest of the country as well, since most of the activity, and nearly all the high value stuff, occurs within DOC estate anyway.
F&G are an anachronism, a hangover from the old acclimatisation societies and should be put to rest along with the colonial concept of acclimatisation.
Aside from the headline (do they have sub-editors any more?) – the story itself seems relatively well-balanced. Pointing out that all 3 major leaders (Labour past/present & National) all do this – and that Luxon does it more than the others (even the quoted interview at the bottom, showing the polly using the technique, is Luxon ).
Although it's a bit of fluff, rather than hard-hitting political commentary. Was anyone in any doubt that our political leaders have extensive media training in how to deliver their message and deflect any unwanted questions?
If the only issue is the headline – then this is pretty much a known issue for every media outlet in NZ – where the headline doesn't reflect the story, or is actively misleading.
It's neither surprising nor new that politicians do what they do. Much more concerning is the lack of skill (or will) of the interviewers.
If the non-answer is "look, let me make it clear" followed by meaningless non-clarity, the interviewer should calmly say "I'll ask the question again", and do just that. No need to get in an argument, just ask until it's answered.
Jeremy Paxman once asked the same question 12 times to UK Tory Michael Howard (in 1997 if anyone wants the YouTube clip, all on Google).
With few exceptions, interviewers in the NZ media have maybe one more try and simply move on to their next prepared question. I suspect page one of "Media Training" says "They will soon give up so just waffle and wait".
Oh, I'm not excusing the misleading headline – just pointing out that it's pretty common practice to have a 'shock' headline which doesn't accurately reflect the story. And is done by every main media outlet.
Auckland Transport have started rolling out new HOP card readers around the network and over the next three months, all of them on buses, at train stations and ferry wharves will be replaced. The change itself is not that remarkable, with the new readers looking similar to what is already ...
Completed reads for April: The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling Carnival of Saints, by George Herman The Snow Spider, by Jenny Nimmo Emlyn’s Moon, by Jenny Nimmo The Chestnut Soldier, by Jenny Nimmo Death Comes As the End, by Agatha Christie Lord of the Flies, by ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Have a story to share about St Paul’s, but today just picturesPopular novels written at this desk by a young man who managed to bootstrap himself out of father’s imprisonment and his own young life in a workhouse Read more ...
The list of former National Party Ministers being given plum and important roles got longer this week with the appointment of former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett as the chair of Pharmac. The Christopher Luxon-led Government has now made key appointments to Bill English, Simon Bridges, Steven Joyce, Roger Sowry, ...
Newsroom has a story today about National's (fortunately failed) effort to disestablish the newly-created Inspector-General of Defence. The creation of this agency was the key recommendation of the Inquiry into Operation Burnham, and a vital means of restoring credibility and social licence to an agency which had been caught lying ...
Holding On To The Present:The moment a political movement arises that attacks the whole idea of social progress, and announces its intention to wind back the hands of History’s clock, then democracy, along with its unwritten rules, is in mortal danger.IT’S A COMMONPLACE of political speeches, especially those delivered in ...
Stuck In The Middle With You:As Christopher Luxon feels the hot breath of Act’s and NZ First’s extremists on the back of his neck and, as he reckons with the damage their policies are already inflicting upon a country he’s described as “fragile”, is there not some merit in reaching out ...
The unpopular coalition government is currently rushing to repeal section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act. The clause is Oranga Tamariki's Treaty clause, and was inserted after its systematic stealing of Māori children became a public scandal and resulted in physical resistance to further abductions. The clause created clear obligations ...
Buzz from the Beehive The government’s official website – which Point of Order monitors daily – not for the first time has nothing much to say today about political happenings that are grabbing media headlines. It makes no mention of the latest 1News-Verian poll, for example. This shows National down ...
It Takes A Train To Cry:Surely, there is nothing lonelier in all this world than the long wail of a distant steam locomotive on a cold Winter’s night.AS A CHILD, I would lie awake in my grandfather’s house and listen to the traffic. The big wooden house was only a ...
Packing A Punch: The election of the present government, including in its ranks politicians dedicated to reasserting the rights of the legislature in shaping and determining the future of Māori and Pakeha in New Zealand, should have alerted the judiciary – including its anomalous appendage, the Waitangi Tribunal – that its ...
Dead Woman Walking: New Zealand’s media industry had been moving steadily towards disaster for all the years Melissa Lee had been National’s media and communications policy spokesperson, and yet, when the crisis finally broke, on her watch, she had nothing intelligent to offer. Christopher Luxon is a patient man - but he’s not ...
Chris Trotter writes – New Zealand politics is remarkably easy-going: dangerously so, one might even say. With the notable exception of John Key’s flat ruling-out of the NZ First Party in 2008, all parties capable of clearing MMP’s five-percent threshold, or winning one or more electorate seats, tend ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is ...
Luxon will no doubt put a brave face on it, but there is no escaping the pressure this latest poll will put on him and the government. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political ...
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler In the wake of any unusual weather event, someone inevitably asks, “Did climate change cause this?” In the most literal sense, that answer is almost always no. Climate change is never the sole cause of hurricanes, heat waves, droughts, or ...
Something odd happened yesterday, and I’d love to know if there’s more to it. If there was something which preempted what happened, or if it was simply a throwaway line in response to a journalist.Yesterday David Seymour was asked at a press conference what the process would be if the ...
Hi,From time to time, I want to bring Webworm into the real world. We did it last year with the Jurassic Park event in New Zealand — which was a lot of fun!And so on Saturday May 11th, in Los Angeles, I am hosting a lil’ Webworm pop-up! I’ve been ...
Education Minister Erica Standford yesterday unveiled a fundamental reform of the way our school pupils are taught. She would not exactly say so, but she is all but dismantling the so-called “inquiry” “feel good” method of teaching, which has ruled in our classrooms since a major review of the New ...
Exactly where are we seriously going with this government and its policies? That is, apart from following what may as well be a Truss-Lite approach on the purported economic “plan“, and Victorian-era regression when it comes to social policy.Oh it’ll work this time of course, we’re basically assured, “the ...
Hey Uncle Dave, When the Poms joined the EEC, I wasn't one of those defeatists who said, Well, that’s it for the dairy job. And I was right, eh? The Chinese can’t get enough of our milk powder and eventually, the Poms came to their senses and backed up the ute ...
Polling shows that Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has the lowest approval rating of any mayor in the country. Siting at -12 per cent, the proportion of constituents who disapprove of her performance outweighs those who give her the thumbs up. This negative rating is higher than for any other mayor ...
Buzz from the Beehive Pharmac has been given a financial transfusion and a new chair to oversee its spending in the pharmaceutical business. Associate Health Minister David Seymour described the funding for Pharmac as “its largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff”. ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its ...
TL;DR: Here’s my top 10 ‘pick ‘n’ mix of links to news, analysis and opinion articles as of 10:10am on Monday, April 29:Scoop: The children's ward at Rotorua Hospital will be missing a third of its beds as winter hits because Te Whatu Ora halted an upgrade partway through to ...
span class=”dropcap”>As hideous as David Seymour can be, it is worth keeping in mind occasionally that there are even worse political figures (and regimes) out there. Iran for instance, is about to execute the country’s leading hip hop musician Toomaj Salehi, for writing and performing raps that “corrupt” the nation’s ...
Yesterday marked 10 years since the first electric train carried passengers in Auckland so it’s a good time to look back at it and the impact it has had. A brief history The first proposals for rail electrification in Auckland came in the 1920’s alongside the plans for earlier ...
Right now, in Aotearoa-NZ, our ‘animal spirits’ are darkening towards a winter of discontent, thanks at least partly to a chorus of negative comments and actions from the Government Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on ...
You make people evil to punish the paststuck inside a sequel with a rotating castThe following photos haven’t been generated with AI, or modified in any way. They are flesh and blood, human beings. On the left is Galatea Young, a young mum, and her daughter Fiadh who has Angelman ...
April has been a quiet month at A Phuulish Fellow. I have had an exceptionally good reading month, and a decently productive writing month – for original fiction, anyway – but not much has caught my eye that suggested a blog article. It has been vaguely frustrating, to be honest. ...
A listing of 31 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, April 21, 2024 thru Sat, April 27, 2024. Story of the week Anthropogenic climate change may be the ultimate shaggy dog story— but with a twist, because here ...
Hi,I spent about a year on Webworm reporting on an abusive megachurch called Arise, and it made me want to stab my eyes out with a fork.I don’t regret that reporting in 2022 and 2023 — I am proud of it — but it made me angry.Over three main stories ...
The new Victoria University Vice-Chancellor decided to have a forum at the university about free speech and academic freedom as it is obviously a topical issue, and the Government is looking at legislating some carrots or sticks for universities to uphold their obligations under the Education and Training Act. They ...
Do you remember when Melania Trump got caught out using a speech that sounded awfully like one Michelle Obama had given? Uncannily so.Well it turns out that Abraham Lincoln is to Winston Peters as Michelle was to Melania. With the ANZAC speech Uncle Winston gave at Gallipoli having much in ...
She was born 25 years ago today in North Shore hospital. Her eyes were closed tightly shut, her mouth was silently moving. The whole theatre was all quiet intensity as they marked her a 2 on the APGAR test. A one-minute eternity later, she was an 8. The universe was ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park in collaboration with members from our Skeptical Science team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is Antarctica gaining land ice? ...
Images of US students (and others) protesting and setting up tent cities on US university campuses have been broadcast world wide and clearly demonstrate the growing rifts in US society caused by US policy toward Israel and Israel’s prosecution of … Continue reading → ...
Barrie Saunders writes – Dear Paul As the new Minister of Media and Communications, you will be inundated with heaps of free advice and special pleading, all in the national interest of course. For what it’s worth here is my assessment: Traditional broadcasting free to air content through ...
