Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Yet there are people who still care and who are unselfish.
Te Puea marae represents the best of New Zealand.
Uncaring.
The present regime running WINZ and Housing NZ represents the worst.
‘Te Puea Marae steps up to find cancer teen and family a home
Her father, who previously worked as a painter in Hamilton, tried to find his family a home.
“He would go to Winz for appointments, he told them about me having cancer, about us.
“They did nothing. He went to Housing NZ, told them. They couldn’t find us a house. Too full, they said, too full.”
When things at her aunt’s “got really tense”, the family left and had stayed at the marae since.’
Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Uncaring and incompetent.
Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett
‘Social housing and community agencies have not yet had approaches from clients wanting to take up a relocation grant, available from today, to move out of Auckland.
The grant of up to $5000 announced last month by Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett will be available from today. The money for relocation costs will not need to be paid back unless the person moved back to Auckland within a year.
Despite the scheme being launched today, the Ministry of Social Development could not tell RNZ News how many Housing New Zealand houses were available outside of Auckland, and where they were.
“It is too soon to answer this question. The grant is available for any vacant housing, including private rentals, or social housing,” the department said in a statement.
At the time she announced the grant, Paula Bennett said there were dozens of empty houses in other parts of New Zealand, such as Lower Hutt where there were 18 state houses ready to let, Palmerston North where there were 15 and Gisborne with four.’ http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/306790/'little-information'-on-grant-to-move-to-regions
or maybe instead of reading the future with the help of tealeaves and bones, they ‘Ministry of Social ‘Welfare” is waiting for Paula Bennett to drop a dump and then they gather around the turd and read the future out of that.
Nor does it say that $ 5000 is the amount anyone who moves is going to get. Firstly, its “up to”…, secondly knowing WINZ they will want quotes for everything, then pay out not a cent more, even if those quotes were a guess. Family and friends helping out won’t get anything for their efforts, but a moving company will.
If anyone hears of (and proves) a case where this offer was taken up and the person given $ 5000 to relocate at their leisure, I will eat my hat.
Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Yet there are people who still care and who are unselfish.
Kai for Kids represents the best of New Zealand.
A government that rejected Mana’s Feed the Kids Bill 4 years ago represents the worst.
‘1200 school lunches in under an hour: Porirua community pitches in to help hungry kids
“Attendance is really low on Mondays and Tuesdays because Wednesday is benefit day.”
“Kids don’t come to school because they don’t have any food to bring.”
Two months later, Clifford and her volunteers now make 1200 lunches for a dozen Porirua schools.”
The fucking Herald must be being paid for this shit. It has run a piece on poor Paula as a victim ” I’ Ve been cyber bullied because of my size”. Well stop eating so many fucking pies then !.
its when National decamp from the chamber for Bellamys, as soon as question time in Parliament is over. I doubt they serve pies.
The media are getting irrelevant, from promoting social engineering like bullying ,oh poor me child Max Key, and reading his latest antics of his music video, to children of musico’s complaining they just get sex offers from men because their daddy is famous.
Nationals brighter future is the homeless sleeping in Aucklands Well lite CBD.
Unfortunately it doesn’t matter what large people do, they always attract abuse including in the form of people telling them there is something wrong with them for the way they eat. In other words the problem with fatphobia is that too many people have prejudices about fat.
Call Bennett out on her politics, her meanness and the atrocious government she works for. Plenty of material there without going for the prejudices about fatness.
“Call Bennett out on her politics, her meanness and the atrocious government she works for. Plenty of material there without going for the prejudices about fatness.”
+1
Same goes for Gerry Brownlee too. Call him out on his stubborn bullish authoritarian ways, not his size.
Prejudice against another’s body is unhelpful. We have no right to make judgements or assumptions about people’s diets, especially as we don’t know, and have no right to know their medical history, such as prescription medicine side effects, endochrinological/hormonal disorders and or injuries that prevent exercise that may have contributed to a person’s weight gain. It’s not all about food.
I called her out because she intimated that she couldn’t,t help being that big, I doubt that she has an endocrinological or hormonal problem because that only occurs in a very very small percentage of people, ( but it makes a good excuse for those unafficted ) and she was half that size when she entered politics and got introduced to the trough in all its permutations.
BTW, I’m overweight and I’m that way because I eat too much and if someone calls me fat I have to agree with them.
Your weight is irrelevant Adrian. It’s not about others agreeing whether you are over weight or not. You know that and so what. If you know you eat too much then that’s your buzz, it doesn’t mean EVERY other big person is big for the same reason as you.
Your weight doesn’t give you license to attack others for the same reasons.
Pullya Benefit is a nasty vindictive spiteful person who bullies others by disclosing sensitive and private information so she can put herself in a position of power.
Her size has got nothing to do with it, and we know nothing of her medical history and shouldn’t speculate on it either. That’s her business, not yours or mine.
Rosie I see where you are coming from, but she has been, not so long ago much smaller than she is now, she yo yo’s with her weight but she can obviously get smaller from eating less, so it probably isn’t a hormonal problem. I see it more as an emotional problem as being an eater for comfort because of the stress of her job and/or being out of her depth or just because she over eats because she enjoys her food. What I cannot understand is seeing she is seen as an intelligent women, surely she sees the health issues she is bringing on herself, heart problems and definitely diabetes because of all her “belly fat” which is what the medical profession call it. Its difficult not to criticise when there are many people who can lose weight and keep it off – self discipline plays a part and pride in one’s appearance is another. Now don’t bite my head off please.
Again. Some one else’s size is their own business. Why do we feel we have a right to criticise or even speculate about their supposed issues? What’s it got to do with us? It doesn’t matter if Pullya Benefit’s shape has changed in the time that we have seen her in parliament.
Speaking of “self discipline and pride in one’s appearance” is very much the line fatphobics use. What you are saying is fat people are ugly and lazy. That is highly prejudiced.
Another sign of fatphobia is faux concern for another persons health. And you do realise that not all heart disease is weight related don’t you? My father died at age 54 from heart disease and he was an average size man. Mr Dr tells me the biggest indicator for heart disease is genetics, even above and beyond smoking. Stress is a bigger killer than weight, so why aren’t we hating on all the stressed people? A person can be overweight but still be fit and healthy and live a long life.
Don’t get sucked into the hate Kate. You’re better than that.
I hope the NZ police are keeping an eye on this website, whose readers are celebrating the killing of Jo Cox and looking forward to similar acts here: https://yournz.org/2016/06/19/crusader-rabid/
Not really, I try to see things in a positive light and see no point in trying to bring everyone down with a daily dose of repetition. The sun is shining, it’s the shortest day onward and upwards.
Tarquin, how about the eye of the beholder thing? Winter solstice, I mourn because I love the cold, short dark days of winter – all moody and introspective as they are, yet cosy, safe and warm by the fire.
Like a true former teen goth I celebrate summer solstice as it’s marks the countdown to winter. Until Autumn comes it’s long wait through the drunken violence of summer (other’s, not me), water restrictions, insufferable heat, mozzies and flies, phoning noise control at 1am, and invites to hideous work xmas parties.
Very true, I’ve only just finished moaning about the heat and now I’m wishing it back again. Up here in Northland we don’t get a real winter, maybe a frost or two and it just rains all the time. I had a white Christmas in England a few years ago – that’s how winters should be.
Ha ha. Well you’re living in the right part of the country if you like it warm.
Like wise, in winter in the southern hemisphere can you pull off an alright mid winter xmas, minus the snow unless you live somewhere really cold. I’ve done some good solstice parties over the years, around the fire.
As for Paul. What he is posting is politically and socially relevant. It IS the depressing truth. It’s really hard to jazz up our reality in any way that makes it palatable. Because of that I find it a bit much early in the morning myself so flick through. However I always read Paul’s posts he posts separate to the early wake up morning cup of depression. I guess we all have ways of expressing our anger and grief over our witnessing of our country going to the dogs.
You sound very much like National’s ex-party president Michelle Boag, who was on the panel of Q&A last Sunday. She appeared to be oblivious of the strive people were going through in this country, apparently in her eyes all was rosy;-)))
Funny how John Key only has time for a few minutes before 8am to be interviewed on RNZ.
By the time he blusters and confuses the issue under questioning the time pips sound. End of story.
Wonder if he chooses the time for the interview?
Guyon could record an interview that went past 8am and play the balance after 8.
Hone’s interview by Guyon would be more interesting but his attempt at humour, trying to be the ‘comeback kid’ in an analogy to a band with singers and bass players etc. is about as silly as his artificial dote com fiasco.
German Foreign Minister Steinmeier says NATO should not be inflaming the situation with Russia
Berlin (AFP) – German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has criticised NATO for having a bellicose policy towards Russia, describing it as “warmongering”, the German daily Bild reported.
Steinmeier pointed to the deployment of NATO troops near borders with Russia in the military alliance’s Baltic and east European member states.
“What we should avoid today is inflaming the situation by warmongering and stomping boots,” Steinmeier told Bild in an interview to be published Sunday.
“Anyone who thinks you can increase security in the alliance with symbolic parades of tanks near the eastern borders, is mistaken,” Germany’s top diplomat added.
“It seems like we have waves of momentum, and then gaps. What can we do to fill the gaps or at least tide us over?”
Probably best if someone who has been in a leadership in activism for decades to answer this curly one. However my 2 cents worth centres around socialising. Yes, socialising, on and off line.
Personally though, I prefer the off line version. In meeting new people and growing bonds with those we know, in person, we don’t miss out on all the subtle non vocal expressions that create a depth to the relationship. We can create intellectual relationships on line and they can be enhanced as we, as a collective (I”m talking about the wider world, not us on TS necessarily) create and ride a wave, but energy falls a bit flat during the troughs does it not? EG, look at online conversation pre and post general elections.
Although, in saying that, I noticed the opposite on the Bella Caledonia site post Scottish indyref – the talk was flat out, soul searching, expressing feelings etc. They even had a guest post by a psychologist to analyse the results and fall out. Their response could be down to different cultural approaches to communication – The Scots might be better communicators than NZer’s, I don’t know. (but the Scots I know and have met are great talkers and listeners)
So, I see advantages in socialising as in holding momentum during trough periods. During these times we build loyalty, maintain bonds, maintain solidarity, and maintain the flow of ideas. New ideas can be discussed and existing ones reworked. The group’s mutual interest remains a living thing rather than it being sucked into a vacuum of loss. Socialising keeps an interest alive and when the time comes to ramp up activism the platform is stable and the group is already in synch to go to work on a project or campaign.
Wow, that is such a great comment Rosie, I wasn’t expecting it to go in that direction.
I completely agree. I’ve been in online communities where there is more relationship building than happens here or on places like FB or twitter, and so that social thing where you have something solid happens more. But still I agree that the place it needs to happen most is in the physical world. I don’t know how to make that happen in my own life because most people I know are really focussed on life outside of political realities. I guess that’s why I come here.
