Ho Hum. I have just scan read 5th January, “Open”(closed/censored) Mic. To see that some that have had the audacity to question & propose other ways forward, dispatched. There has to be a balance of good, open, frank debate that does not discourage others from contributing. I realize that this site is not directly related to the Labour Party yet is a place apparently where those from the broad left can comment. Yet the amount of abusive, confrontational language is appauling . The remit surely, of the site is to challenge the actions of the racist right wing morons in charge and to agitate the labour party to to do better & put forward polices for those that have been victimized, forgotten, written off by those nasty NeoCons!
Someone has said that this site is not a mouth piece of the Labour Party and a coalition of the broad Left however quote the fact of being formed in the late 30′s by The Labour Party. This may be wrong yet seems like a acute case of “Hypocritical Having My Cake and Eating It All!”
From only being on this site for near on a month & I hate to jump to a conclusion yet can see no other. This site, seems to be run and by a “Gang of Four/Five”, whom have there own hobby horse issues and see no room for others to have their points fairly and equitably viewed without them being vilified. The Gang of Five, under the guise usually of authors, seem to run this site like a 3rd rate, chat room. These people should know better and allow open debate and get off their one trick hobby horses and allow others to fully contribute, yet they wont…
One has to wonder about the mindset of these people whom protest to support the broad left yet seem intent on keeping the status quo on the site. Why would this be? Surely they cant be so shallow, as not truly to mean as they protest? Yet actually wish to keep this Perpetual Argue Mental Chat Room Atmosphere as it will secure their positions within it?!
An election looms. NZ has been through merry hell under the command of The Wannabe Fascists of The National Party. A defining moment approaches. Unite as far as possible and agitate, organize, question The Labour Party to do better….Pose the views of our fellow citizens whom have had the life kicked out of them & don’t have the luxury of being a comfortable, one issue-no further comment author/chat room admin(s). I don’t want another term of enslavement of National, do you? Most on this site don’t I am sure….Yet, you have to wonder about some of the authors, As Opposition suits their purposes and keeps their Mini Me Personality, Power Base in Tact in The Fiefdom of TS….
I may not be able to vote till later on this year against The Scum in charge of this wonderful country, however I can vote with my feet and would advocate others do to find a site(s) (for QOT’s benefit, no need to pique too hard, there are many, take your choice. I am sure if you ask Google “nicely” it will oblige) where your voice, comment, suggestion,,,no matter how small is treated with equality, respect and with the true aim of creating a better New Zealand for all! Take care one et All!
[RL: If you read the actual intro to Open Mike “The usual rules of good behaviour apply (See Policy)”. Open means open to all-comers, their ideas and robust debate – not open to mindless, offensive abuse.]
Political movements are bigger than particular parties.
To attract a wide range of contributors that reflect such a movement and those it serves we must all create a welcoming space to meet and talk. There is plenty of knowledge about how to do that, including respecting the communication needs of women who make up 51% of the population.
Productive debate does not mean allowing anyone to say whatever they like, especially in the form of the drunken slurs which attracted moderation yesterday.
MMP allows selecting a political party that fits your own interests best. Likewise, there are many vehicles for contributing to the broader discussion.
From only being on this site for near on a month & I hate to jump to a conclusion yet can see no other. This site, seems to be run and by a “Gang of Four/Five”
Over the seven years this site has run, there have been many authors. Far more people have come and moved on than would be apparent in just one month. In the big picture there certainly has not been a “Gang of Five’ running the site.
Quite the opposite – the person who really runs this site Lynn Prentice, is remarkably ‘hands-free’ in steering the authors or the content. His prime concern is to provide an environment in which robust debate can thrive and then he sits back and watches the fun.
The only other author/mod whose been around since the start is me, and I might be fairly po-faced bugger, but the one thing I’ve never done is stop anyone expressing their ideas (as distinct from behaving badly). Ever. Period.
What you are really touching on is a question of tone. The atmosphere at The Standard has best been described as “noisy local bar”, with a few quiet nooks. Not everyone feels comfortable with that, and either feel silenced or simply not heard. It is still is a masculine dominated space.
Which is not all bad. A lot of the puffing and preening that goes on can also carry a sharp wit, humour and insight. For all the surface “Perpetual Argue Mental Chat Room Atmosphere” there is also an underlying community and over time the really smart people adapt their positions and behaviours. It’s challenging and some people rise to it.
And while men may seem to be engaged in testosterone poisoned death matches – the thing that’s easy to miss is that often the very next day the clock has been reset, the grudge match buried and they’re happily batting away on some completely new topic.
For most people new here, the biggest challenge is just the usual one, breaking into the cliquey conversations that go on. It just takes time, watch what’s going on and eventually it flows. When I take a few months out, I’ve noticed it takes time to ease back in.
An election looms. NZ has been through merry hell under the command of The Wannabe Fascists of The National Party. A defining moment approaches. Unite as far as possible and agitate, organize, question The Labour Party to do better….Pose the views of our fellow citizens whom have had the life kicked out of them
Yes your heart is surely in a good place. It often takes an outsider to see clearly what others have stopped seeing because it was there all the time.
During December some of the regular authors (or at least ones who have been pretty regular in posting over the last year) tend to take some time off writing, take some time out.
Authors come and authors go, and periodically then they come back again. Depends what their work and family loads are. Sometimes it depends on if they can find anything that they really really want to say.
We’ve had about 4 almost complete rollovers of regular authors over the last 6 and a half years. It isn’t a career. It is a voluntary activity that The Standard trust (administered by myself and Mike Smith because we were the known IRL people when we set up the trust) provide to invited people as authors, and anyone else as commenters who behave within our policy.
There are 40 odd authors with writing rights if they can remember their logins (because I don’t turn them off). I’d expect that a fair number of them will start writing again this election year.
A wise comment Red…I think the Scot has a point. Gang of Five? Sometimes it feels that way, to me that’s a known quantity, the other bit is the propensity of bystanders here to kick the (wo)man whilst they are down. Perhaps we should reflect on how good we are at carving our own side up….at this rate we might just kill one another off and leave the field clear for the Right.
I think there’s more women (as far as I can tell re-pseudonymns and stated gender) participating than previously.
I understand “masculine” to be as much about culture and socially aquired characteristics as to do with biology. The masculine legacy of politics generally has slowly changed over the years, but still some of the older characteristics linger.
In my pols paper last semester at Otago, during one of our tutorials that followed a couple of lectures on NZ Politics and the Media, our tutorial group had to divide in to four smaller groups. Each smaller group had to represent one of four NZ political websites: The Standard, The Daily Blog, Whale Oil, and Kiwi Blog. (Couldn’t choose which blog team you could be on, and to my barely disguised horror, I ended up on the Whale Oil team. It was excruciating.)
Anyway, the interesting thing was that the three females on “The Standard” team, all took on male gendered persona’s, and started talking in this kind of gruff salty vernacular. It was kind of disturbing.
I had to stop myself from bellowing “Why aren’t you channelling QoT in all her magnificent mouthy glory??? Or Karol, with her *I will not be ruffled by white noise onslaughts* .” While trying really hard to channel a sort of femmed up version of Tighty Righty/BM and saying “left wing wankers” a lot.
There are a couple of points that arise to explain what occurred in your tutorial:
a. The Standard is full of male gendered personas talking in a gruff and salty vernacular.
b. There are a variety of personas, male, female and gender neutral on the Standard and there are many polite and reasoned comments as well as gruff ones, yet the male gendered personas speaking in a gruff way are what that group of people noticed.
I choose b. as being the most accurate explanation.
Interesting!. I/we did a similar thing (media/sosc related) with social networking (internet dating) sites a few years ago. In my case the one and only social networking site involving a profile database I have, or ever intend signing up to.
Our profiles were complete crap in terms of persona and physical stats but the various responses were fascinating, BOTH in terms of various messages received, and in the way ‘sysops’ made various assumptions.
Of course … only of anecdotal value and borderline unethical, but it did serve to reinforce the findings of an earlier Queensland study.
Yes, I would go with B as well. It really fascinated me. 🙂
The tutorial group I was streamed in to were quite young. As in, NONE of my classmates were old enough to vote at the last election, and only a very small number (3, including me from memory) were looking at Pols as a major, so I don’t think they were reading up on the various political blogs prior to the class requirement.
How much time was spent reading the blogs for the assignment then? Over what kind of time? If it was just a couple of days I can imagine coming away with a distinct impression that doesn’t reflect reality over time.
The time period was over approximately 10 – 14 days, depending on what day your tutorial would have been. And yes, I’d have to say, it felt like the tutorial class was reflecting something of a caricature rather than the reality of the blogs. (Except for Whale Oil, because – well – that already is a caricature ;D )
Secondly, correcting the spelling of commenters here is the act of a wanker, unless the original commenter claims to have a brilliant grasp of the language and accidentally trips themselves up.
Thirdly, pedants who correct the language of others and get it wrong are even funnier than the commenter in example two.
“…all took on male gendered personas…” or “…all took on male gendered personae..”
My formal academic education ended precisely at the end of the third term of my fourth form year – outside of a failed attempt at Massey in 1999 when I freaked out at a 100 level Psych paper that involved basic stats. The giant gaps in my maths knowledge became painfully obvious to me at that point, and I was too embarrassed to ask for help.
These days, I’m not at all adverse to asking for help or clarification, so please feel free to be as pedantic as you like with my spelling and/or grammar. 🙂
Agreed. Personae is correct Latin plural of persona. Personas is correct English for plural of persona. Nobody these days bothers about sticking with the latin plural forms for words we’ve imported into English.
I took on a male personna (albeit a male version of myself) for the first few few months commenting on TS.
Anyways, what conclusions did they come to – do you remember?
It would be hard to get a feel for this place in just a few weeks, you’d have the advatage of the outsider point of view, but without any of the depth of the multiple histories/herstories.
Yes, I think the majority of the students wouldn’t have had a very long overview of the four sites, because it was A: a first year paper, B: the average age was quite young, C: the majority were doing the paper as an elective outside of their majors and D: it was relatively early in the semester. So yes, it was a small snapshot of time in Blog land.
In terms of conclusions, really the exercise was a 101 exploration of the political landscape in NZ via the internet. I think what stood out was how quickly and easily people became polarised and entrenched in our relative positions.
@Karol:
Yes I survived being a Right Wing Nut Job! It was actually a good exercise for me, because I had to argue against my own belief system/world view. It forced me to really think about why I think/believe the things I do, which over the years (cos I’m 43 now) have become – I don’t know – naturalised (?). I’d half forgotten how I’d arrived at many of my beliefs.
Do you keep any statistics on the gender of commenters?
Not directly (obviously I cannot).
But I do have the non-visible email addresses and the emails that people send to me (and some of those have surprised me). Moreover as moderator I do scan a lot of comments. Between one thing and another I can usually pick the probable gender, broad age of most of the commenters, and educational levels of commenters after they do hundreds of comments.
Both are things that I actually look for because I think a well rounded mix of both is crucial to developing an effective community.
Similarly I can also get aggregate probability information from other sources. Statcounter, wordpress stats, and Alexa are all pretty low confidence stuff. The new Google analytics appears to be pretty good – if only because they describe how they arrive at their confidence levels..
But mostly I just look at the comments, and there has been a noticeable change over the years with a gradually reduction in overwhelming predominance of youngish males towards a older audience with a more equal gender distribution.
Thanks for that. I suppose you put the bad spellers under the level of education, I expect that this does not take too many comments. (Re spelling, I have my good and bad days).
Possibly someone at the GCSB has more information on The Standard, maybe I could inquire there!
I suppose you put the bad spellers under the level of education,
Hell no. I’m a naturally sloppy speller saved by the spell check systems. My pronunciation is even worse (especially according to Lyn who gets wound up by that) because often I have only read the words.
Different when looking at code of course – you have to love those compilers.
I usually assess education from what people say. In particular if they can present an argument that I can’t find by putting in key phrases into google and finding out where they got them from. Few people who understand what they are talking about will ever use exactly the same language to describe the concept.
Yes, this is such a terrible place of censorship. I mean, have you ever tried posting almost the exact same thing to multiple days’ Open Mikes? I bet you they don’t let it through, especially if you’re threatening the Final Five.
I saw that earlier. Figured in this case that they’d put it up late in the night, didn’t get a bite, and then come back in the morning and vomited again….
Yes infused – of course. After all, the land was pretty much all stolen from the original inhabitants so ‘easy come, easy go’. However, one would have to wonder how your descendants will feel when they achieve the same negative social statistics that are currently dominated by Maori as a consequence.
Infused, it’s not theirs. Eminent domain and all that. Of course, if you sell it to citizens of other nations eminent domain becomes that little bit harder to enforce. Uncle Sam and all that.
Infused probably works on that old justification that ‘they can’t take it with them’. It’s OK of course for citizens to become tenants of their own nation – IF of course they can even afford to do that. Different cause, but same effect of various Pacific Islanders and Indian Ocean dwellers facing oblivion
A member’s bill from Labour MP and former Foreign Minister Phil Goff to limit rural land sales to foreigners was recently drawn from Parliament’s ballot and will be debated early this year.
We need to do better than limiting foreign ownership, we need to ban it altogether.
Agree. If you do not live here I cannot think of a single reason to own land. Goes for corporations owning property as well. If not majority NZ owned they should not hold land.
At 8.45am this morning on Radio New Zealand, an article on Ngai Tahu creating NZ’s largest dairy farm in Balmoral, South Island. I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of philipino workers. It will draw water out of the Waimakariri River…how is this still allowed to happen given water issues. This cannot be a good thing.
Modern business practices require the exploitation of many, often pushing them into poverty, so as to provide profit for the few. On top of that there’s also the damage done to the environment especially when the environment has already been damaged beyond sustainability, i.e, incapable of maintaining life cycles. And then there’s competition which forces the cheapest, least suitable practices on the participants in the market.
No, it’s not possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.
agree Making money in ‘the market’ involves that you acquire for the lowest price and sell on at the highest…ie, rip off all and sundry or be ripped off…. and sunk.
So the guy who I buy my veges off locally, who intentionally keeps his prices low, who prioritises selling to locals, grows organically, is doing ecosystem restoration, he’s ethically bankrupt?
By your and Draco’s definition we are all ethically bankrupt for ever having bought or sold anything.
Actually he is. He’s part of the growing movement of ethical modern business practices, but much of what he does is old school traditional too (be good to your customers, look after the land etc).
Besides, reread my original comment about making money and you will see I didn’t specify ‘modern business practices’. You made some assumptions and then dumped some ideology into the conversation.
One of the first proper jobs I had was working for a guy who ran his own business. I was the only employee. The owner paid above award rates in pretty much every respect and was very good to me. This was late 80s. He once pointed out to me that when I slagged off ‘business’ policially I was also talking about him. That really made me sit up and take notice and be much more discerning in my politics (I of course had meant ‘big business’ and hadn’t really thought about him as a businessman until he pointed it out). Got to get the target right or so many people get lost along the way.
Fair point, weka. Correction – you can be less unethical, though never entirely ethical when you act within the confines of a capitalist market economy.
Draco / Bill, lets strip the bullshit out of business ethics (because despite all the theories etc it is essentially really simple). Business consists solely of transactions aka trading, buying, selling.
To do a transaction has no ethical basis other than I have, you want, we agree a price. We then trade if we agree (or don’t if we don’t agree).
Essentially it is as honest or dishonest as the traders make it. It has no ethic to be bankrupt of. Ethics are particular to the individuals involved (and might I venture be directed by the environment or system….for example to place an individual in a position of power in a transaction – think corporate banksters- and their ethics might naturally vere toward greed).
Interestingly most long term successful small businesses survive on their long term reputation as being honest traders, usually within a circle of known like businesses. How do I know? Because that is my experience out here in “”marketland”.
The transactions you are referring to involve people and people can act ethically or not- you are taking the people out of the equation in your theory.
You can’t have a market without people. Isn’t this exactly what is going wrong with the current ‘market theory’ mentality – that all the ‘people effects’ are taken out of the equation? i.e. In order to get it resembling a scientific theory ‘people effects’ such as irrationality, following the leader – and lack of ethical behaviour – are removed.
This approach is sadly removing the ability to know or predict the effects of markets. Isn’t this one of the major reasons we are suffering sorely? (from this error of omitting very real inputs in our calculations)
Ennui. Buying and selling isn’t the simple and neutral process you claim it to be. It takes place within a framework of rules and conventions – capitalism or market economics. and one (some would say the) of the defining features of capitalism is exploitation. So, that’s the arena your business operates in. And I’m going to guess we can agree that exploitation is unethical. And even if you are self employed or your business is a collective where no wages are paid and so no direct exploitation occurs…materials still have to be sourced. And that unavoidably ‘supports’ exploitation. Likewise, when you sell on or provide a service, the people doing the purchasing have to enter into exploitative arrangements in order to afford your product/service.
That’s not to say that all business operators/owners are bad bastards – they’re not.
The owner paid above award rates in pretty much every respect and was very good to me.
That’s nice but he was still increasing his own income through your work which is the base exploitation inherent within capitalism. Yes, administration of the business is important but you as the creator of the wealth should have had a direct say in how much the administration was paid. It is this lack of say that employees have that makes their employment exploitation and thus makes a business person unethical even if they’re good people.
He’s part of the growing movement of ethical modern business practices,
So he’s actually making effort to be more ethical – good for him.
but much of what he does is old school traditional too (be good to your customers, look after the land etc).
The old school didn’t really have a lot of looking after the land in it. In fact, it was the old way of doing things that has caused so much damage to NZs environment – a way of doing things that National, in their re-write of the RMA, is bringing back.
Blue / Bill / Weka, I dont disagree with your sentiments at all: if you read me again I say the process of business is transactions and that transactions in themselves have no ethics. I also note that the environment and system will affect a individual involved in the transaction.
Business is in my mind entirely simple and easy to corrupt. For example the power relationships can be manipulated (as in child trafficking). The issue in my mind is how the power relationships can be made equitable in a transaction. If they are equal there can be no exploitation.
My way of keeping it even is to have long term relationships where I can and rely upon regulation etc where I have to. Its a very imperfect world. I suppose the real point is that humans are very corruptable.
“The issue in my mind is how the power relationships can be made equitable in a transaction.”
Which power relationships do you mean? The ones between the two people doing the transactions? Or the ones between all the people affected by the transaction?
I agree what you are saying about long-term relationships and reputation being a good way to go, however it is becoming apparent that ignoring ethics is giving those who are prepared to be dishonest an upper hand.
I believe that the original idea behind markets was exactly what you are conveying at 3.08 – kind of ‘keeping it simple’ I often think about how that system was set up at a time where ethics were possibly valued with greater resolve, (or would that be probably ?)
Ignoring ethics and the complexity of people in regards to transactions people make, in my opinion, however, is simply failing us.
Weka, what I mean is the power in relation to the transaction….i.e does the seller have a monopoly that gives them an unfair power advantage. Is the buyer of the loaf starving with lots of cash but cant buy nearby? And there maybe downstream effects as you intimate that need to be mitigated in the transaction.
Blue, you are right, ethics cannot be ignored in the individuals, the institutions and the systems / isms.
I deliberately went down this track to flush out the difference between doing a transaction (business between two individuals etc) and the systems we call out as unfair and corrupt. People since time immemorial have transacted business, traded, bought, sold. It predates any of our current models and “isms”.
Why did I go down this path? We have a future in which we will still need to trade / exchange / transact. We can pull down isms, institutions etc but we wont stop transactions. I think “transactions” and the ethics / rules around them are the best place to discuss alternatives. Rather than what we want to pull down WHAT do we want to construct? How will it work? What will govern a transaction?
You appear to be aiming at unclouded clear analysis; it is hard to fix things appropriately if the varied problems aren’t separated out and addressed. Good stuff!
Thinking about ethical trading in the simple sense. I noticed when reading about the past that establishing correct weights and measures was very important in establishing ethical markets of the people’s in the town square sort. And in Nelson there is still, or was till recently, the official yard measure set in concrete to use as a ‘yardstick’ for all traders.
re the “It is possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.”
I agree with Draco, (and hopefully am not putting words in his mouth but the “no it’s not” was an obvious mass-generalisation, and who can get through a day without a half dozen of those to keep you sane )
Far too many NZ businesses seem incapable of behaving ethicallly in the pursuit of profit. The nz dairy industry being a glaring example.
$6.50+ for 500g of butter in NZ as exhibit one
$2.80+ for 1 lt of milk as exhibit two
add in the now familiar $4 a loaf for bread and you have three of the most basic of grocery items costing more than an hour’s net income for a minimum wage earner.
so yeah, the minders of NZ business need a refresher course in basic social ethics
So you think that the small organic dairy farms in NZ that exist at least partially outside of Fonterra and are trying to or are succeeding at working entirely outside of that model are ethically bankrupt?
I take your point about the need for mass generalisations on occasion, but if you just named every business owner in NZ as ethically bankrupt how can you expect them to take any notice of what you say or be willing to change? And what exactly are you going to do with all these ethical bankrupts come the revolution.
“if you just named every business owner in NZ as ethically bankrupt how can you expect them to take any notice of what you say or be willing to change?”
I never said anything of the sort weka.
re dairy: If I had just said Fonterra then I feel some readers would have steered the responsibility for the behaviour away from the stockholders in that company i.e the farmers. Farmers whose current practises, especially in Dairy, are swiftly moving away from NZ’s history of largely ethical farming into the realm of factory farming.
I thought it was also clear that I was not throwing a blanket over the whole mess when I wrote “Far too many NZ businesses seem incapable of behaving ethicallly in the pursuit of profit. ”
I think we can all agree that it is largely the primary industries where this profit over people attitude is most often witnessed and in most need of adjustment. Overall though I fundamentally believe that the minders of NZ business do need a refresher course in basic social ethics. Even the good guys can always do better.
I said: It is possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.
Draco said: No, it’s not.
You said: I agree with Draco.
I took that to mean that everyone making money in NZ was ethically bankrupt. I can see that you didn’t, but can you see why it came across that way?
This sub thread was in response to PR saying that it was smart to do whatever to make money, and I pointed out that what he really meant was it was smart to make money that way if you didn’t give a shit about anyone else (ie unethically). I was making a differentiation between ethical business and unethical business. Draco and Bill posted some ideology and theory stating that for all intents and purposes there was no distinction. Hence my conclusion that those agreeing with Draco and disagreeing with me were saying all business was unethical.
It’s a fairly absurd debate now, but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions and ideology here at the expense of exploring actual solutions (theory is important, I’m just saying the balance is wrong).
“It’s a fairly absurd debate now, but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions and ideology here at the expense of exploring actual solutions”
It’s a fairly absurd debate now, but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions and ideology here at the expense of exploring actual solutions (theory is important, I’m just saying the balance is wrong).
Your inability to think (too abstract for me) or to offer cogent arguments for or against the solutions offered is one of the reasons it’s getting absurd.
What you call my ‘inability to think’ is actually a cognitive disability which is esp bad at the moment. It’s not an inability to think so much as a need to ration my cognitive energy.
I repeatedly ask for examples of solutions, and routinely get offered more theory by you.
We also have a different take on logic, as evidenced by the thread you just linked to. In that thread I DID offer cogent responses to what was being put out. What I see you doing in that thread is not really engaging with what I was saying and instead either going on misunderstanding, or just saying what you want. It’s just happened again this very thread. Read my synopsis of the sub thread again and tell me where I am wrong.
