When the New National Party (NNP) undresses itself in private, it is the Real National Party (RNP), the same as it was when it put on its latest NNP clothes.
The Labour Government was criticised widely for "selling" its programmes poorly, especially 3 Waters.
""We're very worried that they seem to think there's something that needs to be changed. And we're not seeing what they're trying to fix at this stage. We don't understand why they need to do this," he said."
This though, from NZEI Te Riu Roa president Mark Potter, is recent and was said in response to this NACTNZF Government's planned changes to the sex education curriculum.
I guess the same people who lambasted Labour for the poor sales job, will be clamouring to decry the present Governments poor communications.
"A lot of it is very conspiracy-based thinking, and lots of claims about what schools are supposed to be doing that they just aren't. Some very untrue statements being made about what children being taught. So we are wondering, who are they pandering to with this kind of move?"
My guess is that this is largely due to the No Debate stance around gender identity ideology. That's why we don't know what is going on, and it's why it's ended up playing out on social media among people that are often conservative, reactionary, or have abandoned the left and a committment to progressive values.
My guess is based on watching exactly this dynamic play out in the UK and the US as well as other countries. GII (gender identity ideology) was rolled out in schools without consultation, and people who tried to ask questions about it were called bigots and shut down. That of course shut up the progressives who had concerns, because ostracisation via accusations of bigotry is a very strong tool among left liberals. The right, centrists and apolitical people care nearly as much and the result is that they are now in charge of the narrative, and in places like NZ that have a RW government and No Debate, they are in charge of policy and legislation now too.
One of the things that is happening is that the right get to redefine not just GII but all of sex and sexuality education, and of course they're going to do that conservatively, because that is their values.
This is an utter failure by the left. We cannot in any way complain about NACTF not being forthcoming with information, when the left has been running No Debate and ostracisation for years.
There is some hope. In the UK, despite a Tory government there is also a strong grassroots gender critical feminist movement (GCF). Those women and men as allies span the whole spectrum of society from MPs and academics to mums and working people, who are socially liberal and who generally support trans people, but want limits on things like women's spaces and transitioning of children.
So there is a tempering there of the push from the right. This is what should be happening in NZ. In the UK women and men lost jobs and careers over this, but stood up anyway. Fewer have done that in NZ, and we don't have the same kind of grassroots activism culture, so it's harder. It's leaving the power with the more conservative and reactionary people.
The best thing the left could do right now is stop ostracising GCFs, and allow an open and wide debate about the issues that matter to people. There is no way to win progressive gains if we don't bring people along, and there is no way to win a war that seeks to remove the rights of women and children. We're in a stalemate. I don't expect the left do this, I expect them to carry on with the own goals until either NACTF fall apart or we are thrown into the next major crisis (climate, economic, oil).
This is the worst possible time for the left to be failing to get to grips with the culture wars, but I think the base cause is the same as the crises, neoliberal capitalism and fear.
But more importantly thank you for making me aware of the No Debate stance. I had sensed this approach but not been able to understand or articulate it.
I felt it some years back when I realised that there had been a major shift in trans rights in particular and that many considered there now to be a default setting that couldn't be questioned.
I wondered where the hell it had come from and if I had been asleep because I didn't recall any wide societal discussion or debate. It was like someone had lifted the arm on record player and we'd skipped a track on an LP.
And like Dorothy said, we weren't in Kansas anymore.
the whole centralise away from the provinces thing …
I think this is an over-simplification; they were trying (!) to increase (!) local/community input & oversight and to create the benefits of a centrally coordinated network with economics of scale. They failed, obviously, partly because they lost control of the narrative quite early on. The rest is history. IMO.
"The Tribunal Panel Judge Nicolle sitting with Non-Legal Members Ms Sandler and Ms Breslin found that both Ms Meade’s regulator and her employer had subjected her to harassment related to her gender-critical belief when SWE threatened her with fitness to practise proceedings and sanctioned her for misconduct, and then WCC suspended her on charges of gross misconduct before issuing a final written warning. By the time the case was heard, both the regulator’s sanction and the employer’s warning had been withdrawn, but Ms Meade had been suspended from work for a year and bullied into silence on the subject of proposed reforms of the Gender Recognition Act, the importance of safe single-sex spaces for women and related subjects.
This is a landmark decision. It is the first time a Regulator and an Employer have together been found to have been liable for discrimination relating to gender critical beliefs".
“Did the actions of the regulator and employer predate the final Forstater judgment?”
No, it didn't.
UK Guardian 21 June 2021
Maya Forstater: her gender-critical views of a researcher who lost her job at a thinktank after tweeting that transgender women could not change their biological sex are a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act, a judge-led panel has ruled.
JUDGMENT OF 8TH JANUARY 2024
WIN IN THE EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNAL – MS R MEADE V WESTMINSTER CITY COUNCIL AND SOCIAL WORK ENGLAND
e.g.
As against her employer, WCC:
3. The on-going refusal to lift the Claimant’s suspension in August and September 2021, in January 2022 and in February 2022 or at any time thereafter and despite requests from the Claimant to do so;
4. An investigation report which was hostile in tone and content, served on the Claimant on 6 December 2021;
As against her Regulator, SWE:
2. Being sanctioned by SWE’s Case Examiners on 8 July 2021;
3. The failure of SWE to set aside the Case Managers’ decision in September 2021 when presented with the evidence in support of the Claimant’s application for a review;
"[The American family] picnic on exquisitely packaged food from a portable icebox by a polluted stream … they may reflect vaguely on the curious unevenness of their blessings."
JK Galbraith
We seem to be headed the same way, given our leaders' desire to worship at the shrine of the economy. Where will your grandchildren fish, swim or paddle a canoe?
"Australian miner sees few barriers to exploiting $8b Central Otago gold find"
"It also told investors that it had a clear pathway to obtaining a mining permit, advising them that a “new pro-mining government” had been place in New Zealand since November."
I predict activists will stop it happening. Higher confidence than usual because of the people with money who stopped the Wanaka Airport expansion and the people that live in the area being against it also probably having money. That combined with a very strong climate case that will bring out activists. Also, it's a rallying point.
Many people, including myself, fought against any jets at Wanaka airport because the flight path was right over town and at low altitude.
One of the flight paths for Tarras airport will take it over Hawea and Hawea Flat but at such a height that the sound will be mitigated-it is 29km from Tarras Airport to Hawea Flat, further to Hawea..
Many people in Queenstown/Frankton want that airport closed because of plane noise which is certain to increase in the future. It is also recognised as a dangerous airport to land/take off and the runway is too short to permit wide body planes-Tarras will cope with wide body planes.
The land under Queenstown airport is probably worth $1.5 billion and is 75% community owned so closing the airport would give the QLDC a major windfall. The land under the airport will be able to be developed in a manner that provides for the future…university…hospitals….schools…council offices….affordable housing … etc etc.
Some business people will scream about losing Queenstown airport but many in the population will be happy to see it go.
oh yeah, I'm aware that some in Queenstown are keen. But they need to sort out their own problems, not pass them on to other people/places.
One of the flight paths for Tarras airport will take it over Hawea and Hawea Flat but at such a height that the sound will be mitigated-it is 29km from Tarras Airport to Hawea Flat, further to Hawea..
what does that mean? Will they hear the planes or not?
There are lots of people in Central Otago, even in Queenstown, who think there should be limits on growth. For obvious reasons. You'd think Queenstown of all places would get that.
The miners spruiking this scheme sound very optimistic. The regional council is no doubt all for it and will probably keep environmental restrictions to a minimum if the promoters promise to employ a few locals as navvies.
But where will they put the mine tailings and other refuse? Te Aroha residents will tell you what can go wrong (taxpayers had to foot a $15 million cleanup bill for the Tui mine because the miner went bust and had paid no bond).
Google "Lessons to be learnt from toxic legacy", Waikato Times, 2013.
The story till now. A coalition policy of removal and replacement of the gender, sexuality, and relationship-based education guidelines (guidelines were introduced in 2020 by then-associate education minister Tracey Martin, who was a New Zealand First MP).
Last year
Post Primary Teachers' Association acting president Chris Abercrombie said schools needed more information from the new government.
The union representing primary school teachers says there still has not been any consultation or guidance from the Government over planned changes to the sex education curriculum, a few weeks out from the school year starting.
Potter said so far, there had been very little indication from the Government on what it wants changed in the guidelines, given the coalition agreement also called for a replacement.
So far clear enough.
NZEI Te Riu Roa president Mark Potter said they had been developed by specialists in that area, as well as educational professionals, and were designed to be age-appropriate for each stage of children's growth.
He is replying to this from Luxon last year
we want a well defined curriculum agreed to by experts that actually makes sure that the content is age-appropriate, that parents have been consulted, and importantly that parents have an ability to withdraw from the education as well.
The last bit is surprising as withdrawing children is something parents can do now
Labour's education spokesperson Jan Tinetti said parents already had the option to withdraw their children from classes.
Both Potter and Tinetti said schools have already developed their curricula for 2024, which would have been developed with their communities.
That is, the government did not legislate changes in the 100 day plan and so the year would go ahead with existing policy.
But schools would need time to make the changes, and consult with parents in time for 2025.
The urgency is related to development a replacement for 2025.
Someone else can do a post on developing a replacement as per the criticism of existing policy from Emeritus professor Sue Middleton
Emeritus professor Sue Middleton wants the guidelines replaced because she disagrees with how gender is defined under them.
The definition is: "Gender is an individual identity related to a continuum of masculinities and femininities. A person's gender is not fixed or immutable".
Middleton believes gender is not a matter of identity but is rather a matter of biological sex.
"Most of us say we don't have a gender identity; we have a sex and we may be according to the stereotypes, be more masculine or more feminine. But that's not in the identity category, it's a quality of our personality and that's fine."
But Middleton did not want all the guidelines thrown out, she said sex education needed to be about more than biological reproduction.
Meanwhile, Katie Fitzpatrick (Senior Research Fellow at the University of Auckland, New Zealand) said there was fear around gender that she thought came from a lack of knowledge.
"Children learn about gender in all kinds of environments from which colours belong to whom and the gender binary is very well established. I think people questioning that, which is not a new thing, some others get nervous about that. We want to open up that conversation rather than shut it down."
She said there needed to be more respectful, meaningful conversations about gender.
I'm not sure what is weird there. This was wholly predictable. I put a comment above under Robert's post about the Gender Critical aspect being central to everything in that. The left gave the right and open door to attack all sex/sexuality education.
Let's just hope there are some in NACTF who aren't completely insane as well and we end up with a more socially conservative but still liberal curriculum rather than something ultra right. I don't know the MPs well enough to know what is most likely.
Also, no fucking point in developing something in the community if No Debate is being run.
Raising the issue of needing more information while MP's (Minister and Cabinet) are at the beach and doing so as per the formation of a replacement policy for 2025.
The only immediate issue would be impact on the curriculum for 2024 if there was a withdrawal of the guidelines before there was a replacement.
PS Where changes are top down, the consultation is then between schools and parents.
The union representing primary school teachers says there still has not been any consultation or guidance from the Government over planned changes to the sex education curriculum, a few weeks out from the school year starting.
Potter said so far, there had been very little indication from the Government on what it wants changed in the guidelines, given the coalition agreement also called for a replacement.
A concern as to what happens if the 2021-2023 teacher practice is impacted by withdrawal of the guidelines this year (and if so, when), before they are replaced (not possible for 2024).
teaching the basics of biological sex, social aspects of sex, and sexuality, and not teaching children that it's possible and desirable to change sex would be a start.
a hard core RW conservative position would teach abstinence to teens as an example of illiberal conservatism. An out of control neoliberal position would prioritise gender identity over biological sex, and lie to children that bio sex can be changed and that this is a good thing (eg disabling surgeries and hormones).
I'm arguing what should be in the curriculum here. I'm pointing to a middle ground that might stop this being a complete disaster while the gender/sex conflict is being resolved.
…not teaching children that it's possible and desirable to change sex would be a start.
When did/will Kiwi teachers start "teaching children that it's possible and desirable to change sex"?
Teaching about the feminine-to-masculine spectrum of human identity and behaviours, and that some aspects of identity are changeable and/or not (pre-)determined by (immutable) biological sex, is OK, imho. My initial thinking was firmly binary, but posts and comments on TS have changed that.
Imho, most trans identities are natural – Kiwi society determines what are acceptable trans (and non-trans) behaviours, and that will continue to evolve.
there have always been gender non-conforming people, throughout time and place.
Gender Identity ideology is new.
Lots of gender critical feminists are gender non-conforming.
What is the feminine to masculine spectrum of human identity and behaviours? Is it based on gender stereotypes and gender roles? Are those roles meaningful outside of gender stereotypes?
One of the things that happens is some trans women believe that being a woman is having big breasts and wearing make up and such. Do you think that is anything to with being a woman?
What is the feminine to masculine spectrum of human identity and behaviours? Is it based on gender stereotypes and gender roles? Are those roles meaningful outside of gender stereotypes?
Not sure if this addresses your first question, but consider the idea that a few people exhibit a preponderance of exaggerated behaviours (stereo)typically associated with females (so represent a 'hyperfeminine' identity), a few people exhibit a preponderance of exaggerated behaviours (stereo)typically associated with males (so represent a 'hypermasculine' identity), and most of us exhibit a mix of less exaggerated feminine and masculine behaviours.
Imho, females who are naturally inclined to exhibit (some) typically masculine behaviours, and males who are naturally inclined to exhibit (some) typically feminine behaviours, can be examples of societal strength in diversity. Potentially incongruent combinations (of feminine or masculine identity/behaviour, and immutable biological sex) are personal, and best resolved (or not) on an individual basis – live and let live.
There’s nothing intrinsically male about XY chromosomes, testosterone, body hair, muscle mass or penises… Sex, like gender, is indeed socially constructed and can be changed
don't worry, it's bonkers and it's hard to believe. This is part of how No Debate has been so damaging. We didn't get to talk about this stuff, and now it's there and no-one can quite believe it.
I've just read this conversation and it confirms my suspicion Tinetti was being disingenuous in her concerns.
Y'all above have been discussing the gender aspect of the indoctrination education guidelines.
She put the spotlight on consent issues, which to the best of my knowledge, almost all of us can get to a general consensus on.
When it came to gender issues, like lots of folk who don't have a strong argument, she starts littering her korero with "conspiracy".