Many criticisms are being made of the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill, including by this writer. But as with everything in politics, every story has two sides, and both deserve attention. It’s important to understand what the Government is trying to achieve and its arguments for such a bold reform. ...
Peter Dunne writes – The great nineteenth British Prime Minister, William Gladstone, once observed that “the first essential for a Prime Minister is to be a good butcher.” When a later British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, sacked a third of his Cabinet in July 1962, in what became ...
Ele Ludemann writes – New Zealanders had the OECD’s second highest tax increase last year: New Zealanders faced the second-biggest tax raises in the developed world last year, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) says. The intergovernmental agency said the average change in personal income tax ...
We all know something’s not right with our elections. The spread of misinformation, people being targeted with soundbites and emotional triggers that ignore the facts, even the truth, and influence their votes.The use of technology to produce deep fakes. How can you tell if something is real or not? Can ...
This video includes conclusions of the creator climate scientist Dr. Simon Clark. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any). This year you will be lied to! Simon Clark helps prebunk some misleading statements you'll hear about climate. The video includes ...
It is all very well cutting the backrooms of public agencies but it may compromise the frontlines. One of the frustrations of the Productivity Commission’s 2017 review of universities is that while it observed that their non-academic staff were increasing faster than their academic staff, it did not bother to ...
Buzz from the Beehive Two speeches delivered by Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters at Anzac Day ceremonies in Turkey are the only new posts on the government’s official website since the PM announced his Cabinet shake-up. In one of the speeches, Peters stated the obvious: we live in a troubled ...
1. Which of these would you not expect to read in The Waikato Invader?a. Luxon is here to do business, don’t you worry about thatb. Mr KPI expects results, and you better believe itc. This decisive man of action is getting me all hot and excitedd. Melissa Lee is how ...
…it has a restricted jurisdiction which must not be abused: it is not an inquisitionNOTE – this article was published before the High Court ruled that Karen Chhour does not have to appear before the Waitangi Tribunal Gary Judd writes – The High Court ...
Lindsay Mitchell writes – One of reasons Oranga Tamariki exists is to prevent child neglect. But could the organisation itself be guilty of the same?Oranga Tamariki’s statistics show a decrease in the number and age of children in care. “There are less children ...
David Farrar writes: Graeme Edgeler wrote in 2017: In the first five years after three strikes came into effect 5248 offenders received a ‘first strike’ (that is, a “stage-1 conviction” under the three strikes sentencing regime), and 68 offenders received a ‘second strike’. In the five years prior to ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has surprised everyone with his ruthlessness in sacking two of his ministers from their crucial portfolios. Removing ministers for poor performance after only five months in the job just doesn’t normally happen in politics. That’s refreshing and will be extremely ...
TL;DR: These are the six things that stood out to me in news and commentary on Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the two days to 6:06am on Thursday, April 25:Politics: PM Christopher Luxon has set up a dual standard for ministerial competence by demoting two National Cabinet ministers while leaving also-struggling ...
Hi,Today I mainly want to share some of your thoughts about the recent piece I wrote about success and failure, and the forces that seemingly guide our lives. But first, a quick bit of housekeeping: I am doing a Webworm popup in Los Angeles on Saturday May 11 at 2pm. ...
It is hard to see what Melissa Lee might have done to “save” the media. National went into the election with no public media policy and appears not to have developed one subsequently. Lee claimed that she had prepared a policy paper before the election but it had been decided ...
Open access notablesIce acceleration and rotation in the Greenland Ice Sheet interior in recent decades, Løkkegaard et al., Communications Earth & Environment:In the past two decades, mass loss from the Greenland ice sheet has accelerated, partly due to the speedup of glaciers. However, uncertainty in speed derived from satellite products ...
Buzz from the Beehive A statement from Children’s Minister Karen Chhour – yet to be posted on the Government’s official website – arrived in Point of Order’s email in-tray last night. It welcomes the High Court ruling on whether the Waitangi Tribunal can demand she appear before it. It does ...
Mr Bombastic:Ironically, the media the academic experts wanted is, in many ways, the media they got. In place of the tyrannical editors of yesteryear, advancing without fear or favour the interests of the ruling class; the New Zealand news media of today boasts a troop of enlightened journalists dedicated to ...
It's hard times try to make a livingYou wake up every morning in the unforgivingOut there somewhere in the cityThere's people living lives without mercy or pityI feel good, yeah I'm feeling fineI feel better then I have for the longest timeI think these pills have been good for meI ...
In 1974, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in United States v. Nixon, finding that the President was not a King, but was subject to the law and was required to turn over the evidence of his wrongdoing to the courts. It was a landmark decision for the rule ...
Every day now just seems to bring in more fresh meat for the grinder.In their relentlessly ideological drive to cut back on the “excessive bloat” (as they see it) of the previous Labour-led government, on the mountains of evidence accumulated in such a short period of time do not ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Megan Valére SosouMarket gardening site of the Itchèléré de Itagui agricultural cooperative in Dassa-Zoumè (Image credit: Megan Valère Sossou) For the residents of Dassa-Zoumè, a city in the West African country of Benin, choosing between drinking water and having enough ...
Buzz from the Beehive Melissa Lee – as may be discerned from the screenshot above – has not been demoted for doing something seriously wrong as Minister of ...
Morning in London Mother hugs beloved daughter outside the converted shoe factory in which she is living.Afternoon in London Travelling writer takes himself and his wrist down to A&E, just to be sure. Read more ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – The recent announcement of the University Advisory Group, chaired by Sir Peter Gluckman, makes very clear where the Government’s focus and priorities lie. The remit of the Advisory Group is that Group members will consider challenges and opportunities for improvement in the university sector including: ...
Eric Crampton writes – The Reserve Bank of New Zealand desperately wants to find reasons to have workstreams in climate change. It makes little sense. They’ve run another stress test on the banks looking to see if they could find a prudential regulation case. They couldn’t. They ...
Rob MacCullough writes – Pundits from the left and the right are arguing that National’s Fast Track Bill that is designed to speed up infrastructure decisions could end up becoming mired in a cesspool of corruption. Political commentator ...
Looking at the headlines this morning it’s hard to feel anything other than pessimistic about the future of humanity.Note that I’m not speaking about the future of mankind, but the survival of our humanity. The values that we believe in seem to be ebbing away, by the day.Perhaps every generation ...
Swabbing mixed breed baby chicks to test for avian influenzaUh oh. Bird flu – often deadly to humans – is not only being transmitted from infected birds to dairy cows, but is now travelling between dairy cows. As of last Friday, Bloomberg News reports, there were 32 American dairy herds ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
What is it with the mining industry? Its not enough for them to pillage the earth - they apparently can't even be bothered getting resource consent to do so: The proponent behind a major mine near the Clutha River had already been undertaking activity in the area without a ...
This afternoon’s interim Waitangi Tribunal report must be taken seriously as it affects our most vulnerable children, Labour children’s spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime. ...
Te Pāti Māori are demanding the New Zealand Government support an international independent investigation into mass graves that have been uncovered at two hospitals on the Gaza strip, following weeks of assault by Israeli troops. Among the 392 bodies that have been recovered, are children and elderly civilians. Many of ...
Our two-tiered system for veterans’ support is out of step with our closest partners, and all parties in Parliament should work together to fix it, Labour veterans’ affairs spokesperson Greg O’Connor said. ...
Stripping two Ministers of their portfolios just six months into the job shows Christopher Luxon’s management style is lacking, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said. ...
Tonight’s court decision to overturn the summons of the Children’s Minister has enabled the Crown to continue making decisions about Māori without evidence, says Te Pāti Māori spokesperson for Children, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “The judicial system has this evening told the nation that this government can do whatever they want when ...
It appears Nicola Willis is about to pull the rug out from under the feet of local communities still dealing with the aftermath of last year’s severe weather, and local councils relying on funding to build back from these disasters. ...
The Government is making short-sighted changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that will take away environmental protection in favour of short-term profits, Labour’s environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
Labour welcomes the release of the report into the North Island weather events and looks forward to working with the Government to ensure that New Zealand is as prepared as it can be for the next natural disaster. ...
The Labour Party has called for the New Zealand Government to recognise Palestine, as a material step towards progressing the two-State solution needed to achieve a lasting peace in the region. ...
Some of our country’s most important work, stopping the sexual exploitation of children and violent extremism could go along with staff on the frontline at ports and airports. ...
The Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill will give projects such as new coal mines a ‘get out of jail free’ card to wreak havoc on the environment, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The government's decision to reintroduce Three Strikes is a destructive and ineffective piece of law-making that will only exacerbate an inherently biased and racist criminal justice system, said Te Pāti Māori Justice Spokesperson, Tākuta Ferris, today. During the time Three Strikes was in place in Aotearoa, Māori and Pasifika received ...
Cuts to frontline hospital staff are not only a broken election promise, it shows the reckless tax cuts have well and truly hit the frontline of the health system, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
The Green Party has joined the call for public submissions on the fast-track legislation to be extended after the Ombudsman forced the Government to release the list of organisations invited to apply just hours before submissions close. ...
New Zealand’s good work at reducing climate emissions for three years in a row will be undone by the National government’s lack of ambition and scrapping programmes that were making a difference, Labour Party climate spokesperson Megan Woods said today. ...
More essential jobs could be on the chopping block, this time Ministry of Education staff on the school lunches team are set to find out whether they're in line to lose their jobs. ...
Te Pāti Māori is disgusted at the confirmation that hundreds are set to lose their jobs at Oranga Tamariki, and the disestablishment of the Treaty Response Unit. “This act of absolute carelessness and out of touch decision making is committing tamariki to state abuse.” Said Te Pāti Māori Oranga Tamariki ...