Ethics need to be defined so that I can disagree with myself. So does “make money”. MOst of my work is for free and the rest I seriously undercharge. Thankfully my partner has ore secure income.
Business process is as abstract and largely redundant comment in relation to ethics because a process rarely exists without humans, from imagining it, to planning it, to implementing it.
The process may be inherently unethical if designed and implemented that way, or can become unethical.
I dont see the point of making an argument based on such an abstract it might as well not exist within the context of the discussion of ethics.
In that thread I DID offer cogent responses to what was being put out.
No, actually, you didn’t.
What I see you doing in that thread is not really engaging with what I was saying and instead either going on misunderstanding, or just saying what you want. It’s just happened again this very thread.
I engaged with what you said, I even understood it. I then pointed out where and why you were wrong.
What was that expression that QoT used the other day that fits what you’re doing here? Oh, that’s right, Gaslighting.
Read my synopsis of the sub thread again and tell me where I am wrong.
You were wrong in this: Draco and Bill posted some ideology and theory stating that for all intents and purposes there was no distinction
because you failed to understand what was actually being said which is what you said here: but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions.
Thinking is an abstraction itself and without using them we would be very limited in expressing ideas for solutions. Ethics are also an almost totally abstract concept.
You were wrong in this: Draco and Bill posted some ideology and theory stating that for all intents and purposes there was no distinction
because you failed to understand what was actually being said which is what you said here:
but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions.
Thinking is an abstraction itself and without using them we would be very limited in expressing ideas for solutions. Ethics are also an almost totally abstract concept.
What you have done there is go “you are wrong, I am right” but you haven’t said how you think I am wrong, so I am still none the wiser what you mean (other than that you think I am wrong).
You’ve pointed to something I’ve already said, and decided that my acknowledging my frustration with abstracts means that I didn’t understand ie you’ve decided you know my reality better than me and haven’t bothered to check if you are right. In fact the times when I do put the mental effort into reading something I am unfamiliar with that seems abstract to me, I understand it well enough (or enough to get the gist at least and come back and ask questions) but I still feel frustrated by the approach. Hence my comment elsewhere where I said I didn’t want someone to say the solution was to smash capitalism, I wanted some actual ‘how’ (which you then supplied).
I’m sure you think you are being clear, but making an assertion without explanation isn’t clarifying. I suspect that you don’t like my using the term ‘abstract’, and that we use that term in different ways. But instead of seeking clarification about what I mean (which might lead to better communication between us), you now want to have a meta argument about abstraction. Given that we don’t communicate that well already, I don’t think that’s a useful path.
“Ethics are also an almost totally abstract concept.”
Only if you look at them abstractly. If you look at how they are applied then you are looking at an application as well, not just an abstraction.
There was a great example of this whole thing the other day when I suggested that Bill and RL bringing conceptual discussion into a space where people were still feeling pretty raw wasn’t the best move. They came up with this, to my mind, brilliant analogy around half-bakery. Bill, in response to RL:
Half baked you say? By that scheme of things, I was only suggesting ingredients that might go in the mixing bowl and hadn’t even thought about pre-heating the oven ffs. Anyway, those new super absorbent mops? They ain’t bad for splattered spillages.
I don’t want to imply a negative around their thinking by the use of the term half-baked. The analogy just really clarified for me the, in that case, very large gap in terms of where people were coming from. And knowing that, that we might build some bridges or telegraph systems or something.
It also helped me understand where Bill in particular is coming from in ways I hadn’t before.
My reading of the “abstraction” by Draco that weka was referring to:
R& D – it was mentioned in pretty general terms – and, for those of us that don’t know the extent and depth of R & D that goes on, it’s impossible to know whether it would happen as Draco says – I think it’s likely that all R & D is not the same – some of it more likely to be done out of neccessity – some avoided, some may need certain conditions: eg enough people to work on it, with the time, available resources etc.
Well if you ask me, the classic example in that thread of miscommunication between myself and Draco is this:
Me: Why limit [jobs for unemployed people] to R and D or Arts and Craft?
Draco: I, personally, can’t think of any limits to those [R and D or Arts and Craft].
I’ve asked one thing, he’s replied to something else (that I didn’t ask about). I still don’t know what he meant (that R/D and A/C would supply all jobs?). It’s like we have subtle but important different versions of the English language. There are other examples where I ask something, and he replies to that specific question, but as if I had said something else. I’m not surprised I gave up soon after.
R& D – it was mentioned in pretty general terms – and, for those of us that don’t know the extent and depth of R & D that goes on, it’s impossible to know whether it would happen as Draco says – I think it’s likely that all R & D is not the same – some of it more likely to be done out of neccessity – some avoided, some may need certain conditions: eg enough people to work on it, with the time, available resources etc.
I was unclear what was actually meant by R& D in that conversation. The gardening example was interesting. Plenty of gardeners do R & D already, to varying degrees. We could formalise that more and build very useful bodies of knowledge. However not every person on the dole moving into a gardening job is going to want to do R & D as well as part of that job. Maybe they just want to mow lawns listening to music or using that time to think about other things. I guess it depends on how broadly you define R & D.
1. thought of apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances: an abstract idea.
2. expressing a quality or characteristic apart from any specific object or instance, as justice, poverty, and speed.
3. theoretical; not applied or practical: abstract science.
4. difficult to understand; abstruse: abstract speculations.
What you have done there is go “you are wrong, I am right” but you haven’t said how you think I am wrong, so I am still none the wiser what you mean (other than that you think I am wrong).
You’ve been calling for less abstraction but it is only through abstraction that we can explain our ideas and solutions for a better world quite often because a concrete example doesn’t exist.
Well if you ask me, the classic example in that thread of miscommunication between myself and Draco is this:
Me: Why limit [jobs for unemployed people] to R and D or Arts and Craft?
Draco: I, personally, can’t think of any limits to those [R and D or Arts and Craft].
We were talking about unemployed and in a previous comment I implied that there shouldn’t be any unemployed. We destroy jobs through R&D and that the people thus made unemployed need to be moved into either R&D (or arts & craft) themselves or into jobs that others have vacated to go into R&D (or arts & craft). The only reason why we have unemployment now is to keep wages low (which really is just another indication of how the present system doesn’t work). There are no limits to what can be researched and developed or in art.
“You’ve been calling for less abstraction but it is only through abstraction that we can explain our ideas and solutions for a better world quite often because a concrete example doesn’t exist.”
Actually, I’ve been calling for more exploration of concretion alongside the abstract. It seems like you see abstract and concete as two discrete things, whereas I see them as a continuum, generally speaking.
Plus, the whole baking bowl analogy. If you are still making a shopping list, and I’m sitting at the table to eat, how can we progress a conversation?
I don’t want to go into the whole R & D thing with you again tongiht, because as I said I think there is a basic miscommunication, so there doesn’t seem to be much point until that is overcome. Also not really willing to deal with being told I’m wrong that much at the moment unless there is a willingness to explain or acknowledge as well.
I have read enough about dairy and health to know that you are grossly misrepresenting science. You can link again if you like, but I suspect that it will just be another search list from your blog, which generally consists of lots of assertion without any evidence. But go on, you might surprise me.
Type 2 diabetes is an issue of insulin resistance. Dairy consumption can be a problem for people that are increasingly insulin resistant (because of the milk sugars I think), but it doesn’t ’cause’ diabetes. Many traditional cultures that consume alot of dairy don’t have high rates of diabetes. The only cultures that I am aware of that have high rates of diabetes are those that eat a Western diet or live a Western lifestyle (and there are many factors involved in why those people get insulin resistant, most notably refined carbohydrate consumption).
Plus, the whole baking bowl analogy. If you are still making a shopping list, and I’m sitting at the table to eat, how can we progress a conversation?
Because I, at least, am capable of making a shopping list at the same time as talking. In fact I’ll likely to be asking what you want to eat. Unfortunately, you’re sitting down, banging your knives and forks on the table and demanding dinner.
I don’t want to go into the whole R & D thing with you again tongiht, because as I said I think there is a basic miscommunication, so there doesn’t seem to be much point until that is overcome.
/facepalm because of a mis-communication I won’t communicate with you
“because of a mis-communication I won’t communicate with you”
That is NOT what I said. Again, this is an example of us speaking different versions of the same language.
Draco, I’ve tried my best to explain how I see things. If you are unwilling to engage in good faith, that’s fine. All I’m hearing from you this evening here is personal disaparagement of me (I’m incapable of thinking, I’m unreasonably demanding something from you, I’m wrong), and virtually nothing in the way of a meeting, so I’ll just leave it there for now.
Balmoral forest is on the north bank of the Hurunui, in a valley between mountains, on very stony soil that cooks in the summer and freezes in winter. On the basis of animal welfare alone using current dairy practices it is a cruel environment. Cows need warmth and shade, the way we treat our stock in NZ is scandalous.
I hope this is not the same place proposed. To farm there will require irrigation schemes, damming of the Hurunui has been proposed and opposed regularly.
The farms – in total 5 – will be ready in 2015 – so I would take it that the trees will be long gone. Then they are to build two big storage reservoirs on site, so in winter they can “harvest” the Waimak and store the extra water for use in summer. The farms will have the highest concentration of cows on the plains. As the sediment under the land there is quite thin, it is expected that there will be some detrimental effects downstream as effluent seeps into the alluvial water, and infects the drinking water of the likes of Christchurch and other towns that lie in the path of the underground waterways. Still, that’s the price we pay for J.K.’s brighter corporatised future.
Some of Helen Clark’s statements in this interview are remarkable, considering her actual behaviour while in office. She speaks forthrightly about the Andrea Vance affair, and seems to approve of that particular journalist’s right to act as an investigative journalist: “she had a right to pursue a story and get to the truth as she saw it.” Which will seem odd for those who remember her choleric outbursts against the journalists who tried to penetrate behind her smokescreen of denials and personal attacks as they were attempting to cover her government’s persecution of Ahmed Zaoui. At more than one press conference she angrily shut down Selwyn Manning, the editor of Scoop, refusing to answer any questions from him about the matter.
Helen Clark’s newly respectful opinion of journalism will be welcome news to John Campbell, who suffered a wrathful public denunciation from Ms Clark after he tried to get her to speak honestly about her government’s ill advised encouragement of GM experiments in this country.
Ms Clark also states, near the end of the interview, that she used her power and influence “to try and make the lives of people better.” Again, this sits oddly with the facts of her time in power. As well as presiding over the cruel detention of Ahmed Zaoui—it was a team effort, with thugs like David Benson-Pope allying with New Zealand First MPs like Peter Brown and Winston Peters in parliament to yell out crude insults in parliament at the political refugee—she was foolish enough to take the advice of her less-than-brilliant “strategists” after Don Brash’s infamous Orewa speech and imitate National Party racism instead of confronting and rejecting it. And any of the 15,000 Māori land rights protestors she sneeringly dismissed as “haters and wreckers” would be interested to hear that Helen Clark thinks she used her power and influence “to try and make the lives of people better.”.
This transcript starts at 21:18 and goes to the end (25:34)…..
CHRIS LAIDLAW: We’ve been talking here,…hrrrumph…. some might say obsessively, about the phenomenon of the surveillance society. Does any of what has been happening here lately over the accessing of private information surprise you? HELEN CLARK: I was certainly surprised that, er, Parliamentary Services handed over those records! [guffaw] CHRIS LAIDLAW: A heh, heh! HELEN CLARK: Ha ha ha! But, errrr… CHRIS LAIDLAW: What would you have SAID to them? HELEN CLARK: Errrmmmm… LAIDLAW: Had that been YOU? HELEN CLARK: I think–heh heh—someone would have had to have been holding the phone out rather a long way from their [sic] ear! ….[guffaw]…. I mean, I don’t think this is acceptable, at ALL. ….[pause]…. I mean, err, y’know, journalists have a duty! And that duty is to get out and seek the truth! That journalist broke what in journalistic terms was a pretty good story! Now, it happened to be pretty annoying to the government! Y’know, been there, experienced THAT! ….[guffaw]….. But, ahh, you know she had a right to pursue a story and get to the truth as she saw it. LAIDLAW: Were you aware of that Defence Force manual that stated that investigative journalists could be lumped in with a lot of other undesirable people? HELEN CLARK:[guffaws] I’m certain I never SAW such a thing! Huh! I would have found it rather extraordinary. LAIDLAW: Did you ever sign a warrant for covert surveillance of a New Zealand citizen? HELEN CLARK:[cagily] Wellllll, as reported on every yeeeear, in the annual report, uh …. [uncomfortable caesura]…. Yes I did sign warrants! LAIDLAW: Mmmm, hmmm… HELEN CLARK: Yep! And they were all, ahh, referred to and counted up in the Annual Report to Parliament every year. LAIDLAW: And you’re convinced that they were absolutely justifiable?
…….[Significant pause]….
HELEN CLARK:[carefully] I aaaaam. Because one of the systems that was put in place and was at the time when the SIS legislation was amended in the late nineties when I was Leader of the Opposition, was this Inspector of Security Warrants, errrr, Sir John Jeffries, through my time as prime minister. I had a HUUUUUUGE respect for John Jeffries and whenever the SIS wanted a warrant, they didn’t come first to me—[guffaw]—I was a BUSY PERSON! They went first to Sir John Jeffries, and Sir John Jeffries went into the offices, into the files, could access EVERYTHING he wanted to see, and then he came with the Director of Security Intelligence to see me, and he would set out the issues as he saw them. And together we would make a decision. So there was a LOT OF CARE taken with that. LAIDLAW: Isn’t the most serious effect of some of this the erosion of public confidence in the organs of the state? We’ve been seeing a lot of pressure on various departments lately, MFAT and others, but revelations of this kind really do make people wonder about whether the state is on their side. HELEN CLARK: They doooo! And it’s partly an issue of not knowing what you don’t know. But I think that, given that in this whole fracas, there appears, if we take the Kitteridge Report as the guide here, that there WAS a gap in the law. Now something has to be done about the gap in the law, BUT…. at the same time I think it’s an opportunity to have a, y’know, broooooader dialogue about the kind of protections New Zealand citizens are entitled to and one would hope that that would come through this sort of process.
….[Pause]…..
LAIDLAW: A lot of people talk about the nature of power, and you’ve had it, and you have it, and you experienced it. Do you understand it? Do you have a better understanding now of what it represents? HELEN CLARK: I think that power as a concept is neutral. You can use power for good ends or you can use it for bad ends. I like to think that I used the power and influence I had in my life in New Zealand and now at UNDP to try and, y’ow, make the lives of people, errr, BETTER. That was my mission. So I think it can be used for GOOD but it can can also be used for ILL. LAIDLAW: Nice to talk to you! And I hope you enjoy your time here. That was former prime minister Helen Clark, who is these days leading the UN Development Program, and her book At the UN is published by Dunmore Publishing.
This time Morrissey actually seems to have gotten the words about right. But as usual, he’s adding extraneous punctuation and emphasis on words, as well as his usual bullshit “Significant pause” crap so as to distort what actually happened.
Yep, better than average effort, only a few errors and really only spoilt by the distortions of meaning that his spin puts on the words. Kinda hypocritical to demand of others standards he doesn’t apply to himself, but that’s our Moz. 6/10.
Already did listen to the tape, Moz, hence my comment that you got it mostly correct. Well done. If you want to find the errors, which are mostly small ommisions, then go back over it yourself.
The distortion is adding emphasis were no emphasis can be heard. That’s not reporting, that’s editorialising. It’s bogus if you are calling it a transcript. As I said, you demand standards of others you don’t apply to yourself.
….mostly correct. Well done.
No, it was completely correct.
If you want to find the errors, which are mostly small ommisions [sic] then go back over it yourself.
So you couldn’t find one small “ommision” then. But you’re happy to carry on with the baseless claim.
The distortion is adding emphasis were no emphasis can be heard.
For example?
That’s not reporting, that’s editorialising.
No, it’s reporting. Pointing out that Helen Clark was cagey and diffident and awkward when asked whether or not she set her spies onto New Zealand citizens is not distortion, as you say, but reporting. It’s quite clear that you think reporters should simply be megaphones for politicians. You don’t like their words being emphasized and underlined: that’s your problem. You are plainly wrong when you try to insinuate there’s something misleading about pointing out the obvious discomfort of a politician.
It’s bogus if you are calling it a transcript.
So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? Please put up your bald transcript of those four minutes—and we’ll see which one is more true to the nature of that conversation.
As I said, you demand standards of others you don’t apply to yourself.
More empty personal insults. Can I remind you: this is not an LEC meeting, and I don’t get intimidated or confused by your strategy of abuse.
“So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? “
That’s pretty much the definition of a transcript.
Thats what we get from the Court. The time the initials of the speaker and the words.
That’s why we depend on honest reporters to bring out the nuances and inflexions that the bare transcripts leave out.
Yes you are right if by victim you mean in criminal cases? That’s wrong of course and transcripts ought to be readily available. The police prosecution service ought to be cooperative in the supply though? Or are they so budget conscious they wont pay for the extra copy?
“So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? “
That’s pretty much the definition of a transcript.
Yes, you’re correct there, felix. That’s why my enhanced transripts, and even my more imperfect slapdash efforts scribbled on a piece of paper, are better than a bald transcription of the words. It would be highly misleading, for instance, to not mention that Helen Clark was uncomfortable and hesitant when pressed on the subject of whether she set her spies onto New Zealand citizens.
Really Morrissey I don’t know why you bother trying to educate TRP he appears to be a rather nasty little bigot and bully boy who is unable to widen his thought processes beyond his own little clique’s list of what is good and what is bad.
I’m also not sure why he’s desperate to suggest Liz Windsor is German .. unless it’s some poor imitation of a Fawlty Towers joke that I’m missing ?
TE REO OUTAKE: That’s twice today you’ve used the royal pronoun, Moz. MORRISSEY: It’s a common propaganda trick—but you were alert to it. Well spotted, Te Reo! TE REO PUTAKE: You’re not related to that German woman on our money, are you?
….[Uncomfortable pause]….
MORRISSEY:[carefully] Errrrr, as far as I know, no-o-o-o-o. If I wasn’t fearful that it was a Mormon site, I might be tempted to check it on the ancestry.com site.
Really Morrissey I don’t know why you bother trying to educate TRP he appears to be a rather nasty little bigot and bully boy who is unable to widen his thought processes beyond his own little clique’s list of what is good and what is bad.
Thanks, sockpuppet, I do appreciate your solicitude. Te Reo is a buddy of mine. He dishes it out to this writer, i.e. moi, fearsomely at times, but he is also kind and supportive at other times. A diamond geezer, he is—as they say in the East End.
I’m also not sure why he’s desperate to suggest Liz Windsor is German .. unless it’s some poor imitation of a Fawlty Towers joke that I’m missing ?
I think he meant this German woman…. http://www.probertencyclopaedia.com/j/Dominatrix.jpg
Thanks for the clarification Morrissey I didn’t realise you were indulging in a grumpy old man double act, although I’m not sure if my reading of TRPs comments in the tone of Ginger Rodgers will make them any less ludicrous.
The Statler and Waldorf of teh blogs? No, Moz and I are actually the same person. We’ve been having this bipolar, duopolist dialogue since June 1984, only days after Al Gore invented the web. Moz corrected Al on his proposed name for the internet (we felt that it obviously should be the elegant ‘bittube’, rather than the cheap, brutalist Americanism of ‘the web’). I publicly disagreed with myself (mozself?) on an embryonic board and an institution was born. We’re sorry if this has led to any confusion, or indeed, contusions.
ps, the Windsors are German. They changed their name from the original Wettin a century ago for PR purposes.
Fascinating that you are one and the same person – it really does make me all the more in awe of Morrissey being able to write so beautifully under his own name as distinct from his efforts under the TRP pseudonym.
Fascinating that you are one and the same person – it really does make me all the more in awe of Morrissey being able to write so beautifully under his own name as distinct from his efforts under the TRP pseudonym.
Thanks for that my friend. I turn into Te Reo Putake whenever I want to write something really horrible.
Our good friend “fender” asks: Have you consigned Professor Longhair to the scrapheap?
The Professor wrote to me the other day. He is on “sabbatical”* in Eastern Europe somewhere. He extends to all Standardisti the very best wishes for the New Year.
Louis Mount Batten was born Prince of Battenburg, changed during world war one cos of german dislike in England. Mount Btten ws Prince Philip’s uncle
Saying she is no more German than you or I is a little spurious given she is only Queen by virtue of those who came before, some of whom in this case were German. Her Great Grandfather Albert was German, so that’s an 8th German right there.
This time Morrissey actually seems to have gotten the words about right.
I got it exactly right, my friend. Exactly. I was careful to even include Ms Clark’s little verbal tics, like the repeated use of y’ow and her frequent guffawing, which is a control mechanism par excellence.
But as usual, he’s adding extraneous punctuation and emphasis on words,
“Extraneous”? I challenge you to put up ONE example of where my punctuation is extraneous or misleading, and where I have emphasized a word inappropriately.
….as well as his usual bullshit “Significant pause” crap so as to distort what actually happened.
There were several significant, awkward, uncomfortable pauses when Laidlaw pressed her on whether she had set the dogs onto New Zealand citizens. They were significant, all right, and you know it.
My “stage directions” are intended, as always, to emphasize and clarify, and to evoke the flavour and nature of the conversation. They are not intended to distort, as you allege.
Because I have some time, and because you’re so much in denial, I figured I’d bother to answer these questions.
“We’ve been talking here,…hrrrumph…. some might say obsessively,”
This “hrrumph” is unwarranted, as it was a very brief mumbled pause before he continued on. Recording this as “hrrumph” has negative connotations that are not warranted.
“I mean, err, y’know, journalists have a duty! And that duty is to get out and seek the truth! That journalist broke what in journalistic terms was a pretty good story! Now, it happened to be pretty annoying to the government!”
None of these exclamation marks are warranted.
“[cagily] Wellllll, as reported on every yeeeear, in the annual report, uh …. [uncomfortable caesura]…. Yes I did sign warrants!”
It wasn’t cagey, you’ve added unnecessary emphasis on “Well” and “year” that implies she was reluctantly answering the question when there is no reluctance in her voice at all. I don’t think “caesura” is the correct term here and there was certianly nothing uncomfortable about it. Once again, an unwarranted exclamation mark.
“Yep!”
Another unwarranted exclamation mark.
…….[Significant pause]….
This pause at 22:48 is shorter than one marked merely “[pause]” at 24:40-24:42. Furthermore there is nothing significant, nor indeed apparently deliberate in the very brief pause here at all. It’s a natural part of speech after someone has asked a question in a new direction on the topic at hand.
“I aaaaam.”
She said “am”.
“I had a HUUUUUUGE respect”
She said “huge”.
“I was a BUSY PERSON!”
Exclamation mark appropriate, but capitalisation is not. This makes it appear like she’s being defensive when there is nothing defensive about this conversation at all.
“and he would set out the issues as he saw them.”
No idea why you chose to embolden ‘as he saw them’ in your first transcript.
“So there was a LOT OF CARE taken with that.”
Inappropriate emphasis on “lot of care” not present in the audio.
“They doooo!”
She said “do”. Again, inappropriate exclamation mark.
“broooooader dialogue”
She said “broader”. Again not sure why you choose to embolden this.