Blissfully unaware of the controversy around gender, so indoctrinated by ideology, she had to look up 'woke gender curriculum'.
Rest assured weka, being a GCF, you have merely been duped by a "imported culture war". So patronising, so condescending, and oddly familiar to those who found themselves on the wrong side of the state's Covid reaction.
I see the similarities with the pandemic resistors too, despite not agreeing with them on on some significant points. The condescension is just stupid.
I supported the idea of 3 Waters because it likely contained a policy of national water supply which frees the councils from the responsibility of managing their water supply so they can do more with managing infrastructure that the government do not concern itself with. As far as I'm concerned, the more nationalised/nationally shared resources we can get, we get better councils as a result.
We can get the councils to focus far more on local infrastructure instead of having to concern themselves with water maintenance and management if we can get around to nationalising water and electricity along with railways and if possible healthcare.
God, that could mean better cities! Better towns! More physically & sensorally accessible cities and towns in Aotearoa/NZ!
All the draft Council budgets should come out for public consultation at the end of March.
So March through to June will be the window we have to show the relationship between water availability, water quality, water price, water ownership, and what our councils should do.
It's all on them now and it's what they all begged for.
Using the advertising approach of calling it "3 waters" was a mistake I think. Should have just called it "water infrastructure" or "drinking water, storm water and sewage services"
The disingenuous would have found "STOP water infrastructure!" or "STOP drinking water, storm water and sewage services!" slogans less useful.
True, it was the right that took advantage. But no need to make it easier for them (and yes, they would have come up with some vapid attack slogan regardless, I suppose)
If we can accept that shaman from all manner of cultures are able to shape-shift and become birds, panthers, lizards etc, then it must be that a male shaman could become a woman, yes?
it's the difference between imaginative and material reality. We can be shamans, but shamans still exist within the laws of nature. Shamans don't become panthers in material reality ie no-one can independently observe them as a panther. The problem isn't with material reality, it's that the west believes that material reality is god and that imaginative reality is either stupid or ok but needs to be put in its place. Sane cultures do both/and.
The gender/sex fight is over the definition of 'woman'. Many people believe that women = biologically female. It's simply not possible for humans to change from one biological sex to the other (there are some animals and plants that can, but not humans).
Other people believe that 'woman' is a feeling. So if a man feels like they are a woman, they can be one literally. This is obviously a nonsense in relation to biological reality, so the issue becomes should the needs of gender non-conforming men take priority over the rights and reality of women? And how should society manage that in terms of law, policy, resources etc.
My own view is that men as a class need to do the mahi of making it acceptable for men to be gender non-conforming so that they don't have to try and colonise women's culture. And support women to have our own politics, thanks.
So, we've paddled in the shallow end of indigenous cultures, such as those who have lived in Australia for tens of thousands of years, but we haven't really given ourselves over to the deeper parts of those cultures.
Goethe encourages deep-observation of plants in order to become the plant.
Holding tight the supremacy of material over spiritual is where we in the Western World are failing, is it not so?
Ursula LeGuin had much to say about this and she wasn't, I believe, joking
Goethe encourages deep-observation of plants in order to become the plant.
Yes, but we don't become a plant in material reality, right? What we do is develop a relational connection with the plant that shifts our consciousness. All very good.
What's not so good is trying to remedy the western overemphasis on material reality with pseudo-spirituality. I'm not being pejorative there, GII isn't a spirituality, but it has aspects of religion that are problematic as a belief system but very problematic when adopted as societal rules.
Here's one of the consequences of allowing dogmatic beliefs to override material reality,
You’re a 10yr old girl. One day you decide to use the toilet while you’re at the market with your mom.
You’re sexually assaulted at knifepoint by a man who’s six and a half feet tall.
You’re told he’s a woman and they call him a her in court
why would you put imagination in quotation marks? Doesn't that diminish the experience of understanding the land as our ancestor? If we understand imagination as being as important as material reality, there's no problem with understanding that some people experience the land as ancestor, is there?
Besides, science shows us that humans and plants share ancestry, so it's not too much of a stretch of the… imagination.
In what way do you believe that humans can become a plant in material reality?
Because imagination has a micro and/plus a macro meaning. Most use its micro form – I wanted to draw attention to the need for thinking more deeply about the word.
What do you mean by "material reality" (quoting from your comment.
"Some people" (again), scoff at the idea that a mountain could be anyone's great etc. grandfather, (in reality).
Who is right?
Are you suggesting multiple realities?
If so, could their not be a reality where men can be women, if their imagination allows it?
What are the micro and macro meanings of the word imagination?
What do you mean by "material reality" (quoting from your comment.
this is a great question, I will answer in a different comment.
What do you mean by reality there?
If so, could their not be a reality where men can be women, if their imagination allows it?
I thought I already answered this. In physical reality, no, it's just not possible. Men can pretend to women in physical reality but that's not the same thing.
If men can be women, then there is no such thing as biological reality, which is obviously nonsense.
If you mean can men be women in the imaginal realm, the problem here, in this context, is that we are now neck deep in an ideology that has powerfully influenced law, policy and society as if it were physical reality. This is both a lie, and it impacts on women and children. Women in particular have been told to shut the fuck up. We won't.
It's not possible to have the conversation about the imaginal realm until the people who want men to imagine themselves women stop trying to remove women's rights. Maslow's hierarchy of needs probably comes in at this point. Absolutely no way will support the progress of an ideology that comes at the expense of a 12 year old girl being sexually assaulted. It would be corrupt to do so.
"Some people" (again), scoff at the idea that a mountain could be anyone's great etc. grandfather, (in reality).
Who is right?
I'm less interested in determining who is right, than I am in exploring the chasm between literal thinkers, imaginative thinkers, and those of us that can think in both at the same time. I'd call it decolonisation of the western mind but that would create another set of communication problems
how do you think I'm using the word imagination? Because I've been arguing to not diminish it as 'just imagination'.
Imagination is indeed an very powerful tool. All the more reason to not be in denial of material reality while using it. That's dangerous.
I think your views on your pet issue are limiting your … imagination
You haven't said how, but let me guess. You think that my position that men cannot become women is a limit of my imagination. I can imagine people imagining themselves as a panther, but if some dude or chick from Timaru was setting themselves up as a shaman who had a panther ally and was running workshops based on ripping off natives, at a $1000 a pop, I'd have some political critiques about that too. Both/and.
You say, "pretend", I say, "be".
We can pretend the mountain is our ancestor, or it can be.
sounds to me like you want to ignore material reality, the 12 year old girl who was sexually assaulted, and what women want. That's disappointing.
I didn't say anything about pretending to be a mountain. I don't see mana whenua relationship with their maunga in that way at all, so I'm asking you now to take a step back and consider that you are missing important aspects of what I am saying here.
I took some time to plant a dozen Japanese quinces and mull over something that's disturbing me and now, if I may…
…you wrote, "…sounds to me like you want to ignore material reality, the 12 year old girl who was sexually assaulted, and what women want. That's disappointing…."
Wtf???
"Material reality" – the topic of our discussion, and those examples you gave to show what specifically I am ignoring, seem way out of kilter to me. It's a "what about" set-up, isn't it? I made no mention of either/any of those examples, yet you've sheeted them to me and tarred me with the, "you haven't denounced" brush. This is what happened over the assaults during the Posie Parker protest; supporters of your position, your sisters in arms, charged me (and others) with failing to denounce actions that they found abhorrent. Is this the standard for putting forward a view (in this case on the nature of reality and the role of the observer) – a declaration of position on matters chosen by "your crew"?
It seems very strange indeed, to me. Perhaps there are others who baulked at this behaviour, I can't know.
Sorry to be freaking you out. Let me reread the thread and get my bearings on what has happened and come back to you and see if we can reconnect the conversation in a better way.
What do you mean by "material reality" (quoting from your comment.
Material reality in the gender/sex context refers to the stuff of the universe that exists and can be observed and interacted with but is fundamentally independent of human thought.
For instance, humans as a species reproduce via a sexual binary (female eggs, male sperm). There is no variant on that, it's an aspect of material reality that cannot be changed by human imagination. The only way to get a new human is by combining the stuff of the universe that is in the egg and in the sperm.
Even if we develop technologies that take us out of nature/evolution eg cloning humans, that still has to happen using the materials and rules of material reality. Our thinking might conceive of how to do that, but it still gets done with physical stuff.
I guess it's theoretically possible that at some point in the future, humans might be able to create a third sex. We're not even close to being able to think about how to that in real life, let alone grapple with the ethical issues.
So when people engage with plants, that exists in material reality, but they engage via non-material means… although in the case of Goethe, it's both/and, right? so let's say they engage with the plant via material and non-material realms, the person doing the engaging still has the physical body they were born with. That body doesn't acquire the capacity for photosynthesis for instance. Nor does she/he have physical roots that are in relationship with soil microbia.
So whatever else is going on with the process and experience, we can definitively say that the person doesn't not become a plant materially.
The reason this matters (haha) is that material reality is a really great thing! We do ourselves and the rest of nature a great disservice to be in denial of it. The denial of material reality is driving the great crises of the world. The disconnect from our innate spiritual relationship with nature is that too. But they're the same thing, not because they are the same thing, but because both exist as each and as one.
Sorry to go all esoteric there, but what I see happening often is people realising the west has lost the plot (mind/body split etc) and then they eschew material reality because Descartes said some stupid shit about it a while back. Why are we letting that unfortunate part of history drive our thinking?
(it's often observed the similarities between the great religions that sought to transcend the body, and GII which seeks likewise. Both hate women in our fantastically female and natural bodies).
"Material reality in the gender/sex context refers to the stuff of the universe that exists and can be observed and interacted with but is fundamentally independent of human thought."
Material reality must cover all contexts, surely?
In any case, what reality can you describe that is fundamentally different from human thought?
not sure what you mean by cover, but I chose to explain in that particular context because that's how the conversation started (and because I’ve read some excellent philosophical discussions about material reality arising from the sex/gender conflict). We can talk about material reality in lots of contexts, is that what you mean?
In any case, what reality can you describe that is fundamentally different from human thought?
everything that is not human exists in a reality that is independent from human thought. We can think about all the things, but when we are not thinking about them they still exist. I don't have to describe it, it just is.
I'm pretty sure my cat is either hunting rabbits or sleeping it off right now (or maybe doing some other cat thing), but whether I am aware of that or not, he's still out there doing it materially.
"The prevailing theory, called the Copenhagen interpretation, says that a quantum system remains in superposition until it interacts with, or is observed by, the external world."
Schrodinger was making the point that the system described by quantum mechanics appeared ridiculus. The description produced is a distribution of probabilities for what will be observed. But this discussion makes the assumption that there is a reality which is exactly what is then observed in any experiment. The key insight should be that there is some missing part from quantum mechanics which if added allowed the exact outcomes to be found. Maybe this is related to fully integrating gravity into quantum mechanics. Its also possible that the resolution of measurement is too great a barrier to such experiments.
The basic product of philosophy (including logic and math) doesnt have to be true or observable. Thats just a basic fact of (human) thought. So it's a further demand of science that any models rejected by experiment should also be discarded. The question here seems to be should politics be expected to be conducted on a scientific understanding of society? Maybe in future we could prioratise the political issues of which ever fictional character appears in the ACT parties political advertising campaign?
For sure. Myth, religion and reality are each/all story, especially for us/we humans.I've seen/worked with, humans who can understand the story at all – it's not a pretty sight. Story is, of course, entirely manipulable, hence we can find ourselves/are in the thrall of powerful storytellers.
"Fantasy"writers such as Le Guin and Tolkien, when speaking/writing from their deepest selves, do not say myth is "not reality", or magic is "fantasy".
For the truth of the matter Read T.H. White's "The Sword in the Stone" and how Merlin teaches young Arthur the true nature of reality.
You can "believe" anything you chose to believe. Fortunately, these days you cannot require other people to believe the same things. Mystical stuff belongs with mystical stuff. It is not biological reality.
A big shoutout to Mels Barton and Greg Presland, Forest and Bird Waitakere, Te Kawerau A Maki and all the good folk of Waima in Titirangi Auckland for the consent conditions that forced Watercare to work so hard for their new pump station.
Hard fought and a great focus for civic environmental activism over the last 5 years,
It will supply water to approximately 300,000 Aucklanders, about 20 per cent of Auckland’s water.
In particular top score to the neighbourhood team for squeezing out $8.25 out of Waitakere to put to local biodoversity and conservation work. Looking forward to really sound preparation for construction starting 2027.
The Post-UMD poll finds 39 percent of Americans who say Fox News is their primary news source believe the FBI organized and encouraged the Jan. 6 attack, compared with 16 percent of CNN or MSNBC viewers and 13 percent who get most of their news from ABC, CBS or NBC. The poll finds 44 percent of those who voted for Trump say the FBI instigated the attack.
If Gharaman's medication is that severe on her judgement, why is she in Parliament making law? Shaw will need to give her a fair amount of sick leave while the prosecution goes through.
I reckons you can stick your attributes up your forum
[You’re obviously a troll who tries to be funny and belligerently displays the usual lack of honesty and integrity and as such, your comments are piss-poor. You’ve been warned before for trolling. No more warning – Incognito]
"First Husband Peter Davis wrote to the Herald on Tuesday accusing them of formenting happy mischief.
A senior journalist suggested to me “Formenting Happy Mischief” would be a better slogan for kiwiblog than the Herald. I'm inclined to agree.
I don't have a tagline for the blog I quite like the idea of using one supplied (indirectly) by Peter Davis!"
It seems to have become 'fomenting.' Whichever it is, it's a great opportunity for posters on that site to start the year flaunting their appalling attitudes.
And for Farrar to play D J Trump: "People tell me that …", reality and fact become established and the invitation to swim in the sewer and ignorance is made and accepted.
Golriz Ghahraman is no indication of us living in a scummy country sad and wretched. You go to Farrar to see that.
The word "happy" is entirely inappropriate for Farrar's pitiful blog, which is (unsurprisingly, considering its proprietor) almost entirely hateful and virulently racist. This writer, i.e. moi, used to hang out there on my occasional periods of exile from The Standard (H/T Lin Prent, weka, Incognito, and Te Reo Putake).
You did say the prosecution was going through. That might happen but it hasn't happened yet. Not that a detail like that stops a resident of Wānaka from the declaration.