But it reminds me of something that Naomi Klein said last year, when asked how she keeps going, she said it’s really important to get in a room with people who are doing the same kind of work, struggling with the same kind of things. I think you’ve really nailed it there, where it needs to happen within normal community interactions if it’s going to be stable and resilient (maybe Klein was talking about something else).
I empathise with your situation of not being physically around others who are focused on political issues/emerging social realities. It’s the same for me.
I do believe group social meeting is what we are going to need, to strengthen us for the next election, just for starters, as we have far bigger ongoing threats to our very existence, in climate change, as well as maintaining momentum and influence.
I think a while back Bill set up a regular meeting in Dunedin, where people met in a park. Hows that going people? Is there a way for Standardista’s to meet in person in their regions?
As I thought about socialising being a key thing to strengthening a group committed to a similar goal I received mail in my inbox from the Labour Party gen sec. He was asking if you were a 20 – 30 something professional interested in socialising. A great move I thought, along the lines of what I’d been thinking about. If that wasn’t your thing, age wise or work wise there was a survey to fill in with your thoughts about doing something similar.
I would be interested to see how many people turn up to a party AGM compared to how many people turn up to a party social gathering, especially if it’s a low cost thing. $ is a barrier for some of us.
Personally, in light of the Lab/Green MOU, I’d like to see a seasonal social get together, to build solidarity and to forge ties at the grass roots, where it really counts.
I think a while back Bill set up a regular meeting in Dunedin, where people met in a park. Hows that going people? Is there a way for Standardista’s to meet in person in their regions?
Unconnected to the Standard, there are a few interested politically aware Dunedinites meeting in the next week as part of a Matariki event. I haven’t been involved in the organisation of the event but I would expect there to be 20-30 very politically interested minds show up.
In general terms I agree that face to face, in person political socialising is crucial to our future.
Endless war, endless greed: The Pentagon is lining its pockets with taxpayer dollars
Obama now plans to rebuild America’s nuclear weapons cache, the latest in a series of military enrichment schemes
Trump’s lies aren’t unique to America: Post-truth politics are killing democracies on both sides of the Atlantic
Voters no longer value truth, and Donald Trump and Boris Johnson are dangerously exploiting the new paradigm
You’ve been pretty harsh with a couple of my comments last couple day so i’m bringing it here to open it up and sort it.
Yep I made a couple boo boo’s, I retaliated too this
[deleted as irrelevant]
[lprent: This isn’t a negotiation, it is an observation of a continued pattern of behaviour and a demand for a permanent modification of some of those behaviours from a moderator. There is no point in various moderators continuing to point out deficiencies in your behaviour if you are too damn lazy or too thick or too self-entitled an arsehole to modify those behaviours.
1. Read the policy again. It is clear you haven’t understood it.
2. How you feel about it has absolutely no relevance and I suspect you don’t have sufficient experience with operating a blog to even be able to offer it. You are a guest on this site, your host is telling you to shape up or ship out.
This is a heart wrenching article. And in our back doorstep. Why do not NZ take the Nauru refugees – it is hard to see how these detention centres can be considered legal under human rights legislation – in particular for the unaccompanied children committing suicide.
“The worst I’ve seen – trauma expert lifts lid on ‘atrocity’ of Australia’s detention regime
Exclusive: In his 43-year career, Paul Stevenson has worked in the aftermath of the Bali bombings and the Boxing Day tsunami but says nothing he witnessed was as bad as the treatment of asylum seekers on Nauru and Manus”
How many people out there think mental illnesses equate to a lower intellect, or reduced mental capacity?
I have found here some resistance to my points of view based on the fact I am mentally ill.
I am in fact B-Polar, and I have an IQ of over 160 according the 2 of the Psychologists who treated me through Hep C treatment.
My illness caused a chemical imbalance in my brain which causes me to have periods of massive empathy/depression and periods of manic/sleepless, fast thinking, impusiveness.
if untreated.
Currently outlooks for Bi-polar people are good, it does take time to find the right chemicals and once a balance of chemicals has been restored we live completely normal lives.
I recently found the right medication , for me it was Effexor, I snapped out of depression in the time it took for the pill to get into my blood stream and have been stable for over two months now.
Comments from LPRENT such as..
“I really can’t be bothered dealing with commenter’s mental issues over and over again and having them disrupting a reasonably rational debate. I suspect you don’t understand yourself well enough to understand your own issues and therefore are unlikely to be able to control yourself. So any ban that I am forced to issue will be for some time”
and the other day you insulted me and my mental health just like someone who knows absolutely nothing and is predjudiced.
I am shocked at the way you talk to and treated me, uses my disabilty and mental health to question my intellect and integrity.
Hi Richard. I can’t comment on the exchange you’ve had with LPrent.
I can, whole heartedly support you in your recovery from depression and your belief (or what I see as fact) that mental illness is in no way related to intelligence.
I’m someone who struggles with depression and chronic insomnia to the point where I can no longer work/ or find suitable part time work, so I’m thrilled to hear you’ve found a medicine that works. That can be a really liberating feeling.
Thanks Rosie, after so many years trying it was super liberating to not dive into depression whenever a saw a animal run over or bad news.
I have 2 months of stress less life now and i’m chilling back out daily. I feel the tension relax and everyday gets better without having to worry if I was about to swing in moods.
Prozac, citalopram, epillim by the truckload, they give you the antidepressants and assume you’ll be fine come back in a month they say, it never did squat, they even thought I was lying and putting it on after all the tablets didn’t do much, it took me over ten years of that and a Hep C treatment that has side effects of making you suicidal, to find a brilliant new Dr who took me over from my old Dr and she cured me in one med change.
I had given up, never give up if the meds aren’t working change them don’t linger on non active antidepressants Rosie is all I can say.
Awesome to hear you’re doing so well Richard after years of suffering. That really is a breakthrough. Well done you! It’s a good feeling, I find, to be back to one true self and feeling safe and well.
It is hard for people in a clinically depressed state to cope with problems, bad news, and upsetting sights. You become sensitised to things and it spirals down. I’ve had to work with being overly empathetic to animal suffering but deal with it in different ways now.
I’m fine and dandy on the paroxetine now but still an insomniac. I use sleeping pills about 3 times a week to get by. I also try to keep a different future in mind too. Once the clouds lift you can see there are good things that ARE going on.
I’ve had to deal with acute depression a number of times in my life, and seem to have quite a few friends and family with various mental aliments – including bigotry. I expect to help and deal with issues to do with it as and when I need to.
But what I was referring to was your attitude and actions on this site. Here I’m not interested in dealing with, protecting or helping you. I’m interested in protecting and helping this site as a place for debate. The way we do to deal with bad behaviour for WHATEVER cause, is to warn about behaviour and (if required) to remove the ability to write comments.
The proportion of people commenting or authoring on this site with various afflictions (mental, physical, bigotry or addictive) probably isn’t that too dissimilar from society at large. However most of them manage to control their behaviour to the level that I don’t notice them. I can’t see any reason that I should treat you differently to them.
There are limits to the amount of time that I (or any other moderator or author) can be expend on this site. And after more than 8 years of doing it, I tend to push so that I don’t have to spend too much time dealing with someone acting like an arsehole. I find it is less of a problem to whack hard once so I don’t have waste time to play whack-a-mole with dickheads.
Respect Lprent, sorry you had too crack out the sledgehammer , but I respect your doing it, now that we had a chance to one to one, vs catching each other on a thread, and distracting from the thread.
Some of the odd comments were tongue in cheek and I have learned humour often gets taken literally here if your not super careful to announce how your inferring a comment.
My comments should tidy up as a I get more familiar with the morally accepted peer standards here.
Thanks again for posting this and allowing me to relate my concerns and have them answered.
Kind regards
Richard
[lprent: Ok, the warning has been heard. Removed from moderation. We will see how it goes. ]
Some of the odd comments were tongue in cheek and I have learned humour often gets taken literally here if your not super careful to announce how your inferring a comment.
Humour, more often than not, simply doesn’t come across in text. To indicate that you’re being humorous usually means that you have to add smileys and/or tags.
Humour, more often than not, simply doesn’t come across in text. To indicate that you’re being humorous usually means that you have to add smileys and/or tags.
Yes. I learnt the hard way in earlier days. Tongue-in-cheek comments were taken too literally by some and I ended up on the receiving end of a few unpleasant barbs. Even adding emoticons or plain language tags is not always a guarantee. Best to confine oneself to such comments when the post itself is humorous and/or satirical in content.
C’mon Stuart Munro. Just because we have a teeny wee bit of fun doesn’t mean we don’t feel strongly for those who are the victims of this heartless and horrible government. Some of us have even been there in one form or another.
There’s still room to lighten up and maybe even have a laugh at ourselves.
Yes… except that with a pretty vacuous and actively biased MSM there is little or no channel for normal outrage. A not too politically interested person who gets their news from TVNZ, stuff, and the Herald could be forgiven for thinking that Nick Smith was vaguely competent or Paula Bennett compassionate.
There is a need to roundly damn this government, in adition to dispassionately discussing alternatives. The trolls never sleep, and never miss an opportunity to paint this vicious and dysfunctional kleptocracy as marginally competent and technically human.
I agree that that part of Lynn’s statement was a form of prejudice in terms of mental health and I wish he hadn’t made it. I hope you can pull back a bit anyway, because I like your contributions on ts in general, and I think you bring perspectives that we don’t otherwise have and I find that valuable. There are rules though, and if you break them too often it’s easier for the site to give you time out.
I do think you are stepping over the bounds a lot at the moment, and you will get moderated for that. Different moderators have different ways of approaching that.
fwiw, Lynn is an equal opportunity moderator and will be abusive to everyone pretty much equally if they piss him off as a moderator. That’s the bit to understand, it’s not a personal thing so much as what is seen with a moderator hat on. It takes time to moderate, there is more involved than in just making a comment. And that time is time we don’t get to spend doing other things. One of Lynn’s trigger points is where he finds he is having to use a lot of time on one person when they’ve already been warned.
My own is people derailing threads (you’ve noticed I’m sure) either by posting off topic or by posting things that are inflammatory.
I’m really happy to explain where I think you are overstepping the bounds if that’s helpful. It is good to reread the Policy, and they still need to be understood in the context of the culture of ts. Lots of people don’t get that, and some of those people end up with bans.
Moderation has changed a bit in the last 6 months, and IMO there has been an improvement in the debate culture. There is less tolerance for bickering and troll derailments. Shutting them down early on keeps discussions much more focussed on the topic of the post, which is the point of the site.
I’d see two main things happening with you at the moment. One is taking personal grudges across multiple conversations. It just disrupts thread, so if you can let it go, or keep it in the thread it originated in if it’s appropriate, that’s going to cause less disruption and get less moderator attention. If all else fails, do what you have done today and take it to Open Mike.
The other is to focus more on the politics. You have interesting ideas and ones that are challenging to some here, so finding ways to communicate those without having a go at people will work better in the long run. Yes, lots of what happens here is unfair (e.g. someone is rude to you and doesn’t get called on it). But it’s on all of us to act within the rules as much as we can and lower the need for moderation in the first place.
edit, just seen Lynn’s comment above, which is a very clear explanation that behaviour will be moderated no matter what the cause.