The entire section between your “significant pause” and “pause” markers actually under-transcribes Helen’s stammering and filler sounds, and for a strict transcripts as you are claiming this is, you actually miss a few words out entirely around these parts.
Awesome analysis, Lanthanide! I do have some disagreements, but I haven’t got the time to answer now. I’ll make a feature of it on tomorrow’s Open Mike (for January 7th).
I have to say …. Helen probably would have been a lot better off withOUT her various ‘advisers’ – the ‘long termers’ probably responsible for the biggest fuckups she ever made.
You mean that Peter Davis and her *both* own – right? I hadn’t noticed Peter leaving his job at Auckland Uni. They just rotate holidays and visits. Perhaps you should look at the requirements of being a “resident”.
While you’re at it look at a mirror to see what fatuous dickhead looks like.
I don’t think those steps have been going on sequentially. Most have been applied in one way or another since the 1980s. At various times the screws are tightened on one or other “step”.
(7) Scream about the high cost of higher education and increases in tuition. Blame the increases on greedy, overpaid professors rather than on the withdrawal of state support, the techno-gadget mania promoted by edu-businesses, or the administrative bloat caused by increased auditing practices and assessment.
Xox
Dairy cows on the Canterbury Plains + Irrigation = pollution of water
I see there was recently another e coli outbreak in township Darfield water supply. Fonterra has recently built a mega processing plant in the area.
..on the advances in knowledge on how our brains actually work..(using mri etc..)
..and what stood out was the evidence of the actual physical benefits to the brain/psyche from either regular religious-practices..prayer/chanting..
..or from the secular practice of meditation..
..we are told these practices physically strengthen areas of our brains…that make us feel/do good..
..and help protect us from things that make us feel bad..anxieties..etc..
..they increase empathy..and strengthen our synapses..which..makes pratitioners think much faster..than those who don’t..(and going on the evidence presented..much much faster..)
fascinating stuff..that should appeal to all..
..and secularists have the meditation-tool to turn to..
..(i’m gonna link to/write it up later..when it comes online..
..the radio nz website will also have it for you..
..and seriously..!..a recommended-listen..
..(i love it when science proves ‘things’..eh..?..it so settles arguments..sometimes..)
what i refer to in the above comment that you sneer at..
..is the response to a question from the interviewer..(in the second half of the interview..(but the preceeding stuff is pretty interesting too..)
..where she asks hanson if his physical-research had shown any difference between the brains of people who followed daily religious-practises..(praying/chanting)..
..and for the secularists..the likes of meditation/yoga..
..and those people who practise none of those..
..the question surprised hanson..which made his answer seem all the more credible..the surprise he expressed at his findings in this area..was genuine..and not part of any prepared script..
..the daily practice seems to be a key factor..
..but the striking benefits cited by hanson..if this mri-based evidence is to be believed..and it is hard to see why it should not..
..is that these multi-faceted benefits are to hand for both the religious/secularists..
..so it is not a religious-barrow that is being pushed..
..it is evidence/proof of helping mental-health/well-being..
Firstly, if I may apologize. I should have been more diplomatic with my wording and what I said was very… abrupt.
You are the very embodiment, it seems, of trying to tell people either that the way they are living is the least perfect or that they could be doing things more perfectly. If it was just a link of “here is cool science, what do you think” then it would be much more palatable but you present it in a manner that provokes a personal response (intentionally or unintentionally) from the likes of myself where I severely dislike being preached at.
Especially on extremely borderline topics such as nutrition and spirituality.
“Because interviews are sooooooo peer-reviewed science papers…
Feel free to link to the evidence. In fact, I implore you to, for once, link to some evidence that is outside your inane ramblings…”
Zorr, the things that phil claimed (as far as I could understand it) are not really in dispute and have been well tested by science. In this situation peer-reviewed papers are not even necessary. Neuroscientists speaking or writing about it from a place of knowledge and authority would do.
Peer-review is important. It’s also flawed esp with regards to medical research. Saying that it’s the gold standard to the exclusion of other knowlege bases is a way of making science elitist. Then a whole bunch of scientists start complaining about the public being ignorant 😉
All that btw is not an endorsement of the RNZ piece, I haven’t looked at it yet.
Trying to find the actual science, following the links via that page, weka, I end up here.
I studied a bit of neurology way back, when I trained in special education etc. Back then it was pretty well known that all kinds of experiences enhanaced brain activity, could get parts working to a greater or less extent following brain damage…. music and dance therapy can be good too.
It doesn’t surprise me that meditation etc, or reading novels has a positive impact on the brain.
The foreword for the book is by Deepak Chopra -ugh
Edited because just realized that author of book and person on radio were 2 different people so shouldn’t go maligning a potentially perfectly decent doctor
Mate, I said I have learned a fair bit about neurology in the past, and ways to improve the brain and, related body functionings – ways that alter the physical make up of the brain. So I just don’t find it at all surprising that mediation etc physically strengthens the brain. Not that revolutionary a finding to me.
It looks like they’ve tipped that one on the rubbish heap—an appropriate destination for anything written by that silly old codger. Meanwhile, there are some choice comments about him on the following thread…. http://thestandard.org.nz/george-on-tax/#comment-360924
I put it up but then saw that Karol had only just put her post up and I thought I should delay it so put it back in draft. will put it up later today or tomorrow. It is about a Garth George column I really enjoyed reading …
In fact, the classic electric shock experiment by social psychologist Stanley Milgram, PhD, showed that when given an order by someone in authority, people would deliver what they believed to be extreme levels of electrical shock to other study participants who answered questions incorrectly.
Zimbardo said the experiment provides several lessons about how situations can foster evil:
Provide people with an ideology to justify beliefs for actions.
Make people take a small first step toward a harmful act with a minor, trivial action and then gradually increase those small actions.
Make those in charge seem like a “just authority.”
Transform a once compassionate leader into a dictatorial figure.
Provide people with vague and ever-changing rules.
Relabel the situation’s actors and their actions to legitimize the ideology.
Provide people with social models of compliance.
Allow dissent, but only if people continue to comply with orders.
Or maybe Obama likes to play golf and gets on well at a personal level with Key and since both were in Hawaii why not have a game? I think the dompost is clutching at straws.
“According to the Huffington Post, “the golf outing put Key in rarified company. Obama is an avid golfer, but prefers to limit his playing partners to a close circle of friends and advisers[“]… The two world leaders (and I use that term in its widest sense) apparently discussed issues of mutual interest and regional security. Whether Kim Dotcom or the TPPA were mentioned, we’ll never know.” – See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/01/06/lazy-hazy-and-crazy/#sthash.pMQjc1I8.dpuf
I’m not saying that either THP or TDB are completely reliable sources, but I’ll take them over your; “maybe Obama likes to play golf and gets on well at a personal level with Key”.
Next time you hear someone praise Abe Lincoln, bring out this article….
“Ordered that of the Indians and Half-breeds sentenced to be hanged by the military commission, composed of Colonel Crooks, Lt. Colonel Marshall, Captain Grant, Captain Bailey, and Lieutenant Olin, and lately sitting in Minnesota, you cause to be executed on Friday the nineteenth day of December, instant, the following names, to wit [39 names listed by case number of record: cases 2, 4, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 19, 22, 24, 35, 67, 68, 69, 70, 96, 115, 121, 138, 155, 170, 175, 178, 210, 225, 254, 264, 279, 318, 327, 333, 342, 359, 373, 377, 382, 383].
The other condemned prisoners you will hold subject to further orders, taking care that they neither escape, nor are subjected to any unlawful violence.
Abraham Lincoln,
President of the United States”
On December 6 (1862) President Lincoln notified Sibley that he should “cause to be executed” thirty-nine of the 303 convicted Santees, Execution date was the 26th of December. At the last minute, one Indian was given a reprieve. About ten o’clock the thirty-eight condemned men were marched from the prison to the scaffold. They sang the Sioux death song until soldiers pulled white caps over their heads and placed nooses around their necks. At a signal from an army officer, the control rope was cut and thirty-eight Santee Sioux dangled lifeless in the air.
A spectator boasted that this was “America’s greatest public execution.”
Watched it, and it led to an interesting discussion about whether it is still reasonable to celebrate the good that someone unintentionally did – and attribute it to their actions.
And vice versa – for example, the emancipation law led to the creation of corporations and their use of the rights entailed within to create legal entities with the same rights as humans. The Corporation is another film that outlines that process.
A belated thank you to whoever posted that link originally…
Iwi Maori farming practice has evolved to align more closely with our cultural and spiritual values represented in the principle of ‘kaitiakitanga.’ Our people have never wholly accepted the commodification of the natural world and the subsequent rape of its resources to fuel profit and greed. Our business leaders are unlearning traditional business thinking and taking on board quadruple, or more, bottom-lines. If you had bothered to investigate further with a simple Google search you would have found this:
“The Eyrewell farming development is 40km northwest of Christchurch and sits within the takiwā (tribal area) of Ngāi Tahu hapu (sub-tribe), Ngāi Tūāhuriri. Ngāi Tahu Farming began dairy farming on the site in 2012.
The Mana Whenua Working Party is made up of members of Ngāi Tahu hapu who hold mana whenua (authority) over the Hurunui and Waimakariri River catchments associated with Ngāi Tahu Farming’s Eyrewell and Balmoral developments.
Cultural and environmental aspirations have been the top priorities for mana whenua, says Ngāi Tūāhuriri Chair and member of the Mana Whenua Working Party, Clare Williams.
“Our main concern is nutrient levels in waterways. We don’t want our farms to adversely affect our waterways because that’s where we get our kai from,” says Clare.
The environmental monitoring of Ngāi Tahu Eyrewell Dairy Farms will involve direct measurements of nitrate leaching losses. Lysimeters (large tubes containing undisturbed columns of soil) will be used to measure the nitrate leaching loss in drainage water. The lysimeters will be installed in an on-farm facility on farm one. This facility will be constructed within a monitor paddock on the dairy farm. The facility will also serve as an on-farm laboratory suitable for visitors to inspect.
Ngāi Tahu Property Chief Executive Tony Sewell says the research is forward-thinking and will allow us to better manage our farming businesses.
“We are pleased to be teaming up with the expertise of Lincoln University. The research will give us valuable and accurate insight into the impact we are having on the environment. Understanding our impact will help us to make educated farming decisions to minimize the movement of harmful contaminants, it will ensure we are at the forefront of dairying and that we are doing our best to uphold Ngāi Tahu values,” says Tony.
The biodiversity programme will protect and expand vegetation remnants within the farms and enhance the future trajectory of the ecological restoration. More than 150 hectares is already set-aside for native plants and animals. This project will provide a template for establishment, monitoring and enhancement of native habitats, focussing on the ecological and environmental benefits of restoration planting. The goal is to add value to the Ngāi Tahu Farming development at Eyrewell, which will provide a template for dairy farms in the future.
In my neck of the woods we have recently retired over 500 ha of farm land to be replanted in both natives and exotic trees. It took 170 plus years to have the lands returned to us under the treaty settlement process. These lands will never be sold off and therefore our farming practices must reflect sustainable methods way into the future.
Thanks for the explanation, Adele. I think you owe Saarbo an apology. There’s no obvious prejudice in his comment that I can see and even if the owners minimise the damage done, damage will still be done. Big dairying is bad, no matter who does it.
I owe Saarbo diddly squat. What’s with the “ I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of Philipino workers” line? Tell me what Māori farm currently does this? Actually for that matter what farm in NZ employs Philippine workers?
Dairying is a fact of life in this country and while tangata whenua would prefer not to be involved in such industries we are committed to making these industries work for us in a way that is sustainable in the long run and aligns with our values.
“Dairying is a fact of life in this country and while tangata whenua would prefer not to be involved in such industries we are committed to making these industries work for us in a way that is sustainable in the long run and aligns with our values.”
As I said below, I don’t believe the industrial/export dairy model can ever be sustainable, but it’s good to see changes being attempted. However, I do also wonder at how often Maori are expected to not use their resources for their own people in the ways that Pakeha do, and are supposed to somehow magic up a new, perfect model of doing pretty much everything in ways that satisfy Pakeha notions of what’s ok. Despite Pakeha not even coming close to their own ideals.
Adele, I hope that Ngai Tahu can make this a beacon of hope on the Plains. Myself, knowing what I do of the soils, geography and climate have little faith that there can be any success within the current economic framework of dairying: I would welcome being proved wrong.
Good news on regaining and retiring land: I see returning land to iwi / hapu as one of the most important strategies we can adopt for both social equity and to save/Aotearoa from foreign ownership,
Listening to those Ngai Tahu spokesmen talking, both recently and in the past, I dread what they have planned or will consent to having done on their land. They sound like, and often are, members of the National Party, and they seem to have about as much respect and care for their whenua as, say, Conor English.
As a member of the iwi I am not a supporter of this development. However there are a lot of checks and many eyes watching so i think the iwi and hapū representatives will do their best to minimise pollution from the dairy farm. But when you take water from the awa for dairy farming that degrades it. Personally I would have preferred Organic small scale sustainable operations – and I actually told them that.
As for you moz yes I’m sure they are members of any and all political parties but your assertion regarding care of the ‘whenua’ is stupid – you ‘seem’ wrong and rather than ‘seem’ why not check out all of the various ways the tikanga is maintained. You seem to display as much care and respect for tangata whenua as any of the gnats.
I’m sure they are members of any and all political parties….
The leadership? They’re solidly National Party. Which raises the question: why does the rest of the iwi tolerate such a situation?
The Ngai Tahu corporation hasn’t shown much care or respect for the Asian crews on the fishing boats they run. Let’s hope they treat their own people with a bit more aroha.
you are out of our depth moz and dog-paddle ain’t going to cut it – the leadership? who exactly are you talking about – rūnanga representatives? kaiwhakahaere? commercial arm of the iwi? Stick to listening to leighton mate or talking about the RWC – you sadly display no nous for this stuff – read up a little and become educated my friend before you embarrass yourself further 🙂
No I’m not out of my depth. I can read and follow what is happening in Ngai Tahu as much as anyone else can, and it’s clear that a small clique of well connected businessmen wield the power there just as a small National Party clique (Georgina Te Heuheu’s family) dominates Ngāti Tūwharetoa, and a small political elite dominates Tainui.
There are many reasons I, and many others, have looked with mounting disquiet at what Ngai Tahu has been doing….
2.) I’m concerned by the people who are routinely allowed to speak for Ngai Tahu—people like Mark Solomon, who has some very disturbing views indeed. For example, in 2010 he expressed his approval of the notorious private prison company Serco, telling Guyon Espiner that he was “blown away in the way that they deal with their prisoners…. We’re completely impressed.” http://tvnz.co.nz/q-and-a-news/q-mark-solomon-interview-3580452
3.) Worse was to come, however. A couple of years ago, Solomon made a point of betraying other Māori and publicly backing John Key’s flogging off of our public assets. As with his backing of private prisons, this anti-Māori posturing earned Solomon some fulsome praise from the rabid right…. http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/tag/mark-solomon/
5.) Solomon has also been less than forthright in his denials that he might commit Ngai Tahu to get involved in one of John Banks’s harebrained “charter school” projects.
Now if you can demonstrate I have been unfair to Mark Solomon—the public face of Ngai Tahu—then I will accept your charge that I have “no nous for this stuff”, and will return to my normal dismal task of logging the idiocy of Hatin’ Leighton and his colleagues.
By the way, I’ll bet that at some time in the last few years, Hatin’ Leighton has stepped away from his normal programme of reading out articles from the Spectator and foaming about Barack Obama’s communist plotting to take over the world to announce how much he is impressed by Mark Solomon.
Yes some like Mark and others don’t and yes he is kaiwhakahaere and that role is often the public face of the iwi. I find myself disagreeing with many of his views. I don’t like the way the fishing has developed – too much ‘market’, let alone the poor condition that some crew experience. I don’t like serco or charter schools or selling our assets. So for each example you have dug out I am generally opposed to Mark’s view. Keep trawling the news moz I am sure your knowledge will continue to increase exponentially…
My attempt at humour at 1.22 was obviously not funny for you – next time I’ll put 2 smiley faces…
I’m sorry, marty, I did get your little joke and I did appreciate it at the time. You know, deadpan non-acknowledgement is my modus operandi; one of the reasons I can hardly bear listening to Jim Mora’s program sometimes is the way that he feels obliged to acknowledge every single quip with a dutiful “That’s very funny!”—rendered all the worse by his patent insincerity. So I did get your little dig.
I appreciate your comments, and I hope it doesn’t look like I’m absolutely opposed to Sir Mark; I recognise that he is an intelligent and accomplished man, and I respect him in spite of some misgivings. It’s just that I get concerned sometimes that there is a lack of democracy and that the iwi corporations are acting just like the “private tyrannies” that Noam Chomsky describes.
I don’t know the Chomsky reference, but it’s the ‘just like’ bit in your comment that I have a problem with. There may be issues with how Ngai Tahu does business, but saying they are the same as Pakeha business is inaccurate and stops us really understanding. I want to see the differences, understand the diversity, because that will help us out of the mess.
This is the problem with the original comment. Someone reports that RNZ reported x about Ngai Tahu. When we see Adele’s comment we see there is in fact a lot more to it. That more to it is important. Seems to be my theme currently, we have to get our targets right.
I don’t know the Chomsky reference, but it’s the ‘just like’ bit in your comment that I have a problem with. There may be issues with how Ngai Tahu does business, but saying they are the same as Pakeha business is inaccurate and stops us really understanding.
All good – I broke my own, self imposed, rule on that one and deserved a good put down. For me ts isn’t really a safe space to discuss this stuff and i usually leave alone unless the errors are really glaring or horrible. The fact is there is no context and to create the context and then discuss/argue the merits each way takes massive time and energy – which frankly i don’t have and don’t have the inclination to acquire.
Morrisey, By public face, I take it you mean to Pakeha NZ.
I’m sure most people, whether Māori or Pakeha, regard Sir Mark Solomon as the leader of Kai Tahu, just as they did Tipene O’Regan before him.
Why exactly should Kai Tahu care about that?
If Kai Tahu wants to pretend that public discourse and politics do not matter, then you’re correct, they need not worry about the public perception of Sir Mark’s comments. If they want to live in the real world, such things matter very much indeed.
How about you give us your analysis of how Solomon fits into the overall power structures within Ngai Tahu?
He is obviously the kaiwhakahaere, and I know he has an immense amount of influence on all aspects of governance in Kai Tahu.
Most of what you just wrote expresses Pakeha political views.
That’s not correct. I know thoughtful Māori are very concerned about the behaviour of certain powerful but virtually unaccountable leaders—and not just in Kai Tahu.
Are you suggesting that Maori, specifically Ngai Tahu, should adhere to those?
Some Ngai Tahu will, some won’t. But it’s not just a Pakeha thing—-I hope not anyway.
Solomon is one person (and we still don’t know who he votes for).
Let’s see: he has publicly stated his admiration for an infamous private prison company; he has broken ranks with other Māori and announced his support for the Key regime’s selling off of our public assets; he has failed to make a principled statement rejecting the National/ACT imposition of “charter schools” on the devastated children, parents and teachers of Canterbury. That spells National, surely? Or if he does not vote National, there are two other options: (a) he belongs to the Shane Jones wing of the Labour Party or (b) he has been lobotomized and has joined the science-deniers, doctor-bashers and grave-robbers in ACT.
Who are all these other leaders who are National Party members/voters?
The iwi leaderships are full of them.
“Most of what you just wrote expresses Pakeha political views.”
That’s not correct. I know thoughtful Māori are very concerned about the behaviour of certain powerful but virtually unaccountable leaders—and not just in Kai Tahu.
Obviously. But the analysis is different IMO to what you have just done.
I’ll give an example. I know people (Pakeha as it happens) who like the idea of Charter Schools, not because they’re rightwing, but because they can see that it gives alternative education some power and control. These are people who think the mainstream education system is competely dysfunctional in terms of basic philosophies around teaching children usefully. So they put Charter Schools in a completely different context than you do. They don’t see education policy in terms of National vs Labour, because to them both are woefully inadequate.
Likewise, when I hear Maori talking about the value of having contracts to deliver welfare services to their people, it makes sense to me, because they are being so badly failed by mainstream welfare. We can jump up and down and shout “privatisation is bad”, but that just fails as well. (Part of the problem there would be solved if Maori were allowed sovereignty to run things for themselves the way they know works ie don’t see Iwi as ‘private’).
So, when you make a list of all the terrible things that Mark Solomon says and does, it’s not that I think you have no valid points, it’s that until you can make those points in the cultural context that Solomon is operating within, then those points are fairly meaningless. By this I mean in the sense that they don’t take us anywhere particularly useful. They just point yet another stick at Ngai Tahu and say x, y, z wrong there, which just feeds another whole thread of racism into NZ society.
For me ts isn’t really a safe space to discuss this stuff and i usually leave alone unless the errors are really glaring or horrible. The fact is there is no context and to create the context and then discuss/argue the merits each way takes massive time and energy
I know exactly what you mean. I think the same whenever I hear Pakeha commentators discussing such matters. Whether it’s the outright hostile, even racist commentators (Sean Plunket, Michael Laws, Leighton Smith, Larry “Lackwit” Williams) or even the “well meaning” ones, the treatment of iwi politics is nearly always substandard.
Mars, pleased you made the stance you did. It is the only one that makes sense to me, though it strains the commercial imperative somewhat.
Years back we did work with Lincoln scientists to ascertain the moister retention and soil retention (from wind erosion) in grass behind shelter belts on the plains. This was in aid of avoiding border dyke irrigation, and abstraction from the Rakaia. Grass growth behind shelter belts came out well in front when the other costs were totaled. Bluntly for every reason not related to the economics of cheap energy and fertilisers dairying on the plains makes no sense.
thanks for that information, as always the real story comes out later when it comes to te Ao Maori. I have no trouble believing that Kai Tahu are generally doing better than their tau iwi neighbours when it comes to kaitiakitanga and farming practices. For me, there is no ethical way to do industrial, export dairy, esp in that landscape. It’s always a loss. The things named in your post are very encouraging, and one thing I would hope would come out of this, as well as the local effect, is for other mainstream farmers to be influenced and shown a different way. That Lincoln are involved is also encouraging, because of their power to influence widely. I do agree with marty though, that there were other paths here. The core model being chosen is inherently unsustainable from land regeneration, AGW and Peak Oil/Everything perspectives.
I also take the view that there tends to be prejudice in critiquing Ngai Tahu’s business practices, and that critique instead should be done intelligently and from an informed perspective taking culture into account, which it usually isn’t. Still so hard for pakeha to look at things in any way other than through their own lenses.
Sorry about the late reply Adele…thanks for the reply and great to read your response.
My understanding is that a huge number of the South Island dairy farms are being worked by a mix of foreigner’s, mostly Philipino…if the farms were a bit smaller, say 300 to 500 cows it would be a hell of a lot easier to get local workers. Large farms are incredibly tedious to work on, cupping 800 cows twice a day is one of the most soul sapping jobs around (Ive done it, Ive also milked smaller herds, so I know what Im talking about). But if Ngai Tahu are going to employ local and put the effort into protecting the environment then I have absolutely NO problem with what they are doing…if Ngai Tahu are going to pollute the local environment then they probably have more rights to do that than the local pakeha farmers.
I do owe you an apology for suggesting that your comments were motivated by prejudice.