So, Ad has (not to mention the nonentity R the Goodfellow) found her guilty regardless? Maybe no-one, including herself, was aware of the possible effect on her.
Either something went radically wrong for her, or she is the latest manifestation of DP. Whatever, I feel sympathy for her. She is a very intelligent young woman.
Innocent until proven guilty but if found guilty I hope she gets a conviction and that its the end of her career.
I'm bloody sick of politicians running around acting like the rules don't apply to them, the behaviour of MPs in the last year has been disgusting.
We've had MPs boast about trying to interfere in court matters, lying about getting rid of their shares to cabinet, resisting arrest, a former or current I don't keep track with the torys getting thrown off a plane and not being charged for it and now we have one allegedly shoplifting.
If she's guilty I believe all MPs as representatives of the public should face the harshest available punishment according to the law broken (laws that they write) if they break a law.
She gets paid boat loads and is just a list mp.
I hope it's all a beat up but the public is sick to death of our representatives acting like the laws they write don't apply to them.
It's a high pressure job but noones forcing anyone to do it, individuals who are burnt out can should step down.
Normal people don't have the options or the money or the resources these people do.
Kiri Allen was not charged with resisting arrest. Refusing to accompany is the one applying with driving a car offences (charged with careless driving).
The legal issue is covered in this story – I suspect she will lose given the type of incident and normal practice takes away the relevance of a lawyer etc.
Ad, I know I said I was taking a break, however, if it's MS, then please leave her alone on that topic.
It's never ever anybody's fault that anybody has a disability and it is not her fault that she has MS and there is a lot of value in having someone with a disability or sickness being in politics and its sphere than if there was nobody in politics with such a background.
We need more people with disabilities and sicknesses to be represented in Aotearoa/NZ politics, not less.
These are perilous times and a lot of lives are on the line. It's only fair that we have political representation regardless of the times we find ourselves in.
"… and there is a lot of value in having someone with a disability or sickness being in politics and its sphere than if there was nobody in politics with such a background".
Value lies in comprehensive research, consultation with advocates and appropriate consideration for those with sickness and disabilities.
The idea that representatives are required is flawed. Perspectives, and needs should be represented and that should be done by standard processes.
Given the experience of women on here, it is unlikely that many men have the capability of achieving "comprehensive research, consultation with advocates and appropriate consideration ".
However, relying on this to be rectified by including a female representative – who may also fail at the above – is a flawed notion.
nevertheless, if you argue that representation isn't needed, what would an appropriate process look like for say a group making decisions about women where that group was all men.
If those men – actually understood and gave due consideration to the needs of women – and effectively represented and advocated for them, then they are more effective than a group of women who do not.
The fact of being female – doesn't mean you are an effective advocate for women.
Any representative – while they may be exceptional advocates for a particular demographic also have to ensure that all other consitituents are represented as well. ie. a politician concerned about women's health, uses processes that serve specific health needs for men.
If those men – actually understood and gave due consideration to the needs of women – and effectively represented and advocated for them, then they are more effective than a group of women who do not.
I don't think anyone has suggested a group of women who don't understand or give due consideration to the needs of women, so that's the wrong comparison.
The comparison is between qualified women and qualified men, all other things being equal, would a group that included women do better for women than a group of men?
Any representative – while they may be exceptional advocates for a particular demographic also have to ensure that all other consitituents are represented as well. ie. a politician concerned about women's health, uses processes that serve specific health needs for men.
Sure, but that ensuring might be by recoginising the limits of one's own knowledge base and experience and making sure that the relevant experience and knowledge is included via people of the class being affected.
No-one can represent everyone all the time at the level required.
Men will never be as good as women at understand childbirth for instance. Yes, the women representing birthing women should have given birth and be qualified. And that makes them better at the job than men. I'm not talking individual exemptions to the principle here.
"The comparison is between qualified women and qualified men, all other things being equal, would a group that included women do better for women than a group of men?"
If the processes are robust, they should achieve the same.
If you have a definitive answer, then that part of the process should be improved.
The idea that representatives are required is flawed.
please explain how.
Perspectives, and needs should be represented and that should be done by standard processes.
using people with first hand experience is part of the standard processes. It doesn't preclude research, consultation and appropriate consideration, it adds to those things.
Meanwhile, across many sectors, we have seen that consultation with groups by people not of that group but who hold the power, leads to poor policy and outcomes.
In the disability area, an example would be town planning and the push towards cycling/walking and non-car spaces that pays lip service to disability and constantly gets it wrong. That is less likely to happen if people with disabilities were part of the planning process (and I don't mean the odd token person with a disability).
Having a disability in and of itself doesn't qualify, having an otherwise qualified person who also has a disability adds perspectives that are needed.
I'm not suggesting the processes are not flawed. They need to be improved to ensure that consultation, research and appropriate considerations are made. Advocates may be elected as representatives – all good – but should not be required for the processes to be effective.
Unfortunately, there are the usual political and administrative impediments to good representation. This can be addressed, with or without specific representatives.
I believe I've been pretty clear. Processes should exist, and be in constant review for improvement, that ensures the needs of all people are represented in policies and governance.
This allows full-time advocates to concentrate on those they advocate for, without the additional time costs and burdens that as political representatives they should devote to other groups.
Consultation with such advocates – should definitely be part of a comprehensive and effective process.
I don't think I have anything further to add. Unless you have something specific you wanted to ask.
They should already exist. It is apparent that if they do – they are inadequate. Have a look at who was consulted regarding policy at Sports NZ that would impact on women and girls in sports:
But if you are happy with inadequate, inefficient and ineffective processes as long as a token representative is in place, that's your call. I have no inclination to spend time attempting to change your mind.
I am myself a disabled person and I have had some experience in politics and I do not like that you think to exclude our bodies and minds by delegating our politics to some well-meaning people all the time. Allies matters, however, there's never a true substitute for authenticity. Sure, there's stinkers and pull-up ladderers in our group, however, that's par for the course for politics. We can't help these who would backstab us or destroy our gains. That's the risk. We should strive nonetheless.
There is nothing better than somebody who can understand and gets it completely and helps you to the degree that even allies cannot. Having agency and power to make your own future is not to be underestimated. It turns you from being a spectator to someone who can do what you think is best for better or worse.
Agency and the ability to execute our own political agenda is extremely vital. All successful political social/economic movements ever created has leaders, representatives and followers who has the authentic experience and lives that comes of going through that sort of experience.
What this tells me is that we still need more people who knows what it's like to be disabled and gets it and can work for us.
Allies are always valuable and are appreciated and should be treasured, however, one thing is clear, it's ultimately our lives that we should be in control of, not be controlled by others. Having ourselves being able to find a way to empower and make our life better means we will be more able to pull our weight to help you right back to make a better future for all.
That is what matters. Being able to be on a more equal basis with other people. We would be more able to make a more universal society where we can be more able to be more involved in all of our futures.
And – I was not talking about tokenism nor advocating for such. I am advocating for a fuller vision of disabled people being woven more into the fabric of our greater society. It was always implicit in my argument that disabled people with some prior knowledge of the matters affecting ourselves were going to be what I was pushing for. Tokenism was never the aim. That you think any of what I was talking about was going to lead to Tokenism is not what I’m aiming for with my arguments: I’m aiming for addition and participation and agency and ability to exercise our voice and power amongst many in our society.
Your arguments seem to imply that we don't place any value on expertise, only representation when I don't actually think that. Ultimately, I am saying that we need more representation in the halls of power with actual expertise and plenty of ability to wield such expertise on the same basis as able-bodied people who we are working with on our own affairs and lives.
Nothing about us without us is what we are saying basically. We need to have power and a say in our own future as disabled people so we can return the favour to everyone else.
“The woman has MS. Medications used to manage the symptoms of MS are a who’s who of brain breakers that can affect moral decision making.”
Speaking as someone who has a close friend with MS – this is deeply insulting. Medication side effects may affect your ability in a range of areas – however, your moral code is not one of them.
If she is indeed so affected by side effects of her medication, that she can't make rational decisions about every-day matters – then she does not belong in the high-pressure environment of the House of Representatives.
List of common medications used to treat MS here – cognitive dysfunction – let alone affecting moral decision making- is not listed as a risk factor for any of them.
As in many matters medical, it often helps to get a second expert opinion.
Maybe the medications that Ghahraman has been prescribed to treat her MS condition (diagnosed in 2018) don't adversely affect her cognition, and maybe the condition itself doesn't affect her cognition, but usually I'd prefer more than a single anecdotal claim (based on the experiences of one of Belladonna's close friends) about how MS and MS treatments can affect people, before coming to a conclusion – we're all individuals.
My reading now of the initial comment is that it was about cognitive impairment (from meds) that impact on ethical decisions, rather than the meds impairing ethics/morals.
This kind of poorly worded speculation potentially does a great deal of harm to all MS sufferers in the workplace. No one wants their boss to be thinking that their medication impacts on their ethics.
Nor, for the vast majority of MS sufferers (yet to see any evidence that it impacts any, but I'm willing to be convinced) – is there any impact of medication on their cognitive abilities or impulse control around decision-making.
People with MS already have a very hard row to hoe, with an 'invisible' disability. They don't need any added burdens arising from public misconception of the side-effects of the medication required to manage their condition.
Fair call B – the human brain is a complex beast, so it's possible that MS medications (or the condition itself) could impair decision making (judgement, cognition etc.), without affecting moral decision making.
Green MP shoplifting reports: What is Scotties Boutique? [11 Jan 2024]]
While there is not yet confirmation about what occurred, the Green Party said it was aware of the accusations and Ghahraman, who is seventh on the party's list, has been stood down from her portfolio positions while the facts were established and until the matter was "resolved".
…
The police said they received a report "about an incident" on December 23 and initial inquiries are being made. Yesterday police said they could not confirm if Ghahraman was the subject of a police investigation.
I don't know what Ghahraman did or didn't do at Scotties Boutique, why she did or didn't do it, whether her decision making was impaired and, if so, what might have contributed to the hypothetical impairment. Seems to be a lot of (pre)judgement given the apparent lack of facts.
SSRIs, SNRIs, and anticonvulsants are used in the management of MS symptoms.
Here, we investigated whether this hyperaltruistic disposition is susceptible to monoaminergic control. We observed dissociable effects of the serotonin reuptake inhibitor citalopram and the dopamine precursor levodopa on decisions to inflict pain on oneself and others for financial gain. Computational models of choice behavior showed that citalopram increased harm aversion for both self and others, while levodopa reduced hyperaltruism. The effects of citalopram were stronger than those of levodopa. Crucially, neither drug influenced the physical perception of pain or other components of choice such as motor impulsivity or loss aversion suggesting a direct and specific influence of serotonin and dopamine on the valuation of harm. We also found evidence for dose dependency of these effects. Finally, the drugs had dissociable effects on response times, with citalopram enhancing behavioral inhibition and levodopa reducing slowing related to being responsible for another’s fate.
Nothing about changing ethical behaviour. If you think it is not OK to steal (or cause pain to others, in your example), taking the MS drugs isn't going to change that ethical decision.
What may change is your appreciation of consequences for your actions. This is not ethics, it's risk/reward.
I'm curious how you think they do. Cognition can obviously be affected, but morality? Do you mean that cognition is impaired and this makes decisions more difficult, or do you mean people's sense of morality is altered?
Related to my own experience with how SNRIs and an anticonvulsant prescribed to treat neuropathic pain altered my decision making processes, no.
It's more a loss of impulse control and decision making abilities combined with a brain fade/blank page/forgetfulness thing. More than once I found myself having to return to a shop because I'd simply forgotten to pay. Driving was diabolical, too. I'd look right and see a car and know that I had to give way, look left, forget about the car on my right, and off I'd go. Multiple near misses until I gave up driving.
The other biggie was suicide ideation. For someone who'd never ever thought about taking their own life, being preoccupied with self harm was as scary AF.
Taking medication doesn't change your ethics. It may change your risk assessment (you don't perceive the consequences of your actions) – but if you think something is 'wrong' before you start your course of medication you'll still think it is 'wrong' while you're taking the drugs.
I stayed out of this discussion for a number of reasons, but ethical behaviour and moral judgement/moral decision-making can be affected by a wide range of medical (and non-medical!) conditions and treatments, incl. medication, obviously. Anyway, a person’s ethical values and principles are not as hard & fast as some (many?) seem to think.
Belladonna @ 15.1.2
I suffer from severe osteoarthritis and am on a 24 hour pain regime. The consequence of that regime – plus the pain I still have to endure – leaves me tired and absent minded. I have walked out of a shop a few times without paying and the assistant has had to call me back. Since I have to use a crutch to get around they seem to know it was not deliberate and there have been no problems.
I have no idea what happened to Gholriz Gharaman, but if she was under some stress from the drugs she has to take, it may have had a bearing on what happened. Certain drugs can have negative effects for some people but not others.
Anne, I agree that medication and long-term pain can cause absent mindedness or brain fog – but that's not what was being alleged here. The claim was that it can "affect moral decision making". Which is AFAIK, completely untrue – and deeply insulting to people with MS.
OK. I see where you are coming from. Perhaps the term "affect moral decision making" is not appropriate. People who are on drugs, including medically prescribed drugs, can sometimes act in a way which is not normal for them. Its possible this is what happened here. Time will tell.
You seem to have a friend for every occasion with respect to political discussion. It's quite remarkable.
Perhaps you could have a conversation with your friend about the affects a MS diagnosis has on mental health. How did your friend fare 1 year after diagnosis, 2 years? For instance, was it difficult to accept having their future potentially ripped away from them?
I believe everyone has a different experience of disease and medication and it seems to me you expect a lot from sufferers, and are being a bit mean about one particular sufferer, for political purposes.
For instance, was it difficult to accept having their future potentially ripped away from them?
That is the kind of comment which inclines me to believe that you have zero practical acquaintance with anyone with a long-term disability or medical diagnosis.
Fail to see in what way I was 'mean' about Ghahraman. I was pointing out that Joe90's claim that MS medication can "affect moral decision making" is bunkum. And dangerous bunkum, at that.
I am perfectly willing to believe (if and when there are some actual examples provided – which, so far, there have not been) that medication for MS can affect decision-making and/or risk/reward decisions. Certainly we see this as a side effect of treatment for other medical conditions. What it can't do is change people's ethics or morals.
