Daily review 25/03/2024

Written By: - Date published: 5:30 pm, March 25th, 2024 - 58 comments
Categories: Daily review - Tags:

Daily review is also your post.

This provides Standardistas the opportunity to review events of the day.

The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Don’t forget to be kind to each other …

58 comments on “Daily review 25/03/2024 ”

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  1. bwaghorn 1
    25 March 2024 at 6:27 pm

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/512590/that-was-then-and-this-is-now-chris-hipkins-talks-up-tax-reform-he-previously-ruled-out

    Jump in a time machine to November 2026, chippie narrowly loses with a full suite of progressive taxs , will labour commit to keeping those proposals for another 3 years.

  2. weka 2
    25 March 2024 at 10:11 pm

    Good lord, did Hipkins just do a reverse ferret on Let Women Speak?

    "we should, in a country like New Zealand, be able to disagree with each other, be able to have debates, including around radical feminism, without throwing things, spitting things, and all that kind of stuff"

    starts at 6m 36s

    https://twitter.com/theplatform_nz/status/1772028116715622682

    • Cricklewood 2.1
      25 March 2024 at 11:01 pm

      Yep, the entire recent speech was a reverse ferret at least as far as his pre election postions went.

      Feels to me like Hipkins is pivoting to secure his position with the base.

    • bwaghorn 2.2
      26 March 2024 at 6:31 am

      Has he worked out what a woman is yet?

      • David 2.2.1
        26 March 2024 at 7:39 am

        I’m sure he knows what a woman is, just like we all knew what a women was up until about 2018…

      • Robert Guyton 2.2.2
        26 March 2024 at 4:39 pm

        "worked out"?

        Like the constipated mathematician? With a pencil?

  3. gsays 3
    26 March 2024 at 8:03 am

    Perhaps it's time to lob that culture war grenade into this administration?

    Ask Luxon "What is a woman?".

    • weka 3.1
      26 March 2024 at 10:26 am

      maybe. It's been an effective tactic in the UK, asking the Tories eventually forced both Tory and UK Labour to shift positions.

      In NZ, it's not so clear. The divide between the liberal left and people fucked off by the liberal left is growing. That particular grenade has the potential to make things a lot worse.

      • David 3.1.1
        26 March 2024 at 2:50 pm

        Would it make things worse? We all knew what a woman was, just like we all knew what a man was. Most of us were also aware that some men felt that they were a woman, and vice versa. The real issue is around social acceptance, but this is true for anyone who doesn’t fit in.
        In my opinion it’s just plain crazy to redefine gender to suit the small percentage of people who are different, and an even smaller percentage of people who insist that everyone else must change.

        What I have written above would have made no ripples 10 years ago, but if I said that in my work place now I may well find myself in trouble. This is why many people are getting f@&ked off by what is called the “liberal left”.

        Maybe it’s the “liberal left” that needs to change. My belief is that the “liberal left” is neither liberal or left. They are authoritarian, violent, intolerant, and are incapable of accepting any views other than those views that are deemed acceptable by whatever ideology it is that they follow.

        • weka 3.1.1.1
          26 March 2024 at 6:52 pm

          from a left/progressive and feminist pov, right wing governments are very hard on the things we hold dear.

          In addition, creating unmendable divisions leads to violence, and women always do badly when that happens.

          So there is a contradiction in those who support women's sex based rights today but don't support women's rights generally. And those people are getting to drive the GC narrative atm, in NZ and some other countries.

          I agree the liberal left have an increasing problem with authoritarianism. It's a mistake imo to see this as negating the whole liberal position, and it's important to understand the difference between rw and lw authoritarianism. But yeah, it worries me a lot.

          • David 3.1.1.1.1
            27 March 2024 at 8:46 am

            I’m not and never have been active in politics, my experience beginning at high school during the 81 springbok and later on with student politics led me to want nothing to do with either side. The left certainly has a issue with intolerance, bullying, misogyny among other things. I get that the right do the same, however when you are trying to change society for the better, you should behave better.