Personally, I would rather dial everything back to before 1800 when life was definitely much more hunter-gather-ish and small-scale. However, we are in the 21st century and are products of the modern age. Our reality is so vastly different from those of our tūpuna.
As a child I used to love collecting eggs from free-range chickens. As an adult, I had the opportunity to revisit these child hood memories on visiting a friend’s lifestyle block. I was mortified to find eggs covered in chicken crap. Out came the hand sanitiser followed by the Samsung Galaxy to research the efficacy of hand sanitiser on the likelihood of developing histoplamosis symptomatology post egg harvest.
Māori business practice is evolving and for the better as our business leaders are having to align their business practice to more closely fit with the principles we espouse as Māori. The rigid ‘for profit’ business model is no longer tenable in an age where growth is no longer possible without extreme prejudice to the environment. Ngai Tahu are being watched by many eyes so let’s see how evolved their thinking has become.
“Māori business practice is evolving and for the better as our business leaders are having to align their business practice to more closely fit with the principles we espouse as Māori. The rigid ‘for profit’ business model is no longer tenable in an age where growth is no longer possible without extreme prejudice to the environment…”
That is fantastic if Maori achieve that, it will be challenging. Dairy farming does have scope for improvement, Ive seen worker rights really take some huge backward steps in dairy farming, instead of dairy farmers meeting the market and paying workers the market rate and also improving conditions they have simply lobbied for overseas workers who are desperate…its just something that really annoys me.
Good luck with the dairy project, I know Whakatohia in Opotiki (much smaller than Ngai Tahu) are running dairy farms with locals..and they relatively large dairy units.
The Steve Irwin’s helicopter first located the Nisshin Maru at 64°44′ S, 162°34′ W, in New Zealand’s sovereign waters in the Ross Dependency Antarctic region, and inside the internationally recognised Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.
Sea Shepherd has obtained compelling footage and images of three dead protected Minke Whales on the deck of the Nisshin Maru, taken at the time the factory ship was first located. A fourth whale, believed to be a Minke, was being butchered on the bloodstained deck.
McCully has already started the weasel words and has issued a statement saying the Ross Dependency is not NZ sovereign waters. We just have search and rescue responsibility for it. So I guess it belongs to us when we want to exploit the shit that’s in it but doesn’t belong to us if that means upsetting the Japanese?
“We’re not the puppet of any master: we are independent and honest.”
Once upon a time, MAYBE perceived as being so ….. now more and more being perceived as a croc of shit BY more and more.
Let’s see how it all pans out (i.e./e.g. in our quest for SC seat).
BTW …. I keep asking myself – how did that little trade mission jaunt to Sth America pan out early last year. Real successful according to Key!
Well tick that one off the list! Next stop India aye?
Increasingly, let me assure them – that perceived honesty and independence is becoming about as relevant as a spin doctor’s advice – especially the likes of Hooten’s, or that Mr I’m-inclined-to-agree-with-you-Mathew’s
It is hard to sort the chaff from the wheat with bias and mis use of statistics coming from both sides … frankly I am ambivilent on the subject and think the experiement should continue unhinderd until some reliable answers become apparent …. I picked several holes in the KB article and the sarcasm of David was unhelpful. With some cherry-picking while others handle the dross is bound to make for misleading statistics.
personally I’m sick of that fucking “both sides do it”-style argument.
It’s essentially an admission that the speaker cannot demonstrate that they are in a “good”, morally or logically defensible position, so all they can do is muddy the waters enough to pretend equivalence with opposing positions.
Since most here are expressing opinions rather than facts I think my opinions are as valid as anybody elses …. I have yet to be convinced by the arguments of the teachers which sound to me to be largely job protectionism cloaked in high sounding principles
I was discussing this subject at least a year or so ago and frankly have forgotten details, it simply isn’t that important to me in my second childhood and grandchild overseas finishing her education … so without taking sides I drew the article to your attention … but as we all know, when we are honest with ourselves, we tend to only read what we agree with though I have a receptive audience for Nasska’s jokes so visit KB for them … as important as anything else I read there.
and it was his job to be seen to ask those ‘radical’ questions so FOX could say it is balanced when delivering the plethora of ‘stay on message’ propaganda pieces that passes for news on FOX.
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“I’ve been internalising a really complicated situation in my head.”When they kept telling us we should wait until we get to know him, were they taking the piss? Was it a case of, if you think this is bad, wait till you get to know the real Christopher, after the ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
.“$10 and a target that bleeds” - Bleeding Targets for Under $10!.Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.This government appears hell-bent on either scrapping life-saving legislation or reintroducing things that - frustrated critics insist - will be dangerous and likely ...
“It hardly strikes me as fair to criticise a government for doing exactly what it said it was going to do. For actually keeping its promises.”THUNDER WAS PLAYING TAG with lightning flashes amongst the distant peaks. Its rolling cadences interrupted by the here-I-come-here-I-go Doppler effect of the occasional passing car. ...
Subversive & Disruptive Technologies: Just as happened with that other great regulator of the masses, the Medieval Church, the advent of a new and hard-to-control technology – the Internet – is weakening the ties that bind. Then, and now, those who enjoy a monopoly on the dissemination of lies, cannot and will ...
Been Here Before: To find the precedents for what this Coalition Government is proposing, it is necessary to return to the “glory days” of Muldoonism.THE COALITION GOVERNMENT has celebrated its first 100 days in office by checking-off the last of its listed commitments. It remains, however, an angry government. It ...
Bob Edlin writes – And what is the world watching today…? The email newsletter from Associated Press which landed in our mailbox early this morning advised: In the news today: The father of a school shooter has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter; prosecutors in Trump’s hush-money case ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal? For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to ...
For the last few years, the Green Party has been the party that has managed to avoid the plague of multiple scandals that have beleaguered other political parties. It appears that their luck has run out with a second scandal which, unfortunately for them, coincided with Golraz Ghahraman, the focus ...
TL;DR: The six newsey things that stood out to me as of 6:46am on Saturday, March 16.Andy Foster has accidentally allowed a Labour/Green amendment to cut road user chargers for plug-in hybrid vehicles, which the Government might accept; NZ HeraldThomas CoughlanSimeon Brown has rejected a plea from Westport ...
What seemed a booming success a couple of years ago has collapsed into fraud convictions.I looked at the crash of FTX (short for ‘Futures Exchange’) in November 2022 to see whether it would impact on the financial system as a whole. Fortunately there was barely a ripple, probably because it ...
Anybody following the situation in Ukraine and Russia would probably have been amused by a recent Tweet on X NATO seems to be putting in an awful lot of effort to influence what is, at least according to them, a sham election in an autocracy.When do the Ukrainians go to ...
TL;DR:Shaun Baker on Wynyard Quarter's transformation. Magdalene Taylor on the problem with smart phones. How private equity are now all over reinsurance. Dylan Cleaver on rugby and CTE. Emily Atkin on ‘Big Meat’ looking like ‘Big Oil’.Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15Photo by Jeppe Hove Jensen ...
Buzz from the Beehive Finance Minister Nicola Willis had plenty to say when addressing the Auckland Business Chamber on the economic growth that (she tells us) is flagging more than we thought. But the government intends to put new life into it: We want our country to be a ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has reported back on the Road User Charges (Light Electric RUC Vehicles) Amendment Bill, basicly rubberstamping it. While there was widespread support among submitters for the principle that EV and PHEV drivers should pay their fair share for the roads, they also overwhelmingly disagreed with ...
Peter Dunne writes – This week’s government bailout – the fifth in the last eighteen months – of the financially troubled Ruapehu Alpine Lifts company would have pleased many in the central North Island ski industry. The government’s stated rationale for the $7 million funding was that it ...
See if you can spot the difference. An Iranian born female MP from a progressive party is accused of serial shoplifting. Her name is leaked to the media, which goes into a pack frenzy even before the Police launch an … Continue reading → ...
Ele Ludemann writes – The government is omitting general Treaty references from legislation : The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last Government in a bid to get greater coherence in the public service on Treaty ...
What was that judge thinking?Peter Williams writes – That Golriz Ghahraman and District Court Judge Maria Pecotic were once lawyer colleagues is incontrovertible. There is published evidence that they took at least one case to the Court of Appeal together. There was a report on ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read:Climate Scorpion – the sting is in the tail. Introducing planetary solvency. A paper via the University of Exeter’s Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.Local scoop:Kāinga Ora starts pulling out of its Auckland projects and selling land RNZ ...
Wellington’s massively upzoned District Plan adds the opportunity for tens of thousands of new homes not just in the central city (such as these Webb St new builds) but also close to the CBD and public transport links. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Wellington gave itself the chance of ...
It’s Friday and we’re halfway through March Madness. Here’s some of the things that caught our attention this week. This Week in Greater Auckland On Monday Matt asked how we can get better event trains and an option for grade separating Morningside Dr. On Tuesday Matt looked into ...
Something you might not know about me is that I’m quite a stubborn person. No, really. I don’t much care for criticism I think’s unfair or that I disagree with. Few of us do I suppose.Back when I was a drinker I’d sometimes respond defensively, even angrily. There are things ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:PM Christopher Luxon said the reversal of interest deductibility for landlords was done to help renters, who ...
It was not so much the Labour Party but really the Chris Hipkins party yesterday at Labour’s caucus retreat in Martinborough. The former Prime Minister was more or less consistent on wealth tax, which he was at best equivocal about, and social insurance, which he was not willing to revisit. ...
Buzz from the BeehiveThe text reproduced above appears on a page which records all the media statements and speeches posted on the government’s official website by Melissa Lee as Minister of Media and Communications and/or by Jenny Marcroft, her Parliamentary Under-secretary. It can be quickly analysed ...
For forty years, Robert Muldoon has been a dirty word in our politics. His style of government was so repulsive and authoritarian that the backlash to it helped set and entrench our constitutional norms. His pig-headedness over forcing through Think Big eventually gave us the RMA, with its participation and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Is the new government reducing tax on rental properties to benefit landlords or to cut the cost of rents? That’s the big question this week, after Associate Finance Minister David Seymour announced on Sunday that the Government would be reversing the Labour Government’s removal ...
Saudi Arabia is rarely far from the international spotlight. The war in Gaza has brought new scrutiny to Saudi plans to normalise relations with Israel, while the fifth anniversary of the controversial killing of Jamal Khashoggi was marked shortly before the war began on October 7. And as the home ...
Questions need to be asked on both sides of the worldPeter Williams writes – The NRL Judiciary hands down an eight week suspension to Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu , an Auckland-born Samoan, after he calls Ezra Mam, Sydney-orn but of Aboriginal and Torres Strait ...
Ele Ludemann writes – Contrary to what many headlines and news stories are saying, residential landlords are not getting a tax break. The government is simply restoring to them the tax deductibility of interest they had until the previous government removed it. There is no logical reason ...
I can't remember when it was goodMoments of happiness in bloomMaybe I just misunderstoodAll of the love we left behindWatching our flashbacks intertwineMemories I will never findIn spite of whatever you becomeForget that reckless thing turned onI think our lives have just begunI think our lives have just begunDoes anyone ...
Michael Bassett writes – At first reading, a front-page story in the New Zealand Herald on 13 March was bizarre. A group of severely intellectually limited teenagers, with little understanding of the law, have been pleading to the Justice Select Committee not to pass a bill dealing with ram ...
How much political capital is Christopher Luxon willing to burn through in order to deliver his $2.9 billion gift to landlords? Evidently, Luxon is: (a) unable to cost the policy accurately. As Anna Burns-Francis pointed out to him on Breakfast TV, the original ”rock solid” $2.1 billion cost he was ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read:Jonathon Porritt calling bullshit in his own blog post on mainstream climate science as ‘The New Denialism’.Local scoop:The Wellington City Council’s list of proposed changes to the IHP recommendations to be debated later today was leaked this ...
TL;DR:Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said yesterday tenants should be grateful for the reinstatement of interest deductibility because landlords would pass on their lower tax costs in the form of lower rents. That would be true if landlords were regulated monopolies such as Transpower or Auckland Airport1, but they’re not, ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Tom Toro Tom Toro is a cartoonist and author. He has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. His cartoons appear in Playboy, the Paris Review, the New York Times, American Bystander, and elsewhere. Related: What 10 EV lovers ...
The business section of the NZ Herald is full of opinion. Among the more opinionated of all is the ex-Minister of Transport, ex-Minister of Railways, ex MP for Auckland Central (1975-93, Labour), Wellington Central (1996-99, ACT, then list-2005), ex-leader of the ACT Party, uncle to actor Antonia, the veritable granddaddy ...
Hi,Just quickly — I’m blown away by the stories you’ve shared with me over the last week since I put out the ‘Gary’ podcast, where I told you about the time my friend’s flatmate killed the neighbour.And you keep telling me stories — in the comments section, and in my ...
The first season of Rings of Power was not awful. It was thoroughly underwhelming, yes, and left a lingering sense of disappointment, but it was more expensive mediocrity than catastrophe. I wrote at length about the series as it came out (see the Review section of the blog, and go ...
Buzz from the Beehive Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden told Auckland Business Chamber members they were the first audience to hear her priorities as a minister in a government committed to cutting red tape and regulations. She brandished her liberalising credentials, saying Flexible labour markets are the ...
Chris Trotter writes – TO UNDERSTAND WHY NEWSHUB FAILED, it is necessary to understand how TVNZ changed. Up until 1989, the state broadcaster had been funded by a broadcasting licence fee, collected from every citizen in possession of a television set, supplemented by a relatively modest (compared ...
Bob Edlin writes – The Māori Party has been busy issuing a mix of warnings and threats as its expresses its opposition to interest deductibility for landlords and the plans of seabed miners. It remains to be seen whether they follow the example of indigenous litigants in Australia, ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
The New Zealand public voted for a change in direction at the 2023 general election and that is exactly what this coalition government has been delivering in its first 100 days. There was an immediate focus on the economy, easing the cost of living, cracking down on law and order ...
The Government has left the health system as an afterthought, announcing half-baked targets at the last minute of their 100-day plan, says Labour Health spokesperson Ayesha Verrall. ...
Kiwis are still waiting for their promised cost of living support after 100 days of a National Government that is taking us backwards, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said today. ...
The National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
100 days of National taking NZ backwardsThe National Government has spent its first 100 days stopping, cutting and reversing. They have scrapped stuff for stuff for the sake of it, without putting up any solutions of their own – and it’s hardworking New Zealanders who will pay for it. ...
The Government must commit to funding free and healthy school lunches, as thousands of people sign the petition to keep them, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti says. ...
If the Government was serious about moving families into public housing, they would build more houses so there is actually somewhere for people to go. ...
The free and healthy school lunches programme feeds our kids, helps them to learn, and saves families money – but it is at risk under this Government, education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said. ...
The Government’s proposed changes to Firearms Prohibition Orders (FPO) add almost nothing new and are merely an attempt to distract from its plans to loosen gun laws, police spokesperson Ginny Andersen and justice spokesperson Dr Duncan Webb said. ...
The great Victorian era English politician Lord Macauley stood in the British House of Parliament and said, "The gallery in which the reporters sit has become a fourth estate of the realm".He understood and outlined even way back then, the significant role and influence media have in a democracy. ...
The government’s attack on Māori health this week is committing tangata-whenua to a premature death, says Te Pāti Māori. “The government have begun their onslaught on Māori health with the abolishment of the Māori Health Authority and smokefree laws in the same day” said health spokesperson and co-leader, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. ...
"The Government is moving quickly to realise an additional $46 million in tariff savings in the EU market this season for Kiwi exporters,” Minister for Trade and Agriculture, Todd McClay says. Parliament is set, this week, to complete the final legislative processes required to bring the New Zealand – European ...
New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April. ...
Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand. Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
Tēna koutou katoa. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and the Honourable Simon Bridges for hosting this address today. I acknowledge the business leaders in this room, the leaders and governors, the employers, the entrepreneurs, the investors, and the wealth creators. The coalition Government shares your ...
Minister Winston Peters completed the final leg of his visit to South and South East Asia in Singapore today, where he focused on enhancing one of New Zealand’s indispensable strategic partnerships. “Singapore is our most important defence partner in South East Asia, our fourth-largest trading partner and a ...
Minister of Internal Affairs and Workplace Relations and Safety, Hon. Brooke van Velden, will travel to the Republic of Korea to represent New Zealand at the Third Summit for Democracy on 18 March. The summit, hosted by the Republic of Korea, was first convened by the United States in 2021, ...
ICNZ Speech 7 March 2024, Auckland Acknowledgements and opening Mōrena, ngā mihi nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Good morning, it’s a privilege to be here to open the ICNZ annual conference, thank you to Mark for the Mihi Whakatau My thanks to Tim Grafton for inviting me ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Lead Coordination Minister Judith Collins have expressed their deepest sympathy on the five-year anniversary of the Christchurch terror attacks. “March 15, 2019, was a day when families, communities and the country came together both in sorrow and solidarity,” Mr Luxon says. “Today we pay our respects to the 51 shuhada ...
Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024 Acknowledgements and opening Morena, Nga Mihi Nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Thanks Nate for your Mihi Whakatau Good morning. It’s a pleasure to formally open your conference this morning. What a lovely day in Wellington, What a great ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters held discussions in Jakarta today about the future of relations between New Zealand and South East Asia’s most populous country. “We are in Jakarta so early in our new government’s term to reflect the huge importance we place on our relationship with Indonesia and South ...
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has announced that the Foreign Minister of China, Wang Yi, will visit New Zealand next week. “We look forward to re-engaging with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and discussing the full breadth of the bilateral relationship, which is one of New Zealand’s ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has today opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre, which will bring together KiwiRail, Auckland Transport, and Auckland One Rail to improve service reliability for Aucklanders. “The recent train disruptions in Auckland have highlighted how important it is KiwiRail and Auckland’s rail agencies work together to ...
The Government is proud to support the 10th edition of Crankworx Rotorua as the Crankworx World Tour returns to Rotorua from 16-24 March 2024, says Minister for Economic Development Melissa Lee. “Over the past 10 years as Crankworx Rotorua has grown, so too have the economic and social benefits that ...
Legislation implementing coalition Government tax commitments and addressing long-standing tax anomalies will be progressed in Parliament next week, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The legislation is contained in an Amendment Paper to the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill issued today. “The Amendment Paper represents ...
Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard has today announced that the Government has agreed to suspend the requirement for councils to comply with the Significant Natural Areas (SNA) provisions of the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity for three years, while it replaces the Resource Management Act (RMA).“As it stands, SNAs ...
Agriculture Minister Todd McClay has classified the drought conditions in the Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts as a medium-scale adverse event, acknowledging the challenging conditions facing farmers and growers in the district. “Parts of Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts are in the grip of an intense dry spell. I know ...
The Government is helping farmers eradicate the significant impact of facial eczema (FE) in pastoral animals, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “A $20 million partnership jointly funded by Beef + Lamb NZ, the Government, and the primary sector will save farmers an estimated NZD$332 million per year, and aims to ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has completed a successful visit to India, saying it was an important step in taking the relationship between the two countries to the next level. “We have laid a strong foundation for the Coalition Government’s priority of enhancing New Zealand-India relations to generate significant future benefit for both countries,” says Mr Peters, ...
Cabinet has agreed to provide $7 million to ensure the 2024 ski season can go ahead on the Whakapapa ski field in the central North Island but has told the operator Ruapehu Alpine Lifts it is the last financial support it will receive from taxpayers. Cabinet also agreed to provide ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
Lower fruit and vegetable prices are welcome news for New Zealanders who have been doing it tough at the supermarket, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. Stats NZ reported today the price of fruit and vegetables has dropped 9.3 percent in the 12 months to February 2024. “Lower fruit and vege ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the sixty-eighth session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
Tēnā koutou katoa and greetings to you all. Chair, I am honoured to address the 68th session of the Commission on the Status of Women. I acknowledge the many crises impacting the rights of women and girls. Heightened global tensions, war, climate related and humanitarian disasters, and price inflation all ...
The coalition Government is supporting farmers to enhance land management practices by investing $3.3 million in locally led catchment groups, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced. “Farmers and growers deliver significant prosperity for New Zealand and it’s vital their ongoing efforts to improve land management practices and water quality are supported,” ...
Good evening everyone and thank you for that lovely introduction. Thank you also to the Honourable Simon Bridges for the invitation to address your members. Since being sworn in, this coalition Government has hit the ground running with our 100-day plan, delivering the changes that New Zealanders expect of us. ...
Recommendations from the Climate Change Commission for New Zealand on the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) auction and unit limit settings for the next five years have been tabled in Parliament, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “The Commission provides advice on the ETS annually. This is the third time the ...
The coalition Government is beginning its fight to lower building costs and reduce red tape by exempting minor building work from paying the building levy, says Building and Construction Minister Chris Penk. “Currently, any building project worth $20,444 including GST or more is subject to the building levy which is ...
Proposed changes to tax legislation to prevent the over-taxation of low-earning trusts are welcome, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The changes have been recommended by Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee following consideration of submissions on the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill. “One of the ...
Assalaamu alaikum. السَّلَام عليكم In light of the holy month of Ramadan, I want to extend my warmest wishes to our Muslim community in New Zealand. Ramadan is a time for spiritual reflection, renewed devotion, perseverance, generosity, and forgiveness. It’s a time to strengthen our bonds and appreciate the diversity ...
Former Transport Minister and CEO of the Auckland Business Chamber Hon Simon Bridges has been appointed as the new Board Chair of the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) for a three-year term, Transport Minister Simeon Brown announced today. “Simon brings extensive experience and knowledge in transport policy and governance to the role. He will ...
Good morning all, it is a pleasure to be here as Minister of Science, Innovation and Technology. It is fantastic to see how connected and collaborative the life science and biotechnology industry is here in New Zealand. I would like to thank BioTechNZ and NZTech for the invitation to address ...
Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says he is looking forward to the day when three key water projects in Northland are up and running, unlocking the full potential of land in the region. Mr Jones attended a community event at the site of the Otawere reservoir near Kerikeri on Friday. ...
Associate Finance Minister David Seymour has today announced that the Government has agreed to restore deductibility for mortgage interest on residential investment properties. “Help is on the way for landlords and renters alike. The Government’s restoration of interest deductibility will ease pressure on rents and simplify the tax code,” says ...
Sport and Recreation Minister Chris Bishop will travel to Switzerland today to attend an Executive Committee meeting and Symposium of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Mr Bishop will then travel on to London where he will attend a series of meetings in his capacity as Infrastructure Minister. “New Zealanders believe ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deborah Lupton, SHARP Professor, Vitalities Lab, Centre for Social Research in Health and Social Policy Centre, and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society, UNSW Sydney kitzcorner/Shutterstock The assertion from Queensland’s chief health officer John Gerrard that ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Martin, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Shutterstock Why are musicians so keen to get played on the radio? It can’t be because of the money. In Australia they are paid at rates so low they ...
"Farmers make a point not to tell our urban cousins how to live, yet Chlöe from central Auckland is hell-bent on having her say about farmers," says ACT Rural Communities spokesman Mark Cameron. “On her first day in the House as Green ...
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards – Democracy Project (https://democracyproject.nz)Political scientist, Dr Bryce Edwards. It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tim Curran, Associate Professor of Ecology, Lincoln University, New Zealand Getty Images/Gerald Corsi In the latest move to reform environmental laws in New Zealand, the coalition government has introduced a bill to fast-track consenting processes for projects deemed to ...