"Frame up" implies there is no truth to the allegations. If that were the case, Ghahraman would have vigorously denied the allegation (possibly with an associated libel claim) – and been supported by the Green Party.
The current actions (refusal to comment, coupled with removal from her portfolios), imply that there is a case to answer.
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A listing of 23 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, February 2, 2025 thru Sat, February 8, 2025. This week's roundup is again published soleley by category. We are still interested in feedback to hone the categorization, so if ...
Today, I stumbled across a Twitter Meme: the ending of The Lord of the Rings as a Chess scenario: https://x.com/mellon_heads/status/1887983845917564991 It gets across the basic gist. Aragorn and Gandalf offering up ‘material’ at the Morannon allows Frodo and Samwise to catch Sauron unawares – fair enough. But there are a ...
Last week, Kieran McAnulty called out Chris Bishop and Nicola Willis for their claims that Kāinga Ora’s costs were too high.They had claimed Kāinga Ora’s cost were 12% higher than market i.e. private devlopersBut Kāinga Ora’s Chair had already explained why last year:"We're not building to sell, so we'll be ...
Stuff’s Political Editor Luke Malpass - A Fellow at New Zealand IniativeLast week I half-joked that Stuff / The Post’s Luke Malpass1 always sounded like he was auditioning for a job at the New Zealand Initiative.Mountain Tui is a reader-supported publication. For a limited time, subscriptions are 20% off. Thanks ...
At a funeral on Friday, there were A4-sized photos covering every wall of the Dil’s reception lounge. There must have been 200 of them, telling the story in the usual way of the video reel but also, by enlargement, making it more possible to linger and step in.Our friend Nicky ...
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. This fact brief was written by Sue Bin Park from the Gigafact team in collaboration with members from our team. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline. Is methane the ...
The Government’s idea is that the private sector and Community Housing Providers will fund, build and operate new affordable housing to address our housing crisis. Meanwhile, the Government does not know where almost half of the 1,700 children who left emergency housing actually went. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong ...
Oh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youOh, home, let me come homeHome is wherever I'm with youSongwriters: Alexander Ebert / Jade Allyson CastrinosMorena,I’m on a tight time frame this morning. In about an hour and a half, I’ll need to pack up and hit the road ...
This is a post about the Mountain Tui substack, and small tweaks - further to the poll and request post the other day. Please don’t read if you aren’t interested in my personal matters. Thank you all.After oohing-and-aahing about how to structure the Substack model since November, including obtaining ...
This transcript of a recent conversation between the Prime Minister and his chief economic adviser has not been verified.We’ve announced we are the ‘Yes Government’. Do you like it?Yes, Prime Minister.Dreamed up by the PR team. It’s about being committed to growth. Not that the PR team know anything about ...
The other day, Australian Senator Nick McKim issued a warning in the Australian Parliement about the US’s descent into fascim.And of course it’s true, but I lament - that was true as soon as Trump won.What we see is now simply the reification of the intention, planning, and forces behind ...
Among the many other problems associated with Musk/DOGE sending a fleet of teenage and twenty-something cultists to remove, copy and appropriate federal records like social security, medicaid and other supposedly protected data is the fact that the youngsters doing the data-removal, copying and security protocol and filter code over-writing have ...
Jokerman dance to the nightingale tuneBird fly high by the light of the moonOh, oh, oh, JokermanSong by Bob Dylan.Morena folks, I hope this fine morning of the 7th of February finds you well. We're still close to Paihia, just a short drive out of town. Below is the view ...
It’s been an eventful week as always, so here’s a few things that we have found interesting. We also hope everyone had a happy and relaxing Waitangi Day! This week in Greater Auckland We’re still running on summer time, but provided two chewy posts: On Tuesday, a guest ...
Queuing on Queen St: the Government is set to announce another apparently splashy growth policy on Sunday of offering residence visas to wealthy migrants. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāLong stories short, the top six things in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Friday, February 7:PM Christopher ...
The fact that Waitangi ended up being such a low-key affair may mark it out as one of the most significant Waitangi Days in recent years. A group of women draped in “Toitu Te Tiriti” banners who turned their backs on the politicians’ powhiri was about as rough as it ...
Hi,This week’s Flightless Bird episode was about “fake seizure guy” — a Melbourne man who fakes seizures in order to get members of the public to sit on him.The audio documentary (which I have included in this newsletter in case you don’t listen to Flightless Bird) built on reporting first ...
National’s cuts to disability support funding and freezing of new residential placements has resulted in significant mental health decline for intellectually disabled people. ...
The hundreds of jobs lost needlessly as a result of the Kinleith Mill paper production closure will have a devastating impact on the Tokoroa community - something that could have easily been avoided. ...
Today Te Pāti Māori MP for Te Tai Tokerau, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi, released her members bill that will see the return of tamariki and mokopuna Māori from state care back to te iwi Māori. This bill will establish an independent authority that asserts and protects the rights promised in He Whakaputanga ...
The Whangarei District Council being forced to fluoridate their local water supply is facing a despotic Soviet-era disgrace. This is not a matter of being pro-fluoride or anti-fluoride. It is a matter of what New Zealanders see and value as democracy in our country. Individual democratically elected Councillors are not ...
Nicola Willis’ latest supermarket announcement is painfully weak with no new ideas, no real plan, and no relief for Kiwis struggling with rising grocery costs. ...
Half of Pacific children sometimes going without food is just one of many heartbreaking lowlights in the Salvation Army’s annual State of the Nation report. ...
The Salvation Army’s State of the Nation report is a bleak indictment on the failure of Government to take steps to end poverty, with those on benefits, including their children, hit hardest. ...
New Zealand First has today introduced a Member’s Bill which would restore decision-making power to local communities regarding the fluoridation of drinking water. The ‘Fluoridation (Referendum) Legislation Bill’ seeks to repeal the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Act 2021 that granted centralised authority to the Direct General of Health ...
New Zealand First has introduced a Member’s Bill aimed at preventing banks from refusing their services to businesses because of the current “Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Framework”. “This Bill ensures fairness and prevents ESG standards from perpetuating woke ideology in the banking sector being driven by unelected, globalist, climate ...
Erica Stanford has reached peak shortsightedness if today’s announcement is anything to go by, picking apart immigration settings piece by piece to the detriment of the New Zealand economy. ...
Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. The intention was to establish a colony with the cession of sovereignty to the Crown, ...
Te Whatu Ora Chief Executive Margie Apa leaving her job four months early is another symptom of this government’s failure to deliver healthcare for New Zealanders. ...
The Green Party is calling for the Prime Minister to show leadership and be unequivocal about Aotearoa New Zealand’s opposition to a proposal by the US President to remove Palestinians from Gaza. ...
The latest unemployment figures reveal that job losses are hitting Māori and Pacific people especially hard, with Māori unemployment reaching a staggering 9.7% for the December 2024 quarter and Pasifika unemployment reaching 10.5%. ...
Waitangi 2025: Waitangi Day must be community and not politically driven - Shane Jones Our originating document, theTreaty of Waitangi, was signed on February 6, 1840. An agreement between Māori and the British Crown. Initially inked by Ngā Puhi in Waitangi, further signatures were added as it travelled south. ...
Despite being confronted every day with people in genuine need being stopped from accessing emergency housing – National still won’t commit to building more public houses. ...
The Green Party says the Government is giving up on growing the country’s public housing stock, despite overwhelming evidence that we need more affordable houses to solve the housing crisis. ...
Before any thoughts of the New Year and what lies ahead could even be contemplated, New Zealand reeled with the tragedy of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming losing her life. For over 38 years she had faithfully served as a front-line Police officer. Working alongside her was Senior Sergeant Adam Ramsay ...
Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson will return to politics at Waitangi on Monday the 3rd of February where she will hold a stand up with fellow co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. ...
Te Pāti Māori is appalled by the government's blatant mishandling of the school lunch programme. David Seymour’s ‘cost-saving’ measures have left tamariki across Aotearoa with unidentifiable meals, causing distress and outrage among parents and communities alike. “What’s the difference between providing inedible food, and providing no food at all?” Said ...
The Government is doubling down on outdated and volatile fossil fuels, showing how shortsighted and destructive their policies are for working New Zealanders. ...
Green Party MP Steve Abel this morning joined Coromandel locals in Waihi to condemn new mining plans announced by Shane Jones in the pit of the town’s Australian-owned Gold mine. ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to strengthen its just-announced 2030-2035 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement and address its woeful lack of commitment to climate security. ...
Today marks a historic moment for Taranaki iwi with the passing of the Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill in Parliament. "Today, we stand together as descendants of Taranaki, and our tūpuna, Taranaki Maunga, is now formally acknowledged by the law as a living tūpuna. ...
Labour is relieved to see Children’s Minister Karen Chhour has woken up to reality and reversed her government’s terrible decisions to cut funding from frontline service providers – temporarily. ...
It is the first week of David Seymour’s school lunch programme and already social media reports are circulating of revolting meals, late deliveries, and mislabelled packaging. ...
The Green Party says that with no-cause evictions returning from today, the move to allow landlords to end tenancies without reason plunges renters, and particularly families who rent, into insecurity and stress. ...
The Government’s commitment to get New Zealand’s roads back on track is delivering strong results, with around 98 per cent of potholes on state highways repaired within 24 hours of identification every month since targets were introduced, Transport Minister Chris Bishop says. “Increasing productivity to help rebuild our economy is ...
The former Cadbury factory will be the site of the Inpatient Building for the new Dunedin Hospital and Health Minister Simeon Brown says actions have been taken to get the cost overruns under control. “Today I am giving the people of Dunedin certainty that we will build the new Dunedin ...
From today, Plunket in Whāngarei will be offering childhood immunisations – the first of up to 27 sites nationwide, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. The investment of $1 million into the pilot, announced in October 2024, was made possible due to the Government’s record $16.68 billion investment in health. It ...
New Zealand’s strong commitment to the rights of disabled people has continued with the response to an important United Nations report, Disability Issues Minister Louise Upston has announced. Of the 63 concluding observations of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), 47 will be progressed ...
Resources Minister Shane Jones has launched New Zealand’s national Minerals Strategy and Critical Minerals List, documents that lay a strategic and enduring path for the mineral sector, with the aim of doubling exports to $3 billion by 2035. Mr Jones released the documents, which present the Coalition Government’s transformative vision ...
Firstly I want to thank OceanaGold for hosting our event today. Your operation at Waihi is impressive. I want to acknowledge local MP Scott Simpson, local government dignitaries, community stakeholders and all of you who have gathered here today. It’s a privilege to welcome you to the launch of the ...
Racing Minister, Winston Peters has announced the Government is preparing public consultation on GST policy proposals which would make the New Zealand racing industry more competitive. “The racing industry makes an important economic contribution. New Zealand thoroughbreds are in demand overseas as racehorses and for breeding. The domestic thoroughbred industry ...
Business confidence remains very high and shows the economy is on track to improve, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis says. “The latest ANZ Business Outlook survey, released yesterday, shows business confidence and expected own activity are ‘still both very high’.” The survey reports business confidence fell eight points to +54 ...
Enabling works have begun this week on an expanded radiology unit at Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital which will double CT scanning capacity in Hawke’s Bay to ensure more locals can benefit from access to timely, quality healthcare, Health Minister Simeon Brown says. This investment of $29.3m in the ...
The Government has today announced New Zealand’s second international climate target under the Paris Agreement, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. New Zealand will reduce emissions by 51 to 55 per cent compared to 2005 levels, by 2035. “We have worked hard to set a target that is both ambitious ...
Nine years of negotiations between the Crown and iwi of Taranaki have concluded following Te Pire Whakatupua mō Te Kāhui Tupua/the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill passing its third reading in Parliament today, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “This Bill addresses the historical grievances endured by the eight iwi ...
As schools start back for 2025, there will be a relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly so all Kiwi kids grow up with the knowledge, skills and competencies needed to grow the New Zealand of the future, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. “A world-leading education system is a key ...
Housing Minister Chris Bishop and Associate Agriculture Minister Mark Patterson have welcomed Kāinga Ora’s decision to re-open its tender for carpets to allow wool carpet suppliers to bid. “In 2024 Kāinga Ora issued requests for tender (RFTs) seeking bids from suppliers to carpet their properties,” Mr Bishop says. “As part ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has today visited Otahuhu College where the new school lunch programme has served up healthy lunches to students in the first days of the school year. “As schools open in 2025, the programme will deliver nutritious meals to around 242,000 students, every school day. On ...
Minister for Children Karen Chhour has intervened in Oranga Tamariki’s review of social service provider contracts to ensure Barnardos can continue to deliver its 0800 What’s Up hotline. “When I found out about the potential impact to this service, I asked Oranga Tamariki for an explanation. Based on the information ...
A bill to make revenue collection on imported and exported goods fairer and more effective had its first reading in Parliament, Customs Minister Casey Costello said today. “The Customs (Levies and Other Matters) Amendment Bill modernises the way in which Customs can recover the costs of services that are needed ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Department of Internal Affairs [the Department] has achieved significant progress in completing applications for New Zealand citizenship. “December 2024 saw the Department complete 5,661 citizenship applications, the most for any month in 2024. This is a 54 per cent increase compared ...
Reversals to Labour’s blanket speed limit reductions begin tonight and will be in place by 1 July, says Minister of Transport Chris Bishop. “The previous government was obsessed with slowing New Zealanders down by imposing illogical and untargeted speed limit reductions on state highways and local roads. “National campaigned on ...
Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced Budget 2025 – the Growth Budget - will be delivered on Thursday 22 May. “This year’s Budget will drive forward the Government’s plan to grow our economy to improve the incomes of New Zealanders now and in the years ahead. “Budget 2025 will build ...
For the Government, 2025 will bring a relentless focus on unleashing the growth we need to lift incomes, strengthen local businesses and create opportunity. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon today laid out the Government’s growth agenda in his Statement to Parliament. “Just over a year ago this Government was elected by ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour welcomes students back to school with a call to raise attendance from last year. “The Government encourages all students to attend school every day because there is a clear connection between being present at school and setting yourself up for a bright future,” says Mr ...
The Government is relaxing visitor visa requirements to allow tourists to work remotely while visiting New Zealand, Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis, Immigration Minister Erica Stanford and Tourism Minister Louise Upston say. “The change is part of the Government’s plan to unlock New Zealand’s potential by shifting the country onto ...