            If I had to choose between a authoritarian left wing government, or a authoritarian right wing government, I would certainly choose the right wing government. To a limited extent we live in a left wing authoritarian society already. My thinking in my workplace is already policed by the pride network, I am told what my beliefs must be, and that I am not allowed to question, challenge or disagree with these beliefs. Sure I personally can challenge these people, but at what cost?

            When it comes to the current gender wars, I’m certainly not willing die in a ditch for transgender people. My recent experience with men involved in the pride network has exposed a disturbing pattern of misogyny directed at young women who are either exclusively straight, or lesbian.

            • Traveller 3.1.1.1.1.1
              27 March 2024 at 3:25 pm

              Great comment.

              "I get that the right do the same, however when you are trying to change society for the better, you should behave better."

              I have long ago abandoned any such expectation. Neither the right nor the left has a monopoly on good behaviour.

        • weka 3.1.1.2
          26 March 2024 at 7:22 pm

          case in point. Library cancels Drag Queen story hour because of safety concerns (I take that as physical safety). Brian Tamaki says "another kill"

          https://x.com/BrianTamakiNZ/status/1772485418505715829?s=20

          They shouldn't be doing DQST in libraries until the issues of sexism and child safeguarding are addressed. But Tamaki and the rest of the paying crowd from that side don't want gay and trans people to exist. The more division we have, the more dangerous that will get.

          • Robert Guyton 3.1.1.2.1
            26 March 2024 at 7:51 pm

            Tamaki's "kill" will be celebrated by some here, yes?

            • weka 3.1.1.2.1.1
              26 March 2024 at 8:10 pm

              why do you think that?

              • Robert Guyton …
                26 March 2024 at 8:33 pm

                I believe some here are anxious about this issue.

                • weka …
                  26 March 2024 at 8:51 pm

                  Don't think we've got too many Destiny Church supporters here.

                • gsays …
                  27 March 2024 at 6:51 am

                  Are you saddened by the loss of DQST in a public library Robert?

                  • Robert Guyton …
                    27 March 2024 at 7:19 am

                    I imagine they'd be really good at it. I read thousands of stories to children over the period of my teaching career and listened to other adults reading as well; not many people read with the verve I think stories are best read with – it looks as though those DQ's have that in spades, so, yes, disappointed on behalf of the children.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      27 March 2024 at 12:19 pm

                      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-gender_acting

                      Robert, I wonder if potential future examples of male-face:

                      Peter Pan
                      Monkey
                      Fanny and Alexander
                      The Year of Living Dangerously
                      Victor/Victoria
                      Albert Nobbs
                      Predestination
                      Suspiria

                      female-face:

                      Kind Hearts and Coronets
                      The Mouse that Roared
                      Monty Python's Life of Brian
                      Hairspray
                      Tootsie
                      Mrs Doubtfire
                      Dame Edna Everage

                      and both:

                      Orlando
                      Cloud Atlas
                      The Twentieth Century

                      may be stillborn in the face of a new wave of moral panic, not to mention Some Like it Hot, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, and pantomime. The horror, the horror – won't someone please think of the confused children!

                      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_panic

                      A brief history of the pantomime – and why it’s about so much more than ‘blokes in dresses’ [17 Dec 2016]
                      Ultimately, theatre has always been a space where gender roles and sexual identity are questioned, mocked or unsettled –the stage offers a safe space to view fluid gender identities.

                      What might 'sanitising' particular safe spaces lead to? Time will tell.

                      Oh yes it is! Oh no it isn’t! Is the panto dame still a suitable cause for mirth? [13 Dec 2022]

                    • weka []
                      27 March 2024 at 12:51 pm

                      You are conflating cross dressing with drag. Drag Queens perform sexual content. Mrs Doubtfire didn’t.

                      When liberals make moral panic arguments without listening to GC progressives, they obscure and thus ignore the really important child safeguarding issues.

                      Let’s try some images to illustrate. I will load them in a new comment.

                    • weka []
                      27 March 2024 at 12:59 pm

                      do you understand what you are looking at?

