The two Canadian bigots Lauren Southern and Stefan Molyneux have now been granted 10 day work visas to visit New Zealand. They’ll be here in a fortnight.
A clearly disappointed Immigration Minister, Iain Lees Galloway, says that the pair’s views are out of step with Kiwi values:
“INZ’s decision in no way condones the views expressed by the pair, which are repugnant to this Government and run counter to the kind and tolerant values of the vast majority of New Zealanders.”
That’s exactly right. The alt Reich activist racists are repugnant, unkind and intolerant.
The pro-fascist backers of the visit, who hide behind snowflake flavoured whines about “free speech”, will be delighted. Ignore these sad, tired, old white men. They’ve had their day, which, from memory was sometime in September 1939.
Build the resistance to modern fascism. Let’s picket the hate away.
That’s assuming, of course, that Axiomatic, the Aussie company promoting the tour can find a venue. Legal papers filed in the Hate Speech Coalition’s lawsuit against Phil Goff admitted that private companies as well as public authorities refused to give these bigots a platform. Fair call that.
Axiomatic, by the way, is a one man band run by far right grub David Pellowe. He’s not the sharpest tool in the box, but he knows there money to be made in hate speech, so he’s going for it.
Let’s make sure that Southern and Molyneux get the message that we fought and beat their brown shirted predecessors in the forties, battled against apartheid in the seventies and eighties, rejected Don Brash’s dog whistles in the 2000’s and we’re not letting racism rise again here in Aotearoa.
No freedom for fascism, no platform for parasites!
To finish on a high note, here’s a song that reminds us that most of what comes out of Canada is thoughtful, respectful and often truly wonderful. This clip is from the Tragically Hip’s final tour before cancer took singer Gord Downie. The moment where the dying Downie forgets the lyrics and a bandmate walks over to sing the line is solidarity at its finest.
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