The opening of Kāinga Ora’s development of 134 homes in Epuni, Lower Hutt will provide much-needed social housing for Hutt families, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “I’ve been a strong advocate for social housing on Kāinga Ora’s Epuni site ever since the old earthquake-prone housing was demolished in 2015. I ...
By Caleb Fotheringham, RNZ Pacific journalist Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown says the deal with China “complements, not replaces” the relationship with New Zealand after signing it yesterday. Brown said “The Action Plan for Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP) 2025-2030” provides a structured framework for engagement between the Cook Islands ...
The government should not set military style academies into youth justice law, the children's commissioner says, despite its first bootcamp getting a glowing report. ...
The infamous over-the-suit T-shirt worn by the PM at a Parliament barbecue has gone on sale to raise funds for children living in poverty, in a TradeMe auction. ...
MONDAYSheriff Seymour rode slowly down the main street of Dodge on his faithful white horse Atlas Network.He liked what he saw.Children were being fed free lunches prepared by kind people who collected the scraps from an offal rendering plant.“Very strongly flavoured liver, such as ox liver, can be soaked overnight ...
Once upon a time it was all about being an astronaut, a firefighter or doctor; but these days kids have their sights set on becoming vloggers or YouTubers.That’s according to a 2019 study by Lego that surveyed 3000 children between the ages of eight to 12 from the US, the ...
Madeleine Chapman reflects on the week that was. From the moment I started high school and realised almost every other girl in my year was at least partially interested in what the boys were up to, I realised that I would be single for life. The feeling wasn’t one of ...
The Pacific profiles series shines a light on Pacific people in Aotearoa doing interesting and important work in their communities, as nominated by members of the public. Today, Selina Alesana Alefosio.All photos by Geoffery Matautia.On a bright Sunday morning from her grandparent’s home in Pito-one, I spoke with ...
The White Lotus star reflects on her life in TV, including the local ad reference that doesn’t work in Australia, and her bananas co-star on Neighbours.Morgana O’Reilly was scrolling her phone next to her sleeping son on an idle Saturday morning when she got the call confirming that she ...
Claire Mabey explores the pros and cons of puff quotes on book covers.In January, Publishers Weekly put out an article by Sean Manning – publisher of Simon & Schuster’s flagship US imprint – in which he said he’d “no longer require authors to obtain blurbs for their books”.The ...
New Zealand’s Entomological Society is hosting its annual bug of the year contest. Here are some of the insects in the running. For some reason – perhaps humans’ inherent competitiveness, the idealisation of democracy, the need to demarcate winners and losers – one of the best ways to get people ...
A journey along the border, with words and illustrations by Bob Kerr.The Spinoff Essay showcases the best essayists in Aotearoa, on topics big and small. Made possible by the generous support of our members.The Sunset Limited leaves Union Station New Orleans on time at nine in the morning. We ...
Neville Peat is the 2024 recipient of the Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement in nonfiction. He’s written 56 books, mostly on natural history; this excerpt is from The Falcon and the Lark: A New Zealand High Country Journal, first published in 1992. The falcon wintering on the Rock and ...
It was a light-hearted gesture Greta Pilkington will be forever grateful for – thanks to an Aussie rival who jumped in when the Olympic sailor couldn’t be at her own graduation.Pilkington, then 20, had been leading a double life – while qualifying for the 2024 Paris Olympics in the ILCA ...
I was born in the back of my grandfather’s ute, by an overgrown windbreak in a remote place called Wahi-Rakauyou can’t find on a map. I was born a girl but given the man’s name Harvey, as my dad always wanted a violent-minded boy to one day help him ...
“We’re not here to interfere in people’s property rights,” Ngāi Tahu’s Te Maire Tau has told the High Court.Tau, a historian, Upoko (traditional leader) of Ngāi Tūāhuriri, and a university professor of history, is the lead witness in a case designed to force the Crown to recognise the tribe’s rangatiratanga ...
Pacific Media Watch Trump administration officials barred two Associated Press (AP) reporters from covering White House events this week because the US-based independent news agency did not change its style guide to align with the president’s political agenda. The AP is being punished for using the term “Gulf of Mexico,” ...
By Lydia Lewis, RNZ Pacific Presenter/Bulletin editor France’s top diplomat in the Pacific region says talks around the “unfreezing” of New Caledonia’s highly controversial electoral roll are back on the table. The French government intended to make a constitutional amendment that would lift restrictions prescribed under the Nouméa Accord, which ...
By bringing these global voices to the fight for free expression in New Zealand, we’ll continue to protect and expand our culture of free speech, says Nathan Seiuli, the Free Speech Union's Events Manager. ...
The issue is no longer a hypothetical one. US President Donald Trump will not explicitly suggest death camps, but he has already consented to Israel’s continuing a war that is not a war but rather a barbaric assault on a desolate stretch of land. From there, the road to annihilation is ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Cecelia Cmielewski, Research Fellow, Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University To be selected as the artist and curator team to represent Australia at the Venice Biennale is considered the ultimate exhibition for an artistic team. To have your selection rescinded, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steve Turton, Adjunct Professor of Environmental Geography, CQUniversity Australia Severe Tropical Cyclone Zelia is bearing down on the northwest coast of Australia and is likely to make landfall early Friday evening. It’s a monster storm of great concern to Western Australia. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Danielle Ireland-Piper, Associate Professor, ANU National Security College, Australian National University A Victorian government decision to allow dingo culling in the state’s east until 2028 has reignited debate over what has been dubbed Australia’s most controversial animal. Animals Australia, an animal welfare ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hassan Vally, Associate Professor, Epidemiology, Deakin University Overnight, Robert F. Kennedy Jr was confirmed as the secretary of the US Health and Human Services Department. Put simply, this makes him the most influential figure in overseeing the health and wellbeing of more ...
Everything you missed from day five of the Treaty principles bill hearings, when the Justice Committee heard eight hours of submissions.Read our recaps of the previous hearings here.It was another work from home day for the Justice Committee, the only people in Room 3 being security guards, committee ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milad Haghani, Associate Professor & Principal Fellow in Urban Risk & Resilience, The University of Melbourne Juris Teivans/Shutterstock In Australia, fatal road crashes are climbing again, especially since the pandemic, and despite years of attempts to reduce road trauma, the numbers ...
In its eagerness to appease supporters of Israel, the media is happy to ride roughshod over due process and basic rights. It’s damaging Australia’s (and New Zealand’s?) democracy.COMMENTARY:By Bernard Keane Two moments stand out so far from the Federal Court hearings relating to Antoinette Lattouf’s sacking by the ...
“The reality is we’re getting poorer. The government this year is leaning heavy on chasing economic growth, which is absolutely the right thing to do.” ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 The Vegetarian by Han Kang (Granta, $28) Han Kang’s astounding novel was based on an ...
This new docuseries about two single comedians looking for love is also a joyful celebration of female friendship. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. “How many people do you think are boning right now?” Kura Forrester asks Brynley Stent as the bright ...
When the New National Party (NNP) undresses itself in private, it is the Real National Party (RNP), the same as it was when it put on its latest NNP clothes.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/kahu/rob-campbell-theres-a-desperate-hunt-on-for-the-mythical-nnp/A74EKBZFDNB27NKFGG5XG4YO2A/
That is a very good take from Mr Campbell..
It's a companion piece to the atlas post…
The Labour Government was criticised widely for "selling" its programmes poorly, especially 3 Waters.
""We're very worried that they seem to think there's something that needs to be changed. And we're not seeing what they're trying to fix at this stage. We don't understand why they need to do this," he said."
This though, from NZEI Te Riu Roa president Mark Potter, is recent and was said in response to this NACTNZF Government's planned changes to the sex education curriculum.
I guess the same people who lambasted Labour for the poor sales job, will be clamouring to decry the present Governments poor communications.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/506348/government-accused-of-conspiracy-thinking-in-changes-to-sex-ed
My guess is that this is largely due to the No Debate stance around gender identity ideology. That's why we don't know what is going on, and it's why it's ended up playing out on social media among people that are often conservative, reactionary, or have abandoned the left and a committment to progressive values.
My guess is based on watching exactly this dynamic play out in the UK and the US as well as other countries. GII (gender identity ideology) was rolled out in schools without consultation, and people who tried to ask questions about it were called bigots and shut down. That of course shut up the progressives who had concerns, because ostracisation via accusations of bigotry is a very strong tool among left liberals. The right, centrists and apolitical people care nearly as much and the result is that they are now in charge of the narrative, and in places like NZ that have a RW government and No Debate, they are in charge of policy and legislation now too.
One of the things that is happening is that the right get to redefine not just GII but all of sex and sexuality education, and of course they're going to do that conservatively, because that is their values.
This is an utter failure by the left. We cannot in any way complain about NACTF not being forthcoming with information, when the left has been running No Debate and ostracisation for years.
There is some hope. In the UK, despite a Tory government there is also a strong grassroots gender critical feminist movement (GCF). Those women and men as allies span the whole spectrum of society from MPs and academics to mums and working people, who are socially liberal and who generally support trans people, but want limits on things like women's spaces and transitioning of children.
So there is a tempering there of the push from the right. This is what should be happening in NZ. In the UK women and men lost jobs and careers over this, but stood up anyway. Fewer have done that in NZ, and we don't have the same kind of grassroots activism culture, so it's harder. It's leaving the power with the more conservative and reactionary people.
The best thing the left could do right now is stop ostracising GCFs, and allow an open and wide debate about the issues that matter to people. There is no way to win progressive gains if we don't bring people along, and there is no way to win a war that seeks to remove the rights of women and children. We're in a stalemate. I don't expect the left do this, I expect them to carry on with the own goals until either NACTF fall apart or we are thrown into the next major crisis (climate, economic, oil).
This is the worst possible time for the left to be failing to get to grips with the culture wars, but I think the base cause is the same as the crises, neoliberal capitalism and fear.
Thanks for the full names, Weka.![wink wink](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/wink_smile.png?x42494)
But more importantly thank you for making me aware of the No Debate stance. I had sensed this approach but not been able to understand or articulate it.
I felt it some years back when I realised that there had been a major shift in trans rights in particular and that many considered there now to be a default setting that couldn't be questioned.
I wondered where the hell it had come from and if I had been asleep because I didn't recall any wide societal discussion or debate. It was like someone had lifted the arm on record player and we'd skipped a track on an LP.
And like Dorothy said, we weren't in Kansas anymore.
I never felt they sold it poorly they where just up against cashed anti everything national and other assorted conservatives.
the whole centralise away from the provinces thing was always going to play badly. That they definitely didn't handle well.
I think this is an over-simplification; they were trying (!) to increase (!) local/community input & oversight and to create the benefits of a centrally coordinated network with economics of scale. They failed, obviously, partly because they lost control of the narrative quite early on. The rest is history. IMO.
Norman Finkelstein: "Who do you attack when you target a hospital? You're destroying the lame, the nearly dead, the sick and the newborn."
The days of "No Debate" are over.
"The Tribunal Panel Judge Nicolle sitting with Non-Legal Members Ms Sandler and Ms Breslin found that both Ms Meade’s regulator and her employer had subjected her to harassment related to her gender-critical belief when SWE threatened her with fitness to practise proceedings and sanctioned her for misconduct, and then WCC suspended her on charges of gross misconduct before issuing a final written warning. By the time the case was heard, both the regulator’s sanction and the employer’s warning had been withdrawn, but Ms Meade had been suspended from work for a year and bullied into silence on the subject of proposed reforms of the Gender Recognition Act, the importance of safe single-sex spaces for women and related subjects.
This is a landmark decision. It is the first time a Regulator and an Employer have together been found to have been liable for discrimination relating to gender critical beliefs".
https://www.colekhan.co.uk/news/uvzuy6kcrtb5lwg59pxbs44tqbeuj2
excellent. Do you know if the actions by the regulator and employer predate the final Forstater judgement?
“Did the actions of the regulator and employer predate the final Forstater judgment?”
No, it didn't.
UK Guardian 21 June 2021
Maya Forstater: her gender-critical views of a researcher who lost her job at a thinktank after tweeting that transgender women could not change their biological sex are a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act, a judge-led panel has ruled.
JUDGMENT OF 8TH JANUARY 2024
WIN IN THE EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNAL – MS R MEADE V WESTMINSTER CITY COUNCIL AND SOCIAL WORK ENGLAND
e.g.
As against her employer, WCC:
3. The on-going refusal to lift the Claimant’s suspension in August and September 2021, in January 2022 and in February 2022 or at any time thereafter and despite requests from the Claimant to do so;
4. An investigation report which was hostile in tone and content, served on the Claimant on 6 December 2021;
As against her Regulator, SWE:
2. Being sanctioned by SWE’s Case Examiners on 8 July 2021;
3. The failure of SWE to set aside the Case Managers’ decision in September 2021 when presented with the evidence in support of the Claimant’s application for a review;
ODT, 10 Jan 2024: "High levels of toxic algae found in Waihopai river".
I wonder if Tourism NZ will feature that news on its website.
Whitebaiters net the Waihopai. Dog owners walk their pets along its banks.
kids swim in the Waihopai (or at least used to).
"[The American family] picnic on exquisitely packaged food from a portable icebox by a polluted stream … they may reflect vaguely on the curious unevenness of their blessings."
JK Galbraith
We seem to be headed the same way, given our leaders' desire to worship at the shrine of the economy. Where will your grandchildren fish, swim or paddle a canoe?
Hurrah!
"Australian miner sees few barriers to exploiting $8b Central Otago gold find"
"It also told investors that it had a clear pathway to obtaining a mining permit, advising them that a “new pro-mining government” had been place in New Zealand since November."
https://www.thepost.co.nz/business/350143245/australian-miner-sees-few-barriers-exploiting-8b-central-otago-gold-find
They will be able to ship the gold from Tarras International Airport….Tarras is going off.
are you in favour of the airport beside the Clutha?
Nope…I'm against Tarras airport on climate change grounds….but I predict it will happen because AirNZ and Qantas want it.
Once Tarras opens Queenstown airport will no longer be viable and will close.
I predict activists will stop it happening. Higher confidence than usual because of the people with money who stopped the Wanaka Airport expansion and the people that live in the area being against it also probably having money. That combined with a very strong climate case that will bring out activists. Also, it's a rallying point.