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      27 March 2024 at 2:16 pm

                      You are conflating cross dressing with drag.

                      ‘Conflating’ has a lot to answer for, when we want clean divisions.

                      Maybe issue all drag entertainers and/or shows/performances with (evidence-based) ratings? Better than a blanket ban, imho. And who knows, maybe those performing for children would 'clean up' their acts so as to mitigate harm – rather depends on why they're doing it in the first place, which admittedly is difficult for me to understand.

                      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Association_film_rating_system#History

                      do you understand what you are looking at?

                      Not really – is (some of) it child pornography?

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      27 March 2024 at 2:36 pm

                      Sorry weka, I wrote that before I read your reply (at 1:57 pm) to RBO – maybe the images you posted are not pornographic, but I hope you can understand why people might conflate (some of) them with pornography, at least at first glance.

                    • weka []
                      27 March 2024 at 2:44 pm

                      I don’t have a problem with anyone seeing those images as pornographic. I do have a problem with a gender identity ideologist like RBO giving me a hard time for making them visible instead of giving the people that are doing that a hard time. It’s frankly fucking weird. Let’s not talk about the child safeguarding issues because we don’t want to look at what is being done to children?

                      The liberal left refuses to engage with the actual safeguarding issues. They also practice No Debate which means we have no left wing critique and the narrative gets gifted to the right who then get to convince people that the only way to protect children is by adopting right wing values.

                    • weka []
                      27 March 2024 at 4:01 pm

                      Maybe issue all drag entertainers and/or shows/performances with (evidence-based) ratings? Better than a blanket ban, imho. And who knows, maybe those performing for children would ‘clean up’ their acts so as to mitigate harm – rather depends on why they’re doing it in the first place, which admittedly is difficult for me to understand.

                      The problem I see is the liberals and a chunk of DQ culture don’t understand safeguarding. The liberals block that conversation, but we need to go back to basics and establish what it is, instead of allowing a bunch of people to react as if doing that is the end of liberal values. It’s not, it’s upholding liberal values. It just says that boundaries are important.

                      I’ve been following this sub topic for a while (haven’t looked at it recently, my links are mostly older ones), and seen two things that are pertinent here.

                      One is that in the UK, because they have such a strong gender critical feminist movement, they’ve been able to push back against the people blocking child safeguarding and get it discusses in the mainstream. No Debate for a long time meant the MSM wouldn’t cover it, but that has changed and organisations are now looking seriously at what is going on. It’s not good yet, but it’s getting there.

                      Two is that I did see some attempt by a DQ to talk about child safeguarding, but it was very obvious they didn’t have the background or understanding to so that well and they cam across as self serving: child safe guarding was being addresses so that DQs could do story hour. That’s a big red flag. The purpose of child safeguarding is to protect children. If there is doubt, then don’t do DQSH. No-one needs DQSH, we all need child safeguarding. The latter is the priority.

                      I will see if I can find some links to the UK discussions. It’s not my background so I don’t have the easy conceptual language to explain child safeguarding, what it actually is and why it matters in this context. Some people will intuitively understand what I am talking about, others will parse it through a reaction against conservatism and miss the point.

                    • weka []
                      27 March 2024 at 4:06 pm

                      I think it’s probably worth pointing out that the reason DQ culture doesn’t really get child safeguarding is because it is men (yes, yes #notallDQs, and yes there are women who do drag, but that’s a different matter). Women have a much greater understanding of child safeguarding because children come out of their bodies. It’s built in (yes, yes, #notallwomen).

                      This is why the meme runs strong that GC women are just older prudes. Older women have lived long enough to see the damage done and the older they get the less fucks they have to give so they stand up and say what needs to be said. We all know this about older women and it transcends this culture war.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      27 March 2024 at 5:54 pm

                      Nicely presented, Drowsy.

                    • Tabletennis …
                      27 March 2024 at 6:40 pm

                      to Robert
                      Maybe: Robert have you actually looked at the reading material presented to these children in these library story times?