The Government is trying to bring in a law that will allow Ministers to cut corners and kill off native species, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said. ...
Cancelling urgently needed new Cook Strait ferries and hiking the cost of public transport for many Kiwis so that National can announce the prospect of another tunnel for Wellington is not making good choices, Labour Transport Spokesperson Tangi Utikere said. ...
A laundry list of additional costs for Tāmaki Makarau Auckland shows the Minister for the city is not delivering for the people who live there, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, and Mema Paremata mō Tāmaki-Makaurau, Takutai Tarsh Kemp, will travel to the Gold Coast to strengthen ties with Māori in Australia next week (15-21 April). The visit, in the lead-up to the 9th Australian National Kapa haka Festival, will be an opportunity for both ...
The Green Party has today launched a step-by-step guide to help New Zealanders make their voice heard on the Government’s democracy dodging and anti-environment fast track legislation. ...
The National Government’s proposed changes to the Residential Tenancies Act will mean tenants can be turfed from their homes by landlords with little notice, Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said. ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson is calling on all parties to support a common-sense change that’s great for the planet and great for consumers after her member’s bill was drawn from the ballot today. ...
There are heartening signs that the extractive sector is once again becoming an attractive prospect for investors and a source of economic prosperity for New Zealand, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. “The beginnings of a resurgence in extractive industries are apparent in media reports of the sector in the past ...
The return of the historic Ō-Rākau battle site to the descendants of those who fought there moved one step closer today with the first reading of Te Pire mō Ō-Rākau, Te Pae o Maumahara / The Ō-Rākau Remembrance Bill. The Bill will entrust the 9.7-hectare battle site, five kilometres west ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has announced 25 new high-speed EV charging hubs along key routes between major urban centres and outlined the Government’s plan to supercharge New Zealand’s EV infrastructure. The hubs will each have several chargers and be capable of charging at least four – and up to 10 ...
The coalition Government will not proceed with the previous Government’s plans to regulate residential property managers, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I have written to the Chairperson of the Social Services and Community Committee to inform him that the Government does not intend to support the Residential Property Managers Bill ...
The Government has announced an independent review into the disability support system funded by the Ministry of Disabled People – Whaikaha. Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston says the review will look at what can be done to strengthen the long-term sustainability of Disability Support Services to provide disabled people and ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has attended the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva and outlined the Government’s plan to restore law and order. “Speaking to the United Nations Human Rights Council provided us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while responding to issues and ...
Trade Minister Todd McClay heads overseas today for high-level trade talks in the Gulf region, and a key OECD meeting in Paris. Mr McClay will travel to Riyadh to meet with counterparts from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). “New Zealand’s goods and services exports to the Gulf region ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford has outlined six education priorities to deliver a world-leading education system that sets Kiwi kids up for future success. “I’m putting ambition, achievement and outcomes at the heart of our education system. I want every child to be inspired and engaged in their learning so they ...
The new NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) App is a secure ‘one stop shop’ to provide the services drivers need, Transport Minister Simeon Brown and Digitising Government Minister Judith Collins say. “The NZTA App will enable an easier way for Kiwis to pay for Vehicle Registration and Road User Charges (RUC). ...
Whānau with tamariki growing up in emergency housing motels will be prioritised for social housing starting this week, says Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka. “Giving these whānau a better opportunity to build healthy stable lives for themselves and future generations is an essential part of the Government’s goal of reducing ...
Racing Minister Winston Peters has paid tribute to an icon of the industry with the recent passing of Dave O’Sullivan (OBE). “Our sympathies are with the O’Sullivan family with the sad news of Dave O’Sullivan’s recent passing,” Mr Peters says. “His contribution to racing, initially as a jockey and then ...
Assalaamu alaikum, greetings to you all. Eid Mubarak, everyone! I want to extend my warmest wishes to you and everyone celebrating this joyous occasion. It is a pleasure to be here. I have enjoyed Eid celebrations at Parliament before, but this is my first time joining you as the Minister ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour has announced Pharmac’s largest ever budget of $6.294 billion over four years, fixing a $1.774 billion fiscal cliff. “Access to medicines is a crucial part of many Kiwis’ lives. We’ve committed to a budget allocation of $1.774 billion over four years so Kiwis are ...
Hon Paula Bennett has been appointed as member and chair of the Pharmac board, Associate Health Minister David Seymour announced today. "Pharmac is a critical part of New Zealand's health system and plays a significant role in ensuring that Kiwis have the best possible access to medicines,” says Mr Seymour. ...
Hundreds of New Zealand families affected by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) will benefit from a new Government focus on prevention and treatment, says Health Minister Dr Shane Reti. “We know FASD is a leading cause of preventable intellectual and neurodevelopmental disability in New Zealand,” Dr Reti says. “Every day, ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones today attended the official opening of Kaikohe’s new $14.7 million sports complex. “The completion of the Kaikohe Multi Sports Complex is a fantastic achievement for the Far North,” Mr Jones says. “This facility not only fulfils a long-held dream for local athletes, but also creates ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters’ engagements in Türkiye this week underlined the importance of diplomacy to meet growing global challenges. “Returning to the Gallipoli Peninsula to represent New Zealand at Anzac commemorations was a sombre reminder of the critical importance of diplomacy for de-escalating conflicts and easing tensions,” Mr Peters ...
Ambassador Millar, Burgemeester, Vandepitte, Excellencies, military representatives, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen – good morning and welcome to this sacred Anzac Day dawn service. It is an honour to be here on behalf of the Government and people of New Zealand at Buttes New British Cemetery, Polygon Wood – a deeply ...
Distinguished guests - It is an honour to return once again to this site which, as the resting place for so many of our war-dead, has become a sacred place for generations of New Zealanders. Our presence here and at the other special spaces of Gallipoli is made ...
Mai ia tawhiti pamamao, te moana nui a Kiwa, kua tae whakaiti mai matou, ki to koutou papa whenua. No koutou te tapuwae, no matou te tapuwae, kua honoa pumautia. Ko nga toa kua hinga nei, o te Waipounamu, o te Ika a Maui, he okioki tahi me o ...
Paul Goldsmith will take on responsibility for the Media and Communications portfolio, while Louise Upston will pick up the Disability Issues portfolio, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced today. “Our Government is relentlessly focused on getting New Zealand back on track. As issues change in prominence, I plan to adjust Ministerial ...
Recreational catch limits will be reduced in areas of Fiordland and the Chatham Islands to help keep those fisheries healthy and sustainable, Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The lower recreational daily catch limits for a range of finfish and shellfish species caught in the Fiordland Marine Area and ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed an important milestone in New Zealand’s hydrogen future, with the opening of the country’s first network of hydrogen refuelling stations in Wiri. “I want to congratulate the team at Hiringa Energy and its partners K one W one (K1W1), Mitsui & Co New Zealand ...
The coalition Government is delivering on its commitment to improve resource management laws and give greater certainty to consent applicants, with a Bill to amend the Resource Management Act (RMA) expected to be introduced to Parliament next month. RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop has today outlined the first RMA Amendment ...
Overseas models for regulating the oil and gas sector, including their decommissioning regimes, are being carefully scrutinised as a potential template for New Zealand’s own sector, Resources Minister Shane Jones says. The Coalition Government is focused on rebuilding investor confidence in New Zealand’s energy sector as it looks to strengthen ...
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell has today released the Report of the Government Inquiry into the response to the North Island Severe Weather Events. “The report shows that New Zealand’s emergency management system is not fit-for-purpose and there are some significant gaps we need to address,” Mr Mitchell ...
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is today travelling to Europe where he’ll update the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Government’s work to restore law and order. “Attending the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva provides us with an opportunity to present New Zealand’s human rights progress, priorities, and challenges, while ...
Associate Agriculture Minister, Mark Patterson, formally reopened the world’s largest wool processing facility today in Awatoto, Napier, following a $50 million rebuild and refurbishment project. “The reopening of this facility will significantly lift the economic opportunities available to New Zealand’s wool sector, which already accounts for 20 per cent of ...
Hon Andrew Bayly, Minister for Small Business and Manufacturing At the Southland Otago Regional Engineering Collective (SOREC) Summit, 18 April, Dunedin Ngā mihi nui, Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Ko Whanganui aho Good Afternoon and thank you for inviting me to open your summit today. I am delighted ...
The Government is delivering on its commitment to bring back the Three Strikes legislation, Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee announced today. “Our Government is committed to restoring law and order and enforcing appropriate consequences on criminals. We are making it clear that repeat serious violent or sexual offending is not ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today announced four new diplomatic appointments for New Zealand’s overseas missions. “Our diplomats have a vital role in maintaining and protecting New Zealand’s interests around the world,” Mr Peters says. “I am pleased to announce the appointment of these senior diplomats from the ...
New Zealand is contributing NZ$7 million to support communities affected by severe food insecurity and other urgent humanitarian needs in Ethiopia and Somalia, Foreign Minister Rt Hon Winston Peters announced today. “Over 21 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance across Ethiopia, with a further 6.9 million people ...
Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Paul Goldsmith is congratulating Mataaho Collective for winning the Golden Lion for best participant in the main exhibition at the Venice Biennale. "Congratulations to the Mataaho Collective for winning one of the world's most prestigious art prizes at the Venice Biennale. “It is good ...
The Government is reforming financial services to improve access to home loans and other lending, and strengthen customer protections, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly and Housing Minister Chris Bishop announced today. “Our coalition Government is committed to rebuilding the economy and making life simpler by cutting red tape. We are ...