(I don't really predict the outcome because I hate making predictions, but I do think there will be substantial resistance).
Many people, including myself, fought against any jets at Wanaka airport because the flight path was right over town and at low altitude.
One of the flight paths for Tarras airport will take it over Hawea and Hawea Flat but at such a height that the sound will be mitigated-it is 29km from Tarras Airport to Hawea Flat, further to Hawea..
Many people in Queenstown/Frankton want that airport closed because of plane noise which is certain to increase in the future. It is also recognised as a dangerous airport to land/take off and the runway is too short to permit wide body planes-Tarras will cope with wide body planes.
The land under Queenstown airport is probably worth $1.5 billion and is 75% community owned so closing the airport would give the QLDC a major windfall. The land under the airport will be able to be developed in a manner that provides for the future…university…hospitals….schools…council offices….affordable housing … etc etc.
Some business people will scream about losing Queenstown airport but many in the population will be happy to see it go.
oh yeah, I'm aware that some in Queenstown are keen. But they need to sort out their own problems, not pass them on to other people/places.
what does that mean? Will they hear the planes or not?
There are lots of people in Central Otago, even in Queenstown, who think there should be limits on growth. For obvious reasons. You'd think Queenstown of all places would get that.
To the workshops of those great French jewellers …
… Tarras to Paris here we come!
The miners spruiking this scheme sound very optimistic. The regional council is no doubt all for it and will probably keep environmental restrictions to a minimum if the promoters promise to employ a few locals as navvies.
But where will they put the mine tailings and other refuse? Te Aroha residents will tell you what can go wrong (taxpayers had to foot a $15 million cleanup bill for the Tui mine because the miner went bust and had paid no bond).
Google "Lessons to be learnt from toxic legacy", Waikato Times, 2013.
Some summertime weirdness.
The story till now. A coalition policy of removal and replacement of the gender, sexuality, and relationship-based education guidelines (guidelines were introduced in 2020 by then-associate education minister Tracey Martin, who was a New Zealand First MP).
Last year
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/503418/axing-sexuality-relationship-education-guidelines-would-be-huge-mistake-warns-co-writer
This year
So far clear enough.
He is replying to this from Luxon last year
The last bit is surprising as withdrawing children is something parents can do now
https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/01/10/sex-education-govt-accused-of-conspiracy-based-thinking/
This is where it gets to the summertime wierdness
That is, the government did not legislate changes in the 100 day plan and so the year would go ahead with existing policy.
The urgency is related to development a replacement for 2025.
Someone else can do a post on developing a replacement as per the criticism of existing policy from Emeritus professor Sue Middleton
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/503418/axing-sexuality-relationship-education-guidelines-would-be-huge-mistake-warns-co-writer
I'm not sure what is weird there. This was wholly predictable. I put a comment above under Robert's post about the Gender Critical aspect being central to everything in that. The left gave the right and open door to attack all sex/sexuality education.
Let's just hope there are some in NACTF who aren't completely insane as well and we end up with a more socially conservative but still liberal curriculum rather than something ultra right. I don't know the MPs well enough to know what is most likely.
Also, no fucking point in developing something in the community if No Debate is being run.
Raising the issue of needing more information while MP's (Minister and Cabinet) are at the beach and doing so as per the formation of a replacement policy for 2025.
The only immediate issue would be impact on the curriculum for 2024 if there was a withdrawal of the guidelines before there was a replacement.
PS Where changes are top down, the consultation is then between schools and parents.
sorry, still not following. Who raised the issue of needing more information? (apart from when it was raised last year).
Last year
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/503418/axing-sexuality-relationship-education-guidelines-would-be-huge-mistake-warns-co-writer
This year
https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/01/10/sex-education-govt-accused-of-conspiracy-based-thinking/
is Potter politicking?
He's back at work, others are not.
A concern as to what happens if the 2021-2023 teacher practice is impacted by withdrawal of the guidelines this year (and if so, when), before they are replaced (not possible for 2024).
What do you define as a "more socially conservative but still liberal curriculum"?
teaching the basics of biological sex, social aspects of sex, and sexuality, and not teaching children that it's possible and desirable to change sex would be a start.
a hard core RW conservative position would teach abstinence to teens as an example of illiberal conservatism. An out of control neoliberal position would prioritise gender identity over biological sex, and lie to children that bio sex can be changed and that this is a good thing (eg disabling surgeries and hormones).
I'm arguing what should be in the curriculum here. I'm pointing to a middle ground that might stop this being a complete disaster while the gender/sex conflict is being resolved.
"teaching the basics of biological sex…" – biology class, surely?
"… social aspects of sex…" who will dictate what those are? Old folks? Religious folks? The community?
"…and sexuality…" ummm…isn't that in place already?
2. just use the curriculum basics we have already
3. yes. Did you miss the point of my comment?
When did/will Kiwi teachers start "teaching children that it's possible and desirable to change sex"?
Teaching about the feminine-to-masculine spectrum of human identity and behaviours, and that some aspects of identity are changeable and/or not (pre-)determined by (immutable) biological sex, is OK, imho. My initial thinking was firmly binary, but posts and comments on TS have changed that.
Imho, most trans identities are natural – Kiwi society determines what are acceptable trans (and non-trans) behaviours, and that will continue to evolve.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_views_on_transgender_topics#Oceania
https://genderequal.nz/what-we-want/
https://www.hrc.org/resources/sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity-terminology-and-definitions
there have always been gender non-conforming people, throughout time and place.
Gender Identity ideology is new.
Lots of gender critical feminists are gender non-conforming.
What is the feminine to masculine spectrum of human identity and behaviours? Is it based on gender stereotypes and gender roles? Are those roles meaningful outside of gender stereotypes?
One of the things that happens is some trans women believe that being a woman is having big breasts and wearing make up and such. Do you think that is anything to with being a woman?
Human societies are always generating new ideas. Time will tell whether the concept/ideology of gender identity becomes firmly established.
Not sure if this addresses your first question, but consider the idea that a few people exhibit a preponderance of exaggerated behaviours (stereo)typically associated with females (so represent a 'hyperfeminine' identity), a few people exhibit a preponderance of exaggerated behaviours (stereo)typically associated with males (so represent a 'hypermasculine' identity), and most of us exhibit a mix of less exaggerated feminine and masculine behaviours.
For example, "males on average are biologically predisposed to systemise, to analyse, and to be more forgetful of others, while females on average are innately designed to empathise, to communicate, and to care for others",
but "you cannot deduce the psychological characteristics of any person [just] by knowing their sex."
Imho, females who are naturally inclined to exhibit (some) typically masculine behaviours, and males who are naturally inclined to exhibit (some) typically feminine behaviours, can be examples of societal strength in diversity. Potentially incongruent combinations (of feminine or masculine identity/behaviour, and immutable biological sex) are personal, and best resolved (or not) on an individual basis – live and let live.
I don't; some people do. This televised statement has stuck in my mind much longer that I would have wished (over 20 years):
Society is continuously (re)constructed by of all kinds of women and men.
https://argumentswithfriends.substack.com/p/what-hutt-valley-high-school-is-teaching
don't worry, it's bonkers and it's hard to believe. This is part of how No Debate has been so damaging. We didn't get to talk about this stuff, and now it's there and no-one can quite believe it.
I've just read this conversation and it confirms my suspicion Tinetti was being disingenuous in her concerns.
Y'all above have been discussing the gender aspect of the
indoctrinationeducation guidelines.She put the spotlight on consent issues, which to the best of my knowledge, almost all of us can get to a general consensus on.
When it came to gender issues, like lots of folk who don't have a strong argument, she starts littering her korero with "conspiracy".
Blissfully unaware of the controversy around gender, so indoctrinated by ideology, she had to look up 'woke gender curriculum'.
Rest assured weka, being a GCF, you have merely been duped by a "imported culture war". So patronising, so condescending, and oddly familiar to those who found themselves on the wrong side of the state's Covid reaction.
I see the similarities with the pandemic resistors too, despite not agreeing with them on on some significant points. The condescension is just stupid.
I supported the idea of 3 Waters because it likely contained a policy of national water supply which frees the councils from the responsibility of managing their water supply so they can do more with managing infrastructure that the government do not concern itself with. As far as I'm concerned, the more nationalised/nationally shared resources we can get, we get better councils as a result.
We can get the councils to focus far more on local infrastructure instead of having to concern themselves with water maintenance and management if we can get around to nationalising water and electricity along with railways and if possible healthcare.
God, that could mean better cities! Better towns! More physically & sensorally accessible cities and towns in Aotearoa/NZ!![😀](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f600.svg)
All the draft Council budgets should come out for public consultation at the end of March.
So March through to June will be the window we have to show the relationship between water availability, water quality, water price, water ownership, and what our councils should do.
It's all on them now and it's what they all begged for.
En Marche.
Good to know…![😏](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f60f.svg)
I'll look at my locality and see what I can do in it.
I encourage you all to do it too.![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
Using the advertising approach of calling it "3 waters" was a mistake I think. Should have just called it "water infrastructure" or "drinking water, storm water and sewage services"
The disingenuous would have found "STOP water infrastructure!" or "STOP drinking water, storm water and sewage services!" slogans less useful.
Wot uncooked said..
Three waters sounds like a new mineral water drink…
Meaningless pap..
3 Waters is an elegant and descriptive title.
It was polluted by the Right.
True, it was the right that took advantage. But no need to make it easier for them (and yes, they would have come up with some vapid attack slogan regardless, I suppose)
If we can accept that shaman from all manner of cultures are able to shape-shift and become birds, panthers, lizards etc, then it must be that a male shaman could become a woman, yes?
it's the difference between imaginative and material reality. We can be shamans, but shamans still exist within the laws of nature. Shamans don't become panthers in material reality ie no-one can independently observe them as a panther. The problem isn't with material reality, it's that the west believes that material reality is god and that imaginative reality is either stupid or ok but needs to be put in its place. Sane cultures do both/and.
The gender/sex fight is over the definition of 'woman'. Many people believe that women = biologically female. It's simply not possible for humans to change from one biological sex to the other (there are some animals and plants that can, but not humans).
Other people believe that 'woman' is a feeling. So if a man feels like they are a woman, they can be one literally. This is obviously a nonsense in relation to biological reality, so the issue becomes should the needs of gender non-conforming men take priority over the rights and reality of women? And how should society manage that in terms of law, policy, resources etc.
My own view is that men as a class need to do the mahi of making it acceptable for men to be gender non-conforming so that they don't have to try and colonise women's culture. And support women to have our own politics, thanks.
So, we've paddled in the shallow end of indigenous cultures, such as those who have lived in Australia for tens of thousands of years, but we haven't really given ourselves over to the deeper parts of those cultures.
Goethe encourages deep-observation of plants in order to become the plant.
Holding tight the supremacy of material over spiritual is where we in the Western World are failing, is it not so?
Ursula LeGuin had much to say about this and she wasn't, I believe, joking![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
Yes, but we don't become a plant in material reality, right? What we do is develop a relational connection with the plant that shifts our consciousness. All very good.
What's not so good is trying to remedy the western overemphasis on material reality with pseudo-spirituality. I'm not being pejorative there, GII isn't a spirituality, but it has aspects of religion that are problematic as a belief system but very problematic when adopted as societal rules.
Here's one of the consequences of allowing dogmatic beliefs to override material reality,
https://twitter.com/FreyaManslayer/status/1744524603257422208
you can click through the quote tweets to see other examples.
What I want to know is why the left is sanctioning an ideology into law, policy and society that enables this.
Le Guin did have some things to say about child abuse. She centred Therru in the later Earthsea books for really good reasons.
"Yes, but we don't become a plant in material reality, right?"
Wrong, but we'll need to explore the true meaning of "become"![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
Māori, I'm told, by some Māori, believe their maunga tapu is IN FACT their ancestor/gggggggggrandfather/mother.
Are we to dismiss that claim as "imagination"?
why would you put imagination in quotation marks? Doesn't that diminish the experience of understanding the land as our ancestor? If we understand imagination as being as important as material reality, there's no problem with understanding that some people experience the land as ancestor, is there?
Besides, science shows us that humans and plants share ancestry, so it's not too much of a stretch of the… imagination.
In what way do you believe that humans can become a plant in material reality?
Because imagination has a micro and/plus a macro meaning. Most use its micro form – I wanted to draw attention to the need for thinking more deeply about the word.
What do you mean by "material reality" (quoting from your comment.
"Some people" (again), scoff at the idea that a mountain could be anyone's great etc. grandfather, (in reality).
Who is right?
Are you suggesting multiple realities?
If so, could their not be a reality where men can be women, if their imagination allows it?
What are the micro and macro meanings of the word imagination?
this is a great question, I will answer in a different comment.
What do you mean by reality there?
I thought I already answered this. In physical reality, no, it's just not possible. Men can pretend to women in physical reality but that's not the same thing.
If men can be women, then there is no such thing as biological reality, which is obviously nonsense.
If you mean can men be women in the imaginal realm, the problem here, in this context, is that we are now neck deep in an ideology that has powerfully influenced law, policy and society as if it were physical reality. This is both a lie, and it impacts on women and children. Women in particular have been told to shut the fuck up. We won't.
It's not possible to have the conversation about the imaginal realm until the people who want men to imagine themselves women stop trying to remove women's rights. Maslow's hierarchy of needs probably comes in at this point. Absolutely no way will support the progress of an ideology that comes at the expense of a 12 year old girl being sexually assaulted. It would be corrupt to do so.
I'm less interested in determining who is right, than I am in exploring the chasm between literal thinkers, imaginative thinkers, and those of us that can think in both at the same time. I'd call it decolonisation of the western mind but that would create another set of communication problems![😉](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f609.svg)
"What are the micro and macro meanings of the word imagination?"
"That's just your imagination" as opposed to, "Imagination is the most powerful tool humans possess".
I think your views on your pet issue are limiting your … imagination![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
You say, "pretend", I say, "be".
We can pretend the mountain is our ancestor, or it can be.
how do you think I'm using the word imagination? Because I've been arguing to not diminish it as 'just imagination'.
Imagination is indeed an very powerful tool. All the more reason to not be in denial of material reality while using it. That's dangerous.