                      As a teacher to children, I have to assume you understand the richness of a child's imagination and that adults telling nice stories can be trusted and are nice, especially the ones in flamboyant colourful outfits?

                      Are you happy to tell a child that doesn't feel happy in their body – or doesn't have no friends they are perhaps born in the wrong body and that they can all change that by becoming 'brave and wonderful' by instead of being Janet become James?

          • David 3.1.1.2.2
            27 March 2024 at 8:53 am

            Drag queens have always been adult entertainment performers, so definitely not suitable for children’s story time in a library.

            • Red Blooded One 3.1.1.2.2.1
              27 March 2024 at 10:22 am

              "Watch out they're behind you" "Oh no they're not" Millions of children scarred and ruined by years of Panto. Also am pretty sure in the Stuff report the Napier Library invitation was for 16+ but carry on with your fear-mongering

              • weka …
                27 March 2024 at 1:02 pm

                please show us the panto equivalent of the sexualised images I just posted above.

                • Red Blooded One …
                  27 March 2024 at 1:20 pm

                  As a Moderator you should not be posting pornographic photos on this site. You clearly trolled the internet after my comment to David. I can't be arsed commenting on the photos (which have nothing to do with NZ) or trolling the internet for Risque Panto to satisfy your urges. Carry on running your biased shotgun on this site. You have all the power. cheerio

                  • weka …
                    27 March 2024 at 1:57 pm

                    Interesting that you see them as pornographic RBO. The photos in order are,

                    1. a post by Rainbow ST with an image from a NZ Herald piece of NZ DQs.
                    2. a DQ in sexualised costume, stripping at a kids event
                    3. another DQ in a sexualised, parody of women costume, reading to children in a public space, with his crotch exposed.
                    4. a blog post about a DQ accused of being in possession of child porn (I'll agree I shouldn't have posted that one without fact checking)
                    5. a boy (probably when he was around age 8) in the US with the DQ name of Lactatia, who does sexualised drag performance, including sometimes with adults
                    6. Lactatia posing with a naked DQ. This image was posted on his Instagram

                    None of those images get condemned by the liberal left, and they shut down debate or avoid like you are doing, so we can't have an adult conversation about the issues.

                    I posted links to those images this morning in OM along with left wing critique of DQSH.

                    A bit later I posted the actual images in response to what I saw as Drowsy minimising the child safeguarding issues.

                    Didn't see your comment until after that.

                    • Descendant Of Smith …
                      28 March 2024 at 1:47 am

                      "None of those images get condemned by the liberal left"

                      This is why I generally stay out of these debates is in part because of these regular assertions as if they are fact. I'm wouldn't think any of those images are OK in a library but am conscious that they are not NZ pictures.

                      I know some of the people who have been involved with telling these stories over the last few years and none of them do or would behave like this. If you think I at least would support that behaviour then you don't really understand anything I've posted here the last 10 or so years.

                      I'm not sure why you need me as a left wing liberal to actually condemn them when it is fairly self-evident.

                      This whole area is difficult. I know for instance a person who has dressed as a women for decades and used women's toilets all that time with no problems (as opposed to getting beaten up in men's toilets) who now barely goes out now because they get abused in women's toilets now as well. They would not harm a fly and never have.

                      At the same time I can clearly see that there are men who seem to have some sort of fetish / desire to abuse who are strident and violent in there misuse of the LGBT and transgender population and acceptance. I am also aware of one instance where a religious arse has deliberately done this to give transgender people a bad name – he is definitely a deliberate bad actor. Bit like this idiot.

                      https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12467071/Trans-teacher-Kayla-Lemieux-MAN-no-breasts-scruffy-beard.html

                      I have several family members who have been sexually abused through at least four generations – some from as young as 3 and 4 including my mother by the policeman who lived next door in a small town. I have an uncle who hung himself after he was caught raping my young cousin – his step daughter. I can give you quite a long list but a couple of examples suffice.

                      At the same time growing up we had my sisters friends freaking out when staying at their place when they got their first period, I've flatted with gay male flatmates and worked with highly homophobic and predatory men, I supported women through pregnancies and abortions and have both gay and straight family members. I'm loyal to my wife but liberal about what others get up to as long as they do not hurt others and all is consensual.