Uber has argued it does not have as much control over drivers as the unions suggest, and wants a judgment ruling that drivers are employees and not contractors set aside and sent back to the Employment Court. The 2022 ruling followed a three-week hearing in which four drivers sought to ...
What can and can’t be purchased by disabled people or their carers has been slashed in an effort by the Ministry of Disabled People Whaikaha to save money. The purchasing guidelines, a set of rules that sets out what can be purchased using the various streams of Government disability funding, ...
The Treasury has published today a new Analytical Note by Tod Wright and Hien Nguyen, Fiscal incidence in New Zealand: The effects of taxes and benefits on household incomes in tax year 2018/19 . Analyses of the distributional impact of taxation and government ...
The Treasury has published today a new Analytical Note by Cory Davis, Boston Hart and Benjamin Stubbing, Household cost-of-living impacts from the Emissions Trading Scheme and using transfers to mitigate regressive outcomes . This Analytical Note ...
A coalition of public transport and climate organisations, united as ‘Transport for All’, is actively opposing the government’s transport proposals. The draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) includes plans for higher fares for public transport, ...
Greater Wellington is inviting feedback on proposed changes to its Revenue and Financing Policy. The Revenue and Financing Policy covers the Council’s various sources of funding, and how the cost of services is shared across the region. This includes ...
Labour has conceded it could have done more to deal with disruptive state housing tenants while in government but says the current coalition is going too far. ...
The band has asked their record label to issue a cease and desist to stop the NZ First leader using their 1997 hit to support his ‘misguided political views’. “I get knocked down, but I get up again,” blared through the speakers on Sunday as Winston Peters took the stage ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific journalist Food rationing is underway in remote areas in Papua New Guinea’s Highlands following torrential rain and flash flooding. More than 20 people have been reported dead in Chimbu Province. In nearby Enga Province, the centre of last month’s massacre, a 15-year-old boy has been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Hughes, Lecturer, Research School of Management, Australian National University After months of debate and intrigue, the AFL’s 19th and newest team, the Tasmania Devils, finally launched its jumper, logo and colours in Devonport this week. The Devils will wear green, ...
Brannavan Gnanalingam reviews the debut novel by Saraid de Silva.One of the most baffling things for children who move to a new country is what their parents’ (or grandparents’) lives were like prior to moving – for kids in particular, they’re too busy trying to fit in in their ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Gaunson, Associate Professor in Cinema Studies, RMIT University Narelle Portanier/Binge “If you don’t know who your mob are, you don’t know who you are,” Detective Andrea “Andie” Whitford (played by Leah Purcell) is told early into the new crime ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elise Klein, Associate professor, Australian National University It’s commonly accepted that women do the vast majority of caregiving in Australian society. But less appreciated is that Indigenous women do larger amounts of unpaid care than any other group. Working with the Aboriginal ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Joe Biden and Donald Trump have both secured their parties’ nominations for the November 5 United States general election by winning a ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Griffiths, Deputy Program Director, Budgets and Government, Grattan Institute Australia’s political donations rules are woefully inadequate, but donations reform is finally on the agenda. The federal government has signalled its interest in reform and will soon begin briefing MPs on its ...
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Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Albert Van Dijk, Professor, Water and Landscape Dynamics, Fenner School of Environment & Society, Australian National University Global climate records were shattered in 2023, from air and sea temperatures to sea-level rise and sea-ice extent. Scores of countries recorded their hottest year ...
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Loading…(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){var ql=document.querySelectorAll('A[quiz],DIV[quiz],A[data-quiz],DIV[data-quiz]'); if(ql){if(ql.length){for(var k=0;k<ql.length;k++){ql[k].id='quiz-embed-'+k;ql[k].href="javascript:var i=document.getElementById('quiz-embed-"+k+"');try{qz.startQuiz(i)}catch(e){i.start=1;i.style.cursor='wait';i.style.opacity='0.5'};void(0);"}}};i['QP']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)})(window,document,'script','https://take.quiz-maker.com/3012/CDN/quiz-embed-v1.js','qp'); Got a good quiz question?Send Newsroom your questions. The post Newsroom daily quiz, Tuesday 19 March appeared first on Newsroom. ...
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Ho Hum. I have just scan read 5th January, “Open”(closed/censored) Mic. To see that some that have had the audacity to question & propose other ways forward, dispatched. There has to be a balance of good, open, frank debate that does not discourage others from contributing. I realize that this site is not directly related to the Labour Party yet is a place apparently where those from the broad left can comment. Yet the amount of abusive, confrontational language is appauling . The remit surely, of the site is to challenge the actions of the racist right wing morons in charge and to agitate the labour party to to do better & put forward polices for those that have been victimized, forgotten, written off by those nasty NeoCons!
Someone has said that this site is not a mouth piece of the Labour Party and a coalition of the broad Left however quote the fact of being formed in the late 30′s by The Labour Party. This may be wrong yet seems like a acute case of “Hypocritical Having My Cake and Eating It All!”
From only being on this site for near on a month & I hate to jump to a conclusion yet can see no other. This site, seems to be run and by a “Gang of Four/Five”, whom have there own hobby horse issues and see no room for others to have their points fairly and equitably viewed without them being vilified. The Gang of Five, under the guise usually of authors, seem to run this site like a 3rd rate, chat room. These people should know better and allow open debate and get off their one trick hobby horses and allow others to fully contribute, yet they wont…
One has to wonder about the mindset of these people whom protest to support the broad left yet seem intent on keeping the status quo on the site. Why would this be? Surely they cant be so shallow, as not truly to mean as they protest? Yet actually wish to keep this Perpetual Argue Mental Chat Room Atmosphere as it will secure their positions within it?!
An election looms. NZ has been through merry hell under the command of The Wannabe Fascists of The National Party. A defining moment approaches. Unite as far as possible and agitate, organize, question The Labour Party to do better….Pose the views of our fellow citizens whom have had the life kicked out of them & don’t have the luxury of being a comfortable, one issue-no further comment author/chat room admin(s). I don’t want another term of enslavement of National, do you? Most on this site don’t I am sure….Yet, you have to wonder about some of the authors, As Opposition suits their purposes and keeps their Mini Me Personality, Power Base in Tact in The Fiefdom of TS….
I may not be able to vote till later on this year against The Scum in charge of this wonderful country, however I can vote with my feet and would advocate others do to find a site(s) (for QOT’s benefit, no need to pique too hard, there are many, take your choice. I am sure if you ask Google “nicely” it will oblige) where your voice, comment, suggestion,,,no matter how small is treated with equality, respect and with the true aim of creating a better New Zealand for all! Take care one et All!
[RL: If you read the actual intro to Open Mike “The usual rules of good behaviour apply (See Policy)”. Open means open to all-comers, their ideas and robust debate – not open to mindless, offensive abuse.]
Political movements are bigger than particular parties.
To attract a wide range of contributors that reflect such a movement and those it serves we must all create a welcoming space to meet and talk. There is plenty of knowledge about how to do that, including respecting the communication needs of women who make up 51% of the population.
Productive debate does not mean allowing anyone to say whatever they like, especially in the form of the drunken slurs which attracted moderation yesterday.
MMP allows selecting a political party that fits your own interests best. Likewise, there are many vehicles for contributing to the broader discussion.
Dear
EcosseMartyr.Far more than five commenters here.
Far more than five readers too.
Even over a period during which a large cohort were on holiday.
From only being on this site for near on a month & I hate to jump to a conclusion yet can see no other. This site, seems to be run and by a “Gang of Four/Five”
Over the seven years this site has run, there have been many authors. Far more people have come and moved on than would be apparent in just one month. In the big picture there certainly has not been a “Gang of Five’ running the site.
Quite the opposite – the person who really runs this site Lynn Prentice, is remarkably ‘hands-free’ in steering the authors or the content. His prime concern is to provide an environment in which robust debate can thrive and then he sits back and watches the fun.
The only other author/mod whose been around since the start is me, and I might be fairly po-faced bugger, but the one thing I’ve never done is stop anyone expressing their ideas (as distinct from behaving badly). Ever. Period.
What you are really touching on is a question of tone. The atmosphere at The Standard has best been described as “noisy local bar”, with a few quiet nooks. Not everyone feels comfortable with that, and either feel silenced or simply not heard. It is still is a masculine dominated space.
Which is not all bad. A lot of the puffing and preening that goes on can also carry a sharp wit, humour and insight. For all the surface “Perpetual Argue Mental Chat Room Atmosphere” there is also an underlying community and over time the really smart people adapt their positions and behaviours. It’s challenging and some people rise to it.
And while men may seem to be engaged in testosterone poisoned death matches – the thing that’s easy to miss is that often the very next day the clock has been reset, the grudge match buried and they’re happily batting away on some completely new topic.
For most people new here, the biggest challenge is just the usual one, breaking into the cliquey conversations that go on. It just takes time, watch what’s going on and eventually it flows. When I take a few months out, I’ve noticed it takes time to ease back in.
An election looms. NZ has been through merry hell under the command of The Wannabe Fascists of The National Party. A defining moment approaches. Unite as far as possible and agitate, organize, question The Labour Party to do better….Pose the views of our fellow citizens whom have had the life kicked out of them
Yes your heart is surely in a good place. It often takes an outsider to see clearly what others have stopped seeing because it was there all the time.
Ecosse only been here for a month or so?
During December some of the regular authors (or at least ones who have been pretty regular in posting over the last year) tend to take some time off writing, take some time out.
Authors come and authors go, and periodically then they come back again. Depends what their work and family loads are. Sometimes it depends on if they can find anything that they really really want to say.
We’ve had about 4 almost complete rollovers of regular authors over the last 6 and a half years. It isn’t a career. It is a voluntary activity that The Standard trust (administered by myself and Mike Smith because we were the known IRL people when we set up the trust) provide to invited people as authors, and anyone else as commenters who behave within our policy.
There are 40 odd authors with writing rights if they can remember their logins (because I don’t turn them off). I’d expect that a fair number of them will start writing again this election year.
A wise comment Red…I think the Scot has a point. Gang of Five? Sometimes it feels that way, to me that’s a known quantity, the other bit is the propensity of bystanders here to kick the (wo)man whilst they are down. Perhaps we should reflect on how good we are at carving our own side up….at this rate we might just kill one another off and leave the field clear for the Right.
Gang of Unknown Five?
fify.
Nothing like insinuation without being clear to leave people wondering who the enemy are and this undermine a community.
Well phrased there.
Ecosse should stick with it.
This is the best place for political debate among actual citizens and commentators anywhere in New Zealand.
Ecosse, the best way to get debate going the way you want is to write and propose a post. Up the flag, see who salutes it. Do it.
+1
A lot less so these days. Looking at commenters the way I do, I’m seeing a steady approach towards parity.
I think there’s more women (as far as I can tell re-pseudonymns and stated gender) participating than previously.
I understand “masculine” to be as much about culture and socially aquired characteristics as to do with biology. The masculine legacy of politics generally has slowly changed over the years, but still some of the older characteristics linger.
In my pols paper last semester at Otago, during one of our tutorials that followed a couple of lectures on NZ Politics and the Media, our tutorial group had to divide in to four smaller groups. Each smaller group had to represent one of four NZ political websites: The Standard, The Daily Blog, Whale Oil, and Kiwi Blog. (Couldn’t choose which blog team you could be on, and to my barely disguised horror, I ended up on the Whale Oil team. It was excruciating.)
Anyway, the interesting thing was that the three females on “The Standard” team, all took on male gendered persona’s, and started talking in this kind of gruff salty vernacular. It was kind of disturbing.
Crikey.
So much for the feminazi take over then.
That exercise sounds disturbingly fascinating.
It was!
I had to stop myself from bellowing “Why aren’t you channelling QoT in all her magnificent mouthy glory??? Or Karol, with her *I will not be ruffled by white noise onslaughts* .” While trying really hard to channel a sort of femmed up version of Tighty Righty/BM and saying “left wing wankers” a lot.
@ NZ Femme,
That is fascinating!
There are a couple of points that arise to explain what occurred in your tutorial:
a. The Standard is full of male gendered personas talking in a gruff and salty vernacular.
b. There are a variety of personas, male, female and gender neutral on the Standard and there are many polite and reasoned comments as well as gruff ones, yet the male gendered personas speaking in a gruff way are what that group of people noticed.
I choose b. as being the most accurate explanation.
Interesting!. I/we did a similar thing (media/sosc related) with social networking (internet dating) sites a few years ago. In my case the one and only social networking site involving a profile database I have, or ever intend signing up to.
Our profiles were complete crap in terms of persona and physical stats but the various responses were fascinating, BOTH in terms of various messages received, and in the way ‘sysops’ made various assumptions.
Of course … only of anecdotal value and borderline unethical, but it did serve to reinforce the findings of an earlier Queensland study.
Yes, I would go with B as well. It really fascinated me. 🙂
The tutorial group I was streamed in to were quite young. As in, NONE of my classmates were old enough to vote at the last election, and only a very small number (3, including me from memory) were looking at Pols as a major, so I don’t think they were reading up on the various political blogs prior to the class requirement.
How much time was spent reading the blogs for the assignment then? Over what kind of time? If it was just a couple of days I can imagine coming away with a distinct impression that doesn’t reflect reality over time.
The time period was over approximately 10 – 14 days, depending on what day your tutorial would have been. And yes, I’d have to say, it felt like the tutorial class was reflecting something of a caricature rather than the reality of the blogs. (Except for Whale Oil, because – well – that already is a caricature ;D )
ERRATUM
There are a variety of personas, male, female and gender neutral…
should be….
There are a variety of personae, male, female and gender neutral…
Firstly, nobody likes a pedant.
Secondly, correcting the spelling of commenters here is the act of a wanker, unless the original commenter claims to have a brilliant grasp of the language and accidentally trips themselves up.
Thirdly, pedants who correct the language of others and get it wrong are even funnier than the commenter in example two.
Thanks for my first laugh of the day, Moz.
….unless the original commenter claims to have a brilliant grasp of the language and accidentally trips themselves [sic] up.
Ignorami will be relieved to know they have such a sterling defender as you, my friend….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IvWoQplqXQ
Second laugh. Get educated, Moz.
Wait! Now I’m confused. Should I have written:
“…all took on male gendered personas…” or “…all took on male gendered personae..”
My formal academic education ended precisely at the end of the third term of my fourth form year – outside of a failed attempt at Massey in 1999 when I freaked out at a 100 level Psych paper that involved basic stats. The giant gaps in my maths knowledge became painfully obvious to me at that point, and I was too embarrassed to ask for help.
These days, I’m not at all adverse to asking for help or clarification, so please feel free to be as pedantic as you like with my spelling and/or grammar. 🙂
Don’t worry, ‘personas’ is an acceptable use. Or you can use ‘personae’. Either is fine.
See TRP’s point 3 with regards to the usefulness of Morrissey’s pedanticism.
That pedanticism or pendantry? Was it deliberate or accidental? How about I just go away now? 🙂
That was me yanking Morrissey’s chain 😀
That was me yanking Morrissey’s chain
Weka, you can “yank my chain” any time. 😀 😀 😀 😀
Stay classy Morrissey.
“personas” is correct, because we are writing in English.
Agreed. Personae is correct Latin plural of persona. Personas is correct English for plural of persona. Nobody these days bothers about sticking with the latin plural forms for words we’ve imported into English.
Interesting.
I took on a male personna (albeit a male version of myself) for the first few few months commenting on TS.
Anyways, what conclusions did they come to – do you remember?
It would be hard to get a feel for this place in just a few weeks, you’d have the advatage of the outsider point of view, but without any of the depth of the multiple histories/herstories.
@Just Saying;
Yes, I think the majority of the students wouldn’t have had a very long overview of the four sites, because it was A: a first year paper, B: the average age was quite young, C: the majority were doing the paper as an elective outside of their majors and D: it was relatively early in the semester. So yes, it was a small snapshot of time in Blog land.
In terms of conclusions, really the exercise was a 101 exploration of the political landscape in NZ via the internet. I think what stood out was how quickly and easily people became polarised and entrenched in our relative positions.
@Karol:
Yes I survived being a Right Wing Nut Job! It was actually a good exercise for me, because I had to argue against my own belief system/world view. It forced me to really think about why I think/believe the things I do, which over the years (cos I’m 43 now) have become – I don’t know – naturalised (?). I’d half forgotten how I’d arrived at many of my beliefs.
Fascinating – and you participated in and survived WO – well done!
Do you keep any statistics on the gender of commenters?
I’d like to know what stats you keep?
Not directly (obviously I cannot).
But I do have the non-visible email addresses and the emails that people send to me (and some of those have surprised me). Moreover as moderator I do scan a lot of comments. Between one thing and another I can usually pick the probable gender, broad age of most of the commenters, and educational levels of commenters after they do hundreds of comments.
Both are things that I actually look for because I think a well rounded mix of both is crucial to developing an effective community.
Similarly I can also get aggregate probability information from other sources. Statcounter, wordpress stats, and Alexa are all pretty low confidence stuff. The new Google analytics appears to be pretty good – if only because they describe how they arrive at their confidence levels..
But mostly I just look at the comments, and there has been a noticeable change over the years with a gradually reduction in overwhelming predominance of youngish males towards a older audience with a more equal gender distribution.
Thanks for that. I suppose you put the bad spellers under the level of education, I expect that this does not take too many comments. (Re spelling, I have my good and bad days).
Possibly someone at the GCSB has more information on The Standard, maybe I could inquire there!
I realise I had become dependent on Chrome’s spellcheck – quick to type, easy to notice and correct errors underlined in red without looking closely.
Now I’m using FF without spellcheck, my spelling is noticable atrocious.
nice
Hell no. I’m a naturally sloppy speller saved by the spell check systems. My pronunciation is even worse (especially according to Lyn who gets wound up by that) because often I have only read the words.
Different when looking at code of course – you have to love those compilers.
I usually assess education from what people say. In particular if they can present an argument that I can’t find by putting in key phrases into google and finding out where they got them from. Few people who understand what they are talking about will ever use exactly the same language to describe the concept.
Yes, this is such a terrible place of censorship. I mean, have you ever tried posting almost the exact same thing to multiple days’ Open Mikes? I bet you they don’t let it through, especially if you’re threatening the Final Five.
Hang on a minute, what’s this? http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-05012014/#comment-753900
Jenny managed to post almost the same thing to Open mike for months before she finally got banned.
And continues to this day on TDB, I’ve seen. She even paid my place a visit.
I saw that earlier. Figured in this case that they’d put it up late in the night, didn’t get a bite, and then come back in the morning and vomited again….
They weren’t alone in that either …
Ho Hum?.. Hum drum.
Some have a hard row to hoe.
Others just want to bang their own drum to tell the hos how hard to row.
After his tilt at the Auckland Mayoralty, Rev Uesifili Unasa eyes up representing Pasifika interests on the national stage – http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11181763
i like unasa..and would like to see him in parliament/a position of power..
..i see him as a positive agent for change..
..and have said so @ whoar….as far back as when he stood for the mayoralty..
..i have never met the man..
..but what i have seen to date has impressed..
..phillip ure..
This government motto is Sell, sell, sell everything that is worth anything – and then we sell the population into slavery.
Oh wait…
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11181102
New Zealanders should be able to sell *their* land to whoever they please.
Yes infused – of course. After all, the land was pretty much all stolen from the original inhabitants so ‘easy come, easy go’. However, one would have to wonder how your descendants will feel when they achieve the same negative social statistics that are currently dominated by Maori as a consequence.
Infused, it’s not theirs. Eminent domain and all that. Of course, if you sell it to citizens of other nations eminent domain becomes that little bit harder to enforce. Uncle Sam and all that.
Sell “*their* land to whoever they please…..” Infused ? You mean on the same basis as *their* car or *their* flat screen ?
National interest ramifications are *absolutely* irrelevant then ? Just a question which you may care to answer.
rules have changed since the minority became the majority. The minority are now thrown in prison for stealing
Infused probably works on that old justification that ‘they can’t take it with them’. It’s OK of course for citizens to become tenants of their own nation – IF of course they can even afford to do that. Different cause, but same effect of various Pacific Islanders and Indian Ocean dwellers facing oblivion
It’s not their land.
We need to do better than limiting foreign ownership, we need to ban it altogether.
Agree. If you do not live here I cannot think of a single reason to own land. Goes for corporations owning property as well. If not majority NZ owned they should not hold land.
My ban on foreign ownership also includes NZ businesses and corporations.
At 8.45am this morning on Radio New Zealand, an article on Ngai Tahu creating NZ’s largest dairy farm in Balmoral, South Island. I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of philipino workers. It will draw water out of the Waimakariri River…how is this still allowed to happen given water issues. This cannot be a good thing.
“I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of philipino workers. It will draw water out of the Waimakariri River”
What is your basis for both these comments?
That’s what other industrial dairy farms are doing as a matter of course?
Plus chopping down trees and using shit loads of electricity.
If its the same Balmarol I’m thinking of thats a large amount of forestry land to be converted but on the plus side (for them) its mostly flat
Chop down trees and build an AGW-enhancing desert instead. Real smart.
Smart if they want to make more money that is
Smart if they want to make more money without any regard for anything or anyone else.
fify
It is possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.
Just to let you know its not my decision to convert it to dairy its Ngai Tahus decision, the guardians of the land and all that
Actually, no it’s not.
can you expand on that?
Modern business practices require the exploitation of many, often pushing them into poverty, so as to provide profit for the few. On top of that there’s also the damage done to the environment especially when the environment has already been damaged beyond sustainability, i.e, incapable of maintaining life cycles. And then there’s competition which forces the cheapest, least suitable practices on the participants in the market.
No, it’s not possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.
agree Making money in ‘the market’ involves that you acquire for the lowest price and sell on at the highest…ie, rip off all and sundry or be ripped off…. and sunk.
So the guy who I buy my veges off locally, who intentionally keeps his prices low, who prioritises selling to locals, grows organically, is doing ecosystem restoration, he’s ethically bankrupt?
By your and Draco’s definition we are all ethically bankrupt for ever having bought or sold anything.
By the sounds of things, he’s not using modern business practices.
Actually he is. He’s part of the growing movement of ethical modern business practices, but much of what he does is old school traditional too (be good to your customers, look after the land etc).
Besides, reread my original comment about making money and you will see I didn’t specify ‘modern business practices’. You made some assumptions and then dumped some ideology into the conversation.
One of the first proper jobs I had was working for a guy who ran his own business. I was the only employee. The owner paid above award rates in pretty much every respect and was very good to me. This was late 80s. He once pointed out to me that when I slagged off ‘business’ policially I was also talking about him. That really made me sit up and take notice and be much more discerning in my politics (I of course had meant ‘big business’ and hadn’t really thought about him as a businessman until he pointed it out). Got to get the target right or so many people get lost along the way.
Fair point, weka. Correction – you can be less unethical, though never entirely ethical when you act within the confines of a capitalist market economy.
Draco / Bill, lets strip the bullshit out of business ethics (because despite all the theories etc it is essentially really simple). Business consists solely of transactions aka trading, buying, selling.
To do a transaction has no ethical basis other than I have, you want, we agree a price. We then trade if we agree (or don’t if we don’t agree).
Essentially it is as honest or dishonest as the traders make it. It has no ethic to be bankrupt of. Ethics are particular to the individuals involved (and might I venture be directed by the environment or system….for example to place an individual in a position of power in a transaction – think corporate banksters- and their ethics might naturally vere toward greed).