I agree that that part of Lynn’s statement was a form of prejudice in terms of mental health…
Only in that I view the type of bigotry that he was displaying as being a type of mental illness. It is pretty damn hard to explain it any other way. I’ve talked to enough bigots on various subjects (including some very intelligent ones) to realize that in some people it appears to be hardwired well below any cognitive layer.
I think it was more just that thing of equating behaviour with mental illness when it’s pretty hard to know how much of anyone’s behaviour comes from that. And people with formal mental health diagnosis like bipolar already get stigmatised more than most, and attributing behaviour to their mental illness tends to make that even more so.
Bigotry is a different thing IMO.
I’m glad you explained what you meant to Richard and that he gets it now. All good.
I don’t know if this has been posted today but its a weak and cowardly position of Andrew Little over this and its even more cowardly and weak of john Key in not picking this up as well
Basically every politician, no matter what party they’re with, that doesn’t support this is a gutless coward
Maryan Street is completely right about this, we at least need to start talking about it
“staunchly prolife” engenders a whole spectrum of political beliefs in of itself, starting with an understanding that life is sacred and it is not man’s place to play God with and take others’ lives.
Yes, for various reasons, I think that any Government Authorised Suicide programme is a bad idea.
There are hundreds of improvements which should be made to the care of terminally ill people before this measure is even considered.
BTW if NZ ended up performing euthanasia at the same rate that the Dutch do, we would have 1,450 Kiwis a year die under a Government Authorised Suicide programme.
Yes, that’s four times NZ’s annual road toll.
And we’d be investigating whether or not the programme should be extended to children under 16 years of age.
I doubt the National Party Board and their major funders consider Joyce as an electable leader for the National Party. So I do not think that he will have any support from that quarter. And without that support, any leadership coup attempt is going nowhere.
I’m just working on the idea that Slater doesn’t give an opinion without an ulterior motive – a comment above suggests that his “Catholic mafia” line could have been aimed at knobbling any number of contenders 🙂
Before you jump to conclusions about the Catholic Mafia you may want to read this interview (plus 2 comments) with Simon O’Connor who is the chairman of the Health Select Committee that is tasked with the inquiry. Mr O’Connor was almost ordained as Catholic Priest.
The fossil fuel industry’s business model is to externalize its costs by clawing in obscene subsidies and tax deductions—causing grave environmental costs, including toxic pollution and global warming. Among the other unassessed prices of the world’s addiction to oil are social chaos, war, terror, the refugee crisis overseas, and the loss of democracy and civil rights abroad and at home.
As we focus on the rise of ISIS and search for the source of the savagery that took so many innocent lives in Paris and San Bernardino, we might want to look beyond the convenient explanations of religion and ideology and focus on the more complex rationales of history and oil, which mostly point the finger of blame for terrorism back at the champions of militarism, imperialism and petroleum here on our own shores.
It’s an interesting history lesson that connects the dots of US imperialism for the last 60+ years.
How nice it would be for the Western Empire to have a Qatari pipeline going through Syria; it would ensure energy supplies to Israel and the EU could access a massive amount of gas while cutting Russia out of the loop.
Damn that Assad for not allowing the use of his country for this project. He’s simply got to go.
Although I went to the trouble of identifying the work and the man portrayed I managed to get myself involved in a rather unpleasant flame war with another blog host when he posted the image below.
But he didn’t seem to be able to understand why some would find the manipulation offensive.
What sort of cultural infant would even think to do that?
And as for the shower curtains!! 😒
I wonder if the descendants have made any representation to these unthinking idiots?
If NZ took a leaf from the yanks’ book we’d make reproductions of moko illegal, and then try to extradite the sellers for “money laundering” because the payments were transferred from one account to another.
I heard it. Not before time, although it took a bit to get him to shut up. Talk about verbal diarrhoea! Never heard Kathryn Ryan so exasperated. Can’t she turn him off or something ?
Key said the intention was not to go beyond two years and the mission would be reviewed in 12 months. At the initial deployment.
really,
Now he extends them for another 18 months.. that’s 18 months on top of the 2 years. Oh btw did he not mention we are at war now or is that coming later.
So John Key , how do you feel about people sleeping under bridges?
JK : We’ve had a bit of a discussion about that and we are quite comfortable with that really, I mean there is no real safety issue here as the vehicles are well above them and being under the bridge they shouldn’t pose a distraction for the motorist. If they want to live under a bridge then be my guest.
Arrr, I was more referring to the homeless problem.
JK: Well I haven’t had any homeless approach me directly about this, but we desperately need more roads and bridges and we are pushing that through so that should produce a win win situation with the extra bridges.
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Daisy Simmons Farmers who can’t sleep, worrying they’ll lose everything amid increasing drought. Youth struggling with depression over a future that feels hopeless. Indigenous people grief-stricken over devastated ecosystems. For all these people and more, climate change is taking a clear toll ...
New Zealand’s relationship with China is becoming harder to define, and with that comes a worry that a deteriorating political relationship could spill over into the economic relationship. It is about more than whether New Zealand will join Pillar Two of Aukus, though the Chinese Ambassador, more or less, suggested ...
Been hoping we would see something like this from Sir Geoffrey Palmer. This is excellent.The present Bill goes further than the National Development Act 1979 in stripping away procedures designed to ensure that environmental issues are properly considered. The 1979 approach was not acceptable then and this present approach is ...
He’s Got The Moxie: Only Willie Jackson possesses the credentials to meld together a new Labour message that is, at one and the same moment, staunchly working-class, union-friendly, and which speaks to the hundreds-of-thousands of urban Māori untethered to the neo-tribal capitalist elites of the Iwi Leaders Forum.IT’S ONE OF THE ...
Tree-huggers may well accuse the Government of giving them the fingers, after Energy Minister Simeon Brown announced new measures to protect powerlines from trees, rather than measures to protect trees from powerlines. It can be no coincidence, surely, that this has been announced at the same as Fisheries Minister Shane Jones ...
Willie Jackson will participate in the prestigious Oxford Union debate on Thursday, following in David Lange’s footsteps. Coincidentally, Jackson has also followed Lange’s footsteps by living in his old home in South Auckland. And like Lange, Jackson might be the sort of loud-mouth scrapper who could take over the Labour ...
Barrister Gary Judd KC’s complaint to the Regulatory Review Committee has sparked a fierce debate about the place of tikanga Māori – or Māori customs, values and spiritual beliefs – in the law.Judd opposes the New Zealand Council of Legal Education’s plans to make teaching tikanga compulsory in the legal curriculum.AUT ...
Alwyn Poole writes – In New Zealand we have approximately 460 high schools. The gaps between the schools that produce the best results for students and those at the other end of the spectrum are enormous.In terms of the data for their leavers, the top 30 schools have ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand First Cabinet Minister Shane Jones has become the best advertisement against the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill. In selling the radical new resource consenting processes, in which ministers can green light any mine, dam, or other major development, Jones seems to be ...
Brian Eastonwrites – The Fast-Track Approvals Bill enables cabinet ministers to circumvent key environmental planning and protection processes for infrastructure projects. Its difficulties have been well canvassed. This column suggests a different way of thinking about the proposal. I am ...
The split opening up in Israel’s “War Cabinet” is not just between PM Benjamin Netanyahu and his long-term rival Benny Gantz. It is actually a three-way split, set in motion by Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. It was Gallant’s open criticism of Netanyahu that finally flushed Gantz out into the open. ...
On Thursday 17 May, the Mayoral Proposal for Auckland’s Long Term Plan 2024-2034 was passed by Auckland Council, 20 to 1. It is set to be formally adopted by the Governing Body at its June 27th meeting. The entire process took 8 hours, with the vast majority of that time ...
Pakanga o muaTukua, ka ngaroPuritia taku ringaNgaro ana te ara ki pae rauThere's a battle aheadMany battles are lostBut you'll never see the end of the roadWhile you're travelling with meLate yesterday morning I headed to Wynyard Quarter to see Marama Davidson and Chlöe Swarbrick give their pre-budget State of ...
Maybe the Prime Minister and his Finance Minister expected the worst, so they mounted a stout defence of the Budget tax cuts to their party faithful at a party conference over the weekend. In turn, they were greeted with applause, which, though it may have been less than wildly enthusiastic, ...
A listing of 34 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, May 12, 2024 thru Sat, May 18, 2024. Story of the week “The legislation I signed today [will] keep windmills off our beaches, gas in our tanks, and ...
TL;DR: Here’s six links that stood out to me in the last day in Aotearoa’s political economy to 6:06am on Sunday, May 19:Aotearoa-NZ is the seventh worst in the OECD’s homelessness rankings, just behind the United States and just ahead of Australia. BlackRock thinks rate hikes actually worsen inflation because ...
Halfway up a historic tower in York, we are neither up nor down. At the top you will have views of a city steeped in antiquity, made and remade by Romans, Normans, Vikings, Tescos. Below, you will find a retired minister happy to tell you all about this most astonishing ...
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. Does breathing contribute to CO2 ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: KiwiRail’s seemingly endless requests for more money is damning. At one point, KiwiRail assured Robertson when he was the Finance Minister that the worst-case scenario would be an extra $300 million before requesting $1.2 billion a few months later. Not what most people ...
No one knows what it's likeTo be the bad manTo be the sad manBehind blue eyesNo one knows what it's likeTo be hatedTo be fatedTo telling only liesHave you ever wondered what life must be like for Mike Hosking? Seeing things in black and white through blue tinted specs? In ...
Hello! Here comes the Saturday edition of More Than A Feilding, catching you up on the past two week’s editions.Share More Than A FeildingBike bling, London Read more ...
Hi,I think we all made it through another week — congratulations. I’ve been digesting the new Arab Strap record, which is astonishing. In other news, I’m going to be doing a Webworm popup in Auckland, New Zealand on Saturday July 13. I’ll bring a bunch of merch, and some other ...
The Fast-Track Approvals Bill enables cabinet ministers to circumvent key environmental planning and protection processes for infrastructure projects. Its difficulties have been well canvassed. This column suggests a different way of thinking about the proposal. I am going to explore the Bill from the perspective of its proponents with their ...
New Zealand First Cabinet Minister Shane Jones has become the best advertisement against the Government’s Fast Track Approvals Bill. In selling the radical new resource consenting processes, in which ministers can green light any mine, dam, or other major development, Jones seems to be shooting the proposal in the foot. ...
Buzz from the Beehive Associate Education Minister David Seymour is urging the PostPrimary Teachers Association to put learning ahead of ideology. He wants the union leaders to call off their teachers meetings around the country where they hope to muster the strength to undo the government’s plans to establish several ...
What are police for? "Fighting crime" is the obvious answer. If there's a burglary, they should show up and investigate. Ditto if there's a murder or sexual assault. Speeding or drunk or dangerous driving is a crime, so obviously they should respond to that. And obviously, they should respond to ...