“China remains a strong commercial opportunity for Kiwi exporters as Chinese businesses and consumers continue to value our high-quality safe produce,” Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay says. Mr McClay has returned to New Zealand following visits to Beijing, Harbin and Shanghai where he met ministers, governors and mayors and engaged in trade and agricultural events with the New ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has completed a successful trip to Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, deepening relationships and capitalising on opportunities. Mr Luxon was accompanied by a business delegation and says the choice of countries represents the priority the New Zealand Government places on South East Asia, and our relationships in ...
New Zealand is demonstrating its commitment to reducing global greenhouse emissions, and supporting clean energy transition in South East Asia, through a contribution of NZ$41 million (US$25 million) in climate finance to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-led Energy Transition Mechanism (ETM). Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced ...
The Government is today releasing a list of organisations who received letters about the Fast-track applications process, says RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop. “Recently Ministers and agencies have received a series of OIA requests for a list of organisations to whom I wrote with information on applying to have a ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today announced the appointment of Wellington Barrister David Jonathan Boldt as a Judge of the High Court, and the Honourable Justice Matthew Palmer as a Judge of the Court of Appeal. Justice Boldt graduated with an LLB from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990, and also holds ...
Education Minister Erica Stanford will lead the New Zealand delegation at the 2024 International Summit on the Teaching Profession (ISTP) held in Singapore. The delegation includes representatives from the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) Te Wehengarua and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) Te Riu Roa. The summit is co-hosted ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland A bright Eta Aquariid meteor photobombed this photo of comet C/2020 F8 (SWAN) in May 2020.Jonti Horner Meteors – commonly known as shooting stars – can be seen on any night of the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Flannery, Honorary fellow, The University of Melbourne Shutterstock Current concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in Earth’s atmosphere are unprecedented in human history. But CO₂ levels today, and those that might occur in coming decades, did occur millions of years ago. ...
Winston Peters has been keen to dismiss speculation on our involvement in Aukus but will give a speech tonight on the direction of our foreign policy, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Usmar, Lecturer in Critical Media Literacies, Auckland University of Technology Getty Images With the coalition government’s ban of student mobile phones in New Zealand schools coming into effect this week, reaction has ranged from the sceptical (kids will just get ...
A new report on protecting journalism and democracy in New Zealand recommends a levy be charged on global platforms like Facebook and Google to fund media firms undertaking public interest reporting. It also calls for the reinstatement of a powerful Broadcasting Commission to distribute public funding for journalism and other ...
On International Workers' Day, also known as May Day, the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi and the wider union movement are celebrating the proud history of the labour movement during a tough time for working people. ...
From bills to beards, a walk through the former Green co-leader’s time in politics. After close to a decade in politics, James Shaw is preparing to bid farewell to parliament. Tonight will see the former minister deliver his valedictory address, certain to be a speech filled with Shaw’s trademark wit ...
Two months ago, MPs unanimously voted to give themselves a week off in Efeso Collins’ honour. On Tuesday, most were too busy to give even an hour of their time. The day Fa’anānā Efeso Collins died, parliament felt different. In a building that operates at a breakneck pace, everyone stopped ...
India’s election involves hundreds of millions of people and is a months-long affair. Here’s how voting works and what’s at stake.The biggest-ever election in world history started on April 19, with more than 10% of the world’s population eligible to vote. Elections in India, the world’s most populous country ...
“I had just come off the end of a major robbery case which I had been working on for six months when I got a call on the afternoon of September 1, 1992, that some remains had been found at a building site in Devonport, so I drove over with ...
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Comment: Journalists are very good at telling other people’s stories, but they fall well short when writing about their own profession. Perhaps that is why it is so undervalued. Every successive poll on the public’s attitude toward journalism is more alarming than the last. In the last month we have ...
Opinion: A young Māori woman and her Pacific partner arrive at their local hospital by ambulance. She has gone into labour at just under 24 weeks, but the couple haven’t recognised the symptoms – and don’t know the risks of premature birth for their baby. By the time they arrive, ...
Behind closed doors, NZ First will be arguing fiercely against any watering down of the ministerial decision-making powers in the Bill The post Bishop backtracks after fast-track backlash appeared first on Newsroom. ...
Emotional scenes played out in the Invercargill courthouse on the first two days of the coronial inquest into the death of Gore toddler Lachlan Jones, in which the boy’s mother was accused of disposing of her son’s body. The second season of Newsroom’s award-nominated podcast The Boy in the Water ...
Opinion: The impression from the carpark is very inviting. The area is well fenced but barred so there is easy visibility of loved ones. Inside, the spaces are welcoming and clean and staff are friendly and clearly comfortable. I am greeted by ‘Kim’. She has worked here for three years, ...
After the Christchurch earthquake, the then-national civil defence boss compared his experience to “putting a team on the rugby field who have never ever played together before”. Now, eight years later – and following a damning inquiry into the emergency response of cyclones Gabrielle, Hale and the Auckland anniversary weekend floods – ...
Asia Pacific Report A Pacific civil society alliance has condemned French neocolonial policies in Kanaky New Caledonia, saying Paris is set on “maintaining the status quo” and denying the indigenous Kanak people their inalienable right to self-determination. The Pacific Regional Non-Governmental Organisations (PRNGOs) Alliance, representing some 15 groups, said in ...
Koi Tū New Zealand cannot sit back and see the collapse of its Fourth Estate, the director of Koi Tū: The Centre for Informed Futures, Sir Peter Gluckman, says in the foreword of a paper published today. The paper, “If not journalists, then who?” paints a picture of an industry ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Foreign investment proposals with implications for Australia’s strategic or economic security will face tougher scrutiny, under a policy overhaul to be announced by Treasurer Jim Chalmers on Wednesday. At the same time, the government ...
A Waitangi Tribunal inquiry report has warned government that a repeal of Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act could cause harm to children in care. ...
The Treasury has published today three new papers covering government consumption multipliers, automatic stabilisers and the impacts of global shocks on New Zealand’s economy. ...
Asia Pacific Report The Pacific state of Hawai’i’s House of Representatives has joined the state’s Senate in calling for a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza, becoming the first state to pass such a resolution, reports Hawaii News Now. In March, the Senate passed a ceasefire resolution with a 24–1 ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Ferrie, A/Prof, UTS Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Research and ARC DECRA Fellow, University of Technology Sydney PsiQuantum The Australian government has announced a pledge of approximately A$940 million (US$617 million) to PsiQuantum, a quantum computing start-up company based in Silicon Valley. Half ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hunter Bennett, Lecturer in Exercise Science, University of South Australia Cameron Prins/Shutterstock If you spend a lot of time exploring fitness content online, you might have come across the concept of heart rate zones. Heart rate zone training has become more ...
SPECIAL REPORT:By Eugene Doyle He is the most popular Palestinian leader alive today — and yet few people in the West even know his name. Absolutely no one in Gaza or the West Bank does not know him. That difference speaks volumes about who dominates the media narrative that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Will McCallum, PhD Candidate – School of Communication and Creative Arts, Deakin University Earlier this year, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton accused Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of not supporting Operation Sovereign Borders – the military-led border security operation that has “closed Australia’s borders ...
By Melyne Baroi in Port Moresby A Papua New Guinea MP, Peter Isoaimo, who had been ousted by the National Court in an alleged bribery case, has been reinstated by the Supreme Court on appeal. A three-member Supreme Court bench found that the National Court had erred in finding that ...
Publisher Chris Holdaway reflects on the unique project of collecting the work of the late, terrific poet Schaeffer Lemalu. One of the nice things you can do as a truly independent publisher is to make the books that writers want to make, whatever they happen to be. That’s how I’ve ...
Those profiled in the stamp series served on overseas deployments from 1995 onwards, and all have been awarded theNew Zealand Operational Service Medal. ...
Last night’s dismal poll result for the coalition government shows the limits of trying to govern as an opposition, argues Joel MacManus. There’s a quote from the American political activist Barbara Deming: “Vengeance is not the point; change is. But the trouble is that in most people’s minds, the thought ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Shireen Morris, Associate Professor and Director of the Radical Centre Reform Lab at Macquarie University Law School, Macquarie University Leonid Andronov/Shutterstock Foreign interference in Australian democracy poses a growing risk to our national sovereignty. It refers to coercive, corrupt or ...
A defendant charged by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has pleaded guilty to four charges of obtaining by deception in relation to a mortgage fraud scheme. Sentencing has been scheduled for 14 August 2024. ...
What to say when pesky journalists ask gotcha questions like ‘can you name a single book you’ve ever read?’ and ‘did you read it, or did you just see the movie?’This week, Act Party arts spokesperson Todd Stephenson foolishly agreed to an interview with Newsroom’s Steve Braunias regarding his ...
Explainer - What will a ban on cellphones in schools achieve? Can students use them during lunch breaks? And what happens if you need to contact your child? ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jodi Rowley, Curator, Amphibian & Reptile Conservation Biology, Australian Museum, UNSW Sydney Jodi Rowley, CC BY-NC-ND In winter 2021, Australia’s frogs started dropping dead. People began posting images of dead frogs on social media. Unable to travel to investigate the deaths ...
In the year ended March 2024, 0.4 percent of home transfers were to people who didn’t hold New Zealand citizenship or a resident visa, according to figures released by Stats NZ today. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wasay Majid, Research Assistant , University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau New Zealand’s accommodation supplement scheme is facing scrutiny, with Social Development Minister Louise Upston recently saying “there is merit in considering whether the current settings are fair and sustainable long-term”. The ...
By Koroi Hawkins, RNZ Pacific editor The first prime ministerial candidate has been announced in Solomon Islands and it is not Manasseh Sogavare. The man of the hour is Jeremiah Manele, the MP for Hograno/Kia/Havulei constituency in Isabel Province, who served as minister of foreign affairs in the last government. ...