Interestingly most long term successful small businesses survive on their long term reputation as being honest traders, usually within a circle of known like businesses. How do I know? Because that is my experience out here in “”marketland”.
@ Ennui 2.29pm
The transactions you are referring to involve people and people can act ethically or not- you are taking the people out of the equation in your theory.
You can’t have a market without people. Isn’t this exactly what is going wrong with the current ‘market theory’ mentality – that all the ‘people effects’ are taken out of the equation? i.e. In order to get it resembling a scientific theory ‘people effects’ such as irrationality, following the leader – and lack of ethical behaviour – are removed.
This approach is sadly removing the ability to know or predict the effects of markets. Isn’t this one of the major reasons we are suffering sorely? (from this error of omitting very real inputs in our calculations)
Ennui. Buying and selling isn’t the simple and neutral process you claim it to be. It takes place within a framework of rules and conventions – capitalism or market economics. and one (some would say the) of the defining features of capitalism is exploitation. So, that’s the arena your business operates in. And I’m going to guess we can agree that exploitation is unethical. And even if you are self employed or your business is a collective where no wages are paid and so no direct exploitation occurs…materials still have to be sourced. And that unavoidably ‘supports’ exploitation. Likewise, when you sell on or provide a service, the people doing the purchasing have to enter into exploitative arrangements in order to afford your product/service.
That’s not to say that all business operators/owners are bad bastards – they’re not.
There is also the ethics of what is being sold. Trafficking of child prositutes as neutral transaction?
That’s nice but he was still increasing his own income through your work which is the base exploitation inherent within capitalism. Yes, administration of the business is important but you as the creator of the wealth should have had a direct say in how much the administration was paid. It is this lack of say that employees have that makes their employment exploitation and thus makes a business person unethical even if they’re good people.
So he’s actually making effort to be more ethical – good for him.
The old school didn’t really have a lot of looking after the land in it. In fact, it was the old way of doing things that has caused so much damage to NZs environment – a way of doing things that National, in their re-write of the RMA, is bringing back.
Blue / Bill / Weka, I dont disagree with your sentiments at all: if you read me again I say the process of business is transactions and that transactions in themselves have no ethics. I also note that the environment and system will affect a individual involved in the transaction.
Business is in my mind entirely simple and easy to corrupt. For example the power relationships can be manipulated (as in child trafficking). The issue in my mind is how the power relationships can be made equitable in a transaction. If they are equal there can be no exploitation.
My way of keeping it even is to have long term relationships where I can and rely upon regulation etc where I have to. Its a very imperfect world. I suppose the real point is that humans are very corruptable.
“The issue in my mind is how the power relationships can be made equitable in a transaction.”
Which power relationships do you mean? The ones between the two people doing the transactions? Or the ones between all the people affected by the transaction?
@ Ennui,
I agree what you are saying about long-term relationships and reputation being a good way to go, however it is becoming apparent that ignoring ethics is giving those who are prepared to be dishonest an upper hand.
I believe that the original idea behind markets was exactly what you are conveying at 3.08 – kind of ‘keeping it simple’ I often think about how that system was set up at a time where ethics were possibly valued with greater resolve, (or would that be probably ?)
Ignoring ethics and the complexity of people in regards to transactions people make, in my opinion, however, is simply failing us.
Weka, what I mean is the power in relation to the transaction….i.e does the seller have a monopoly that gives them an unfair power advantage. Is the buyer of the loaf starving with lots of cash but cant buy nearby? And there maybe downstream effects as you intimate that need to be mitigated in the transaction.
Blue, you are right, ethics cannot be ignored in the individuals, the institutions and the systems / isms.
I deliberately went down this track to flush out the difference between doing a transaction (business between two individuals etc) and the systems we call out as unfair and corrupt. People since time immemorial have transacted business, traded, bought, sold. It predates any of our current models and “isms”.
Why did I go down this path? We have a future in which we will still need to trade / exchange / transact. We can pull down isms, institutions etc but we wont stop transactions. I think “transactions” and the ethics / rules around them are the best place to discuss alternatives. Rather than what we want to pull down WHAT do we want to construct? How will it work? What will govern a transaction?
+1 Ennui,
You appear to be aiming at unclouded clear analysis; it is hard to fix things appropriately if the varied problems aren’t separated out and addressed. Good stuff!
Thinking about ethical trading in the simple sense. I noticed when reading about the past that establishing correct weights and measures was very important in establishing ethical markets of the people’s in the town square sort. And in Nelson there is still, or was till recently, the official yard measure set in concrete to use as a ‘yardstick’ for all traders.
The new Green Party campaign slogan for the next election 🙂
re the “It is possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.”
I agree with Draco, (and hopefully am not putting words in his mouth but the “no it’s not” was an obvious mass-generalisation, and who can get through a day without a half dozen of those to keep you sane )
Far too many NZ businesses seem incapable of behaving ethicallly in the pursuit of profit. The nz dairy industry being a glaring example.
$6.50+ for 500g of butter in NZ as exhibit one
$2.80+ for 1 lt of milk as exhibit two
add in the now familiar $4 a loaf for bread and you have three of the most basic of grocery items costing more than an hour’s net income for a minimum wage earner.
so yeah, the minders of NZ business need a refresher course in basic social ethics
So you think that the small organic dairy farms in NZ that exist at least partially outside of Fonterra and are trying to or are succeeding at working entirely outside of that model are ethically bankrupt?
I take your point about the need for mass generalisations on occasion, but if you just named every business owner in NZ as ethically bankrupt how can you expect them to take any notice of what you say or be willing to change? And what exactly are you going to do with all these ethical bankrupts come the revolution.
“if you just named every business owner in NZ as ethically bankrupt how can you expect them to take any notice of what you say or be willing to change?”
I never said anything of the sort weka.
re dairy: If I had just said Fonterra then I feel some readers would have steered the responsibility for the behaviour away from the stockholders in that company i.e the farmers. Farmers whose current practises, especially in Dairy, are swiftly moving away from NZ’s history of largely ethical farming into the realm of factory farming.
I thought it was also clear that I was not throwing a blanket over the whole mess when I wrote “Far too many NZ businesses seem incapable of behaving ethicallly in the pursuit of profit. ”
I think we can all agree that it is largely the primary industries where this profit over people attitude is most often witnessed and in most need of adjustment. Overall though I fundamentally believe that the minders of NZ business do need a refresher course in basic social ethics. Even the good guys can always do better.
Fair enough.
I said: It is possible to make money without being ethically bankrupt.
Draco said: No, it’s not.
You said: I agree with Draco.
I took that to mean that everyone making money in NZ was ethically bankrupt. I can see that you didn’t, but can you see why it came across that way?
This sub thread was in response to PR saying that it was smart to do whatever to make money, and I pointed out that what he really meant was it was smart to make money that way if you didn’t give a shit about anyone else (ie unethically). I was making a differentiation between ethical business and unethical business. Draco and Bill posted some ideology and theory stating that for all intents and purposes there was no distinction. Hence my conclusion that those agreeing with Draco and disagreeing with me were saying all business was unethical.
It’s a fairly absurd debate now, but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions and ideology here at the expense of exploring actual solutions (theory is important, I’m just saying the balance is wrong).
“It’s a fairly absurd debate now, but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions and ideology here at the expense of exploring actual solutions”
that happens a lot when humans are involved, 🙂
and may I add
you are not alone
Your inability to think (too abstract for me) or to offer cogent arguments for or against the solutions offered is one of the reasons it’s getting absurd.
Thanks freedom 🙂
Draco,
What you call my ‘inability to think’ is actually a cognitive disability which is esp bad at the moment. It’s not an inability to think so much as a need to ration my cognitive energy.
I repeatedly ask for examples of solutions, and routinely get offered more theory by you.
We also have a different take on logic, as evidenced by the thread you just linked to. In that thread I DID offer cogent responses to what was being put out. What I see you doing in that thread is not really engaging with what I was saying and instead either going on misunderstanding, or just saying what you want. It’s just happened again this very thread. Read my synopsis of the sub thread again and tell me where I am wrong.
Hmmmm I think you can make money and have ethics.
Ethics need to be defined so that I can disagree with myself. So does “make money”. MOst of my work is for free and the rest I seriously undercharge. Thankfully my partner has ore secure income.
Business process is as abstract and largely redundant comment in relation to ethics because a process rarely exists without humans, from imagining it, to planning it, to implementing it.
The process may be inherently unethical if designed and implemented that way, or can become unethical.
I dont see the point of making an argument based on such an abstract it might as well not exist within the context of the discussion of ethics.
I may also have misunderstood the post.
the elephants in the room being ignored in all this talk of ‘ethical-dairying’..
..is a)..that dairy causes cancer..so essentially..as a country..we export death..we had may as well be growing/exporting tobacco..
..and b)..all the other vile/cruel treatments of animals continues apace with the ‘unethical’-farmers..
..ie..calves taken from mothers after birth..(how do you think you get the milk..?..it is intended for them..in the grand scheme of things..)
..and have you ever heard that..?..the cries-of-separation from both the mothers..and their calves..?
..you really should..it is heart-rending..will chill yr soul..and should have you thinking:.
.(‘this is being done in my name?..)’
..and of course..once the serially-inseminated cows are flogged out..after a few years..(natural life-span 20+ yrs..)
..they too are sent to the slaughterhouse..
..’ethical-dairying’..?
..my arse..!
phillip ure..
You may be surprised to hear then that much of my objection to industrial dairying is for animal welfare reasons.
It is perfectly possible to grow milk for human consumption while keeping the calf with the cow.
Consumption of dairy doesn’t cause cancer.
No, actually, you didn’t.
I engaged with what you said, I even understood it. I then pointed out where and why you were wrong.
What was that expression that QoT used the other day that fits what you’re doing here? Oh, that’s right, Gaslighting.
You were wrong in this:
Draco and Bill posted some ideology and theory stating that for all intents and purposes there was no distinction
because you failed to understand what was actually being said which is what you said here:
but it comes out of my increasing frustration for the amount of focus on abstractions.
Thinking is an abstraction itself and without using them we would be very limited in expressing ideas for solutions. Ethics are also an almost totally abstract concept.
What you have done there is go “you are wrong, I am right” but you haven’t said how you think I am wrong, so I am still none the wiser what you mean (other than that you think I am wrong).
You’ve pointed to something I’ve already said, and decided that my acknowledging my frustration with abstracts means that I didn’t understand ie you’ve decided you know my reality better than me and haven’t bothered to check if you are right. In fact the times when I do put the mental effort into reading something I am unfamiliar with that seems abstract to me, I understand it well enough (or enough to get the gist at least and come back and ask questions) but I still feel frustrated by the approach. Hence my comment elsewhere where I said I didn’t want someone to say the solution was to smash capitalism, I wanted some actual ‘how’ (which you then supplied).
I’m sure you think you are being clear, but making an assertion without explanation isn’t clarifying. I suspect that you don’t like my using the term ‘abstract’, and that we use that term in different ways. But instead of seeking clarification about what I mean (which might lead to better communication between us), you now want to have a meta argument about abstraction. Given that we don’t communicate that well already, I don’t think that’s a useful path.
“Ethics are also an almost totally abstract concept.”
Only if you look at them abstractly. If you look at how they are applied then you are looking at an application as well, not just an abstraction.
There was a great example of this whole thing the other day when I suggested that Bill and RL bringing conceptual discussion into a space where people were still feeling pretty raw wasn’t the best move. They came up with this, to my mind, brilliant analogy around half-bakery. Bill, in response to RL:
Half baked you say? By that scheme of things, I was only suggesting ingredients that might go in the mixing bowl and hadn’t even thought about pre-heating the oven ffs. Anyway, those new super absorbent mops? They ain’t bad for splattered spillages.
I don’t want to imply a negative around their thinking by the use of the term half-baked. The analogy just really clarified for me the, in that case, very large gap in terms of where people were coming from. And knowing that, that we might build some bridges or telegraph systems or something.
It also helped me understand where Bill in particular is coming from in ways I hadn’t before.
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-05012014/#comment-753614
Your gaslighting link is broken.
My reading of the “abstraction” by Draco that weka was referring to:
R& D – it was mentioned in pretty general terms – and, for those of us that don’t know the extent and depth of R & D that goes on, it’s impossible to know whether it would happen as Draco says – I think it’s likely that all R & D is not the same – some of it more likely to be done out of neccessity – some avoided, some may need certain conditions: eg enough people to work on it, with the time, available resources etc.
Well if you ask me, the classic example in that thread of miscommunication between myself and Draco is this:
Me: Why limit [jobs for unemployed people] to R and D or Arts and Craft?
Draco: I, personally, can’t think of any limits to those [R and D or Arts and Craft].
I’ve asked one thing, he’s replied to something else (that I didn’t ask about). I still don’t know what he meant (that R/D and A/C would supply all jobs?). It’s like we have subtle but important different versions of the English language. There are other examples where I ask something, and he replies to that specific question, but as if I had said something else. I’m not surprised I gave up soon after.
R& D – it was mentioned in pretty general terms – and, for those of us that don’t know the extent and depth of R & D that goes on, it’s impossible to know whether it would happen as Draco says – I think it’s likely that all R & D is not the same – some of it more likely to be done out of neccessity – some avoided, some may need certain conditions: eg enough people to work on it, with the time, available resources etc.
I was unclear what was actually meant by R& D in that conversation. The gardening example was interesting. Plenty of gardeners do R & D already, to varying degrees. We could formalise that more and build very useful bodies of knowledge. However not every person on the dole moving into a gardening job is going to want to do R & D as well as part of that job. Maybe they just want to mow lawns listening to music or using that time to think about other things. I guess it depends on how broadly you define R & D.
Abstract:
You’ve been calling for less abstraction but it is only through abstraction that we can explain our ideas and solutions for a better world quite often because a concrete example doesn’t exist.
We were talking about unemployed and in a previous comment I implied that there shouldn’t be any unemployed. We destroy jobs through R&D and that the people thus made unemployed need to be moved into either R&D (or arts & craft) themselves or into jobs that others have vacated to go into R&D (or arts & craft). The only reason why we have unemployment now is to keep wages low (which really is just another indication of how the present system doesn’t work). There are no limits to what can be researched and developed or in art.
“You’ve been calling for less abstraction but it is only through abstraction that we can explain our ideas and solutions for a better world quite often because a concrete example doesn’t exist.”
Actually, I’ve been calling for more exploration of concretion alongside the abstract. It seems like you see abstract and concete as two discrete things, whereas I see them as a continuum, generally speaking.
Plus, the whole baking bowl analogy. If you are still making a shopping list, and I’m sitting at the table to eat, how can we progress a conversation?
I don’t want to go into the whole R & D thing with you again tongiht, because as I said I think there is a basic miscommunication, so there doesn’t seem to be much point until that is overcome. Also not really willing to deal with being told I’m wrong that much at the moment unless there is a willingness to explain or acknowledge as well.
@ weka..
“..Consumption of dairy doesn’t cause cancer..”
yes..yes it does..
..do you need the evidence-links again..?
..and not only cancer..what about the diabetes..?..the strokes..?
..the huge role it plays in obesity..?
..any of this ringing any bells..?
..do you need those evidence-links too..?
..phillip ure..
no, no it doesn’t.
I have read enough about dairy and health to know that you are grossly misrepresenting science. You can link again if you like, but I suspect that it will just be another search list from your blog, which generally consists of lots of assertion without any evidence. But go on, you might surprise me.
Type 2 diabetes is an issue of insulin resistance. Dairy consumption can be a problem for people that are increasingly insulin resistant (because of the milk sugars I think), but it doesn’t ’cause’ diabetes. Many traditional cultures that consume alot of dairy don’t have high rates of diabetes. The only cultures that I am aware of that have high rates of diabetes are those that eat a Western diet or live a Western lifestyle (and there are many factors involved in why those people get insulin resistant, most notably refined carbohydrate consumption).
Because I, at least, am capable of making a shopping list at the same time as talking. In fact I’ll likely to be asking what you want to eat. Unfortunately, you’re sitting down, banging your knives and forks on the table and demanding dinner.
/facepalm
because of a mis-communication I won’t communicate with you
if the r/t’s broken, there’s no point in continuing to try to use it.
“because of a mis-communication I won’t communicate with you”
That is NOT what I said. Again, this is an example of us speaking different versions of the same language.
Draco, I’ve tried my best to explain how I see things. If you are unwilling to engage in good faith, that’s fine. All I’m hearing from you this evening here is personal disaparagement of me (I’m incapable of thinking, I’m unreasonably demanding something from you, I’m wrong), and virtually nothing in the way of a meeting, so I’ll just leave it there for now.
Dairy farms were not meant for arid areas. THAT is why the Waimak shouldnt EVER be diverted to farms converted to dairy.
Yep, you got it. Although I would say there is no good landscape for industrial dairy as it’s done today.
Balmoral forest is on the north bank of the Hurunui, in a valley between mountains, on very stony soil that cooks in the summer and freezes in winter. On the basis of animal welfare alone using current dairy practices it is a cruel environment. Cows need warmth and shade, the way we treat our stock in NZ is scandalous.
I hope this is not the same place proposed. To farm there will require irrigation schemes, damming of the Hurunui has been proposed and opposed regularly.
I’m assuming its the one on the state highway though to Culverden (or Hanmer Springs)
Yes
north canterbury then. frequently suffers from drought so perfect place for dairying…
The farms – in total 5 – will be ready in 2015 – so I would take it that the trees will be long gone. Then they are to build two big storage reservoirs on site, so in winter they can “harvest” the Waimak and store the extra water for use in summer. The farms will have the highest concentration of cows on the plains. As the sediment under the land there is quite thin, it is expected that there will be some detrimental effects downstream as effluent seeps into the alluvial water, and infects the drinking water of the likes of Christchurch and other towns that lie in the path of the underground waterways. Still, that’s the price we pay for J.K.’s brighter corporatised future.
Barely on topic … but some images from the US worth looking at regarding intensive farming, which I came across tonight.
“To try and make the lives of people better”
Helen Clark interviewed by Chris Laidlaw, August 2013
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday
Some of Helen Clark’s statements in this interview are remarkable, considering her actual behaviour while in office. She speaks forthrightly about the Andrea Vance affair, and seems to approve of that particular journalist’s right to act as an investigative journalist: “she had a right to pursue a story and get to the truth as she saw it.” Which will seem odd for those who remember her choleric outbursts against the journalists who tried to penetrate behind her smokescreen of denials and personal attacks as they were attempting to cover her government’s persecution of Ahmed Zaoui. At more than one press conference she angrily shut down Selwyn Manning, the editor of Scoop, refusing to answer any questions from him about the matter.
Helen Clark’s newly respectful opinion of journalism will be welcome news to John Campbell, who suffered a wrathful public denunciation from Ms Clark after he tried to get her to speak honestly about her government’s ill advised encouragement of GM experiments in this country.
Ms Clark also states, near the end of the interview, that she used her power and influence “to try and make the lives of people better.” Again, this sits oddly with the facts of her time in power. As well as presiding over the cruel detention of Ahmed Zaoui—it was a team effort, with thugs like David Benson-Pope allying with New Zealand First MPs like Peter Brown and Winston Peters in parliament to yell out crude insults in parliament at the political refugee—she was foolish enough to take the advice of her less-than-brilliant “strategists” after Don Brash’s infamous Orewa speech and imitate National Party racism instead of confronting and rejecting it. And any of the 15,000 Māori land rights protestors she sneeringly dismissed as “haters and wreckers” would be interested to hear that Helen Clark thinks she used her power and influence “to try and make the lives of people better.”.
This transcript starts at 21:18 and goes to the end (25:34)…..
CHRIS LAIDLAW: We’ve been talking here,…hrrrumph…. some might say obsessively, about the phenomenon of the surveillance society. Does any of what has been happening here lately over the accessing of private information surprise you?
HELEN CLARK: I was certainly surprised that, er, Parliamentary Services handed over those records! [guffaw]
CHRIS LAIDLAW: A heh, heh!
HELEN CLARK: Ha ha ha! But, errrr…
CHRIS LAIDLAW: What would you have SAID to them?
HELEN CLARK: Errrmmmm…
LAIDLAW: Had that been YOU?
HELEN CLARK: I think–heh heh—someone would have had to have been holding the phone out rather a long way from their [sic] ear! ….[guffaw]…. I mean, I don’t think this is acceptable, at ALL. ….[pause]…. I mean, err, y’know, journalists have a duty! And that duty is to get out and seek the truth! That journalist broke what in journalistic terms was a pretty good story! Now, it happened to be pretty annoying to the government! Y’know, been there, experienced THAT! ….[guffaw]….. But, ahh, you know she had a right to pursue a story and get to the truth as she saw it.
LAIDLAW: Were you aware of that Defence Force manual that stated that investigative journalists could be lumped in with a lot of other undesirable people?
HELEN CLARK: [guffaws] I’m certain I never SAW such a thing! Huh! I would have found it rather extraordinary.
LAIDLAW: Did you ever sign a warrant for covert surveillance of a New Zealand citizen?
HELEN CLARK: [cagily] Wellllll, as reported on every yeeeear, in the annual report, uh …. [uncomfortable caesura]…. Yes I did sign warrants!
LAIDLAW: Mmmm, hmmm…
HELEN CLARK: Yep! And they were all, ahh, referred to and counted up in the Annual Report to Parliament every year.
LAIDLAW: And you’re convinced that they were absolutely justifiable?
…….[Significant pause]….
HELEN CLARK: [carefully] I aaaaam. Because one of the systems that was put in place and was at the time when the SIS legislation was amended in the late nineties when I was Leader of the Opposition, was this Inspector of Security Warrants, errrr, Sir John Jeffries, through my time as prime minister. I had a HUUUUUUGE respect for John Jeffries and whenever the SIS wanted a warrant, they didn’t come first to me—[guffaw]—I was a BUSY PERSON! They went first to Sir John Jeffries, and Sir John Jeffries went into the offices, into the files, could access EVERYTHING he wanted to see, and then he came with the Director of Security Intelligence to see me, and he would set out the issues as he saw them. And together we would make a decision. So there was a LOT OF CARE taken with that.
LAIDLAW: Isn’t the most serious effect of some of this the erosion of public confidence in the organs of the state? We’ve been seeing a lot of pressure on various departments lately, MFAT and others, but revelations of this kind really do make people wonder about whether the state is on their side.
HELEN CLARK: They doooo! And it’s partly an issue of not knowing what you don’t know. But I think that, given that in this whole fracas, there appears, if we take the Kitteridge Report as the guide here, that there WAS a gap in the law. Now something has to be done about the gap in the law, BUT…. at the same time I think it’s an opportunity to have a, y’know, broooooader dialogue about the kind of protections New Zealand citizens are entitled to and one would hope that that would come through this sort of process.
….[Pause]…..
LAIDLAW: A lot of people talk about the nature of power, and you’ve had it, and you have it, and you experienced it. Do you understand it? Do you have a better understanding now of what it represents?
HELEN CLARK: I think that power as a concept is neutral. You can use power for good ends or you can use it for bad ends. I like to think that I used the power and influence I had in my life in New Zealand and now at UNDP to try and, y’ow, make the lives of people, errr, BETTER. That was my mission. So I think it can be used for GOOD but it can can also be used for ILL.
LAIDLAW: Nice to talk to you! And I hope you enjoy your time here. That was former prime minister Helen Clark, who is these days leading the UN Development Program, and her book At the UN is published by Dunmore Publishing.
chrs 4 that morrissy..