You haven't said how, but let me guess. You think that my position that men cannot become women is a limit of my imagination. I can imagine people imagining themselves as a panther, but if some dude or chick from Timaru was setting themselves up as a shaman who had a panther ally and was running workshops based on ripping off natives, at a $1000 a pop, I'd have some political critiques about that too. Both/and.
sounds to me like you want to ignore material reality, the 12 year old girl who was sexually assaulted, and what women want. That's disappointing.
I didn't say anything about pretending to be a mountain. I don't see mana whenua relationship with their maunga in that way at all, so I'm asking you now to take a step back and consider that you are missing important aspects of what I am saying here.
weka; you're freaking me out!
I took some time to plant a dozen Japanese quinces and mull over something that's disturbing me and now, if I may…
…you wrote, "…sounds to me like you want to ignore material reality, the 12 year old girl who was sexually assaulted, and what women want. That's disappointing…."
Wtf???
"Material reality" – the topic of our discussion, and those examples you gave to show what specifically I am ignoring, seem way out of kilter to me. It's a "what about" set-up, isn't it? I made no mention of either/any of those examples, yet you've sheeted them to me and tarred me with the, "you haven't denounced" brush. This is what happened over the assaults during the Posie Parker protest; supporters of your position, your sisters in arms, charged me (and others) with failing to denounce actions that they found abhorrent. Is this the standard for putting forward a view (in this case on the nature of reality and the role of the observer) – a declaration of position on matters chosen by "your crew"?
It seems very strange indeed, to me. Perhaps there are others who baulked at this behaviour, I can't know.
Sorry to be freaking you out. Let me reread the thread and get my bearings on what has happened and come back to you and see if we can reconnect the conversation in a better way.
Okay, thanks, no rush.
Material reality in the gender/sex context refers to the stuff of the universe that exists and can be observed and interacted with but is fundamentally independent of human thought.
For instance, humans as a species reproduce via a sexual binary (female eggs, male sperm). There is no variant on that, it's an aspect of material reality that cannot be changed by human imagination. The only way to get a new human is by combining the stuff of the universe that is in the egg and in the sperm.
Even if we develop technologies that take us out of nature/evolution eg cloning humans, that still has to happen using the materials and rules of material reality. Our thinking might conceive of how to do that, but it still gets done with physical stuff.
I guess it's theoretically possible that at some point in the future, humans might be able to create a third sex. We're not even close to being able to think about how to that in real life, let alone grapple with the ethical issues.
So when people engage with plants, that exists in material reality, but they engage via non-material means… although in the case of Goethe, it's both/and, right? so let's say they engage with the plant via material and non-material realms, the person doing the engaging still has the physical body they were born with. That body doesn't acquire the capacity for photosynthesis for instance. Nor does she/he have physical roots that are in relationship with soil microbia.
So whatever else is going on with the process and experience, we can definitively say that the person doesn't not become a plant materially.
The reason this matters (haha) is that material reality is a really great thing! We do ourselves and the rest of nature a great disservice to be in denial of it. The denial of material reality is driving the great crises of the world. The disconnect from our innate spiritual relationship with nature is that too. But they're the same thing, not because they are the same thing, but because both exist as each and as one.
Sorry to go all esoteric there, but what I see happening often is people realising the west has lost the plot (mind/body split etc) and then they eschew material reality because Descartes said some stupid shit about it a while back. Why are we letting that unfortunate part of history drive our thinking?
(it's often observed the similarities between the great religions that sought to transcend the body, and GII which seeks likewise. Both hate women in our fantastically female and natural bodies).
"Material reality in the gender/sex context refers to the stuff of the universe that exists and can be observed and interacted with but is fundamentally independent of human thought."
Material reality must cover all contexts, surely?
In any case, what reality can you describe that is fundamentally different from human thought?
If a tree falls in a forest…"
not sure what you mean by cover, but I chose to explain in that particular context because that's how the conversation started (and because I’ve read some excellent philosophical discussions about material reality arising from the sex/gender conflict). We can talk about material reality in lots of contexts, is that what you mean?
everything that is not human exists in a reality that is independent from human thought. We can think about all the things, but when we are not thinking about them they still exist. I don't have to describe it, it just is.
I'm pretty sure my cat is either hunting rabbits or sleeping it off right now (or maybe doing some other cat thing), but whether I am aware of that or not, he's still out there doing it materially.
Glad you brought up cats![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
Mr Schrödinger had one.
"The prevailing theory, called the Copenhagen interpretation, says that a quantum system remains in superposition until it interacts with, or is observed by, the external world."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrödinger%27s_cat#:~:text=In%20Schrödinger%27s%20original%20formulation%2C%20a,poison%2C%20which%20kills%20the%20cat.
Schrodinger was making the point that the system described by quantum mechanics appeared ridiculus. The description produced is a distribution of probabilities for what will be observed. But this discussion makes the assumption that there is a reality which is exactly what is then observed in any experiment. The key insight should be that there is some missing part from quantum mechanics which if added allowed the exact outcomes to be found. Maybe this is related to fully integrating gravity into quantum mechanics. Its also possible that the resolution of measurement is too great a barrier to such experiments.
You've nailed it, Nic!
The basic product of philosophy (including logic and math) doesnt have to be true or observable. Thats just a basic fact of (human) thought. So it's a further demand of science that any models rejected by experiment should also be discarded. The question here seems to be should politics be expected to be conducted on a scientific understanding of society? Maybe in future we could prioratise the political issues of which ever fictional character appears in the ACT parties political advertising campaign?
Had to read that one several times![🙂](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f642.svg)
Could it be that one person’s myth is another person’s religion or reality?
For sure. Myth, religion and reality are each/all story, especially for us/we humans.I've seen/worked with, humans who can understand the story at all – it's not a pretty sight. Story is, of course, entirely manipulable, hence we can find ourselves/are in the thrall of powerful storytellers.
"Fantasy"writers such as Le Guin and Tolkien, when speaking/writing from their deepest selves, do not say myth is "not reality", or magic is "fantasy".
For the truth of the matter
Read T.H. White's "The Sword in the Stone" and how Merlin teaches young Arthur the true nature of reality.
You can "believe" anything you chose to believe. Fortunately, these days you cannot require other people to believe the same things. Mystical stuff belongs with mystical stuff. It is not biological reality.
Why the quotation marks around the first "believe" in your reply, Visubversa?
Human sex as binary can be quantified and verified.
Anything that says otherwise – without any measurable or testable criteria, is an article of faith. Thus 'belief'.
Science, eh!
It's cut and dried, this and never that.
All else is flim-flam.
See you around. I'm taking another break.
I need to plan stuff.
Thanks for your thoughtful post in the Atlas Smirked thread about where to from here. I'm still thinking about what that means for me where I am.
Kia kaha
One in a hundred thousand boasts 2023
Dead cat bounce says planet earth
https://www.climate.gov/media/15006
https://www.climate.gov/sites/default/files/graph-from-scott-wing-620px.png.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2024/01/scientists-confirm-2023-was-world-s-hottest-year-on-record.html
They must be reading TS![cheeky cheeky](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/tongue_smile.png?x42494)
https://www.labour.org.nz/news-labour_calls_on_govt_to_join_case_against_israel
A big shoutout to Mels Barton and Greg Presland, Forest and Bird Waitakere, Te Kawerau A Maki and all the good folk of Waima in Titirangi Auckland for the consent conditions that forced Watercare to work so hard for their new pump station.
Hard fought and a great focus for civic environmental activism over the last 5 years,
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU2401/S00020/watercare-receives-long-awaited-consent-for-huia-water-treatment-plant-replacement.htm
It will supply water to approximately 300,000 Aucklanders, about 20 per cent of Auckland’s water.
In particular top score to the neighbourhood team for squeezing out $8.25 out of Waitakere to put to local biodoversity and conservation work. Looking forward to really sound preparation for construction starting 2027.
how about we just say that there is no absolute reality….reality being just a grey matter construct anyway.
The faux news brain worm at work.
@Acyn
Right now, Fox is suggesting that Taylor Swift is a psyop because she posted a link to register voters.
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1744897719578055029
The Post-UMD poll finds 39 percent of Americans who say Fox News is their primary news source believe the FBI organized and encouraged the Jan. 6 attack, compared with 16 percent of CNN or MSNBC viewers and 13 percent who get most of their news from ABC, CBS or NBC. The poll finds 44 percent of those who voted for Trump say the FBI instigated the attack.
https://archive.li/y6OBh (wapo)
As we say at work..
... it's me, my, I'm the problem it's me
Golriz?
The woman has MS. Medications used to manage the symptoms of MS are a who's who of brain breakers that can affect moral decision making.
If Gharaman's medication is that severe on her judgement, why is she in Parliament making law? Shaw will need to give her a fair amount of sick leave while the prosecution goes through.
From the ocean to the sea
Scotties clothes shall be free!
So droll!
This from Kiwiblog a couple of hours ago:
Not hard to see where you get your talking points from but you could at least link and attribute material that is not yours.
Also interesting that NZ zionist and noted Islamophobe, David Farrar, made a special post about this to declare it to his followers.
Let us remind ourselves that David Farrar had to introduce gateway moderation to his blog after the Christchurch mass murders…
Considering I got it from the new zealand subreddit page I don't think I'll be linking to kiwiblog
Ok, mate. It's all the same and you still didn't attribute.
It's important to attribute so that members of this forum know where your reckons come from, and that your reckons are not actually your own.
I reckons you can stick your attributes up your forum
[You’re obviously a troll who tries to be funny and belligerently displays the usual lack of honesty and integrity and as such, your comments are piss-poor. You’ve been warned before for trolling. No more warning – Incognito]
Mod note
Noted
"It's important to attribute so that members of this forum know where your reckons come from…"
That's good to hear MB.
Now you will be able to answer the question asked by myself and weka.
https://thestandard.org.nz/daily-review-26-10-2023/#comment-1974357
After all, calling someone you don’t know a “militant, gender denying activist.” is othering and we know you don’t like that.
Don't hold your breath
Years ago, this was online from David Farrar:
It seems to have become 'fomenting.' Whichever it is, it's a great opportunity for posters on that site to start the year flaunting their appalling attitudes.
And for Farrar to play D J Trump: "People tell me that …", reality and fact become established and the invitation to swim in the sewer and ignorance is made and accepted.
Golriz Ghahraman is no indication of us living in a scummy country sad and wretched. You go to Farrar to see that.
The word "happy" is entirely inappropriate for Farrar's pitiful blog, which is (unsurprisingly, considering its proprietor) almost entirely hateful and virulently racist. This writer, i.e. moi, used to hang out there on my occasional periods of exile from The Standard (H/T Lin Prent, weka, Incognito, and Te Reo Putake).
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-18-04-2019/#comment-1609201
Superiority complex with victimhood tendencies is more common than people realise.
I don't see David Farrar as superior to anyone, and he's certainly not a victim.
I agree with you on both points. Never mind.
My kindest solicitations to you, Mr Incognito.![heart heart](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/heart.png?x42494)
Some people have made up their minds already.
Shaw stood her down from portfolios not me.
The Green leadership have made the judgement.
You did say the prosecution was going through. That might happen but it hasn't happened yet. Not that a detail like that stops a resident of Wānaka from the declaration.
So, Ad has (not to mention the nonentity R the Goodfellow) found her guilty regardless? Maybe no-one, including herself, was aware of the possible effect on her.
Either something went radically wrong for her, or she is the latest manifestation of DP. Whatever, I feel sympathy for her. She is a very intelligent young woman.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/506410/green-mp-golriz-ghahraman-stands-aside-from-portfolios-after-being-accused-of-shoplifting
You are the poster child for the Trump defence that all politicians are immune from prosecution.
The Green Party are already in contact with Scotties.
Presumably a statement tomorrow morning.
Bullshit.![🙄](https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/svg/1f644.svg)
Innocent until proven guilty but if found guilty I hope she gets a conviction and that its the end of her career.
I'm bloody sick of politicians running around acting like the rules don't apply to them, the behaviour of MPs in the last year has been disgusting.
We've had MPs boast about trying to interfere in court matters, lying about getting rid of their shares to cabinet, resisting arrest, a former or current I don't keep track with the torys getting thrown off a plane and not being charged for it and now we have one allegedly shoplifting.
If she's guilty I believe all MPs as representatives of the public should face the harshest available punishment according to the law broken (laws that they write) if they break a law.
She gets paid boat loads and is just a list mp.
I hope it's all a beat up but the public is sick to death of our representatives acting like the laws they write don't apply to them.
It's a high pressure job but noones forcing anyone to do it, individuals who are burnt out can should step down.
Normal people don't have the options or the money or the resources these people do.
Kiri Allen was not charged with resisting arrest. Refusing to accompany is the one applying with driving a car offences (charged with careless driving).
The legal issue is covered in this story – I suspect she will lose given the type of incident and normal practice takes away the relevance of a lawyer etc.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/kiri-allan-car-crash-former-justice-minister-explains-why-shes-pleading-not-guilty-to-car-crash-charges/QVKEJEBHJJCRDEBOWWDY4KDJ7E/
Corey, can you finish this sentence?
Innocent until proven guilty but if found innocent I hope she gets …
Never said she was guilty but it is funny
Ad, I know I said I was taking a break, however, if it's MS, then please leave her alone on that topic.
It's never ever anybody's fault that anybody has a disability and it is not her fault that she has MS and there is a lot of value in having someone with a disability or sickness being in politics and its sphere than if there was nobody in politics with such a background.
We need more people with disabilities and sicknesses to be represented in Aotearoa/NZ politics, not less.
These are perilous times and a lot of lives are on the line. It's only fair that we have political representation regardless of the times we find ourselves in.
That's all.
"… and there is a lot of value in having someone with a disability or sickness being in politics and its sphere than if there was nobody in politics with such a background".
Value lies in comprehensive research, consultation with advocates and appropriate consideration for those with sickness and disabilities.
The idea that representatives are required is flawed. Perspectives, and needs should be represented and that should be done by standard processes.
So, no need for women in politics?
Men who do "comprehensive research, consultation with advocates and appropriate consideration for (women) ", would suffice?
Given the experience of women on here, it is unlikely that many men have the capability of achieving "comprehensive research, consultation with advocates and appropriate consideration ".
However, relying on this to be rectified by including a female representative – who may also fail at the above – is a flawed notion.
The processes should be improved.
nevertheless, if you argue that representation isn't needed, what would an appropriate process look like for say a group making decisions about women where that group was all men.