Protesting the removal of bins by leaving piles of your dog’s shit for others to deal with doesn’t make you a hero – it’s precious and entitled behaviour. You haven’t truly lived until you’ve stood on the shoreline of Auckland’s Cheltenham beach, desperately trying to scoop increasingly liquid dog shit ...
Analysis - Christopher Luxon will be alert to the factors driving the dire polling, but won't be waving the white flag just yet, RNZ political editor Jo Moir writes. ...
Writer, teacher and academic Vincent O’Sullivan died on Sunday 28 April. Here we gather tributes from friends, colleagues, and students who remember his extraordinary contributions. I went down to the garage tonight. There was a bird shrieking out in the bush, in the dark, maybe a kākā. Miraculously, through the ...
As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a burnt-out corporate escapee explains how she gets by ‘working as little as possible’. Want to be part of The Cost of Being? Fill out the questionnaire here.Gender: Female Age: 31 Ethnicity: Pākehā Role: Contractor in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Schmidt, Professor of Chemistry, UNSW Sydney Albert Russ / Shutterstock The icebreaker of many a barbeque conversation is something like “what do you do for a crust?” “I teach chemistry at university,” is what we usually reply. Then silence. Our ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Asher Flynn, Associate Professor of Criminology, Monash University Shutterstock Sexual harassment is often considered to be a person-to-person act, but new research shows Australians are also experiencing and perpetrating workplace harassment in large numbers through technology. Our latest study shows one ...
A petition signed by more than 16,500 people, demanding the government take stronger action to halt the genocide of Palestinians by the State of Israel, is being presented to the House of Representatives today by Hon Phil Twyford. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Burnett, Honorary Associate Professor, ANU College of Law, Australian National University jenmartin/Shutterstock April has been a bad month for the Australian environment. The Great Barrier Reef was hit, yet again, by intense coral bleaching. And Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek delayed ...
Winston Peters might not give a ‘rat’s derriere’ about last night’s poll, but it revealed the unusual absence of a honeymoon period and little payoff for the government’s action plan approach, writes Anna Rawhiti-Connell in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marco de Jong, Lecturer, Law School, Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Details released by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet under the Official Information Act reveal New Zealand officials have been considering involvement in AUKUS from the outset. ...
The government's treatment of Māori raised eyebrows, with countries saying New Zealand needed to do more to reduce health, education and justice inequities. ...
The age of criminal responsibility was one of numerous human rights issues raised during Aotearoa New Zealand’s UPR. Other key themes were racism and discrimination, the disproportionate representation of Māori in prison, and to uphold the UN Declaration ...
In a sitdown interview ahead of his final day at Parliament this week, the former Green Party co-leader tells RNZ about his lowest point during 2017's rough election campaign. ...
Is the fringe radio station really in a financial crisis, or is it just running a hyped-up donation drive? Fringe internet radio station Reality Check Radio was launched by the anti-vaccine mandates group Voices for Freedom in March 2023. For the next year, it undertook probably the most aggressive promotional ...
Above the Fold: On Monday, the biggest Māori screen production company faced down the biggest funder of Māori content at the High Court. It was an incredibly tense moment – then, just as quickly, it resolved. Duncan Greive breaks down a strange day in the screen sector.Yesterday morning, Māori ...
During Key's doubtful reign in NZ politics, a commentator/moderator on the Standard, blip, compiled a very long list of all Key's lies and half truths.
Is it time someone did the same for Luxon's gaffes and walkbacks?
I’ll start the ball rolling, his very first action as LOTO:
1. a 200 metre ride in a hired limo to parliament.
2."bottom feeders"
100% Barfly.
I quite like Morgan Godfrey's writing, though I'm getting serious Piggy Muldoon (or is it John Lithgow?) vibes from his picture. Not a criticism, just an ob. On ya Morgan ❤️
He gets a piece in the Guardian, which drives a lot of righties nuts and he (usually) offers a genuine left wing perspective. And he isn't that mind bendingly smug liberal centrist Danyl Mclauchlan, so there is that.
I quite like him actually, he seems pretty on point most of the time. His commentary comes across as sensible and non-confrontational, a bit like Brian Easton's. I know he gets up Bomber Bradbury's nose, but who doesn't.
The whole TDB schtick is to provide a platform for fringe merchants, perennial protestors and the bitter to indiscriminately target anyone they think is in the "establishment" with the use often of abusive language. If you were to (for example) replace in one of Bradbury's rants "professional middle class" with "Jewish bankers" it would be indistinguishable from hate speech. That is why he doth protesteth too much at hate speech legislation – Bradbury knows he crosses the line into appalling online bullying and abuse all the time and he'd ne totally in the crosshairs of a regulator.
Re hate speech legislation, I googled it to ascertain the latest state of the art. Got this Feb update:
Rather like a unicorn hunt, eh? People think it exists, but evidence seems impossible to find. Perhaps we can see proposed law reforms as akin to the envelope of possibilities used by physicists. In this analogy enacting legislation collapses the wave function.
Hipkins played his tough hand with that purge. Not quite as tough as Stalin's purges of the 1930s, but enough to show that relentless controlling of deviant tendencies remains part of left-wing political praxis. The pc crowd yielded in instant submission, apparently. There's been a noticeable lack of rabble marching in the streets calling for the downfall of Hipkins in consequence.
The inevitable end product of stoking anti trans ideas:
a Canadian spectator at a local school athletics meet asks officials to debar a 9yo girl who had a pixie cut, claiming she is a boy or trans
an organised mob of 14 yo US students destroys a Pride week display set up by by other LGBTQ students in their school, chanting 'USA is my pronoun'.
Give people a focus and a licence to hate, saturate social media with ugly transphobe and 'groomer' and 'mutilator' memes, and this is what happens. Comment under a NZ social media post about the 9yo accused of being trans: 'my daughter's already been hassled in toilets because she has short hair'. Thanks, Posie Parker.
Qui bono? The 'metaverse' and its pushers I reckon.
No – that is what you get when aggressive gender ideologists demand the complete removal of all safeguarding for women and children, the removal of any and all of the sex based rights and protections women fought for over the last couple of centuries, deny the very existence of same sex attraction, and promote the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of neurodiverse and same sex attracted children.
If you look at the facts, in the US and UK, GC activists and christian extremists, have advocated against, then stripped away, existing legal rights from the trans community.
[please name the laws that have been changed in the US, and the UK, that remove rights from trans people. Be specific to the laws and provide back up in the form of links. You are possibly right about the US, I don’t think you are right about the UK, but we need the details of what you are meaning so that we can respond meaningfully and not descend into SM tit for tat. Thanks – weka]
What "legal rights" would those be then?
The patriarchy rolls on it seems…to paraphrase comedian Ricky Gervais…“are you into old school women with uteruses or the trendy new ones with cocks and balls?…”
Politicised Lesbian women are some of the staunchest allies in class battles I have ever met in a lengthy career, “non men” is blatant misogyny and misuse of language and meaning.
I support all exploited and oppressed people in our capitalist society on a class left basis. I defend the rights of trans people to live their lives unharrassed, and I also support the 50% of the population–women–having their own spaces and hard fought for rights defended.
Some trans activists are playing a classic divisive card politically. In all but a tiny number of people, in terms of chromosomes, Trans women are trans women and women are women. As Scientific American put it in 2021 “An individual should not need to justify their gender identity any more than someone would need to justify their eye color.” It is more realised now that gender is a social construct that is evolving. Back in the 70s it was common for males like me with long hair to get…“what is it…a boy or a girl…” type comments.
Non trans should respect trans rights and vice versa is what it comes down to.
Sorry, but in "terms of chromosomes", "trans women" are XY – they are men. They may state that they have a special identity – an "gendered soul" which makes them not a man, but the truth is still in every drop of their blood.
Their "gender identity" is certainly a social construct in that it is an identification with a set of sexist stereotypes usually reserved for the opposite sex. They can certainly call themselves what they want – the test is whether or not they are legally entitled to any and every one of the rights which women have gained in society.
I did not make my self clear enough perhaps, yes they are genetically men except in a tiny number of cases contested by various scientists over the internet–but they consider themselves women. Which is why I counterposed trans women to women–two different beings–one self identified, but in reality both able to be confirmed by DNA.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/q-a-mixed-sex-biology/
The problem with this is that DSD's (Differences of Sex Development) have nothing to do with transgenderism, and are just variations on male or variations on female. This is demonstrated by the fact that those that are fertile (and many are not) produce either sperm or eggs. There are no additional gametes and therefore no additional sexes.
They fall in to about 40 different medical syndromes which are detectable by a chromosome test.
The weaponisation of these conditions to support gender ideology does nobody any good.
https://differently-normal.com/2021/10/25/the-invention-of-intersex/
very well put TM.
you might enjoy this thread. It's the 1980s, I wonder how much had changed by then.
https://twitter.com/GrantJupiter/status/1668681538509086724
It depended on what circles you moved in really, and geography played a role too. Androgynous people certainly had their fans among teens “in my day”–it’s still my day of course or would not bother commenting!
There were always trans and gays around but it was more an underground and nightlife scene apart from cultural events and maybe widened in the 80s with the gay focused clubs and public fight for Homosexual Law Reform.
I guess the shift from working for mainstream acceptance to the confrontations of recent years with some trans activists has partly been down to…
• the medicalisation and profit motive in gender issues in the 21st century
• Neo liberal individualism–me me me–has trumped collective ways to some extent and emphasised identity
• Post Modernist philosophy where anything can mean anything, as opposed to existentialism and materialism where there can be agreed terms even among opponents
• Social Media–half the world now seems to have brains like busted mirrors and hooked on a massive 24/7 info flow rather than making time for reflection and learning.
here endeth etc…
mod note. please attend to this before you comment again, thanks.
weka, why does Visubversa, who does not quote any references to rebut my original links (which are to well balanced and factual media reporting) not get this same moderator comment from you?