Michael Reddell writes – I got curious yesterday about how the Australia/New Zealand real exchange rate had changed over the last decade, and so dug out the data on the changes in the two countries’ CPIs. Over the 10 years from March 2014 to March 2024, New Zealand’s ...
Graham Adams writes that 20 years after the land march, judges are quietly awarding a swathe of coastal rights to iwi. Early this month, an hour-long documentary was released by TVNZ to mark the 20th anniversary of the land-rights march to oppose Helen Clark’s Foreshore and Seabed Act. The account ...
David Farrar writes – The Herald reports: Suspended Green MP Darleen Tana has passed an unpleasant milestone: she has now been absent for as many parliamentary sitting days as she has been present for this year. Tana is on full pay while she is suspended, and will benefit from a ...
Peter Dunne writes – It is no coincidence that two Labour should-have-been MPs are making the most noise about public sector cuts. As assistant general secretary of the Public Service Association, Fleur Fitzsimons has been at the forefront of revealing where the next round of state sector job ...
Bryce Edwards writes – It’s becoming a classic case study for why lobbying deals with politicians need greater scrutiny. Former National Minister Steven Joyce runs a lobbying company with a major client – the University of Waikato. The University desperately wants $300m+ of taxpayer funding to establish a ...
This is one of the (extra) weekly columns on music or movies. Plenty of solid analyses of Possession exist online and most of them – inevitably – contain spoilers. This column is more in the way of a first-timer’s aid to getting your initial bearings. You don’t need to have ...
I am painting in oil, a portrait of a manWho has taken all the heart aches,And all the pain he can stand.I am using all the colors of blue,I have here on my stand.I am painting in oil, a portrait of a man.This has been an interesting week for me. ...
Helen Clark joins the Hoon as a special guest talking whether Aotearoa should join Aukus II, and her views on the fast track legislation and how Luxon and the new Government are performing. File Photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts ...
With an election due in less than nine months, Britain’s embattled PM, Rishi Sunak, gave a useful speech earlier this week. He made a substantial case for his government, perhaps as compelling as is possible in the current environment. Quite an achievement. His overall theme was security, first pulling ...
Open access notablesPublicly expressed climate scepticism is greatest in regions with high CO2 emissions, Pearson et al., Climatic Change:We analysed a recently released corpus of climate-related tweets to examine the macro-level factors associated with public declarations of climate change scepticism. Analyses of over 2 million geo-located tweets in the U.S. showed that climate ...
You can be all negative about these charter schools if you want, but I’m here to accentuate the positive. You can get all worked up, if you want to, by the contradiction of Luxon saying We’re going to make sure that every school in the country is teaching exactly the same ...
Losing The Room: One can only speculate about what has persuaded the Coalition Government that it will pay no electoral price for unreasonably pushing ahead with policies that are so clearly against the national interest. They seem quite oblivious to the risk that by doing so they will convince an increasing ...
Name suppression decisions can be tough sometimes. No matter your views on free speech, you have to be hard-hearted not to be torn by the tug of the competing arguments. I think you can feel the Supreme Court wrestling with that in M v The King. The case for ...
The Merchants of Menace: The Coalition Government has convinced itself that the “Brahmins’” emollient functions have become much too irksome and expensive. Those who see themselves as the best hope of rebuilding New Zealand’s ailing capitalist system, appear to have convinced themselves that a little bit of blunt trauma is what their mollycoddled ...
When National first proposed its Muldoonist "fast-track" law, they were warned that it would inevitably lead to corruption. And that is exactly what has happened, with Resources Minister Shane Jones taking secret meetings with potential applicants:On Tuesday, in a Newsroom story, questions were raised about a dinner Jones ...
Buzz from the Beehive One day – hopefully – we will push that Russian rascal, Vladimir Putin, beyond breaking point. Perhaps it will happen today, when he learns that Foreign Minister Winston Peters is again tightening the thumbscrews. Peters announced further sanctions, this time on 28 individuals and 14 entities ...
How Labour’s and National’s failure to move beyond neoliberalism has brought New Zealand to the brink of economic and cultural chaos.TO START LOSING, so soon after you won, requires a special kind of political incompetence. At the heart of this Coalition Government’s failure to retain, and build upon, the public ...
“Members of Parliament don’t work for us, they represent us, an entirely different thing. As with so much that has turned out badly, the re-organising of MPs’ responsibilities began with the Fourth Labour Government. That’s when they began to be treated like employees – public servants – whose diaries had ...
It’s becoming a classic case study for why lobbying deals with politicians need greater scrutiny. Former National Minister Steven Joyce runs a lobbying company with a major client – the University of Waikato. The University desperately wants $300m+ of taxpayer funding to establish a third medical school in New Zealand, ...
Time To Choose: Like it or not, the Kiwis are either going into AUKUS’s “Pillar 2” – or they are going to China.HAD ZHENG HE’S FLEET sailed east, not west, in the early Fifteenth Century, how different our world would be. There is little reason to suppose that the sea-going junks ...
Henry Ergas writes – When in Randall Jarrell’s Pictures from an Institution, a college president is accused of being a hypocrite, the novel’s narrator retorts that the description is grossly unfair. After all, the man is still far from the stage of moral development at which the charge ...
David Farrar writes – Radio NZ reports: The Education Review Office says too many new teachers feel poorly prepared for their jobs. In a report published on Monday, the review office said 60 percent of the principals it interviewed said their new teachers were not ready. ...
New Zealand’s economic performance and the PM’s vision Michael Reddell writes – When I wrote yesterday morning’s post, highlighting how poorly both New Zealand and its Anglo peer countries have been doing in respect of productivity in recent times (ie, in the case of New ...
Hi all,Firstly - thank you! You guys are awesome. The response I’ve received to last night’s mail has been quite overwhelming. It’s a ghastly day outside, but there are no clouds in here.In case you didn’t read my email and are wondering what on earth I’m talking about you can ...
If there was still any doubt as to who is actually running this government – and it isn’t the buffoon from Botany – then this week’s announcement of a huge spend up on charter schools has settled the matter. While jobs and public services continue to be cut in the ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Gaye Taylor As widespread drought raises expectations for a repeat of last year’s ferocious wildfire season, response teams across Canada are grappling with the rapidly changing face of fire in a warming climate. No longer quenched by winter, nor quelled by the ...
Half of Christchurch City Holdings Ltd’s directors and its chair resigned en masse last night in protest at Christchurch City Council’s demand to front-load dividends File Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The chair of Christchurch City Council’s investment company and four of its independent directors resigned in protest last ...
The University of Waikato has reworded an advertisement that begins the tender process for its new $300 million-plus medical school even though the Government still needs to approve it. However, even the reworded ad contains an architect’s visualisations of what the school might look like. ACT leader David Seymour told ...
As a follow-up to the Rings of Power trailer discussion, I thought I needed to add something. There has been some online mockery about the use of the same actor for both the Halbrand and Annatar incarnations of Sauron. The reasoning is that Halbrand with a shave and a new ...
This isn’t quite as dramatic as the title might suggest. I’m not going anywhere, but there is something I wanted to talk to you about.Let’s start with a typical day.Most days I send out a newsletter in the morning. If I’ve written a lot the previous evening it might be ...
Buzz from the Beehive The promise of tax relief loomed large in his considerations when the PM delivered a pre-Budget speech to the Auckland Business Chamber. The job back in Wellington is getting government spending back under control, he said, bandying figures which show that in per capita terms, the ...
Yesterday de facto Prime Minister David Seymour announced that his glove puppet government would be re-introducing charter schools, throwing $150 million at his pet quacks, donors and cronies and introducing an entire new government agency to oversee them (the existing Education Review Office, which actually knows how to review schools, ...
Seeing that, in order to discredit the figures and achieve moral superiority while attempting to deflect attention away from the military assault on Rafa, Israel supporters in NZ have seized on reports that casualty numbers in Gaza may be inflated … Continue reading → ...
David Farrar writes – Newstalk ZB report: The man responsible for a horror hit and run in central Wellington last year was on a suspended licence and was so drunk he later asked police, “Did I kill someone?” Jason Tuitama injured two women when he ran a red ...
Muriel Newman writes – Former US President Ronald Reagan once said, “Freedom is a fragile thing and it’s never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by way of inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation.” The fight for ...
Why Courts should have said Waitangi Tribunal could not summons Karen Chhour Gary Judd writes – In the High Court, Justice Isacs declined to uphold the witness summons issued by the Waitangi Tribunal to compel Minister for Children, Karen Chhour, to appear before it to be ...
Bryce Edwards writes – The number of voices raising concerns about the Government’s Fast-Track Approvals Bill is rapidly growing. This is especially apparent now that Parliament’s select committee is listening to submissions from the public to evaluate the proposed legislation. Twenty-seven thousand submissions have been made to Parliament ...
An average of 166 New Zealand citizens left the country every day during the March quarter, up 54% from a year ago.Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The economy and housing market is sinking into a longer recession through the winter after a slump in business and consumer confidence in ...
The government has made it abundantly clear they’re addicted to the smell of new asphalt. On Tuesday they introduced a new term to the country’s roading lexicon, the Roads of Regional Significance (RoRS), a little brother for the Roads of National (Party) Significance (RoNS). Driving ahead with Roads of Regional ...
School is outAnd I walk the empty hallwaysI walk aloneAlone as alwaysThere's so many lucky penniesLying on the floorBut where the hell are all the lucky peopleI can't see them any moreYesterday morning, I’d just sent out my newsletter on Tama Potaka, and I was struggling to make the coffee. ...
Hi,I wanted to check in and ask how you’re doing.This is perhaps a selfish act, of attempting to find others feeling a similar way to me — that is to say, a little hopeless at the moment.Misery loves company, that sort of deal.Some context.I wish I could say I got ...
I have hitherto been fairly quiet on the new season of Rings of Power, on the basis that the underwhelming first season did not exactly build excitement – and the rumours were fairly daft. The only real thing of substance to come out has been that they have re-cast Adar ...
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 ...
“The thing is,” Chris Luxon says, leaning forward to make his point, “this has always been my thing.”“This goes all the way back to the first multinational I worked for. I was saying exactly the same thing back then. The name of our business needs to be more clear; people ...
Buzz from the Beehive It’s been a momentous few days for Children’s Minister Karen Chhour. The Court of Appeal has overturned a High Court decision which blocked a summons order from the Waitangi Tribunal for her. And today she has announced the Government is putting children first by introducing to ...
In 2014 former Australian army lawyer David McBride leaked classified military documents about Australian war crimes to the ABC. Dubbed "The Afghan Files", the documents led to an explosive report on Australian war crimes, the disbanding of an entire SAS unit, and multiple ongoing prosecutions. The journalist who wrote the ...
Treasury officials have outlined many ways in which the Fast Track Approvals Bill is deeply flawed, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking says. ...
Green Party co-leaders Marama Davidson and Chlöe Swarbrick used this year's State of the Planet to call on the Government to prioritise people and planet as the delivery of the Budget approaches. A full transcript of their speeches can be found below. ...
