“…[Identity] politics is not an alternative to class politics; it is a class politics, the politics of the left-wing of neoliberalism. It is the expression and active agency of a political order and moral economy in which capitalist market forces are treated as unassailable nature.
An integral element of that moral economy is displacement of the critique of the invidious outcomes produced by capitalist class power onto equally naturalized categories of ascriptive identity that sort us into groups supposedly defined by what we essentially are rather than what we do. As I have argued, following Walter Michaels and others, within that moral economy a society in which 1% of the population controlled 90% of the resources could be just, provided that roughly 12% of the 1% were black, 12% were Latino, 50% were women, and whatever the appropriate proportions were LGBT people.
It would be tough to imagine a normative ideal that expresses more unambiguously the social position of people who consider themselves candidates for inclusion in, or at least significant staff positions in service to, the ruling class…”
It seems to me that identity politics is a sort of MMP thrust at the usual left wing advance onto right wing policies. When identity politics develop it is to get other people’s needs looked at, included and acted on. Without the theoretical language, that is how I see it in plain terms and without a lobby championing identity politics nothing gets done for the people in the group, they get vague promises but no action. Identity politics forces the hand of government to act.
The problem is when people in that identity group continue to be fused totally to their own demands, to be carried out to their own prescription, and stop looking at the whole range of problems facing us all, with themselves as part of the whole.
These days it is climate change and the commodification of people, loss of jobs, loss of job conditions, loss of regulation and control governing employers, the desire to increase poverty by neo liberal wealth screwers, automation, loss of humanity and the progress towards a better world, that loom as the large, inescapable challenges.
A driver in identity politics is the memory of past wrongs, added to present failures to better conditions for the particular lobby group, and the tendency to ignore the other disastrous memes and practices that threaten us all. That results in a neglect to face and fight the dragon menacing the village but sacrificing all to help the one vulnerable female in its jaws.
This is how I see it and I haven’t any links or quotes to provide other people’s thinking.
It is interesting to see Adolph Reed appears to be a black man. I haven’t time at present to read all of his essay and background and I don’t yet understand why he would take the stance he has adopted.
“The problem is when people in that identity group continue to be fused totally to their own demands, to be carried out to their own prescription, and stop looking at the whole range of problems facing us all, with themselves as part of the whole.”
Except that’s not how it generally works. If you look at feminism for instance, you can easily find a variety of feminists who are actively working on issues far beyond what the mainstream perceive women’s rights to be. Many feminisms are working for equal rights of all people, not equal rights for just women. And feminists working as activists are acutely aware of the bigger picture. Likewise for other things named as identity politics in a derogatory way.
The problem arises when you have superficial and in fact misleading analysis of the likes that CV gives eg the identity politics has ruined Labour. The reality is that Rogernomics ruined Labour, Labour members and activists and the rest of NZ let it happen. Of course one of the consequences to that is that certain inividuals of identity groups will be privilged and given more of a hearing than others (the ones who support neoliberalism and can work within that framework). Because co-option is a big part of how neoliberalism works.
But even where some groups are focussed in their needs to the exclusion of other things, it’s usually because they’ve been forced into that situation by the people in power and the general culture marginalising them. You only have so much time and energy and often the political climate means you have to use that shouting until you get heard.
Well my take on the problem of focus within identity politics is that to succeed within the ruling ideology it must first become, to some degree, complicit within the ideology.
A detailed argument in support of this contention requires more time than I have available however consider the following simile. In much the same way as union officials/spokespeople were feted by employer groups with the sole intention of wooing and personally obligating them to the employers purpose before then sending them back to the worker group with a resolution that was much less than that which was being demanded, so it is with identity groups within neoliberalism. Firstly the must surrender to the supremacy and inequality of the system. They must side with the ideology and walk over the needs of others before they are allowed to gain anything.
The extent to which one surrenders to, resists, avoids or escapes the system varies across any identity group doing political work, and the dynamic you describe applies to all politics, including those politics based on working class identity, and on economics.
I think more of an issue is to what extent a group’s politics are co-opted and where the indiviudals have bought into the system the most. Hence we have Margaret Thatcher and Jenny Shipley having been helped by feminism but having coopted feminism for anti-feminist work. The Māori Party could be seen as a group based on identity politics that has chosen to work within the system far more than most of us are comfortable with. But equally there are many feminists and Māori whose work is actively and even primarily working to replace the system.
Further, if we look at the place that second wave feminism arose from, many women were leaving traditional socialist groups precisely because the men working there were privileged by the patriachal system and not willing to look at that privilege as part of the politics of replacing ‘the system’. It’s pretty easy to argue that those men were affected by the dymnamic you name.
– that within neoliberalism the identity or any clique within the identity that gain success have not “won” that success but have been allowed it within a managed power framework. The extent and the terms of that success are always determined by the powerful. Then as its own strategy the Powerful adopts aspects of the identity, mainstreams it and make use of it for political and economic ends. At the same time it changes but never undermines an ongoing requirement for groupings of identified undeserving others.
I largely agree with that except that you are talking in absolutes. And that real change happens despite neoliberalism even where neoliberalism still exists.
Do you included class politics in what you are saying? Politics based on economic revolution? Politics based on ending capitalism?
Other than that I’m not sure what your point is. Are you saying that identity politics are a problem?
My point is basically one of solidarity in the pursuit of equality.Negotiated concessions to identity factions within the framework of neoliberalism acts to undermine the position of other disadvantaged in ways that make the concession politically pointless.