I’ll be happy to look at that once you have responded to my mod request 👍
CNN give a thorough account of the categories of anti-trans and anti-gay bills presented to US state legislatures in the past 5 years. Over 417 alone, a huge jump, were introduced just this year til April. Of those, 15 States had passed legislation by April.
In the UK, the overide by the UK government of self-id legislation passed by the devolved Scottish Parliament last year is a removal of trans rights. And Kemi Badenoch has signalled she will change the UK Human Rights Act 2010 to remove existing trans rights. As the UK has no self-id law, this will apply to all trans women who have had those rights for more than a decade. Qcic.
thanks.
I followed that CNN link and it took me down a rabbit hole where I found no explanations of the legislations, or what they do. You also didn’t say. There was this,
I did find a reference to Senate Bill 16 (Utah), unfortunately I can’t get the link to load, so I’ll come back to this https://le.utah.gov/~2023/bills/static/SB0016.html On the face of it, I’m guessing that stopping experimental surgeries on teens is good idea, and I will come back to this with explanation and links too.
The second bit in the quote about Utah, “systematic review of the medical evidence regarding hormonal transgender treatments.”, is consistent with many other countries, including NZ. This has been well covered on TS in posts and comments over a long time, links below.
I cannot see a problem with mandating such a review in law, and I fail to see how reviewing medical practice has “stripped away, existing legal rights from the trans community.” It will in fact protect trans people from overmedicalisation and medical negligence, as well as protecting children and teens that have been coralled into a medical model path of gender non-conformity that has already harmed many. Again, links below.
From my perspective, the CNN link is relatively useless. What it does is repeat gender ideology talking points and link to other CNN pages based in the same. It doesn’t name specific legislation, explain what the legislation is, and explain how this negatively impacts on trans people.
I can only assume that this is the kind of material you are reading and that you too don’t know the answers to those things but have just adopted a general, vague opinion that all these Bills are bad for trans people.
I have no doubt that some of the legislation is. I also believe that the US is in a conservative backlash against trans people.
However for robust debate here we need facts to work with not ideological position statements. Myself, I want to know what’s in the legislation so that I can understand both the nature of the backlash, but also the central dynamic of why so many people are joining the the conservatives on this, almost surely because they don’t agree with minors transitioning in the way that is currently happening (overmedicalisation, surgical experimentation), and they don’t agree with the kind of material being taught to kids (age inappropriate).
The links in the next comment are akin to your CNN link and require you do the reading and parsing and figuring it all out. I want to demonstrate just how disrespectful that is to TS and mods here. I’ll let you out of premod, but I will make a note in the back end, because my patience isn’t limitless on this. Next time you make an assertion of fact I will expect specific details. That means an explanation by you, and then quotes and links to back that up. It doesn’t mean dropping links and expecting others to do a lot of reading to try and parse your point.
[commented edited]
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/puberty+blockers/?search_posts=true&search_sortby=date
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/puberty+blockers/?search_comments=true&search_sortby=date
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/Tavistock/?search_posts=true&search_sortby=date
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/tavistock/?search_comments=true&search_sortby=date
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/detrans/?search_posts=true&search_sortby=date
https://thestandard.org.nz/search/detrans/?search_comments=true&search_sortby=date
At least in those links you will find actual explanations of what people are talking about.
Did you even bother to read the entirely factual CNN article, weka? It factually enumerates ALL categories of anti trans and antigay legislation proposed in the US.
To cherrypick a single aspect that you want to emphasise and to ignore the many other elements of anti-trans laws: the anti-education, anti-drag in public, and removal of affirming medical care for all trans people, not just children? That doesn't negate the facts in the CNN article.
I provided factual articles as requested. When will you chase up Visubversa? Qcic.
Trans people are moving out of Florida and Texas because they rightfully fear for their safety and future.
[you made the claim of fact that existing legal rights from trans people had been stripped away in the US and the UK.
The onus is on you to make your argument and provide evidence for that when asked.
Links are insufficient on their own.
It’s not up to me as a moderator to use my own time to read a lot of material in order to parse your points. Or other comnenters. I’ve already explained the problems with the CNN link (it doesn’t appear to support what you claimed).
In order to back up your claim that existing legal rights from trans people had been stripped away in the US and the UK you need to do three things,
If that information is in the CNN link, you can use that, but you still have to explain, quote as well as link. Otherwise, please do the work to find the material and bring it to the table.
mod note.
So no existing rights of trans people have been removed in the UK.
The first example was to prevent self-ID law that would remove women's sex based rights.
Re the second example, what rights specifically will be removed.
Please explain because all you are doing is still making vague declarations and expecting others to read your links and parse what you mean. You've been here long enough to know that's not how it works.
Totally agree. My point is that the reason this is so prevalent and encouraged online, is that when people hate each other they want to spend more time (and money) in their alt worlds, online. And when people hate themselves enough, they'll opt for a world where they can escape and be anything they want.
We may think we are immune, but the mighty algs affect us too.
Then there are things like this,
https://www.newsweek.com/white-house-bars-topless-transgender-influencer-events-pride-lgbtq-1806366
Of course in a country like the US, with a large religious and conservative population, actions like this are going to prompt a backlash. But it's not just a type of conservatism, lots of people would find it inappropriate socially and politically to do what the TW did. So in addition to the conservatives who hate trans people and want them not to exist, there is another, large group of people who are probably ok with trans people but will absolutely push back against the excesses of gender identity activitism. This is clearly happening in the area of sport, women's spaces, and child social and medical transition.
The elephant on the White House South Lawn of course is autogynephilia, the sexual fetish of some males who get aroused from thinking of themselves as women (or a stereotype of women). I have no idea if Montoya is AGP, and if that was a motivation in their actions, but the fact that AGP is both known to exist, is demonstrated in transgressive ways frequently, and is largely denied by the rainbow community and allies as well as most liberals, politicians and the media class, means that it's always going to be in question.
Once we get to have an open and frank conversation about AGP, things will change. The irony here is that liberals seem conservative in their thinking in their refusal to even acknowledge the existence of AGP. Which means the narratives about AGP are left to the right and to the GC people who think its disgusting and thus tar all trans people with the same brush.
The Right , of course makes absolute hay over that sort of thing. It is not politically sustainable and has real world electoral consequences.
The West Virginia Governors' race was a lot closer until voters were confronted with the sight of a father being dragged out of a School Board meeting for protesting that the Board had lied about the sexual assault of his daughter in a school bathroom by a trans identified male student. The student was later convicted of that assault, and a later one at the next school he was sent to.
The Republican candidate made a lot of noise about it, as did the right wing Press.
https://www2.cbn.com/news/us/va-judge-finds-trans-teen-guilty-sexual-assault-loudoun-county-high-school-girls-bathroom?fbclid=IwAR2lUG5PVFm2AbqGhkIJykK1_RZb33NNOnASw0mZ5hC7RyMCwKSJthcTF1I
liberals don't want to talk about those assaults though. Only some sexual assaults are deemed worthy of consideration. They're literally divvying up which rapists are ok. Nothing to do with the women affected.
And yep, of course conservatives, centrists and quite a few lefties are going to react to that.
Autogynephilia is an antitrans hate word
coined 40 years ago by a researcher whose current twitter feed is pretty gross. His 40 yo theory that transwomen become so by uncontrollable fetishisation of the female body has been elegantly proved to be wrong. The term does have a current narrow meaning. How do I know? I read his paper and downstream research.
Good grief…..that's what you get when you put into legislation some thing that has got no popular support or need, fail to publicise it, then meet any genuine submitters with the most profound rudeness from within the Select Committee, take SUFW to court ot try to stop them having a meeting by calling them a hate group etc etc. Multiply this a 100 times around the world to sell this ideology largely through stealth and outpouring of money by the merchants of sale of drugs & ideology……
Only after all of that above when the women who may be affected finally become aware of the rights they may have lost, and the likes of PP and Sal Grover come along does your 'story' start tWiggle.
Now explain to us how your pet thug got diversion.
[Please tone down the level of contempt & aggression, thanks. We can have robust debate without it – Incognito]
Mod note
I'm fairly certain that debate won't happen – a new entitled autocratic "nobility" have decided the issue is none of our business, and events have proven they are perfectly happy to resort to violence over it.
Our government is in cahoots with them, having ridden roughshod over the greatest number of submissions ever made to an NZ select committee to demonstrate unequivocally that they are accountable to no-one.
And I'm afraid that thuggery is the most generous interpretation applicable to a twenty-year old man breaking an elderly woman's skull to shut her up. The police have a lot of explaining to do.
As does tWiggle – who asserted that we should wait for the outcome of the legal proceedings. Well, the results are not edifying.
We are nursing a generation of vipers. Our Police have forgotten their duty. And the government is away with the fairies.
Incognito will do the moderation on this, but I will explain as well. It's nothing to do with the politics or issues in the world. It's to do with your behaviour on TS today.
You seem to think you can be aggressive to someone who you disagree with. You can't. It's really that simple. I'm saying this in part because I want people to see that moderation here isn't partisan on this particular issue. I disagree with tWiggle, but you cannot treat them on TS like you did.
tWiggle isn't responsible for the man who assaulted the elderly woman in Albert Park, anymore than GCFs are responsible for men who attack trans women. It's a bullshit argument on both sides. But here on TS, it's anti social as well. When you do short comments like that that tie a commenter to someone else's violence it's a form of flaming and it's nasty.