Green Party co-leaders Marama Davidson and Chlöe Swarbrick have used their State of the Planet speeches to challenge the Government to prioritise people and planet over profit as the delivery of the Budget approaches. ...
The Government’s introduction of legislation that would enable landlords to end tenancies with no reason marks a dark day for the 1.4 million people who rent their home in Aotearoa. ...
The Minister for Mental Health has found the Suicide Prevention Office and mental health support for 111 calls slipping through his fingers, says Labour spokesperson for Mental Health Ingrid Leary. ...
Today’s justification from the Minister for Children for scrapping protections for our tamariki was either a case of ignorance or deliberate deception. ...
The Green Party says the Government’s misguided policy on gangs will fail, following the announcement of the establishment of a national gang unit and district gang disruption units to target gang activities. ...
“With Police pay negotiations still unresolved after six months in Government, Mark Mitchell has today rolled the Commissioner out for a rebrand of their approach to gang crime,” Labour police spokesperson Ginny Andersen said. ...
The Government bringing back 50 charter schools will not increase achievement and is a distraction from the core mission of the education system, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Te Pāti Māori is showing extreme concern over the Environment Select Committees adoption of a lucky dip draw to determine hearings for the Fast Track Approvals bill. Of the 27,000 submissions, 2,900 requested to present. All organisations will be heard; however, the remaining 2,350 submitters will be subject to a ...
Today New Zealand First will introduce a Member’s Bill that will protect women’s spaces. The ‘Fair Access to Bathrooms Bill’ will require, primarily in the interest and safety of women and girls, that all new non-domestic publicly accessible buildings provide separate, clearly demarcated, unisex and single sex bathrooms. This Bill ...
The Green Party is welcoming Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ continuation of Hon. James Shaw’s cross-party work on climate adaptation, now in the form of a Finance and Expenditure Committee Inquiry. ...
The National Government plans to cut 390 jobs at ACC, including roles in the areas of prevention of sexual violence, road safety and workplace safety. ...
The Government has been caught in opposition to evidence once again as it looks to usher in tried, tested and failed work seminar obligations for job-seeking beneficiaries. ...
The Green Party is welcoming the announcement by the Minister Responsible for RMA Reform Chris Bishop to approve most of the Wellington City Council’s District Plan recommendations. ...
David Seymour has failed to get the sweeping cuts he wanted to the free and healthy school lunch programme, Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
Hon Willie Jackson has been invited by the Oxford Union to debate the motion “This House Believes British Museums are not Very British’ on May 23rd. ...
Green Party MP Hūhana Lyndon says her Public Works (Prohibition of Compulsory Acquisition of Māori Land) Amendment Bill is an opportunity to right some past wrongs around the alienation of Māori land. ...
A senior, highly respected King’s Counsel with decades of experience in our law courts, Gary Judd KC, has filed a complaint about compulsory tikanga Māori studies for law students - highlighting the utter depths of absurdity this woke cultural madness has taken our society. The tikanga regulations will compel law ...
The Government needs to be clear with the people of the Nelson Marlborough region about the changes it is considering for the Nelson Hospital rebuild, Labour health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall said. ...
Ministers must front up about which projects it will push through under its Fast Track Approvals legislation, Labour environment spokesperson Rachel Brooking said today. ...
The Government is again adding to New Zealand’s growing unemployment, this time cutting jobs at the agencies responsible for urban development and growing much needed housing stock. ...
With Minister Karen Chhour indicating in the House today that she either doesn’t know or care about the frontline cuts she’s making to Oranga Tamariki, we risk seeing more and more of our children falling through the cracks. ...
The Labour Party is saddened to learn of the death of Sir Robert Martin, a globally renowned disability advocate who led the way for disability rights both in New Zealand and internationally. ...
Labour is calling for the Government to urgently rethink its coalition commitment to restart live animal exports, Labour animal welfare spokesperson Rachel Boyack said. ...
Today’s Financial Stability Report has once again highlighted that poverty and deep inequality are political choices - and this Government is choosing to make them worse. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to do more for our households in most need as unemployment rises and the cost of living crisis endures. ...
Unemployment is on the rise and it’s only going to get worse under this Government, Labour finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds said. Stats NZ figures show the unemployment rate grew to 4.3 percent in the March quarter from 4 percent in the December quarter. “This is the second rise in unemployment ...
The Coalition Government will introduce legislation this year that will enable roadside drug testing as part of our commitment to improve road safety and restore law and order, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Alcohol and drugs are the number one contributing factor in fatal road crashes in New Zealand. In ...
The Government has announced a series of immediate actions in response to the independent review of Kāinga Ora – Homes and Communities, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “Kāinga Ora is a large and important Crown entity, with assets of $45 billion and over $2.5 billion of expenditure each year. It ...
Associate Health Minister David Seymour is pleased that Pseudoephedrine can now be purchased by the general public to protect them from winter illness, after the coalition government worked swiftly to change the law and oversaw a fast approval process by Medsafe. “Pharmacies are now putting the medicines back on their ...
Tēnā koutou katoa. Da jia hao. Good morning everyone. Prime Minister Luxon, your excellency, a great friend of New Zealand and my friend Ambassador Wang, Mayor of what he tells me is the best city in New Zealand, Wayne Brown, the highly respected Fran O’Sullivan, Champion of the Auckland business ...
Energy Minister Simeon Brown has announced that the Government will make it easier for lines firms to take action to remove vegetation from obstructing local powerlines. The change will ensure greater security of electricity supply in local communities, particularly during severe weather events. “Trees or parts of trees falling on ...
Wairarapa Moana ki Pouakani were the top winners at this year’s Ahuwhenua Trophy awards recognising the best in Māori dairy farming. Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka announced the winners and congratulated runners-up, Whakatōhea Māori Trust Board, at an awards celebration also attended by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Finance Minister ...
"On the 27th of March, I sought assurances from the Chief Executive, Department of Internal Affairs, that the Department’s correct processes and policies had been followed in regards to a passport application which received media attention,” says Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden. “I raised my concerns after being ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins has announced the appointment of three new District Court Judges, to replace Judges who have recently retired. Peter James Davey of Auckland has been appointed a District Court Judge with a jury jurisdiction to be based at Whangarei. Mr Davey initially started work as a law clerk/solicitor with ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour is calling on the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) to put ideology to the side and focus on students’ learning, in reaction to the union holding paid teacher meetings across New Zealand about charter schools. “The PPTA is disrupting schools up and down the ...
Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly today announced the appointment of Craig Stobo as the new chair of the Financial Markets Authority (FMA). Mr Stobo takes over from Mark Todd, whose term expired at the end of April. Mr Stobo’s appointment is for a five-year term. “The FMA plays ...
Surf Life Saving New Zealand and Coastguard New Zealand will continue to be able to keep people safe in, on, and around the water following a funding boost of $63.644 million over four years, Transport Minister Simeon Brown and Associate Transport Minister Matt Doocey say. “Heading to the beach for ...
New Zealand and Tuvalu have reaffirmed their close relationship, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand is committed to working with Tuvalu on a shared vision of resilience, prosperity and security, in close concert with Australia,” says Mr Peters, who last visited Tuvalu in 2019. “It is my pleasure ...
New Zealand is gravely concerned about the situation in New Caledonia, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “The escalating situation and violent protests in Nouméa are of serious concern across the Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “The immediate priority must be for all sides to take steps to de-escalate the ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon met today with Samoa’s O le Ao o le Malo, Afioga Tuimalealiifano Vaaletoa Sualauvi II, who is making a State Visit to New Zealand. “His Highness and I reflected on our two countries’ extensive community links, with Samoan–New Zealanders contributing to all areas of our national ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has announced that he has approved Waiheke Island ferry operator Island Direct to be eligible for SuperGold Card funding, paving the way for a commercial agreement to bring the operator into the scheme. “Island Direct started operating in November 2023, offering an additional option for people ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters today announced further sanctions on 28 individuals and 14 entities providing military and strategic support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Russia is directly supported by its military-industrial complex in its illegal aggression against Ukraine, attacking its sovereignty and territorial integrity. New Zealand condemns all entities and ...
A year on from the tragedy at Loafers Lodge, the Government is working hard to improve building fire safety, Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk says. “I want to share my sincere condolences with the families and friends of the victims on the anniversary of the tragic fire at Loafers ...
Ka nui te mihi kia koutou. Kia ora and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you so much for having me here in the lead up to my Government’s first Budget. Before I get started can I acknowledge: Simon Bridges – Auckland Business Chamber CEO. Steve Jurkovich – Kiwibank CEO. Kids born ...
New Zealand and Vanuatu will enhance collaboration on issues of mutual interest, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “It is important to return to Port Vila this week with a broad, high-level political delegation which demonstrates our deep commitment to New Zealand’s relationship with Vanuatu,” Mr Peters says. “This ...
Minister for Land Information, Chris Penk will travel to Peru this week to represent New Zealand at a meeting of trade ministers from the Asia-Pacific region on behalf of Trade Minister Todd McClay. The annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Ministers Responsible for Trade meeting will be held on 17-18 May ...
Minister of Education Erica Stanford will head to the United Kingdom this week to participate in the 22nd Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers (CCEM) and the 2024 Education World Forum (EWF). “I am looking forward to sharing this Government’s education priorities, such as introducing a knowledge-rich curriculum, implementing an evidence-based ...
Minister of Education Erica Stanford has today thanked outgoing New Zealand Qualifications Authority Chair, Hon Tracey Martin. “Tracey Martin tendered her resignation late last month in order to take up a new role,” Ms Stanford says. Ms Martin will relinquish the role of Chair on 10 May and current Deputy ...
New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and President Emmanuel Macron of France today announced a new non-governmental organisation, the Christchurch Call Foundation, to coordinate the Christchurch Call’s work to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content online. This change gives effect to the outcomes of the November 2023 Call Leaders’ Summit, ...
Distinguished public servant and former diplomat Sir Maarten Wevers will lead the independent review into the disability support services administered by the Ministry of Disabled People – Whaikaha. The review was announced by Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston a fortnight ago to examine what could be done to strengthen the ...
Today’s announcement by Police Commissioner Andrew Coster of a National Gang Unit and district Gang Disruption Units will help deliver on the coalition Government’s pledge to restore law and order and crack down on criminal gangs, Police Minister Mark Mitchell says. “The National Gang Unit and Gang Disruption Units will ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has today expressed regret at North Korea’s aggressive rhetoric towards New Zealand and its international partners. “New Zealand proudly stands with the international community in upholding the rules-based order through its monitoring and surveillance deployments, which it has been regularly doing alongside partners since 2018,” Mr ...
Air Vice-Marshal Tony Davies MNZM is the new Chief of Defence Force, Defence Minister Judith Collins announced today. The Chief of Defence Force commands the Navy, Army and Air Force and is the principal military advisor to the Defence Minister and other Ministers with relevant portfolio responsibilities in the defence ...