..i tried listening to this interview..
..but the exercise in self-justification/glossing-over from/by clark..
..was giving me serious gastric-reflux..
(..i had to turn back to music..my salve at times like that..)
..did she dare to say anything about poverty..?
phillip ure..
Hello Morrissey, good work.
This time Morrissey actually seems to have gotten the words about right. But as usual, he’s adding extraneous punctuation and emphasis on words, as well as his usual bullshit “Significant pause” crap so as to distort what actually happened.
Yep, better than average effort, only a few errors and really only spoilt by the distortions of meaning that his spin puts on the words. Kinda hypocritical to demand of others standards he doesn’t apply to himself, but that’s our Moz. 6/10.
Listen to the tape, then come back and tell us where I distorted anything.
Anything.
And where were the “couple of errors”?
Already did listen to the tape, Moz, hence my comment that you got it mostly correct. Well done. If you want to find the errors, which are mostly small ommisions, then go back over it yourself.
The distortion is adding emphasis were no emphasis can be heard. That’s not reporting, that’s editorialising. It’s bogus if you are calling it a transcript. As I said, you demand standards of others you don’t apply to yourself.
….mostly correct. Well done.
No, it was completely correct.
If you want to find the errors, which are mostly small ommisions [sic] then go back over it yourself.
So you couldn’t find one small “ommision” then. But you’re happy to carry on with the baseless claim.
The distortion is adding emphasis were no emphasis can be heard.
For example?
That’s not reporting, that’s editorialising.
No, it’s reporting. Pointing out that Helen Clark was cagey and diffident and awkward when asked whether or not she set her spies onto New Zealand citizens is not distortion, as you say, but reporting. It’s quite clear that you think reporters should simply be megaphones for politicians. You don’t like their words being emphasized and underlined: that’s your problem. You are plainly wrong when you try to insinuate there’s something misleading about pointing out the obvious discomfort of a politician.
It’s bogus if you are calling it a transcript.
So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? Please put up your bald transcript of those four minutes—and we’ll see which one is more true to the nature of that conversation.
As I said, you demand standards of others you don’t apply to yourself.
More empty personal insults. Can I remind you: this is not an LEC meeting, and I don’t get intimidated or confused by your strategy of abuse.
Again with the slander, moz? You’re a sad wee man.
So you don’t behave at LEC meetings in the same way you behave on this forum? Okay, we’ll take your word for it.
As they say in parliament, I withdraw and apologize.
“So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? “
That’s pretty much the definition of a transcript.
Thats what we get from the Court. The time the initials of the speaker and the words.
Thats what we get from the Court. The time the initials of the speaker and the words.
That’s why we depend on honest reporters to bring out the nuances and inflexions that the bare transcripts leave out.
hmmmm. I use the transcript and the audio. You are right that how someone says something matters, but that ius why I read and audio.
when the courts actually let you see the transcripts that is 🙁
I get that but they release ones to parties, that is the context I get them in.
Tracey, It has been my experience that when it comes to the courts, ‘parties’ seems not to include the victim.
So crumbled the cookie of justice into the teacup of disillusion.
Yes you are right if by victim you mean in criminal cases? That’s wrong of course and transcripts ought to be readily available. The police prosecution service ought to be cooperative in the supply though? Or are they so budget conscious they wont pay for the extra copy?
I deal with civil matters btw.
“So you want just the words, without any colour, without any bringing out of nuances that are often contained in a hesitation or a slightly irritated tone of voice? “
That’s pretty much the definition of a transcript.
Yes, you’re correct there, felix. That’s why my enhanced transripts, and even my more imperfect slapdash efforts scribbled on a piece of paper, are better than a bald transcription of the words. It would be highly misleading, for instance, to not mention that Helen Clark was uncomfortable and hesitant when pressed on the subject of whether she set her spies onto New Zealand citizens.
‘Enhanced’ transcript.
So your efforts relate to real transcripts in the way enhanced interrogation techniques relate to lawful questioning? Good to know.
False analogy. I’m not surprised.
By the way, I’m guessing that you support “enhanced interrogation”. Am we correct in surmising that?
That’s twice today you’ve used the royal pronoun, Moz. You’re not related to that German woman on our money, are you?
Really Morrissey I don’t know why you bother trying to educate TRP he appears to be a rather nasty little bigot and bully boy who is unable to widen his thought processes beyond his own little clique’s list of what is good and what is bad.
I’m also not sure why he’s desperate to suggest Liz Windsor is German .. unless it’s some poor imitation of a Fawlty Towers joke that I’m missing ?
TE REO OUTAKE: That’s twice today you’ve used the royal pronoun, Moz.
MORRISSEY: It’s a common propaganda trick—but you were alert to it. Well spotted, Te Reo!
TE REO PUTAKE: You’re not related to that German woman on our money, are you?
….[Uncomfortable pause]….
MORRISSEY: [carefully] Errrrr, as far as I know, no-o-o-o-o. If I wasn’t fearful that it was a Mormon site, I might be tempted to check it on the ancestry.com site.
Really Morrissey I don’t know why you bother trying to educate TRP he appears to be a rather nasty little bigot and bully boy who is unable to widen his thought processes beyond his own little clique’s list of what is good and what is bad.
Thanks, sockpuppet, I do appreciate your solicitude. Te Reo is a buddy of mine. He dishes it out to this writer, i.e. moi, fearsomely at times, but he is also kind and supportive at other times. A diamond geezer, he is—as they say in the East End.
I’m also not sure why he’s desperate to suggest Liz Windsor is German .. unless it’s some poor imitation of a Fawlty Towers joke that I’m missing ?
I think he meant this German woman….
http://www.probertencyclopaedia.com/j/Dominatrix.jpg
Thanks for the clarification Morrissey I didn’t realise you were indulging in a grumpy old man double act, although I’m not sure if my reading of TRPs comments in the tone of Ginger Rodgers will make them any less ludicrous.
‘grumpy old man double act’
The Statler and Waldorf of teh blogs? No, Moz and I are actually the same person. We’ve been having this bipolar, duopolist dialogue since June 1984, only days after Al Gore invented the web. Moz corrected Al on his proposed name for the internet (we felt that it obviously should be the elegant ‘bittube’, rather than the cheap, brutalist Americanism of ‘the web’). I publicly disagreed with myself (mozself?) on an embryonic board and an institution was born. We’re sorry if this has led to any confusion, or indeed, contusions.
ps, the Windsors are German. They changed their name from the original Wettin a century ago for PR purposes.
http://www.private-eye.co.uk/covers.php?showme=90
…the Windsors are German. They changed their name from the original Wettin a century ago for PR purposes.
http://www.private-eye.co.uk/covers.php?showme=90
Here’s another great British/German royalty-themed cover from 1985…
http://www.private-eye.co.uk/covers.php?showme=615
To say that Liz Windsor is German is a bit of a stretch. She’s probably no more German than you or I.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancestry_of_Elizabeth_II
Fascinating that you are one and the same person – it really does make me all the more in awe of Morrissey being able to write so beautifully under his own name as distinct from his efforts under the TRP pseudonym.
Fascinating that you are one and the same person – it really does make me all the more in awe of Morrissey being able to write so beautifully under his own name as distinct from his efforts under the TRP pseudonym.
Thanks for that my friend. I turn into Te Reo Putake whenever I want to write something really horrible.
😀 😀 😀 🙄
Next I might try being Garth Gaga George….
Have you consigned Professor Longhair to the scrapheap? 😉
Our good friend “fender” asks: Have you consigned Professor Longhair to the scrapheap?
The Professor wrote to me the other day. He is on “sabbatical”* in Eastern Europe somewhere. He extends to all Standardisti the very best wishes for the New Year.
* Colloquially known as “on the run”.
I don’t think they’ll catch up with him
Louis Mount Batten was born Prince of Battenburg, changed during world war one cos of german dislike in England. Mount Btten ws Prince Philip’s uncle
Saying she is no more German than you or I is a little spurious given she is only Queen by virtue of those who came before, some of whom in this case were German. Her Great Grandfather Albert was German, so that’s an 8th German right there.
That’s great great grandfather ….. and a good chap as far as that family goes by all accounts.
This time Morrissey actually seems to have gotten the words about right.
I got it exactly right, my friend. Exactly. I was careful to even include Ms Clark’s little verbal tics, like the repeated use of y’ow and her frequent guffawing, which is a control mechanism par excellence.
But as usual, he’s adding extraneous punctuation and emphasis on words,
“Extraneous”? I challenge you to put up ONE example of where my punctuation is extraneous or misleading, and where I have emphasized a word inappropriately.
….as well as his usual bullshit “Significant pause” crap so as to distort what actually happened.
There were several significant, awkward, uncomfortable pauses when Laidlaw pressed her on whether she had set the dogs onto New Zealand citizens. They were significant, all right, and you know it.
My “stage directions” are intended, as always, to emphasize and clarify, and to evoke the flavour and nature of the conversation. They are not intended to distort, as you allege.
Because I have some time, and because you’re so much in denial, I figured I’d bother to answer these questions.
“We’ve been talking here,…hrrrumph…. some might say obsessively,”
This “hrrumph” is unwarranted, as it was a very brief mumbled pause before he continued on. Recording this as “hrrumph” has negative connotations that are not warranted.
“I mean, err, y’know, journalists have a duty! And that duty is to get out and seek the truth! That journalist broke what in journalistic terms was a pretty good story! Now, it happened to be pretty annoying to the government!”
None of these exclamation marks are warranted.
“[cagily] Wellllll, as reported on every yeeeear, in the annual report, uh …. [uncomfortable caesura]…. Yes I did sign warrants!”
It wasn’t cagey, you’ve added unnecessary emphasis on “Well” and “year” that implies she was reluctantly answering the question when there is no reluctance in her voice at all. I don’t think “caesura” is the correct term here and there was certianly nothing uncomfortable about it. Once again, an unwarranted exclamation mark.
“Yep!”
Another unwarranted exclamation mark.
…….[Significant pause]….
This pause at 22:48 is shorter than one marked merely “[pause]” at 24:40-24:42. Furthermore there is nothing significant, nor indeed apparently deliberate in the very brief pause here at all. It’s a natural part of speech after someone has asked a question in a new direction on the topic at hand.
“I aaaaam.”
She said “am”.
“I had a HUUUUUUGE respect”
She said “huge”.
“I was a BUSY PERSON!”
Exclamation mark appropriate, but capitalisation is not. This makes it appear like she’s being defensive when there is nothing defensive about this conversation at all.
“and he would set out the issues as he saw them.”
No idea why you chose to embolden ‘as he saw them’ in your first transcript.
“So there was a LOT OF CARE taken with that.”
Inappropriate emphasis on “lot of care” not present in the audio.
“They doooo!”
She said “do”. Again, inappropriate exclamation mark.
“broooooader dialogue”
She said “broader”. Again not sure why you choose to embolden this.
The entire section between your “significant pause” and “pause” markers actually under-transcribes Helen’s stammering and filler sounds, and for a strict transcripts as you are claiming this is, you actually miss a few words out entirely around these parts.
Awesome analysis, Lanthanide! I do have some disagreements, but I haven’t got the time to answer now. I’ll make a feature of it on tomorrow’s Open Mike (for January 7th).
Sorry, but I have to go now.
But it’s ~enhanced~, Lanth. Like all propaganda.
This is an exactly accurate transcript, and you know it, QoT.
I have to say …. Helen probably would have been a lot better off withOUT her various ‘advisers’ – the ‘long termers’ probably responsible for the biggest fuckups she ever made.
How much NZ property does Clark own while a non-NZ resident again?
You mean that Peter Davis and her *both* own – right? I hadn’t noticed Peter leaving his job at Auckland Uni. They just rotate holidays and visits. Perhaps you should look at the requirements of being a “resident”.
While you’re at it look at a mirror to see what fatuous dickhead looks like.
That was a reply to flip’s “If you do not live here I cannot think of a single reason to own land.”
PS: blow me
Why would I be interested in contact with a genital wart?
An article worth reading from Steven Ward professor of sociology at WCU http://chronicle.com/blogs/conversation/2013/10/02/a-machiavellian-guide-to-destroying-public-universities-in-12-easy-steps/
I am trying to work out which step Joyce and his cohort have reached. It certainly sounds familiar.
I don’t think those steps have been going on sequentially. Most have been applied in one way or another since the 1980s. At various times the screws are tightened on one or other “step”.
meh!
(7) Scream about the high cost of higher education and increases in tuition. Blame the increases on greedy, overpaid professors rather than on the withdrawal of state support, the techno-gadget mania promoted by edu-businesses, or the administrative bloat caused by increased auditing practices and assessment.
http://twistedsifter.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/highest-paid-us-public-employees-by-state.jpg
Xox
Dairy cows on the Canterbury Plains + Irrigation = pollution of water
I see there was recently another e coli outbreak in township Darfield water supply. Fonterra has recently built a mega processing plant in the area.
and the hobbits slumber on.
Compare and contrast:
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jan/03/nick-griffin-declared-bankrupt-bnp-leader
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/jan/05/tony-blair-businesses-amass-13m-cash-surge-profits
Compare and contrast…..
Nick Griffin: responsible for ZERO deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Tony Blair: responsible for hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq.
And so goddamn WEAK at the same time….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVreL6SFQ_k
just heard a brilliant interview on nat-rad..
..on the advances in knowledge on how our brains actually work..(using mri etc..)
..and what stood out was the evidence of the actual physical benefits to the brain/psyche from either regular religious-practices..prayer/chanting..
..or from the secular practice of meditation..
..we are told these practices physically strengthen areas of our brains…that make us feel/do good..
..and help protect us from things that make us feel bad..anxieties..etc..
..they increase empathy..and strengthen our synapses..which..makes pratitioners think much faster..than those who don’t..(and going on the evidence presented..much much faster..)
fascinating stuff..that should appeal to all..
..and secularists have the meditation-tool to turn to..
..(i’m gonna link to/write it up later..when it comes online..
..the radio nz website will also have it for you..
..and seriously..!..a recommended-listen..
..(i love it when science proves ‘things’..eh..?..it so settles arguments..sometimes..)
..phillip ure..
Sorry I must have missed something, what did it prove?
go listen to the interview..ron..
phillip ure..
Because interviews are sooooooo peer-reviewed science papers…
Feel free to link to the evidence. In fact, I implore you to, for once, link to some evidence that is outside your inane ramblings…
@ zorr..
..here is the interview..
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/summernoelle/audio/2581774/dr-rick-hanson-rewiring-happiness
what i refer to in the above comment that you sneer at..
..is the response to a question from the interviewer..(in the second half of the interview..(but the preceeding stuff is pretty interesting too..)
..where she asks hanson if his physical-research had shown any difference between the brains of people who followed daily religious-practises..(praying/chanting)..
..and for the secularists..the likes of meditation/yoga..
..and those people who practise none of those..
..the question surprised hanson..which made his answer seem all the more credible..the surprise he expressed at his findings in this area..was genuine..and not part of any prepared script..
..the daily practice seems to be a key factor..
..but the striking benefits cited by hanson..if this mri-based evidence is to be believed..and it is hard to see why it should not..
..is that these multi-faceted benefits are to hand for both the religious/secularists..
..so it is not a religious-barrow that is being pushed..
..it is evidence/proof of helping mental-health/well-being..
..what is to hate on about that..?
..was it something i said..?
phillip ure..
Firstly, if I may apologize. I should have been more diplomatic with my wording and what I said was very… abrupt.
You are the very embodiment, it seems, of trying to tell people either that the way they are living is the least perfect or that they could be doing things more perfectly. If it was just a link of “here is cool science, what do you think” then it would be much more palatable but you present it in a manner that provokes a personal response (intentionally or unintentionally) from the likes of myself where I severely dislike being preached at.
Especially on extremely borderline topics such as nutrition and spirituality.
‘nutrition’..an ‘extreme borderline topic’…?
(heh..!..)
phillip ure..
“Because interviews are sooooooo peer-reviewed science papers…
Feel free to link to the evidence. In fact, I implore you to, for once, link to some evidence that is outside your inane ramblings…”
Zorr, the things that phil claimed (as far as I could understand it) are not really in dispute and have been well tested by science. In this situation peer-reviewed papers are not even necessary. Neuroscientists speaking or writing about it from a place of knowledge and authority would do.
Peer-review is important. It’s also flawed esp with regards to medical research. Saying that it’s the gold standard to the exclusion of other knowlege bases is a way of making science elitist. Then a whole bunch of scientists start complaining about the public being ignorant 😉
All that btw is not an endorsement of the RNZ piece, I haven’t looked at it yet.
here’s the science page link on the interviewee’s website.
http://www.wisebrain.org/science
Trying to find the actual science, following the links via that page, weka, I end up here.
I studied a bit of neurology way back, when I trained in special education etc. Back then it was pretty well known that all kinds of experiences enhanaced brain activity, could get parts working to a greater or less extent following brain damage…. music and dance therapy can be good too.
It doesn’t surprise me that meditation etc, or reading novels has a positive impact on the brain.
The foreword for the book is by Deepak Chopra -ugh
Edited because just realized that author of book and person on radio were 2 different people so shouldn’t go maligning a potentially perfectly decent doctor
I haven’t had a chance to have a proper look yet.
If you were writing a book on popular science and wanted to sell lots of copies, getting a foreward by Chopra would probably do it 😉
Karol, which links did you follow? All the links on this page appear to be PDFs, not outbound links.
http://www.wisebrain.org/science/key-scientific-papers
Or you could just go read a novel.
@karol..yes i saw that one..
..but surely it is not either/or..?
..just do both..
..phillip ure..
There are many ways to get the brain working, and in diverse ways. This is not revolutionary.
it is actually ‘revolutionary’..karol..
..did you even listen to the interview..?
..or are you making this pronouncement from a position of ignorance/unheard..?..
..does the ‘religious’ aspect of it scare you..?
..relax..!
..secular-practices such as t.m/meditation/yoga – will do the same thing for you..
this is what i found ‘revolutionary’..both that and the proof/evidence of (visible) physical-strengthenings in the brain..
..were you not impressed by that..?
..or is yr sneer from a fists-stuffed-in-ears-position..?
..is yr dismissal basically an orifice-pluck..?
..and you haven’t even listened to what you so easily dismissed..?
..really..?
phillip ure..
Mate, I said I have learned a fair bit about neurology in the past, and ways to improve the brain and, related body functionings – ways that alter the physical make up of the brain. So I just don’t find it at all surprising that mediation etc physically strengthens the brain. Not that revolutionary a finding to me.
ok..so you haven’t…heh..!
..you already ‘know it all’..eh..?..and with this ‘knowledge’ you have..
..and if you already ‘know’ what these new findings are..
do you put it to practical use in yr own life..?
..do you even know what i am talking about..?
..and….is this the only area where there is nothing left for you to know..?
..carry on..!
phillip ure..
Its official:
wail boil is “COLLECTING” the s.l.a.
what a guy!
what is ‘the sla’..?
phillip ure,,
What is the sla?
Stupid Liars Award?
Slack Leaders Accreditation?
ShonKeys Lie Affiliation?
etc. etc.?
Service Level Agreement.
Special Libraries Association.
State Liquor Authority
Srsly though, what is “the s.l.a.”?
What happened to the post on Garth George? Down the memory hole?
It looks like they’ve tipped that one on the rubbish heap—an appropriate destination for anything written by that silly old codger. Meanwhile, there are some choice comments about him on the following thread….
http://thestandard.org.nz/george-on-tax/#comment-360924
Sitting in draft. I suspect that you saw a unforced mistake of an early release 🙂
I put it up but then saw that Karol had only just put her post up and I thought I should delay it so put it back in draft. will put it up later today or tomorrow. It is about a Garth George column I really enjoyed reading …
🙂 and I snuck JK’s guest post in…
Ah, sorry, didn’t see there was a clash, micky.
No problems yours was up before I had even finished mine and I should have checked …
“It is about a Garth George column I really enjoyed reading …”
??!!???
You “really enjoyed reading” something by GARTH GEORGE?
Are you sure he wrote it? Or did he just reproduce a public relations hand-out verbatim, as he does with his military “reporting”?
http://www.topshelfproductions.co.nz/Blog/this-week-on-media-7-4/
Yep have a read Morrisssey.
http://thestandard.org.nz/garth-georges-best-column-ever/
“Seduced into evil
In fact, the classic electric shock experiment by social psychologist Stanley Milgram, PhD, showed that when given an order by someone in authority, people would deliver what they believed to be extreme levels of electrical shock to other study participants who answered questions incorrectly.
Zimbardo said the experiment provides several lessons about how situations can foster evil:
Provide people with an ideology to justify beliefs for actions.
Make people take a small first step toward a harmful act with a minor, trivial action and then gradually increase those small actions.
Make those in charge seem like a “just authority.”
Transform a once compassionate leader into a dictatorial figure.
Provide people with vague and ever-changing rules.
Relabel the situation’s actors and their actions to legitimize the ideology.
Provide people with social models of compliance.
Allow dissent, but only if people continue to comply with orders.
Make exiting the situation difficult.”
http://www.apa.org/monitor/oct04/goodbad.aspx
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/comment/editorials/9577985/Minnows-need-to-beware-the-elephants
Or maybe Obama likes to play golf and gets on well at a personal level with Key and since both were in Hawaii why not have a game? I think the dompost is clutching at straws.
Or maybe Obama likes to play golf and gets on well at a personal level with Key….
http://adamsmith.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/adam2.jpg
PR
“According to the Huffington Post, “the golf outing put Key in rarified company. Obama is an avid golfer, but prefers to limit his playing partners to a close circle of friends and advisers[“]… The two world leaders (and I use that term in its widest sense) apparently discussed issues of mutual interest and regional security. Whether Kim Dotcom or the TPPA were mentioned, we’ll never know.” – See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/01/06/lazy-hazy-and-crazy/#sthash.pMQjc1I8.dpuf
I’m not saying that either THP or TDB are completely reliable sources, but I’ll take them over your; “maybe Obama likes to play golf and gets on well at a personal level with Key”.
Fair enough
Dunnokeyo’s already forgotten…
Next time you hear someone praise Abe Lincoln, bring out this article….
“Ordered that of the Indians and Half-breeds sentenced to be hanged by the military commission, composed of Colonel Crooks, Lt. Colonel Marshall, Captain Grant, Captain Bailey, and Lieutenant Olin, and lately sitting in Minnesota, you cause to be executed on Friday the nineteenth day of December, instant, the following names, to wit [39 names listed by case number of record: cases 2, 4, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 19, 22, 24, 35, 67, 68, 69, 70, 96, 115, 121, 138, 155, 170, 175, 178, 210, 225, 254, 264, 279, 318, 327, 333, 342, 359, 373, 377, 382, 383].
The other condemned prisoners you will hold subject to further orders, taking care that they neither escape, nor are subjected to any unlawful violence.
Abraham Lincoln,
President of the United States”
On December 6 (1862) President Lincoln notified Sibley that he should “cause to be executed” thirty-nine of the 303 convicted Santees, Execution date was the 26th of December. At the last minute, one Indian was given a reprieve. About ten o’clock the thirty-eight condemned men were marched from the prison to the scaffold. They sang the Sioux death song until soldiers pulled white caps over their heads and placed nooses around their necks. At a signal from an army officer, the control rope was cut and thirty-eight Santee Sioux dangled lifeless in the air.