                      I get highly frustrated with the religious fanatics who see sexual abuse on every corner and in every interaction and wonder what the fuck goes on in their heads. We do not need there puritanical view of sex and sexuality and they need to stay out of other peoples lives. They certainly seem to think about sex and abuse an awful lot.

                      Part of this puritan approach does come from some parts of the feminist movement as well – particularly around areas like prostitution and the notion that men only see women as vessels for their body parts. I'm much more tolerant of this than the religious stridency because I'm well aware that some of those women have been abused by men. It is the men that abused them that are the problem. Prostitution won't ever go away so safety and regulation is much more important than tilting at windmills. Cash is sometimes a more honest transaction than a few drinks and a meal or a tinder swipe. Some people don't want a committed relationship.

                      Added into this mix is the dis-information and internet bullshit like kitty litter boxes in classrooms and students identifying as cats and the undoubted confusion of teenage sexuality.

                      There are also sheltered children and unsheltered children. We knew about sex and men's behaviours at a very young age – partly being rural and partly I suspect due to Mum's abuse. I had a staff member once at 18 and first job who did not know how you got pregnant. I do not think children should be protected from knowing about these things and generally we seem to underestimate what children read and know. Normal books such as Jaws and Wilbur Smith had quite explicit sex scenes, stuff like Edge westerns had plenty of sex and violence. We were reading those at 7 or 8 when I was at school.

                      In short I suspect I'm in a similar position to many other men in NZ who are under no illusions about what goes on in real life in many families. Most of us of my age would also know someone who went through borstals, children's homes etc who came out awful at the other end.

                      I find many of these conversations focus on the extremes. It is self evident that men behaving badly in women's toilets is wrong. Whether they are transgender, cross dressing, dressed in a boiler suit I don't really care. Get out of there. I also get why women don't want the abusive ones there but then I feel sorry for my mate who has peacefully done this for 40 odd years. I understand the historical bullshit when disabled toilets were wanted and almost always it was a women's stall made into the disabled toilet. To some extent this is a repeat – mens, womens, disabled and gender neutral would seem to me to be the ideal and normal practise these days and if space doesn't allow gender neutral with a disability design.

                      Then lying across all this I have no problem with people taking (what may seem) extreme positions because sometimes that is what is needed to get change. Women getting the vote was an extreme position at the time, overturning Roe vs Wade another.

                      I've tried not to rant but thought that maybe it was time to respond. I hopeful that you will find this supportive of treating all people well and why at times I don't join into these discussions. I simply can't take a black and white position on many of these things.

              • David …
                27 March 2024 at 2:47 pm

                Drag queens have always been adult entertainment performers, as in highly sexualised. This is quite okay in an adult setting, but not okay for children. My understanding is that the story telling is aimed towards children, not teenagers.

            • Robert Guyton 3.1.1.2.2.2
              27 March 2024 at 10:30 am

              No Shakespeare in Schools, then, David?

              All those adult performers, on school grounds!

              And Shakespeare! So bawdy!!

              Appalling!

              • weka …
                27 March 2024 at 1:04 pm

                Which Shakespeare play that is performed for primary school children that includes sexualised content?

                • Robert Guyton …
                  27 March 2024 at 1:25 pm

                  The actors, weka, having performed Shakespeare's bawdy works, visit schools to perform non-bawdy plays.

                  Same scenario as the Drag Queens reading children's books in libraries.

                  • weka …
                    27 March 2024 at 1:50 pm

                    are you assuming that DQs don't do sexualised content at DQSH?

                    If so, I suggest you look at the images above and read my commentary in today's OM.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      27 March 2024 at 5:51 pm

                      I'm assuming, weka, that actors who play bawdy Shakespearean characters are capable of anything!!!

                      How can you condone their presence in schools???

                      🙂

              • David …
                27 March 2024 at 3:00 pm

                From memory Robert, Shakespeare was introduced in high school, the bawdiness was fairly tame and age appropriate.