Legislation to repeal section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act has been introduced to Parliament. The Bill’s introduction reaffirms the Coalition Government’s commitment to the safety of children in care, says Minister for Children, Karen Chhour. “While section 7AA was introduced with good intentions, it creates a conflict for Oranga ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins will this week travel to the UK and Italy to meet with her defence counterparts, and to attend Battles of Cassino commemorations. “I am humbled to be able to represent the New Zealand Government in Italy at the commemorations for the 80th anniversary of what was ...
The upcoming Budget will include funding for up to 50 charter schools to help lift declining educational performance, Associate Education Minister David Seymour announced today. $153 million in new funding will be provided over four years to establish and operate up to 15 new charter schools and convert 35 state ...
“The results of the public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has now been received, with results indicating over 13,000 submissions were made from members of the public,” Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “We heard feedback about the extended lockdowns in ...
Foreign Minister, Defence Minister, other Members of Parliament Acting Chief of Defence Force, Secretary of Defence Distinguished Guests Defence and Diplomatic Colleagues Ladies and Gentlemen, Good afternoon, tēna koutou, apinun tru It’s a pleasure to be back in Port Moresby today, and to speak here at the Kumul Leadership ...
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Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Yet there are people who still care and who are unselfish.
Te Puea marae represents the best of New Zealand.
Uncaring.
The present regime running WINZ and Housing NZ represents the worst.
‘Te Puea Marae steps up to find cancer teen and family a home
Her father, who previously worked as a painter in Hamilton, tried to find his family a home.
“He would go to Winz for appointments, he told them about me having cancer, about us.
“They did nothing. He went to Housing NZ, told them. They couldn’t find us a house. Too full, they said, too full.”
When things at her aunt’s “got really tense”, the family left and had stayed at the marae since.’
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11659501
Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Uncaring and incompetent.
Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett
‘Social housing and community agencies have not yet had approaches from clients wanting to take up a relocation grant, available from today, to move out of Auckland.
The grant of up to $5000 announced last month by Social Housing Minister Paula Bennett will be available from today. The money for relocation costs will not need to be paid back unless the person moved back to Auckland within a year.
Despite the scheme being launched today, the Ministry of Social Development could not tell RNZ News how many Housing New Zealand houses were available outside of Auckland, and where they were.
“It is too soon to answer this question. The grant is available for any vacant housing, including private rentals, or social housing,” the department said in a statement.
At the time she announced the grant, Paula Bennett said there were dozens of empty houses in other parts of New Zealand, such as Lower Hutt where there were 18 state houses ready to let, Palmerston North where there were 15 and Gisborne with four.’
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/306790/'little-information'-on-grant-to-move-to-regions
making shit up as they go along.
or maybe instead of reading the future with the help of tealeaves and bones, they ‘Ministry of Social ‘Welfare” is waiting for Paula Bennett to drop a dump and then they gather around the turd and read the future out of that.
Oh look, she had sushi last week for dinner.
Apparently ( according to Tracy Watkins of Fairfax) Bennett was at the Field Days a lot last week.
Too busy to be dealing with the housing crisis…….
Apparently ( according to Tracy Watkins of Fairfax) Bennett was at the Field Days a lot last week.
Too busy to be dealing with the housing crisis…….
I wonder if she realises that $5000 isn’t actually enough to cover the expenses of moving a family.
Nor does it say that $ 5000 is the amount anyone who moves is going to get. Firstly, its “up to”…, secondly knowing WINZ they will want quotes for everything, then pay out not a cent more, even if those quotes were a guess. Family and friends helping out won’t get anything for their efforts, but a moving company will.
If anyone hears of (and proves) a case where this offer was taken up and the person given $ 5000 to relocate at their leisure, I will eat my hat.
+1
Another day in John Key’s neo-liberal nightmare.
We have become a cruel, greedy, uncaring and selfish nation under his wretched leadership.
Yet there are people who still care and who are unselfish.
Kai for Kids represents the best of New Zealand.
A government that rejected Mana’s Feed the Kids Bill 4 years ago represents the worst.
‘1200 school lunches in under an hour: Porirua community pitches in to help hungry kids
“Attendance is really low on Mondays and Tuesdays because Wednesday is benefit day.”
“Kids don’t come to school because they don’t have any food to bring.”
Two months later, Clifford and her volunteers now make 1200 lunches for a dozen Porirua schools.”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/81198151/1200-school-lunches-in-under-an-hour-porirua-community-pitches-in-to-help-hungry-kids
http://www.maoritelevision.com/news/politics/feed-kids-bill-looks-doubtful
The fucking Herald must be being paid for this shit. It has run a piece on poor Paula as a victim ” I’ Ve been cyber bullied because of my size”. Well stop eating so many fucking pies then !.
its when National decamp from the chamber for Bellamys, as soon as question time in Parliament is over. I doubt they serve pies.
The media are getting irrelevant, from promoting social engineering like bullying ,oh poor me child Max Key, and reading his latest antics of his music video, to children of musico’s complaining they just get sex offers from men because their daddy is famous.
Nationals brighter future is the homeless sleeping in Aucklands Well lite CBD.
Unfortunately it doesn’t matter what large people do, they always attract abuse including in the form of people telling them there is something wrong with them for the way they eat. In other words the problem with fatphobia is that too many people have prejudices about fat.
Call Bennett out on her politics, her meanness and the atrocious government she works for. Plenty of material there without going for the prejudices about fatness.
“Call Bennett out on her politics, her meanness and the atrocious government she works for. Plenty of material there without going for the prejudices about fatness.”
+1
Same goes for Gerry Brownlee too. Call him out on his stubborn bullish authoritarian ways, not his size.
Prejudice against another’s body is unhelpful. We have no right to make judgements or assumptions about people’s diets, especially as we don’t know, and have no right to know their medical history, such as prescription medicine side effects, endochrinological/hormonal disorders and or injuries that prevent exercise that may have contributed to a person’s weight gain. It’s not all about food.
Drop the fatphobia folks. It’s discrimination.
I called her out because she intimated that she couldn’t,t help being that big, I doubt that she has an endocrinological or hormonal problem because that only occurs in a very very small percentage of people, ( but it makes a good excuse for those unafficted ) and she was half that size when she entered politics and got introduced to the trough in all its permutations.
BTW, I’m overweight and I’m that way because I eat too much and if someone calls me fat I have to agree with them.
You know, there are other reasons for people being fat than “endocrinological or hormonal problem[s]”, or “because [they] eat too much”.
Your weight is irrelevant Adrian. It’s not about others agreeing whether you are over weight or not. You know that and so what. If you know you eat too much then that’s your buzz, it doesn’t mean EVERY other big person is big for the same reason as you.
Your weight doesn’t give you license to attack others for the same reasons.
Pullya Benefit is a nasty vindictive spiteful person who bullies others by disclosing sensitive and private information so she can put herself in a position of power.
Her size has got nothing to do with it, and we know nothing of her medical history and shouldn’t speculate on it either. That’s her business, not yours or mine.
+1
+2
For what its worth, agreed
Noted, pr. I suppose we can all experience life’s little surprises now and then, like you and me agreeing on something 😀
Rosie I see where you are coming from, but she has been, not so long ago much smaller than she is now, she yo yo’s with her weight but she can obviously get smaller from eating less, so it probably isn’t a hormonal problem. I see it more as an emotional problem as being an eater for comfort because of the stress of her job and/or being out of her depth or just because she over eats because she enjoys her food. What I cannot understand is seeing she is seen as an intelligent women, surely she sees the health issues she is bringing on herself, heart problems and definitely diabetes because of all her “belly fat” which is what the medical profession call it. Its difficult not to criticise when there are many people who can lose weight and keep it off – self discipline plays a part and pride in one’s appearance is another. Now don’t bite my head off please.
Again. Some one else’s size is their own business. Why do we feel we have a right to criticise or even speculate about their supposed issues? What’s it got to do with us? It doesn’t matter if Pullya Benefit’s shape has changed in the time that we have seen her in parliament.
Speaking of “self discipline and pride in one’s appearance” is very much the line fatphobics use. What you are saying is fat people are ugly and lazy. That is highly prejudiced.
Another sign of fatphobia is faux concern for another persons health. And you do realise that not all heart disease is weight related don’t you? My father died at age 54 from heart disease and he was an average size man. Mr Dr tells me the biggest indicator for heart disease is genetics, even above and beyond smoking. Stress is a bigger killer than weight, so why aren’t we hating on all the stressed people? A person can be overweight but still be fit and healthy and live a long life.
Don’t get sucked into the hate Kate. You’re better than that.
I hope the NZ police are keeping an eye on this website, whose readers are celebrating the killing of Jo Cox and looking forward to similar acts here: https://yournz.org/2016/06/19/crusader-rabid/
Another day of Pauls impotent whining. Do us all a favour and stay in bed.
Sounds like you make a special effort to read Paul’s comments 🙄
Not really, I try to see things in a positive light and see no point in trying to bring everyone down with a daily dose of repetition. The sun is shining, it’s the shortest day onward and upwards.
desperately looking for that brighter future, eh?
Tarquin, how about the eye of the beholder thing? Winter solstice, I mourn because I love the cold, short dark days of winter – all moody and introspective as they are, yet cosy, safe and warm by the fire.
Like a true former teen goth I celebrate summer solstice as it’s marks the countdown to winter. Until Autumn comes it’s long wait through the drunken violence of summer (other’s, not me), water restrictions, insufferable heat, mozzies and flies, phoning noise control at 1am, and invites to hideous work xmas parties.
Can’t all see the world the same way eh?
Very true, I’ve only just finished moaning about the heat and now I’m wishing it back again. Up here in Northland we don’t get a real winter, maybe a frost or two and it just rains all the time. I had a white Christmas in England a few years ago – that’s how winters should be.
Ha ha. Well you’re living in the right part of the country if you like it warm.
Like wise, in winter in the southern hemisphere can you pull off an alright mid winter xmas, minus the snow unless you live somewhere really cold. I’ve done some good solstice parties over the years, around the fire.
As for Paul. What he is posting is politically and socially relevant. It IS the depressing truth. It’s really hard to jazz up our reality in any way that makes it palatable. Because of that I find it a bit much early in the morning myself so flick through. However I always read Paul’s posts he posts separate to the early wake up morning cup of depression. I guess we all have ways of expressing our anger and grief over our witnessing of our country going to the dogs.
You sound very much like National’s ex-party president Michelle Boag, who was on the panel of Q&A last Sunday. She appeared to be oblivious of the strive people were going through in this country, apparently in her eyes all was rosy;-)))
By the sounds of things you should be the one staying in bed. You obviously need the rest as you’re getting overly stressed-out.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/cyber-bullying/news/headlines.cfm?c_id=1504076
PB oinks about bullying this morning, does anyone else find this ironic?
Funny how John Key only has time for a few minutes before 8am to be interviewed on RNZ.
By the time he blusters and confuses the issue under questioning the time pips sound. End of story.
Wonder if he chooses the time for the interview?
Guyon could record an interview that went past 8am and play the balance after 8.