A spectator boasted that this was “America’s greatest public execution.”
Read more…..
http://www.unitednativeamerica.com/hanging.html
With god on their side.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_Destiny
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_of_Tears
… and his views on intermarriage.
… and his signing of the execution order for the largest mass execution in the US with the Dakota 38.
Can’t remember who posted up Wall of Films but Dakota 38 was one of them.
Watched it, and it led to an interesting discussion about whether it is still reasonable to celebrate the good that someone unintentionally did – and attribute it to their actions.
And vice versa – for example, the emancipation law led to the creation of corporations and their use of the rights entailed within to create legal entities with the same rights as humans. The Corporation is another film that outlines that process.
A belated thank you to whoever posted that link originally…
Kiaora Saarbo
Prejudice much?
Iwi Maori farming practice has evolved to align more closely with our cultural and spiritual values represented in the principle of ‘kaitiakitanga.’ Our people have never wholly accepted the commodification of the natural world and the subsequent rape of its resources to fuel profit and greed. Our business leaders are unlearning traditional business thinking and taking on board quadruple, or more, bottom-lines. If you had bothered to investigate further with a simple Google search you would have found this:
“The Eyrewell farming development is 40km northwest of Christchurch and sits within the takiwā (tribal area) of Ngāi Tahu hapu (sub-tribe), Ngāi Tūāhuriri. Ngāi Tahu Farming began dairy farming on the site in 2012.
The Mana Whenua Working Party is made up of members of Ngāi Tahu hapu who hold mana whenua (authority) over the Hurunui and Waimakariri River catchments associated with Ngāi Tahu Farming’s Eyrewell and Balmoral developments.
Cultural and environmental aspirations have been the top priorities for mana whenua, says Ngāi Tūāhuriri Chair and member of the Mana Whenua Working Party, Clare Williams.
“Our main concern is nutrient levels in waterways. We don’t want our farms to adversely affect our waterways because that’s where we get our kai from,” says Clare.
The environmental monitoring of Ngāi Tahu Eyrewell Dairy Farms will involve direct measurements of nitrate leaching losses. Lysimeters (large tubes containing undisturbed columns of soil) will be used to measure the nitrate leaching loss in drainage water. The lysimeters will be installed in an on-farm facility on farm one. This facility will be constructed within a monitor paddock on the dairy farm. The facility will also serve as an on-farm laboratory suitable for visitors to inspect.
Ngāi Tahu Property Chief Executive Tony Sewell says the research is forward-thinking and will allow us to better manage our farming businesses.
“We are pleased to be teaming up with the expertise of Lincoln University. The research will give us valuable and accurate insight into the impact we are having on the environment. Understanding our impact will help us to make educated farming decisions to minimize the movement of harmful contaminants, it will ensure we are at the forefront of dairying and that we are doing our best to uphold Ngāi Tahu values,” says Tony.
The biodiversity programme will protect and expand vegetation remnants within the farms and enhance the future trajectory of the ecological restoration. More than 150 hectares is already set-aside for native plants and animals. This project will provide a template for establishment, monitoring and enhancement of native habitats, focussing on the ecological and environmental benefits of restoration planting. The goal is to add value to the Ngāi Tahu Farming development at Eyrewell, which will provide a template for dairy farms in the future.
In my neck of the woods we have recently retired over 500 ha of farm land to be replanted in both natives and exotic trees. It took 170 plus years to have the lands returned to us under the treaty settlement process. These lands will never be sold off and therefore our farming practices must reflect sustainable methods way into the future.
Thanks for the explanation, Adele. I think you owe Saarbo an apology. There’s no obvious prejudice in his comment that I can see and even if the owners minimise the damage done, damage will still be done. Big dairying is bad, no matter who does it.
Te Reo Putake
I owe Saarbo diddly squat. What’s with the “ I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of Philipino workers” line? Tell me what Māori farm currently does this? Actually for that matter what farm in NZ employs Philippine workers?
Dairying is a fact of life in this country and while tangata whenua would prefer not to be involved in such industries we are committed to making these industries work for us in a way that is sustainable in the long run and aligns with our values.
“What’s with the “ I bet it ends up employing lots and lots of Philipino workers” line?”
Um, filipino workers make up a significant number of migrant labour being used and abused on our farms, Adele. Google it.
You owe Saarbo an apology.
“Dairying is a fact of life in this country and while tangata whenua would prefer not to be involved in such industries we are committed to making these industries work for us in a way that is sustainable in the long run and aligns with our values.”
As I said below, I don’t believe the industrial/export dairy model can ever be sustainable, but it’s good to see changes being attempted. However, I do also wonder at how often Maori are expected to not use their resources for their own people in the ways that Pakeha do, and are supposed to somehow magic up a new, perfect model of doing pretty much everything in ways that satisfy Pakeha notions of what’s ok. Despite Pakeha not even coming close to their own ideals.
Adele, I hope that Ngai Tahu can make this a beacon of hope on the Plains. Myself, knowing what I do of the soils, geography and climate have little faith that there can be any success within the current economic framework of dairying: I would welcome being proved wrong.
Good news on regaining and retiring land: I see returning land to iwi / hapu as one of the most important strategies we can adopt for both social equity and to save/Aotearoa from foreign ownership,
Listening to those Ngai Tahu spokesmen talking, both recently and in the past, I dread what they have planned or will consent to having done on their land. They sound like, and often are, members of the National Party, and they seem to have about as much respect and care for their whenua as, say, Conor English.
As a member of the iwi I am not a supporter of this development. However there are a lot of checks and many eyes watching so i think the iwi and hapū representatives will do their best to minimise pollution from the dairy farm. But when you take water from the awa for dairy farming that degrades it. Personally I would have preferred Organic small scale sustainable operations – and I actually told them that.
As for you moz yes I’m sure they are members of any and all political parties but your assertion regarding care of the ‘whenua’ is stupid – you ‘seem’ wrong and rather than ‘seem’ why not check out all of the various ways the tikanga is maintained. You seem to display as much care and respect for tangata whenua as any of the gnats.
I’m sure they are members of any and all political parties….
The leadership? They’re solidly National Party. Which raises the question: why does the rest of the iwi tolerate such a situation?
The Ngai Tahu corporation hasn’t shown much care or respect for the Asian crews on the fishing boats they run. Let’s hope they treat their own people with a bit more aroha.
you are out of our depth moz and dog-paddle ain’t going to cut it – the leadership? who exactly are you talking about – rūnanga representatives? kaiwhakahaere? commercial arm of the iwi? Stick to listening to leighton mate or talking about the RWC – you sadly display no nous for this stuff – read up a little and become educated my friend before you embarrass yourself further 🙂
…you are out of our depth moz
No I’m not out of my depth. I can read and follow what is happening in Ngai Tahu as much as anyone else can, and it’s clear that a small clique of well connected businessmen wield the power there just as a small National Party clique (Georgina Te Heuheu’s family) dominates Ngāti Tūwharetoa, and a small political elite dominates Tainui.
There are many reasons I, and many others, have looked with mounting disquiet at what Ngai Tahu has been doing….
1.) Its involvement in the brutal mistreatment of overseas fishing crews…..
http://www.dol.govt.nz/News/Media/2012/2012-foreign-charter-vessels.pdf
2.) I’m concerned by the people who are routinely allowed to speak for Ngai Tahu—people like Mark Solomon, who has some very disturbing views indeed. For example, in 2010 he expressed his approval of the notorious private prison company Serco, telling Guyon Espiner that he was “blown away in the way that they deal with their prisoners…. We’re completely impressed.”
http://tvnz.co.nz/q-and-a-news/q-mark-solomon-interview-3580452
3.) Worse was to come, however. A couple of years ago, Solomon made a point of betraying other Māori and publicly backing John Key’s flogging off of our public assets. As with his backing of private prisons, this anti-Māori posturing earned Solomon some fulsome praise from the rabid right….
http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/tag/mark-solomon/
4.) In 2012, Shane Taurima keelhauled Solomon for his craven behaviour in a memorable televised interrogation….
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1210/S00338/qa-shane-taurima-interviews-mark-solomon.htm
5.) Solomon has also been less than forthright in his denials that he might commit Ngai Tahu to get involved in one of John Banks’s harebrained “charter school” projects.
Now if you can demonstrate I have been unfair to Mark Solomon—the public face of Ngai Tahu—then I will accept your charge that I have “no nous for this stuff”, and will return to my normal dismal task of logging the idiocy of Hatin’ Leighton and his colleagues.
By the way, I’ll bet that at some time in the last few years, Hatin’ Leighton has stepped away from his normal programme of reading out articles from the Spectator and foaming about Barack Obama’s communist plotting to take over the world to announce how much he is impressed by Mark Solomon.
thanks for the info, morrissey
Yes some like Mark and others don’t and yes he is kaiwhakahaere and that role is often the public face of the iwi. I find myself disagreeing with many of his views. I don’t like the way the fishing has developed – too much ‘market’, let alone the poor condition that some crew experience. I don’t like serco or charter schools or selling our assets. So for each example you have dug out I am generally opposed to Mark’s view. Keep trawling the news moz I am sure your knowledge will continue to increase exponentially…
My attempt at humour at 1.22 was obviously not funny for you – next time I’ll put 2 smiley faces…
I’m sorry, marty, I did get your little joke and I did appreciate it at the time. You know, deadpan non-acknowledgement is my modus operandi; one of the reasons I can hardly bear listening to Jim Mora’s program sometimes is the way that he feels obliged to acknowledge every single quip with a dutiful “That’s very funny!”—rendered all the worse by his patent insincerity. So I did get your little dig.
I appreciate your comments, and I hope it doesn’t look like I’m absolutely opposed to Sir Mark; I recognise that he is an intelligent and accomplished man, and I respect him in spite of some misgivings. It’s just that I get concerned sometimes that there is a lack of democracy and that the iwi corporations are acting just like the “private tyrannies” that Noam Chomsky describes.
I don’t know the Chomsky reference, but it’s the ‘just like’ bit in your comment that I have a problem with. There may be issues with how Ngai Tahu does business, but saying they are the same as Pakeha business is inaccurate and stops us really understanding. I want to see the differences, understand the diversity, because that will help us out of the mess.
This is the problem with the original comment. Someone reports that RNZ reported x about Ngai Tahu. When we see Adele’s comment we see there is in fact a lot more to it. That more to it is important. Seems to be my theme currently, we have to get our targets right.
I don’t know the Chomsky reference, but it’s the ‘just like’ bit in your comment that I have a problem with. There may be issues with how Ngai Tahu does business, but saying they are the same as Pakeha business is inaccurate and stops us really understanding.
Fair comment, weka.
By the way, here’s Chomsky talking about private tyrannies, AKA corporations…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmrfWF3S4Tk
If you’ve got a couple of hours to spare…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTuawY8Qnz8
All good – I broke my own, self imposed, rule on that one and deserved a good put down. For me ts isn’t really a safe space to discuss this stuff and i usually leave alone unless the errors are really glaring or horrible. The fact is there is no context and to create the context and then discuss/argue the merits each way takes massive time and energy – which frankly i don’t have and don’t have the inclination to acquire.
Morrisey,
By public face, I take it you mean to Pakeha NZ. Why exactly should Kai Tahu care about that?
How about you give us your analysis of how Solomon fits into the overall power structures within Ngai Tahu?
Most of what you just wrote expresses Pakeha political views. Are you suggesting that Maori, specifically Ngai Tahu, should adhere to those?
Solomon is one person (and we still don’t know who he votes for). Who are all these other leaders who are National Party members/voters?
Morrisey, By public face, I take it you mean to Pakeha NZ.
I’m sure most people, whether Māori or Pakeha, regard Sir Mark Solomon as the leader of Kai Tahu, just as they did Tipene O’Regan before him.
Why exactly should Kai Tahu care about that?
If Kai Tahu wants to pretend that public discourse and politics do not matter, then you’re correct, they need not worry about the public perception of Sir Mark’s comments. If they want to live in the real world, such things matter very much indeed.
How about you give us your analysis of how Solomon fits into the overall power structures within Ngai Tahu?
He is obviously the kaiwhakahaere, and I know he has an immense amount of influence on all aspects of governance in Kai Tahu.
Most of what you just wrote expresses Pakeha political views.
That’s not correct. I know thoughtful Māori are very concerned about the behaviour of certain powerful but virtually unaccountable leaders—and not just in Kai Tahu.
Are you suggesting that Maori, specifically Ngai Tahu, should adhere to those?
Some Ngai Tahu will, some won’t. But it’s not just a Pakeha thing—-I hope not anyway.
Solomon is one person (and we still don’t know who he votes for).
Let’s see: he has publicly stated his admiration for an infamous private prison company; he has broken ranks with other Māori and announced his support for the Key regime’s selling off of our public assets; he has failed to make a principled statement rejecting the National/ACT imposition of “charter schools” on the devastated children, parents and teachers of Canterbury. That spells National, surely? Or if he does not vote National, there are two other options: (a) he belongs to the Shane Jones wing of the Labour Party or (b) he has been lobotomized and has joined the science-deniers, doctor-bashers and grave-robbers in ACT.
Who are all these other leaders who are National Party members/voters?
The iwi leaderships are full of them.
“Most of what you just wrote expresses Pakeha political views.”
That’s not correct. I know thoughtful Māori are very concerned about the behaviour of certain powerful but virtually unaccountable leaders—and not just in Kai Tahu.
Obviously. But the analysis is different IMO to what you have just done.
I’ll give an example. I know people (Pakeha as it happens) who like the idea of Charter Schools, not because they’re rightwing, but because they can see that it gives alternative education some power and control. These are people who think the mainstream education system is competely dysfunctional in terms of basic philosophies around teaching children usefully. So they put Charter Schools in a completely different context than you do. They don’t see education policy in terms of National vs Labour, because to them both are woefully inadequate.
Likewise, when I hear Maori talking about the value of having contracts to deliver welfare services to their people, it makes sense to me, because they are being so badly failed by mainstream welfare. We can jump up and down and shout “privatisation is bad”, but that just fails as well. (Part of the problem there would be solved if Maori were allowed sovereignty to run things for themselves the way they know works ie don’t see Iwi as ‘private’).
So, when you make a list of all the terrible things that Mark Solomon says and does, it’s not that I think you have no valid points, it’s that until you can make those points in the cultural context that Solomon is operating within, then those points are fairly meaningless. By this I mean in the sense that they don’t take us anywhere particularly useful. They just point yet another stick at Ngai Tahu and say x, y, z wrong there, which just feeds another whole thread of racism into NZ society.
For me ts isn’t really a safe space to discuss this stuff and i usually leave alone unless the errors are really glaring or horrible. The fact is there is no context and to create the context and then discuss/argue the merits each way takes massive time and energy
I know exactly what you mean. I think the same whenever I hear Pakeha commentators discussing such matters. Whether it’s the outright hostile, even racist commentators (Sean Plunket, Michael Laws, Leighton Smith, Larry “Lackwit” Williams) or even the “well meaning” ones, the treatment of iwi politics is nearly always substandard.
I understand your concern.
Mars, pleased you made the stance you did. It is the only one that makes sense to me, though it strains the commercial imperative somewhat.
Years back we did work with Lincoln scientists to ascertain the moister retention and soil retention (from wind erosion) in grass behind shelter belts on the plains. This was in aid of avoiding border dyke irrigation, and abstraction from the Rakaia. Grass growth behind shelter belts came out well in front when the other costs were totaled. Bluntly for every reason not related to the economics of cheap energy and fertilisers dairying on the plains makes no sense.
thanks for the information
Kiaora Adele,
thanks for that information, as always the real story comes out later when it comes to te Ao Maori. I have no trouble believing that Kai Tahu are generally doing better than their tau iwi neighbours when it comes to kaitiakitanga and farming practices. For me, there is no ethical way to do industrial, export dairy, esp in that landscape. It’s always a loss. The things named in your post are very encouraging, and one thing I would hope would come out of this, as well as the local effect, is for other mainstream farmers to be influenced and shown a different way. That Lincoln are involved is also encouraging, because of their power to influence widely. I do agree with marty though, that there were other paths here. The core model being chosen is inherently unsustainable from land regeneration, AGW and Peak Oil/Everything perspectives.
I also take the view that there tends to be prejudice in critiquing Ngai Tahu’s business practices, and that critique instead should be done intelligently and from an informed perspective taking culture into account, which it usually isn’t. Still so hard for pakeha to look at things in any way other than through their own lenses.
yeah..a major industrial dairy-farm will be good for the environment…
..(excuse me while i pick myself up off the floor..i fell there..laughing..)
..and no thoughts on the product to be peddled causing cancer/diabetes etc..?
..(and ultimate-irony)..especially amongst the owners..?
..it’s all ‘good!’..eh..?..)
..why don’t they use their power for ‘good’..f.f.s..!
..follow the lead of james cameron..
..he bought huge dairy-holdings..in the wairarapa..
..and is now converting them back to growing ‘real’-food..
..why t.f. do ngai tahu..(and others..).. want to just do more of what has fucked the country in the first place..?..
..am i the only one face-palming over this..?
..(as we all morris-dance on the heads of pins..over how ‘ethical’ some animal concentration-camps are or aren’t..?..)
..why don’t they drop james cameron an email..?
..i am sure he would be glad to help/advise..
phillip ure..
Sorry about the late reply Adele…thanks for the reply and great to read your response.
My understanding is that a huge number of the South Island dairy farms are being worked by a mix of foreigner’s, mostly Philipino…if the farms were a bit smaller, say 300 to 500 cows it would be a hell of a lot easier to get local workers. Large farms are incredibly tedious to work on, cupping 800 cows twice a day is one of the most soul sapping jobs around (Ive done it, Ive also milked smaller herds, so I know what Im talking about). But if Ngai Tahu are going to employ local and put the effort into protecting the environment then I have absolutely NO problem with what they are doing…if Ngai Tahu are going to pollute the local environment then they probably have more rights to do that than the local pakeha farmers.
@ sarbo..
“.if Ngai Tahu are going to pollute the local environment then they probably have more rights to do that than the local pakeha farmers..”
are you fucken kidding me..?
phillip ure..
Kiaora Saarbo
I do owe you an apology for suggesting that your comments were motivated by prejudice.
Personally, I would rather dial everything back to before 1800 when life was definitely much more hunter-gather-ish and small-scale. However, we are in the 21st century and are products of the modern age. Our reality is so vastly different from those of our tūpuna.
As a child I used to love collecting eggs from free-range chickens. As an adult, I had the opportunity to revisit these child hood memories on visiting a friend’s lifestyle block. I was mortified to find eggs covered in chicken crap. Out came the hand sanitiser followed by the Samsung Galaxy to research the efficacy of hand sanitiser on the likelihood of developing histoplamosis symptomatology post egg harvest.
Māori business practice is evolving and for the better as our business leaders are having to align their business practice to more closely fit with the principles we espouse as Māori. The rigid ‘for profit’ business model is no longer tenable in an age where growth is no longer possible without extreme prejudice to the environment. Ngai Tahu are being watched by many eyes so let’s see how evolved their thinking has become.
Thanks Adele,
“Māori business practice is evolving and for the better as our business leaders are having to align their business practice to more closely fit with the principles we espouse as Māori. The rigid ‘for profit’ business model is no longer tenable in an age where growth is no longer possible without extreme prejudice to the environment…”
That is fantastic if Maori achieve that, it will be challenging. Dairy farming does have scope for improvement, Ive seen worker rights really take some huge backward steps in dairy farming, instead of dairy farmers meeting the market and paying workers the market rate and also improving conditions they have simply lobbied for overseas workers who are desperate…its just something that really annoys me.
Good luck with the dairy project, I know Whakatohia in Opotiki (much smaller than Ngai Tahu) are running dairy farms with locals..and they relatively large dairy units.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
Albert Einstein
@ treetop..+1..
(..and the conclusion..?)
..that way lies madness..
phillip ure..
A wonderful moral lesson from the man who wrote to US President Roosevelt suggesting that the US should commence a nuclear weapons program.
Sea Shepherd Locates Whale Poachers
I wonder what our government will say to this.
nothing is my guess
McCully has already started the weasel words and has issued a statement saying the Ross Dependency is not NZ sovereign waters. We just have search and rescue responsibility for it. So I guess it belongs to us when we want to exploit the shit that’s in it but doesn’t belong to us if that means upsetting the Japanese?
David Shearer seems to have found his footing as foreign affairs spokesman.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/9578995/NZs-reputation-great-asset-in-UN-quest
Yeah, I’m gonna call BS on that one – especially under the present government.
“We’re not the puppet of any master: we are independent and honest.”
Once upon a time, MAYBE perceived as being so ….. now more and more being perceived as a croc of shit BY more and more.
Let’s see how it all pans out (i.e./e.g. in our quest for SC seat).
BTW …. I keep asking myself – how did that little trade mission jaunt to Sth America pan out early last year. Real successful according to Key!
Well tick that one off the list! Next stop India aye?
Increasingly, let me assure them – that perceived honesty and independence is becoming about as relevant as a spin doctor’s advice – especially the likes of Hooten’s, or that Mr I’m-inclined-to-agree-with-you-Mathew’s
@ draco..and the previous one..
phillip ure..
Helpful summary on Sir Mark there Morrissey. It’s an odd regional-grotesque capitalist variant all right.
After all the abuse awhile back I received on the subject I found this report on KB interesting
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2014/01/ny_charter_schools.html
LoTR was also “interesting”.
Maybe one day you’ll figure out how to judge the reliability of a source.
It is hard to sort the chaff from the wheat with bias and mis use of statistics coming from both sides … frankly I am ambivilent on the subject and think the experiement should continue unhinderd until some reliable answers become apparent …. I picked several holes in the KB article and the sarcasm of David was unhelpful. With some cherry-picking while others handle the dross is bound to make for misleading statistics.
Can you show some examples of bias and misuse of statistics coming from the pro-education (ie: teachers’ unions, left wing parties) “side”?
Or even one single example?
Put up or shut up.
personally I’m sick of that fucking “both sides do it”-style argument.
It’s essentially an admission that the speaker cannot demonstrate that they are in a “good”, morally or logically defensible position, so all they can do is muddy the waters enough to pretend equivalence with opposing positions.
Since most here are expressing opinions rather than facts I think my opinions are as valid as anybody elses …. I have yet to be convinced by the arguments of the teachers which sound to me to be largely job protectionism cloaked in high sounding principles
most people here can provide facts to support their opinions when asked. You – not so much
I was discussing this subject at least a year or so ago and frankly have forgotten details, it simply isn’t that important to me in my second childhood and grandchild overseas finishing her education … so without taking sides I drew the article to your attention … but as we all know, when we are honest with ourselves, we tend to only read what we agree with though I have a receptive audience for Nasska’s jokes so visit KB for them … as important as anything else I read there.
Judge Napolitano: How to get fired from Fox in under 5 mins
Lots of questions that, apparently, Fox News didn’t like.
Draco, that was from February 2012, here is what Napolitano had to say about the cancellation
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/14/andrew-napolitano-fans-fox-email_n_1276468.html
and it was his job to be seen to ask those ‘radical’ questions so FOX could say it is balanced when delivering the plethora of ‘stay on message’ propaganda pieces that passes for news on FOX.
and remember he is currently senior judicial analyst for Fox News Channel
http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/personalities/andrew-p-napolitano/bio/#s=m-q