I'm pretty sure you've been pulled up on this kind of thing before, so I'm asking you to stop because if you keep doing that kind of behaviour you will get banned. If you don't understand what the issue is here, please ask either of the main mods.
All the more reason to maintain the TS robust debate ethic where we argue the politics strongly sans personal attacks.
I concur with weka.
Indeed, tWiggle cannot be held responsible for those actions of violence nor for the Government, Select Committees, NZ Police, or the outcomes of legal proceedings – you have quite a list there. By creating this imaginary link, you effectively try to make her guilty by association.
Unfortunately, you’re not the only one who behaves this way and it has a negative effect on the discourse here on TS.
I know it can be hard, especially with controversial topics, to separate and disentangle the commenter from their comment(s) and address the contents of their comments in a civil, constructive, and respectful manner. If we cannot do this then we might as well terminate TS, all join SM (or TDB) and yell and blame each other for all societal ills, and what have you.
I don’t believe you no longer believe in healthy debate, so please put your best foot forward or simply take a detour and scroll past if/when you have nothing constructive to add. I don’t think that’s asking too much, is it?
The matters are complex, but holding a position in a debate may require one to defend one's position. tWiggle has been supportive of the person who received diversion up until now. This is inconsistent with an ethical argument that contemporary trans activism deserves support because of victimization, as events have shown that they are aggressors.
tWiggle chooses not to acknowledge that he or she has forfeited the moral high ground. Successful progressive activism is usually careful to distance itself from violence. Trans activism has evidently chosen a different path. Shaming them for such a position is entirely proper.
[I really didn’t expect this needing any more litigation, but apparently you found a piece of rope 🙁
Link & verbatim quote required as evidence for your accusation.
Nobody here is required to answer any question from another commenter – this is not a Court of Justice. Nobody in their right mind should respond to pig-fucker tactics, as Lprent calls it. tWiggle was wise enough not to take the bait and I’d already modded you 14 min after your comment had appeared and nipped it in the bud.
Comply with this Mod note or retract everything and apologise to tWiggle – Incognito]
Mod note
Sorry Incog – I have principles – I'll take a year off or whatever while you defend the indefensible.
[I’m sorry too to read your antagonistic response, but I have to uphold the rules & principles of the site.
I was going to give you a medium-short ban for your attack on another commenter, also because you have form with this. I think it would have been easy enough to link & quote to the alleged offending comment by the other commenter if indeed it exists.
However, by adding those last words you implied that I had sided with the other commenter. This is a stupid doubling-down on a baseless and unproven accusation and dragging a Mod through the mud too.
If you change your mind on the latter aspect of your comment I’d consider halving your ban – I can read your comments in the Trash folder after you’ve been banned – the systems dumps them there fully automatically.
For now, take two months off – Incognito]
Mod note
Well Stuart not answering your question but I am pondering this…..the Police refused to police, for breaches of the peace, the gathering as everyone was expecting they would, and has happened at protests since Adam was a cowboy.
So they made a choice not to police. Then being confronted with something that could not be ignored they were more or less forced to act to charge a person. According to what I recall on Twitter the police did not actually do the work to identify this person. It was done by a group of citizens and I think Leo Molloy was one.
So having to deal with an issue they did not want to police in the first place, then having the protestor identified by the work of others they then have given diversion. Diversion is not classed as a punishment and is not subject to appeal, as I understand.
https://communitylaw.org.nz/community-law-manual/chapter-33-the-criminal-courts/ways-to-stay-out-of-court-diversion-and-restorative-justice/
From the link above
'Diversion usually won’t be offered for the following types of offending:
…
As this was the most serious of the two cases, the other the sauce tipping incident I wonder if the Police are getting out the wet bus ticket for this one also.
On viewing the distinct lack of policing at the time I wondered if the word had gone down somehow from above, it would not have been done in any traceable manner as that would breach the (so-called) independence of the police.
So with the whole incident being an example of the Thugs/Hecklers veto we now the individual thuggish behaviour being excused as well.
I wonder when the Police will take their diversion roadshow to South Auckland where there are families whose sons also commited a one off incident and who will forever face the consequences in job applications and travel? I'm picking never…..
/Intense sarc
What question?
You realise that SM wasn’t addressing you, yes?
How the pet thug got diversion* and I specifically said I was not answering it…..as it was addressed further up the page to tWiggle, I think, who has not answered.
I seem to recall that we have been over these,
in the Robert G process and, for the first, several times before that.
I don't think we can expect only the person whose comment is being responded to to answer the query. Indeed by only allowing one person to answer one person we would hold up the free flow.
I do not want to traverse the RG issue but you did advise that people were not obliged to answer queries.
I had a view on the thug person and I wanted to express it.
I see tWiggle has exercised their ability not to answer.
high powered lawyers, wealthy family, knowledge of the system, pedastal-puttting of those going to Uni who might be in either the law, med or commerce streams and who might have a reasonable presumption of travelling, or of having to meet good character requirements for post Uni registration……'Just a young person who did not know what he was doing'…..There are other reasons but privilege is a reason this person has got diversion, and stereotyping is the reason that his age peers in South Auckland do not have it offered to them.
Stereotyping is probably why an elderly woman won't get to see justice:
I see a number of issues with your comment.
Firstly, there was no question as such; it was an instruction, an imperative, and a rather problematic and rude one at that. I moderated it yet you completely ignored this and decided to pour more fuel into the flames anyway.
You said that you were not answering it, yet that’s exactly what you’re doing here, and rather poorly, may I add (see below). You’re not facilitating ‘the free flow’, you’re diverting away to your own preferred narrative aka block & bridge (https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/491995/what-chris-hipkins-says-when-he-wants-to-change-the-subject).
Your references to the other commenters, who are and have been on the receiving end, are misplaced & misguided.
You mention some previous advice and then continue to ignore and even litigate this. Go figure!
The second half of your comment is biased, highly speculative, and merely another reiteration and load of your bilious opinions that add no particular insights nor anything constructive or respectful to the conversation.
If you have views that you want to express here then start a new thread without hijacking one that’s already going up in flames of fury (from another commenter).
This conversation is over and I don’t want to waste more time on it!
This morning I posted two fairly clear examples of news stories, reported factually, in a balanced way, of how transphobic messaging has permeated US and Canada culture (and anectodally NZ culture) to directly affect innocent children. I appear to be under attack about unrelated issues from at least four people because of that post.
The argument seems distill down to 'trans people are responsible because they started it'. Really? Is that even an argument? That completely sidesteps my main point, that transphobic 'free speech' has serious real world consequences, mostly for innocent bystanders.
Thanks for stepping in, Incognito.
Quick question:
You mention 'transphobic free speech'.
Does this include speech about the rights of women
I ask as I have seen many responses saying 'thats transphobic' because someone had a different view or wanted to explore how the rights of women can be protected or wanted to be sure that children were protected.
I would have thought these are not transphobic but evidence of a different viewpoint or concern for the rights of others.
To be honest I don't think I have read actual transphobic speech on the Twitter or blogs or columns I read….perhaps we're too good mannered? I've read unmentionable stuff/name calling on the links that Weka has provided a couple of times but that is transpeople name calling others.
These are your examples of "The inevitable end product of stoking anti trans ideas":
Two fairly mild events from the US? (I only mention the US, because you often seem quite preoccupied on location.)
1. A non-recorded, incident of a badly behaved parent at an athletics meet? (I did competitive club athletics from 4 years of age to my early teens, then went back for volunteer work in my twenties. This was a common occurrence in competitions.) This strangely ignores the many emerging stories of women and girls leaving their sports codes because of the intrusion of men, and the distress and direct harm caused to them.
2. Children being children providing their own version of pronouns – "“USA are my pronouns,”?
Do you really blame Kellie Jay Keen (Posie Parker) for these disconnected incidents?
Is she also responsible for the death threats sent in the last couple of days to female MP's in the UK talking about ensuring that sex in the Equalities Act is confirmed as sex NOT gender identity?
Let's see, shall we?
https://twitter.com/joannaccherry/status/1668941085278720000?s=20
Link to a woman cyclist's retirement speech:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11895323/Heartbreaking-words-female-cyclist-quit-sport-constant-beatings-trans-competitors.html
Yeah na. As a gay man, y'all don't speak for me.
LGBT+ acceptance has been trending downwards for the first time in history, for consecutive years now and it's because of radical gender ideology not homophobia.
Traditionally LGBT+ allies and many in the LGBT+ itself are really, really uncomfortable with the radicals and their changes to sexuality and sex.
I've seen more homophobia from the radical trans brigade than I've ever seen from the hard right or the god squad, and unlike the hard right and God squad, the radial gender brigade have the support of media, academia and major political parties.
We've reached a place where despite an onslaught on women's reproductive rights, left wing political leaders won't say the word woman, healthcare providers (apparently too lazy too look a patients notes) call women "birthing parents" "bleeders" "gestational parents" "uterus havers"
As for sexuality, Jesus Christ, out attractions are not just bigoted, we're not same sex attracted anymore we're same gendered, that's why gay men and lesbians are increasingly calling themselves "homosexual", and very quietly, when noones looking most gay and lesbian cis men and women are hurt, upset,angry and increasingly uncomfortable with being attached to a radical group with opposite goals to us, but afraid to say it publicly because we what happens to others who do.
If I was a young person, in a generation with based on test scores, mass illiteracy, I'd be smashing those signs down too and I'd be demanding the teachers teach us how to f***ing read, write and count instead of giving us constant positive vibes and affirmation.
I'm surprised these kids know what a pronoun is!
How can you have Pride month in school when kids cant spell pride or month.
Bravo. Lots of older lesbians are at the forefront of this resistance because we know what a woman is – and what one is not. We will not be force teamed with a bunch of straight people telling us to relearn our sexuality.