Hone’s interview by Guyon would be more interesting but his attempt at humour, trying to be the ‘comeback kid’ in an analogy to a band with singers and bass players etc. is about as silly as his artificial dote com fiasco.
We have enough clowns in parliament already.
enough clones also
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11659634
A new, to me, Herald news summary online with visuals. Like TV I guess.
German Foreign Minister Steinmeier says NATO should not be inflaming the situation with Russia
https://www.yahoo.com/news/germany-slams-nato-warmongering-russia-115515814.html?ref=gs
So weka, back to answer your question, you raised here:
http://thestandard.org.nz/kiaora-matariki-puaka/#comment-1190406
or at least attempt to.
“It seems like we have waves of momentum, and then gaps. What can we do to fill the gaps or at least tide us over?”
Probably best if someone who has been in a leadership in activism for decades to answer this curly one. However my 2 cents worth centres around socialising. Yes, socialising, on and off line.
Personally though, I prefer the off line version. In meeting new people and growing bonds with those we know, in person, we don’t miss out on all the subtle non vocal expressions that create a depth to the relationship. We can create intellectual relationships on line and they can be enhanced as we, as a collective (I”m talking about the wider world, not us on TS necessarily) create and ride a wave, but energy falls a bit flat during the troughs does it not? EG, look at online conversation pre and post general elections.
Although, in saying that, I noticed the opposite on the Bella Caledonia site post Scottish indyref – the talk was flat out, soul searching, expressing feelings etc. They even had a guest post by a psychologist to analyse the results and fall out. Their response could be down to different cultural approaches to communication – The Scots might be better communicators than NZer’s, I don’t know. (but the Scots I know and have met are great talkers and listeners)
So, I see advantages in socialising as in holding momentum during trough periods. During these times we build loyalty, maintain bonds, maintain solidarity, and maintain the flow of ideas. New ideas can be discussed and existing ones reworked. The group’s mutual interest remains a living thing rather than it being sucked into a vacuum of loss. Socialising keeps an interest alive and when the time comes to ramp up activism the platform is stable and the group is already in synch to go to work on a project or campaign.
Hope that makes sense.
Wow, that is such a great comment Rosie, I wasn’t expecting it to go in that direction.
I completely agree. I’ve been in online communities where there is more relationship building than happens here or on places like FB or twitter, and so that social thing where you have something solid happens more. But still I agree that the place it needs to happen most is in the physical world. I don’t know how to make that happen in my own life because most people I know are really focussed on life outside of political realities. I guess that’s why I come here.
But it reminds me of something that Naomi Klein said last year, when asked how she keeps going, she said it’s really important to get in a room with people who are doing the same kind of work, struggling with the same kind of things. I think you’ve really nailed it there, where it needs to happen within normal community interactions if it’s going to be stable and resilient (maybe Klein was talking about something else).
Take it from a pro, Naomi Klein would know. 😀
I empathise with your situation of not being physically around others who are focused on political issues/emerging social realities. It’s the same for me.
I do believe group social meeting is what we are going to need, to strengthen us for the next election, just for starters, as we have far bigger ongoing threats to our very existence, in climate change, as well as maintaining momentum and influence.
I think a while back Bill set up a regular meeting in Dunedin, where people met in a park. Hows that going people? Is there a way for Standardista’s to meet in person in their regions?
As I thought about socialising being a key thing to strengthening a group committed to a similar goal I received mail in my inbox from the Labour Party gen sec. He was asking if you were a 20 – 30 something professional interested in socialising. A great move I thought, along the lines of what I’d been thinking about. If that wasn’t your thing, age wise or work wise there was a survey to fill in with your thoughts about doing something similar.
I would be interested to see how many people turn up to a party AGM compared to how many people turn up to a party social gathering, especially if it’s a low cost thing. $ is a barrier for some of us.
Personally, in light of the Lab/Green MOU, I’d like to see a seasonal social get together, to build solidarity and to forge ties at the grass roots, where it really counts.
That should read “Naomi Klein’s a pro, she would know”. Just so there’s no confusion about who the pro actually is. 😀
Unconnected to the Standard, there are a few interested politically aware Dunedinites meeting in the next week as part of a Matariki event. I haven’t been involved in the organisation of the event but I would expect there to be 20-30 very politically interested minds show up.
In general terms I agree that face to face, in person political socialising is crucial to our future.
That’s really good to hear CV. Off the keyboards and exercising the vocal chords instead of the fingers. Hope it’s a fruitful event 🙂
Endless war, endless greed: The Pentagon is lining its pockets with taxpayer dollars
Obama now plans to rebuild America’s nuclear weapons cache, the latest in a series of military enrichment schemes
http://www.salon.com/2016/06/18/the_pentagon_is_soaking_us_all_partner/
Trump’s lies aren’t unique to America: Post-truth politics are killing democracies on both sides of the Atlantic
Voters no longer value truth, and Donald Trump and Boris Johnson are dangerously exploiting the new paradigm
http://www.salon.com/2016/06/19/trumps_lies_arent_unique_to_america_post_truth_politics_are_killing_democracies_on_both_sides_of_the_atlantic/
_LPRENT
You’ve been pretty harsh with a couple of my comments last couple day so i’m bringing it here to open it up and sort it.
Yep I made a couple boo boo’s, I retaliated too this
[deleted as irrelevant]
[lprent: This isn’t a negotiation, it is an observation of a continued pattern of behaviour and a demand for a permanent modification of some of those behaviours from a moderator. There is no point in various moderators continuing to point out deficiencies in your behaviour if you are too damn lazy or too thick or too self-entitled an arsehole to modify those behaviours.
1. Read the policy again. It is clear you haven’t understood it.
2. How you feel about it has absolutely no relevance and I suspect you don’t have sufficient experience with operating a blog to even be able to offer it. You are a guest on this site, your host is telling you to shape up or ship out.
3. Your only viable alternative to changing your behaviour here is contained in the last section of the about.
4. The only reason I’m bothering with this tedious exercise is because you haven’t been a particularly obnoxious
pestguest until recently.5. I really don’t care what you decide to do. So I won’t waste any more time on it. ]
This is a heart wrenching article. And in our back doorstep. Why do not NZ take the Nauru refugees – it is hard to see how these detention centres can be considered legal under human rights legislation – in particular for the unaccompanied children committing suicide.
“The worst I’ve seen – trauma expert lifts lid on ‘atrocity’ of Australia’s detention regime
Exclusive: In his 43-year career, Paul Stevenson has worked in the aftermath of the Bali bombings and the Boxing Day tsunami but says nothing he witnessed was as bad as the treatment of asylum seekers on Nauru and Manus”
http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jun/20/the-worst-ive-seen-trauma-expert-lifts-lid-on-atrocity-of-australias-detention-regime
How many people out there think mental illnesses equate to a lower intellect, or reduced mental capacity?
I have found here some resistance to my points of view based on the fact I am mentally ill.
I am in fact B-Polar, and I have an IQ of over 160 according the 2 of the Psychologists who treated me through Hep C treatment.
My illness caused a chemical imbalance in my brain which causes me to have periods of massive empathy/depression and periods of manic/sleepless, fast thinking, impusiveness.
if untreated.
Currently outlooks for Bi-polar people are good, it does take time to find the right chemicals and once a balance of chemicals has been restored we live completely normal lives.
I recently found the right medication , for me it was Effexor, I snapped out of depression in the time it took for the pill to get into my blood stream and have been stable for over two months now.
Comments from LPRENT such as..
“I really can’t be bothered dealing with commenter’s mental issues over and over again and having them disrupting a reasonably rational debate. I suspect you don’t understand yourself well enough to understand your own issues and therefore are unlikely to be able to control yourself. So any ban that I am forced to issue will be for some time”
and the other day you insulted me and my mental health just like someone who knows absolutely nothing and is predjudiced.
I am shocked at the way you talk to and treated me, uses my disabilty and mental health to question my intellect and integrity.
Hi Richard. I can’t comment on the exchange you’ve had with LPrent.
I can, whole heartedly support you in your recovery from depression and your belief (or what I see as fact) that mental illness is in no way related to intelligence.
I’m someone who struggles with depression and chronic insomnia to the point where I can no longer work/ or find suitable part time work, so I’m thrilled to hear you’ve found a medicine that works. That can be a really liberating feeling.
Go well and stay well.
Kia Kaha!
Thanks Rosie, after so many years trying it was super liberating to not dive into depression whenever a saw a animal run over or bad news.
I have 2 months of stress less life now and i’m chilling back out daily. I feel the tension relax and everyday gets better without having to worry if I was about to swing in moods.
Prozac, citalopram, epillim by the truckload, they give you the antidepressants and assume you’ll be fine come back in a month they say, it never did squat, they even thought I was lying and putting it on after all the tablets didn’t do much, it took me over ten years of that and a Hep C treatment that has side effects of making you suicidal, to find a brilliant new Dr who took me over from my old Dr and she cured me in one med change.
I had given up, never give up if the meds aren’t working change them don’t linger on non active antidepressants Rosie is all I can say.
Awesome to hear you’re doing so well Richard after years of suffering. That really is a breakthrough. Well done you! It’s a good feeling, I find, to be back to one true self and feeling safe and well.
It is hard for people in a clinically depressed state to cope with problems, bad news, and upsetting sights. You become sensitised to things and it spirals down. I’ve had to work with being overly empathetic to animal suffering but deal with it in different ways now.
I’m fine and dandy on the paroxetine now but still an insomniac. I use sleeping pills about 3 times a week to get by. I also try to keep a different future in mind too. Once the clouds lift you can see there are good things that ARE going on.
Take care. Rosie
I’ve had to deal with acute depression a number of times in my life, and seem to have quite a few friends and family with various mental aliments – including bigotry. I expect to help and deal with issues to do with it as and when I need to.
But what I was referring to was your attitude and actions on this site. Here I’m not interested in dealing with, protecting or helping you. I’m interested in protecting and helping this site as a place for debate. The way we do to deal with bad behaviour for WHATEVER cause, is to warn about behaviour and (if required) to remove the ability to write comments.
The proportion of people commenting or authoring on this site with various afflictions (mental, physical, bigotry or addictive) probably isn’t that too dissimilar from society at large. However most of them manage to control their behaviour to the level that I don’t notice them. I can’t see any reason that I should treat you differently to them.
There are limits to the amount of time that I (or any other moderator or author) can be expend on this site. And after more than 8 years of doing it, I tend to push so that I don’t have to spend too much time dealing with someone acting like an arsehole. I find it is less of a problem to whack hard once so I don’t have waste time to play whack-a-mole with dickheads.
Respect Lprent, sorry you had too crack out the sledgehammer , but I respect your doing it, now that we had a chance to one to one, vs catching each other on a thread, and distracting from the thread.
Some of the odd comments were tongue in cheek and I have learned humour often gets taken literally here if your not super careful to announce how your inferring a comment.
My comments should tidy up as a I get more familiar with the morally accepted peer standards here.