                Drag queens are grown men dressed up as highly sexualised caricatures of women, reinforcing the idea that women are basically just a receptacle for a man’s penis. Definitely not the kind of person that should be allowed around children.

                • Robert Guyton …
                  27 March 2024 at 5:52 pm

                  Your memory, David, is Fawlty.

                  • David …
                    27 March 2024 at 7:34 pm

                    I maybe getting older Robert, but my memory is fine.

                    Shakespeare is generally introduced to high school students in the 4th to 5th form (year 10 or 11). For me that was 1980ish, by that age most of us boys were passing around copies of our dads playboy or the even more highly sophisticated penthouse magazines. Of course our fathers and ourselves were just reading the articles… But Shakespeare was certainly tame in comparison with what we saw on the telly back then.

                    However what is appropriate for teenagers in high school, is certainly not appropriate for children in primary school. We now know that teenagers and young adults should not be viewing pornography (especially the more graphic type) drinking alcohol or taking drugs.

                    Drag queens are men who dress up as highly sexualised fake women, it’s almost as though women are reduced to their most basic function for the sexual gratification of men. They are certainly not suitable for young children.

                    From here I could get into how children from a young age can be gradually groomed to become sexual playthings by selfish adults who are only interested in their own sexual pleasures, while dismissing and minimising the devastating effects on their victims. However I’m sure that Weka has a much greater understanding and would be far more skilled in discussing this than I am.

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      27 March 2024 at 9:36 pm

                      "… most of us boys were passing around copies of our dads playboy or the even more highly sophisticated penthouse magazines."

                      "We now know that teenagers and young adults should not be viewing pornography…"

                      So… should we regard you as a reliable commenter on the issue, or a corrupted one?

                    • David []
                      27 March 2024 at 10:26 pm

                      Robert, I’m have no idea what you mean…

                      I have known people who have been groomed from a young age by what could only be described as predators. It’s certainly no joke, although I get the impression that some people don’t really care, unless they can take political advantage from it.

                    • weka …
                      27 March 2024 at 10:09 pm

                      it's a difficult conversation to have and tbh, while I think TS is doing reasonably well at talking about the conflict between women's rights and trans rights, I'm not sure if we have the ability to talk about sexual abuse of children in this context.

                    • David []
                      27 March 2024 at 10:35 pm

                      Maybe child abuse is too close to the bone. Just like most of us were bullied by the older kids, we in turn bullied others but we justified what we did. I don’t think I understood the effect and seriousness of abuse or violence until I experienced it firsthand.

                    • Descendant Of Smith …
                      28 March 2024 at 9:23 am

                      "Just like most of us were bullied by the older kids, we in turn bullied others but we justified what we did."

                      Nah we didn't. Lots of of us decided not to go down that road.

                      Others do go down that road – particularly when damaged young.

                      What made some more resistant I don't know. For me I think it was learning to read at a very young age. This opened me up to enormous range of alternatives that my parents had no control over. My mother encouraged me to read.

                      Reading changes the mind – I'm a big fan of books and libraries.

                      As I've said here previously an early poem that stuck was:

                      “I and the public know
                      What all schoolchildren learn,
                      Those to whom evil is done
                      Do evil in return.”

                      W. H. Auden

                      Another that told me, and still does today, that the bullies in my life will to be lying in the sand one day. This to me has always been a poem of hope and perseverance.

                      I met a traveller from an antique land,
                      Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
                      Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
                      Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
                      And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
                      Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
                      Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
                      The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
                      And on the pedestal, these words appear:
                      My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
                      Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
                      Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
                      Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
                      The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

                      Percy Bysshe Shelley

  4. joe90 4
    26 March 2024 at 8:36 pm

    Mary Trump is optimistic.

    .

    While the media was focused on trying to convince us that the bond reduction was an unmitigated win for Donald, the results of a hearing in a courtroom a few blocks away was an unmitigated disaster for him…

    https://marytrump.substack.com/p/now-judge-shuts-down-donalds-lawyers

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