But gender ideology is everywhere, and people are forced to give it lip service if they want any public $$$ for their organisations, or to keep their jobs. People are required to signal their fealty to the belief by using the right language, to the point where it is almost instinctive.
It is enforced with violence and intimidation.
If you read the article, the display was produced by students in the local LGBTQ support group, not teachers. I would expect that they put this material together in their out of class time, like any other club, eg, Jewish students club might.
Well…evidently somebody likes this POS. But really….a VC hero? Just a fkn scumbag.
IMO i rate the whistleblowers in the SAS..who spoke up..and refused to be part of the torture and murder this slime enabled. SAS..not SS.
A simple test: here's a story about a gang member in NZ …
He had committed murder … by pressuring a newly deployed and inexperienced [member] to execute an elderly, unarmed [person] in order to “blood the rookie”.
He committed murder by machine-gunning a man with a prosthetic leg, and then took the leg [home] and encouraged his fellow gang members to use it as a novelty drinking vessel.
Outrage and condemnation everywhere, and a very long jail sentence. Deservedly so, I think we can agree.
But probably not a medal.
Caught in a trap of his own devising. Roberts-Smith tried to scare the journalists involved into backing down with the threat of a ruinous defamation case. Instead, a parade of witnesses convincingly confirmed most of the well-researched allegations of the press.
But a bit small-minded to stop him having a holiday. Nothing to do with NZ.
Are you…. serious? Maybe actually read the links….
Have been reading about the case for months, thanks. Just making the point that it's an Aussie issue, he's not our problem. I'm sure he's a pos too, but I believe even a pos has a right to a peaceful holiday in a country where his actions have zero relevance.
Good to see where you are on this. I'll keep that in mind…..
The allegations are extremely serious (the war crimes of civilian murder) and similar civilian crimes would get you barred.
A civil defamation case is not a court-martial or a criminal case. As I understand it, there was a review in 2020 by the Australian Defense Force of war-crimes by SAS units in Afghanistan, which is when RS was first named in the media.
That review didn't seem to have any consequences for RS, but he took offence at being named, hence the defamation case.
As neither the Defense Force nor the government sanctioned him as a result of that report, it is likely there will only be further consequences for RS, pos (as became very evident in the trial), in the court of public opinion. He has lost money from cancelled appearances, and costs awarded from his trial could be as high as $23mi.
"A civil defamation case is not a court-martial or a criminal case."
True. I expect the decision to grant an entry visa into NZ would rely on civil standards of evidence (balance of probability), not criminal.
All boats will rise.
/
Paul Johnson
@PJTheEconomist
Staggering statistics. Real average weekly earnings are same today as in November 2005.
A completely unprecedented period with no earnings growth. Hard to compare but likely this has not happened over any comparable period since Napoleonic wars.
https://twitter.com/PJTheEconomist/status/1668634104517242883
After months of National claiming local government spending is the cause of our inflation (when it is worldwide), Callum Purves of the Taxpayer Union now claims it is causing our recession (now we have one with a second negative quarter, albeit only 0.1.)
Why should anyone takes these buffoons seriously?
They want smaller government and more of the economic activity in the private sector (including wealth acquisition by asset purchase), but their misdiagnosis of cause end effect is in the territory of those who blame earthquakes on government social policy.
Today we have yet another example of National saying very different things to different audiences. While Luxon panders to those who grumble about the uppity Mowrees, a National party candidate is just fine with "co-governance":
https://thespinoff.co.nz/live-updates/15-06-2023/national-often-misunderstood-on-co-governance-says-tamaki-makaurau-candidate
If we do end up with a National/ACT government, it is inevitable that there will be a major internal row, both within National and between the two right-wing parties. Sadly, few commentators can be bothered to look beyond the horse race and actually consider what happens after the election.
There will be more popcorn days and nights than for any government since the Shipley/Peters bloodbath in 1997-98.
Last year, the Government introduced the Natural and Built Environment Bill to replace the Resource Management Act.
The Bill creates a new framework for how New Zealand manages its natural environment including freshwater, bio-diversity and resources.
Fish & Game is extremely concerned about this Bill and its implications for the sustainable management of our natural environment and the future of game bird hunting and freshwater fishing.
…
The Bill also removes the habitat protection of trout and salmon, which has long been safeguarded by the Resource Management Act.
This will fundamentally strip Fish & Game’s ability to carry out our statutory duty to provide for the interests of anglers and hunters, and to ensure freshwater habitats, including wetlands, are healthy and support trout, salmon and game bird populations.
As one of the only remaining independent environmental voices, Fish and Game has stepped into the void created by Forest & Bird swallowing the 1080 Kool-Aid. No good deed goes unpunished, and the government will stamp out dissent by defunding their critics instead of addressing their concerns – shameless autocrats.
Is the tagline of fish and game 'we kill animals for fun'..?
If not it should be…
Fish and Game are copping it from both sides of the political spectrum.
Forest and Bird aren't too keen on them because F&G are all about protecting introduced predators (trout and salmon) and introduced birds that displace native species.
The agricultural lobby hate F&G's guts because they object to every irrigation consent and have a well funded and professional organisation to do that. In the recent Lindis hearing the farmers went full F&B, arguing that F&G were protecting introduced predators, and harming, not protecting the environment. The judge agreed and pretty much ignored F&G's arguments, so the Lindis continued to get trashed and F&G got no environmental gain for their efforts.
F&G did sfa about preventing the arrival and spread of didimo when it was well identified as a potential threat to our freshwater environment after wreaking havoc in North and South America. It was beyond sad when it turned up in a river frequented by overseas anglers, and then got spread throughout the country. All by F&G members.
F&G got grandfathered into the RMA, and Conservation Act before, to get rid of the old Acclimatiastion Societies, and really their time is well in the past. Freshwater fisheries should be managed the same as saltwater, (but the ideal would be a bit of both current regimes) and come under a government department.
Politically F&G don't seem to have many friends, Labour don't want to know them, National and ACT have to be careful of upsetting farmers, which leaves F&G with Sue Grey's lot.
Can't see this ending well for F&G, it's all their own work.
Labour should bear in mind that F&G have a paid up membership that dwarfs both major parties.
The management of our saltwater fisheries essentially amounts to chronicling their demise – not a good model for anything.
If they munt it, as it seems they would love to do, it will make appreciable holes in both domestic and foreign tourism – one of the only industries to survive the neoliberal putsch of the 80s.
Most of that 'paid up membership' would rather they didn't have to fork out $100+ just for the privilege of going out for few cast occasionally in the vain hope of actually catching a fish. We don't pay to be members of F&G, we pay so we can go fishing and not end up in court. F&G seem to put more effort into checking you've paid your licence than doing anything to enhance the fishery.
DOC administer the Taupo fishery and do a pretty good job, would probably be more efficient if DOC took on the rest of the country as well, since most of the activity, and nearly all the high value stuff, occurs within DOC estate anyway.
F&G are an anachronism, a hangover from the old acclimatisation societies and should be put to rest along with the colonial concept of acclimatisation.
Up until now the hate-primed policies/ideas/beliefs of the raving loons in act..have pretty much had no scrutiny from the media…
It's about/past time that media got off their arses…and did what they are meant to do..
Shine some light in that dark corner..
And show to the voters what an act-nat government would mean/do..
The radio station upset with story manipulation doesn't have a problem with story manipulation.
As Hamish Keith points out in the comments: "That Radio New Zealand can do this on the eve of an inquiry into media manipulation is beyond belief"
https://twitter.com/SachaDylan/status/1669136184529031168
Aside from the headline (do they have sub-editors any more?) – the story itself seems relatively well-balanced. Pointing out that all 3 major leaders (Labour past/present & National) all do this – and that Luxon does it more than the others (even the quoted interview at the bottom, showing the polly using the technique, is Luxon ).
Although it's a bit of fluff, rather than hard-hitting political commentary. Was anyone in any doubt that our political leaders have extensive media training in how to deliver their message and deflect any unwanted questions?
If the only issue is the headline – then this is pretty much a known issue for every media outlet in NZ – where the headline doesn't reflect the story, or is actively misleading.
It's neither surprising nor new that politicians do what they do. Much more concerning is the lack of skill (or will) of the interviewers.
If the non-answer is "look, let me make it clear" followed by meaningless non-clarity, the interviewer should calmly say "I'll ask the question again", and do just that. No need to get in an argument, just ask until it's answered.
Jeremy Paxman once asked the same question 12 times to UK Tory Michael Howard (in 1997 if anyone wants the YouTube clip, all on Google).
With few exceptions, interviewers in the NZ media have maybe one more try and simply move on to their next prepared question. I suspect page one of "Media Training" says "They will soon give up so just waffle and wait".
Luxon would not survive a real interview.
QFT and that interview with Jack Tame is QED
Was he as bad as Hipkins seems to be when talking to Mike Hosking?
It's the headline that people take in. And it does not reflect accurately the result of the study.
Oh, I'm not excusing the misleading headline – just pointing out that it's pretty common practice to have a 'shock' headline which doesn't accurately reflect the story. And is done by every main media outlet.
Here's a Suff example from today
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/300903897/hastings-councils-increased-development-fees-will-see-developers-thrown-under-the-bus
And a Herald one
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/fieldays-act-party-differing-from-nationals-flip-flopping-in-hunt-for-rural-vote/THJEGGPHYFH5LAU2O5P5FVLOSU/
Both have headlines which are arguably misleading when reading the articles in question.
Yes. Some are arguable, some are plain and simple misleading. Read only that headline and you won't find out the facts. It's a form of propaganda.
What is this about and why should we click on the link?
What is the political point you want to make and discuss here?
Please make a genuine effort to initiate, stimulate, and encourage a real conversation with others on this forum.