Thanks again for posting this and allowing me to relate my concerns and have them answered.
Kind regards
Richard
[lprent: Ok, the warning has been heard. Removed from moderation. We will see how it goes. ]
Thanks for that.
Humour, more often than not, simply doesn’t come across in text. To indicate that you’re being humorous usually means that you have to add smileys and/or tags.
Yes. I learnt the hard way in earlier days. Tongue-in-cheek comments were taken too literally by some and I ended up on the receiving end of a few unpleasant barbs. Even adding emoticons or plain language tags is not always a guarantee. Best to confine oneself to such comments when the post itself is humorous and/or satirical in content.
Try being humorous on here if you’re seen as a tory 🙂
Right wingers with a sense of humour are usually given credit on this site. Just remember to add the smiley or a humour tag so we know… 😉
Or a /sarc tag so I (and others) don’t take what is said literally.
You have to remember that in this environs we can’t see the puckish smile (wasn’t he a rodent in one of williams plays ?) /sarc .
… we can’t see the puckish smile (wasn’t he a rodent in one of williams plays ?) /sarc .
No, he was fairy. 😀
I played him once in a high school play.
It doesn’t come across as puckish when a policy hurts someone – making a joke of their pain is provocative.
C’mon Stuart Munro. Just because we have a teeny wee bit of fun doesn’t mean we don’t feel strongly for those who are the victims of this heartless and horrible government. Some of us have even been there in one form or another.
There’s still room to lighten up and maybe even have a laugh at ourselves.
Yes… except that with a pretty vacuous and actively biased MSM there is little or no channel for normal outrage. A not too politically interested person who gets their news from TVNZ, stuff, and the Herald could be forgiven for thinking that Nick Smith was vaguely competent or Paula Bennett compassionate.
There is a need to roundly damn this government, in adition to dispassionately discussing alternatives. The trolls never sleep, and never miss an opportunity to paint this vicious and dysfunctional kleptocracy as marginally competent and technically human.
I agree that that part of Lynn’s statement was a form of prejudice in terms of mental health and I wish he hadn’t made it. I hope you can pull back a bit anyway, because I like your contributions on ts in general, and I think you bring perspectives that we don’t otherwise have and I find that valuable. There are rules though, and if you break them too often it’s easier for the site to give you time out.
I do think you are stepping over the bounds a lot at the moment, and you will get moderated for that. Different moderators have different ways of approaching that.
fwiw, Lynn is an equal opportunity moderator and will be abusive to everyone pretty much equally if they piss him off as a moderator. That’s the bit to understand, it’s not a personal thing so much as what is seen with a moderator hat on. It takes time to moderate, there is more involved than in just making a comment. And that time is time we don’t get to spend doing other things. One of Lynn’s trigger points is where he finds he is having to use a lot of time on one person when they’ve already been warned.
My own is people derailing threads (you’ve noticed I’m sure) either by posting off topic or by posting things that are inflammatory.
I’m really happy to explain where I think you are overstepping the bounds if that’s helpful. It is good to reread the Policy, and they still need to be understood in the context of the culture of ts. Lots of people don’t get that, and some of those people end up with bans.
Moderation has changed a bit in the last 6 months, and IMO there has been an improvement in the debate culture. There is less tolerance for bickering and troll derailments. Shutting them down early on keeps discussions much more focussed on the topic of the post, which is the point of the site.
I’d see two main things happening with you at the moment. One is taking personal grudges across multiple conversations. It just disrupts thread, so if you can let it go, or keep it in the thread it originated in if it’s appropriate, that’s going to cause less disruption and get less moderator attention. If all else fails, do what you have done today and take it to Open Mike.
The other is to focus more on the politics. You have interesting ideas and ones that are challenging to some here, so finding ways to communicate those without having a go at people will work better in the long run. Yes, lots of what happens here is unfair (e.g. someone is rude to you and doesn’t get called on it). But it’s on all of us to act within the rules as much as we can and lower the need for moderation in the first place.
edit, just seen Lynn’s comment above, which is a very clear explanation that behaviour will be moderated no matter what the cause.
Only in that I view the type of bigotry that he was displaying as being a type of mental illness. It is pretty damn hard to explain it any other way. I’ve talked to enough bigots on various subjects (including some very intelligent ones) to realize that in some people it appears to be hardwired well below any cognitive layer.
I think it was more just that thing of equating behaviour with mental illness when it’s pretty hard to know how much of anyone’s behaviour comes from that. And people with formal mental health diagnosis like bipolar already get stigmatised more than most, and attributing behaviour to their mental illness tends to make that even more so.
Bigotry is a different thing IMO.
I’m glad you explained what you meant to Richard and that he gets it now. All good.
Equally understood, Weka, again sorry for the trouble.
I replied to Lprent and the same curtesy and sentiment is given to you.
Nice one Richard, glad you sorted it out 🙂
Rant begins
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/81219380/renewed-calls-for-euthanasia-debate-as-petition-submissions-set-to-break-record
I don’t know if this has been posted today but its a weak and cowardly position of Andrew Little over this and its even more cowardly and weak of john Key in not picking this up as well
Basically every politician, no matter what party they’re with, that doesn’t support this is a gutless coward
Maryan Street is completely right about this, we at least need to start talking about it
Rant over
I’ve seen Whaleoil mention the Catholic Mafia within National as being the main block in the euthanasia debate.
Same probably applies to Labour,
Didn’t think the Catholic Church still had that amount of power today
I’d say Bill English is staunchly prolife.
“staunchly prolife” engenders a whole spectrum of political beliefs in of itself, starting with an understanding that life is sacred and it is not man’s place to play God with and take others’ lives.
So you’d be against euthanasia, CV?
http://thestandard.org.nz/voluntary-euthanasia/#comment-1124288
Yes, for various reasons, I think that any Government Authorised Suicide programme is a bad idea.
There are hundreds of improvements which should be made to the care of terminally ill people before this measure is even considered.
BTW if NZ ended up performing euthanasia at the same rate that the Dutch do, we would have 1,450 Kiwis a year die under a Government Authorised Suicide programme.
Yes, that’s four times NZ’s annual road toll.
And we’d be investigating whether or not the programme should be extended to children under 16 years of age.
Bill English, Michael Woodhouse ,Chris Finlayson, Chester Borrows and probably quite a few others.
Well that’s depressing
Yes, there’s always a chance that joyce might make a tilt at the top job at any time. Slater needs to head that one off at the pass for his mate.
I think Steven Joyce prefers to be the power behind the throne.
as an imminent grease
I doubt the National Party Board and their major funders consider Joyce as an electable leader for the National Party. So I do not think that he will have any support from that quarter. And without that support, any leadership coup attempt is going nowhere.
I’m just working on the idea that Slater doesn’t give an opinion without an ulterior motive – a comment above suggests that his “Catholic mafia” line could have been aimed at knobbling any number of contenders 🙂
Before you jump to conclusions about the Catholic Mafia you may want to read this interview (plus 2 comments) with Simon O’Connor who is the chairman of the Health Select Committee that is tasked with the inquiry. Mr O’Connor was almost ordained as Catholic Priest.
Syria: Another Pipeline War
It’s an interesting history lesson that connects the dots of US imperialism for the last 60+ years.
How nice it would be for the Western Empire to have a Qatari pipeline going through Syria; it would ensure energy supplies to Israel and the EU could access a massive amount of gas while cutting Russia out of the loop.
Damn that Assad for not allowing the use of his country for this project. He’s simply got to go.
horrible misappropriating bastards
http://fineartamerica.com/shop/shower+curtains/lindauer
so culturally wrong but someones got to make money somehow //bangs head on anything…
gosh.
That entire site is Trump-tacky-ular…
shower curtains, I mean bloody hell!!!
Although I went to the trouble of identifying the work and the man portrayed I managed to get myself involved in a rather unpleasant flame war with another blog host when he posted the image below.
But he didn’t seem to be able to understand why some would find the manipulation offensive.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BD0t7ELvUV-/
that one made me sick joe
What sort of cultural infant would even think to do that?
And as for the shower curtains!! 😒
I wonder if the descendants have made any representation to these unthinking idiots?
If NZ took a leaf from the yanks’ book we’d make reproductions of moko illegal, and then try to extradite the sellers for “money laundering” because the payments were transferred from one account to another.
Might even get a helicopter raid on their home…
Am I the only one who heard Kathryn Ryan shout down Matthew Hooton this morning? First good moment in bloody years…
Ah that kind of explains felix’s somewhat obscure tweet today,
https://twitter.com/bsidebeats/status/744673898101248001
Off to have a listen now.
*shock*
I heard it. Not before time, although it took a bit to get him to shut up. Talk about verbal diarrhoea! Never heard Kathryn Ryan so exasperated. Can’t she turn him off or something ?
I wonder – she never stops him normally, but this time she was defending RNZ’s integrity..
I wonder if she has wanted to do the same in the past, but only today did she feel that she would have the backing of her own bosses?
Can’t she turn him off or something ?
That’s what I kept yelling out to her to do. She couldn’t hear me.
Kiwi troops to stay in Iraq for another 18 months. No one saw this coming.. then again I remember various spokespeople from the left saying this is exactly what would happen.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/81265744/kiwi-troop-deployment-to-iraq-has-been-extended-by-18-months
Yep deployment to now extend beyond the next election
Key said the intention was not to go beyond two years and the mission would be reviewed in 12 months. At the initial deployment.
really,
Now he extends them for another 18 months.. that’s 18 months on top of the 2 years. Oh btw did he not mention we are at war now or is that coming later.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11659951
Last line of that article:
Wtf!
Yes, amusing. I don’t know how poor Gerry can sleep at night, knowing that so many swords of Damocles are swaying and hovering above our heads…
vino
The only imminent threat NZ is experiencing is the National party, led by John Key they are doing far more damage to people than ISIL have in NZ.
Sadly that’s actually a fact.
Reminds me of this tweet from the Economist:
My reply:
Nice 1 DTB.
When will John Key speak out against this scofflaw regime?
http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jun/20/the-worst-ive-seen-trauma-expert-lifts-lid-on-atrocity-of-australias-detention-regime
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=11660016
Now don’t bust your mouse furiously following this link nor froth so much your unable to offload your love of all things Paula Bennet.
However Barry Soper’s lovely post on PB just popped up and what do you know a comments section on her is open.
Good luck guys let her and Soper know we know, if you know what I mean.
She does not care, she’s a bully, you know the truth.
The $5000 is in part to be given to the removal Company and just $2000 given to the people as a start up grant, they said on Morning report today.
So John Key , how do you feel about people sleeping under bridges?
JK : We’ve had a bit of a discussion about that and we are quite comfortable with that really, I mean there is no real safety issue here as the vehicles are well above them and being under the bridge they shouldn’t pose a distraction for the motorist. If they want to live under a bridge then be my guest.
Arrr, I was more referring to the homeless problem.
JK: Well I haven’t had any homeless approach me directly about this, but we desperately need more roads and bridges and we are pushing that through so that should produce a win win situation with the extra bridges.