If those men – actually understood and gave due consideration to the needs of women – and effectively represented and advocated for them, then they are more effective than a group of women who do not.
The fact of being female – doesn't mean you are an effective advocate for women.
Any representative – while they may be exceptional advocates for a particular demographic also have to ensure that all other consitituents are represented as well. ie. a politician concerned about women's health, uses processes that serve specific health needs for men.
I don't think anyone has suggested a group of women who don't understand or give due consideration to the needs of women, so that's the wrong comparison.
The comparison is between qualified women and qualified men, all other things being equal, would a group that included women do better for women than a group of men?
Sure, but that ensuring might be by recoginising the limits of one's own knowledge base and experience and making sure that the relevant experience and knowledge is included via people of the class being affected.
No-one can represent everyone all the time at the level required.
Men will never be as good as women at understand childbirth for instance. Yes, the women representing birthing women should have given birth and be qualified. And that makes them better at the job than men. I'm not talking individual exemptions to the principle here.
"The comparison is between qualified women and qualified men, all other things being equal, would a group that included women do better for women than a group of men?"
If the processes are robust, they should achieve the same.
If you have a definitive answer, then that part of the process should be improved.
You did indicate that you believe there's no need for those most affected by policy to be central to policy delivery, hence my question.
please explain how.
using people with first hand experience is part of the standard processes. It doesn't preclude research, consultation and appropriate consideration, it adds to those things.
Meanwhile, across many sectors, we have seen that consultation with groups by people not of that group but who hold the power, leads to poor policy and outcomes.
In the disability area, an example would be town planning and the push towards cycling/walking and non-car spaces that pays lip service to disability and constantly gets it wrong. That is less likely to happen if people with disabilities were part of the planning process (and I don't mean the odd token person with a disability).
Having a disability in and of itself doesn't qualify, having an otherwise qualified person who also has a disability adds perspectives that are needed.
I'm not suggesting the processes are not flawed. They need to be improved to ensure that consultation, research and appropriate considerations are made. Advocates may be elected as representatives – all good – but should not be required for the processes to be effective.
Unfortunately, there are the usual political and administrative impediments to good representation. This can be addressed, with or without specific representatives.
ok, but you still haven't explained why. Would you mind putting your thinking out in more detail?
I believe I've been pretty clear. Processes should exist, and be in constant review for improvement, that ensures the needs of all people are represented in policies and governance.
This allows full-time advocates to concentrate on those they advocate for, without the additional time costs and burdens that as political representatives they should devote to other groups.
Consultation with such advocates – should definitely be part of a comprehensive and effective process.
I don't think I have anything further to add. Unless you have something specific you wanted to ask.
I have.
Who should design those processes?
They should already exist. It is apparent that if they do – they are inadequate. Have a look at who was consulted regarding policy at Sports NZ that would impact on women and girls in sports:
https://sportnz.org.nz/media/okjhw2n2/summary-of-feedback-final-1.pdf
But if you are happy with inadequate, inefficient and ineffective processes as long as a token representative is in place, that's your call. I have no inclination to spend time attempting to change your mind.
"… inadequate, inefficient and ineffective processes as long as a token representative is in place…"
Is that the case?
@Robert Guyton
"Is that the case?"
We are coming across a familiar occurrence, where you appear to lose sight of the original point of discussion.
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-10-01-2024/#comment-1984131
You may have a long lifespan ahead of you, but mine is too short to spend further time while I wait for you to regroup and catch up.
Carry on without me. It seems my comments are unnecessary for you to misconstrue what I say anyway.
I am myself a disabled person and I have had some experience in politics and I do not like that you think to exclude our bodies and minds by delegating our politics to some well-meaning people all the time. Allies matters, however, there's never a true substitute for authenticity. Sure, there's stinkers and pull-up ladderers in our group, however, that's par for the course for politics. We can't help these who would backstab us or destroy our gains. That's the risk. We should strive nonetheless.
There is nothing better than somebody who can understand and gets it completely and helps you to the degree that even allies cannot. Having agency and power to make your own future is not to be underestimated. It turns you from being a spectator to someone who can do what you think is best for better or worse.
Agency and the ability to execute our own political agenda is extremely vital. All successful political social/economic movements ever created has leaders, representatives and followers who has the authentic experience and lives that comes of going through that sort of experience.
What this tells me is that we still need more people who knows what it's like to be disabled and gets it and can work for us.
Allies are always valuable and are appreciated and should be treasured, however, one thing is clear, it's ultimately our lives that we should be in control of, not be controlled by others. Having ourselves being able to find a way to empower and make our life better means we will be more able to pull our weight to help you right back to make a better future for all.
That is what matters. Being able to be on a more equal basis with other people. We would be more able to make a more universal society where we can be more able to be more involved in all of our futures.
Nothing about all of us without all of us.
And – I was not talking about tokenism nor advocating for such. I am advocating for a fuller vision of disabled people being woven more into the fabric of our greater society. It was always implicit in my argument that disabled people with some prior knowledge of the matters affecting ourselves were going to be what I was pushing for. Tokenism was never the aim. That you think any of what I was talking about was going to lead to Tokenism is not what I’m aiming for with my arguments: I’m aiming for addition and participation and agency and ability to exercise our voice and power amongst many in our society.
Your arguments seem to imply that we don't place any value on expertise, only representation when I don't actually think that. Ultimately, I am saying that we need more representation in the halls of power with actual expertise and plenty of ability to wield such expertise on the same basis as able-bodied people who we are working with on our own affairs and lives.
Nothing about us without us is what we are saying basically. We need to have power and a say in our own future as disabled people so we can return the favour to everyone else.
I fully support your views, Rolling-on-Gravel.
“The woman has MS. Medications used to manage the symptoms of MS are a who’s who of brain breakers that can affect moral decision making.”
Speaking as someone who has a close friend with MS – this is deeply insulting. Medication side effects may affect your ability in a range of areas – however, your moral code is not one of them.
If she is indeed so affected by side effects of her medication, that she can't make rational decisions about every-day matters – then she does not belong in the high-pressure environment of the House of Representatives.
Personally, I doubt that this is the case.
"Medications used to manage the symptoms of MS are a who’s who of brain breakers that can affect moral decision making.”"
Is this then, not true?
List of common medications used to treat MS here – cognitive dysfunction – let alone affecting moral decision making- is not listed as a risk factor for any of them.
https://www.webmd.com/multiple-sclerosis/ms-treatment
Your list proves it then: no cognitive dysfunction from MS medications.
Those who think otherwise, no matter what their experience, are wrong, right?
I'd be surprised if all of the meds in that article had zero impact on cognitive function. Read joe90's comments as well.
As in many matters medical, it often helps to get a second expert opinion.
Maybe the medications that Ghahraman has been prescribed to treat her MS condition (diagnosed in 2018) don't adversely affect her cognition, and maybe the condition itself doesn't affect her cognition, but usually I'd prefer more than a single anecdotal claim (based on the experiences of one of Belladonna's close friends) about how MS and MS treatments can affect people, before coming to a conclusion – we're all individuals.
https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD011381.pub3/full
I'd prefer some actual evidence that MS medications can "affect moral decision making" which was the initial claim.
So far – zip.
Joe has clarified here,
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-10-01-2024/#comment-1984184
My reading now of the initial comment is that it was about cognitive impairment (from meds) that impact on ethical decisions, rather than the meds impairing ethics/morals.
Great. Glad he's walked that back.
This kind of poorly worded speculation potentially does a great deal of harm to all MS sufferers in the workplace. No one wants their boss to be thinking that their medication impacts on their ethics.
Nor, for the vast majority of MS sufferers (yet to see any evidence that it impacts any, but I'm willing to be convinced) – is there any impact of medication on their cognitive abilities or impulse control around decision-making.
People with MS already have a very hard row to hoe, with an 'invisible' disability. They don't need any added burdens arising from public misconception of the side-effects of the medication required to manage their condition.
fair points about the misconceptions about MS.
Anyone could have asked joe right at the start to clarify. It’s a shortcoming of our political debate culture.
Nah.
/
affect 1
/əˈfɛkt/
verb
verb: affect; 3rd person present: affects; past tense: affected; past participle: affected; gerund or present participle: affecting
"the dampness began to affect my health"
Fair call B – the human brain is a complex beast, so it's possible that MS medications (or the condition itself) could impair decision making (judgement, cognition etc.), without affecting moral decision making.
I don't know what Ghahraman did or didn't do at Scotties Boutique, why she did or didn't do it, whether her decision making was impaired and, if so, what might have contributed to the hypothetical impairment. Seems to be a lot of (pre)judgement given the apparent lack of facts.
That's politics for you.
SSRIs, SNRIs, and anticonvulsants are used in the management of MS symptoms.
Here, we investigated whether this hyperaltruistic disposition is susceptible to monoaminergic control. We observed dissociable effects of the serotonin reuptake inhibitor citalopram and the dopamine precursor levodopa on decisions to inflict pain on oneself and others for financial gain. Computational models of choice behavior showed that citalopram increased harm aversion for both self and others, while levodopa reduced hyperaltruism. The effects of citalopram were stronger than those of levodopa. Crucially, neither drug influenced the physical perception of pain or other components of choice such as motor impulsivity or loss aversion suggesting a direct and specific influence of serotonin and dopamine on the valuation of harm. We also found evidence for dose dependency of these effects. Finally, the drugs had dissociable effects on response times, with citalopram enhancing behavioral inhibition and levodopa reducing slowing related to being responsible for another’s fate.
https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(15)00595-3
Nothing about changing ethical behaviour. If you think it is not OK to steal (or cause pain to others, in your example), taking the MS drugs isn't going to change that ethical decision.
What may change is your appreciation of consequences for your actions. This is not ethics, it's risk/reward.
Medications that affect decision making don't affect ethical decisions.
Really?
I'm curious how you think they do. Cognition can obviously be affected, but morality? Do you mean that cognition is impaired and this makes decisions more difficult, or do you mean people's sense of morality is altered?
Related to my own experience with how SNRIs and an anticonvulsant prescribed to treat neuropathic pain altered my decision making processes, no.
It's more a loss of impulse control and decision making abilities combined with a brain fade/blank page/forgetfulness thing. More than once I found myself having to return to a shop because I'd simply forgotten to pay. Driving was diabolical, too. I'd look right and see a car and know that I had to give way, look left, forget about the car on my right, and off I'd go. Multiple near misses until I gave up driving.
The other biggie was suicide ideation. For someone who'd never ever thought about taking their own life, being preoccupied with self harm was as scary AF.
thanks for clarifying joe, that makes a lot of sense.
Do you think someone with that level of impairment, while in that period, should have the additional burden and responsibility of acting as a MP?
Yes, Really.
Taking medication doesn't change your ethics. It may change your risk assessment (you don't perceive the consequences of your actions) – but if you think something is 'wrong' before you start your course of medication you'll still think it is 'wrong' while you're taking the drugs.
Those "date-rape" drugs – do they affect decision-making?
Datura is famed for changing a person's behaviour, suggestibility, long-established reactions to threats to safety.
the issue isn't decision making (meds affect that), it's whether morals and ethics are affected.
Ethics and morals don't involve decisions?
Colour me surprised.
you’ve completely misinterpreted what I said. Care to try again?
I stayed out of this discussion for a number of reasons, but ethical behaviour and moral judgement/moral decision-making can be affected by a wide range of medical (and non-medical!) conditions and treatments, incl. medication, obviously. Anyway, a person’s ethical values and principles are not as hard & fast as some (many?) seem to think.
That’s all I want to say about this.
How concrete are morals and ethics under the influence of medications?
Are you suggesting rock-solid?
I'm not of that mind.
Pain, desperation, despair, hopelessness coupled with narcotics, soporifics, deliriant etc. can dissipate ethical and moral resolve, imo.
(I'm not referring to Golritz' situation here).
No, I’m suggesting that you are misinterpreting what I am saying.
It’s hard to have a conversation when that is happening.
Belladonna @ 15.1.2
I suffer from severe osteoarthritis and am on a 24 hour pain regime. The consequence of that regime – plus the pain I still have to endure – leaves me tired and absent minded. I have walked out of a shop a few times without paying and the assistant has had to call me back. Since I have to use a crutch to get around they seem to know it was not deliberate and there have been no problems.
I have no idea what happened to Gholriz Gharaman, but if she was under some stress from the drugs she has to take, it may have had a bearing on what happened. Certain drugs can have negative effects for some people but not others.
Anne, I agree that medication and long-term pain can cause absent mindedness or brain fog – but that's not what was being alleged here. The claim was that it can "affect moral decision making". Which is AFAIK, completely untrue – and deeply insulting to people with MS.
OK. I see where you are coming from. Perhaps the term "affect moral decision making" is not appropriate. People who are on drugs, including medically prescribed drugs, can sometimes act in a way which is not normal for them. Its possible this is what happened here. Time will tell.
I support your view, Anne.
You seem to have a friend for every occasion with respect to political discussion. It's quite remarkable.
Perhaps you could have a conversation with your friend about the affects a MS diagnosis has on mental health. How did your friend fare 1 year after diagnosis, 2 years? For instance, was it difficult to accept having their future potentially ripped away from them?
I believe everyone has a different experience of disease and medication and it seems to me you expect a lot from sufferers, and are being a bit mean about one particular sufferer, for political purposes.
That is the kind of comment which inclines me to believe that you have zero practical acquaintance with anyone with a long-term disability or medical diagnosis.
Fail to see in what way I was 'mean' about Ghahraman. I was pointing out that Joe90's claim that MS medication can "affect moral decision making" is bunkum. And dangerous bunkum, at that.
I am perfectly willing to believe (if and when there are some actual examples provided – which, so far, there have not been) that medication for MS can affect decision-making and/or risk/reward decisions. Certainly we see this as a side effect of treatment for other medical conditions. What it can't do is change people's ethics or morals.
Frame up, trying to discredit a young brown liberated woman who fights for the poor, LGBTQ and Palestine. No shortage of people who want her out.
Hell of a frame up if it gets someone to stand from their roles
That's the whole idea.
"Frame up" implies there is no truth to the allegations. If that were the case, Ghahraman would have vigorously denied the allegation (possibly with an associated libel claim) – and been supported by the Green Party.
The current actions (refusal to comment, coupled with removal from her portfolios), imply that there is a case to answer.
I only replied so you wouldn't feel bad