From the same article: This should not by any means be interpreted as a blanket condemnation of anti-racism, feminism, or other movements for social equality. Rather, it should be construed as a condemnation of a politics that is centered on social constructs like race or gender, rather than on material conditions.
it is not as if the author thinks that these movements are wrong in themselves, just that they cannot replace the more general struggle against entrenched material hardship. Moreover, in their early stages, anti-racist, anti-sexist, etc, movements focused largely on the link between social exclusion and material hardship. Under neoliberalism identity concerns have been slid into place as replacements for, rather than aspects of, the struggle for material justice. That is what the mantra “I am socially liberal but economically conservative” just means.
Thanks for the explanation Olwyn. I understand now, and it was plain to see but it is so confusing trying to sort out what effects and reasons each policy has.
The point of posting it was simply to open up a discussion of ideas. I don’t profess to totally agreeing with the link (although I am very sympathetic). More generally posting controversial views in good faith can hopefully stimulate a proper debate, and set readers thinking for themselves. Given the intellectual state of NZ in the current ambient dominant media-cultural environment my personal POV is that a blog like the Standard could productively host a separate (good faith and well moderated) forum for links to left wing intellectual discussions from the web. 🙂
The premise seems to be that identity politics is the wrong lens through which to look at societal problems. As though people must choose one lens and stick to it.
I think using the lens as a point, when looking at what needs to be done it should be with binoculars, not a telescope. I think that sizes up a lot of the misgivings felt about lobby groups sector divisions.
Is it possible to have a caption competition for the picture in the article from Audrey Young -NZ Herald – “Brave concession a real boost for NZers” from this morning 5am. It took me a long time to wipe the tears of laughter….
That is the second time that brave has been used by the herald for political issues recently!!
I note that the costs are high
The main application charge has been set at A$3600 per applicant, an extra A$1800 for partners and dependent children over 18 and A$900 for children under 18
Can Hillary Clinton be trusted to look after the interests of ‘everyday Americans’ when she won’t tell them what she told the BIG banks in the speeches they paid her to make?
Hillary Clinton Again Declines to Disclose What She Told Big Banks in Her Paid Speeches
Lee Fang
Feb. 20 2016, 4:34 a.m.
The guy in the audience said it was a matter of trust. “Please just release those transcripts so we know exactly where you stand,” he said.
But Hillary Clinton wasn’t going there. At the MSNBC town hall with the Democratic presidential candidates on Thursday evening in Las Vegas, Clinton once again refused to release transcripts or recordings of the secret speeches she was paid millions of dollarsto make to Wall Street banks.
……..
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Auckland mayoral candidates had their first hit-up in front of the public but nothing much of substance came out of it.
Sure there’s a bunch of candidates, but right now Phil Goff will romp in – even if he can’t work up the courage to cut loose from Labour ideology.
Goff is up against minnows.
The centre-right candidate I’m told is Victoria Crone, but I have no idea what she stands for beyond politic-speak cliches.
Then you have the numpties, like rates defaulter Penny Bright – who in my opinion is a sideshow who should be banned from running.
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If I’m supposedly so ‘stupid or ineffectual’ – why even bother mentioning my name – let alone stating that you think I should be ‘banned from running’?
Even with every factor tilted to their advantage, Compass’ Meals on Wheels food is pretty unappealing:
“I hope I don’t ever have to rely on that sort of food when I get really old.”
That is the verdict of award-winning Dunedin food writer Charmian Smith after taste-testing the reheated frozen meals at a session convened by the Compass Group at Dunedin Hospital this week…
The ingredient list was an internal document that could not be taken away from the session. A seemingly high level of preservatives was concerning…
She was concerned that to meet minimum mandatory standards meals needed to provide only a third of a person’s nutrition needs. “They are expected to find two-thirds of the nutrients themselves but may well resort to bread and biscuits and other easy things to eat.”
A company spokeswoman later responded to Ms Smith’s concerns over sulphites in a statement to the newspaper, saying they were added to food to preserve its appearance and quality.
Note that this was a taste test done; under the supervision of Company reps (“Compass national development and innovation manager” shown in pics); at the hospital where the reheating kitchens are located, and; served onto plates with some care for appearance. In practice, with the reheated food; slopped into aluminium trays, then transported around town by community volunteers, the results look more like this:
At the time of that article; 44 of the 250 receiving meals on wheels had cancelled, although only the day before the SDHB had been trying to claim that as; only 11 cancellations, by selectively reporting only those cancellations processed by Compass itself. I imagine this is well over 20% cancellations by now if this comment from the above link is anything to go by:
These meals are a disgrace. After months of ill health you finally get an appitite and then this tasteless, tough food arrives. You try and try but sorry, make that 45 meals cancelled.
THE Forage North Canterbury event was created by five North Canterbury vineyards; Bellbird Spring, Black Estate, Greystone, Pegasus Bay and Tongue in Groove which, as it turns out, make wine in environments rich with seasonal wild food.
To celebrate the relationship between local grapes and food, the vineyards invited cooks, sommeliers and writers from as far afield as China and England to hunt in the hills, forage in the fields and forests, fish in the ocean and gather from the seashore in and around the Waipara Valley.
And let’s not forget that a significant chunk of people have no options other than Meals on Wheels. If they cancel they have to eat out of the cupboard.
I’d also like to know of the people cancelling, how many can prepare food safely? I’ve had elderly relatives rely on Meals on Wheels when they reached the point they couldn’t remember they’d left something cooking on the stove and where burning things. That’s a recipe for disaster.
There is another locally prepared Meals on Wheels program, but it isn’t subsidised by the health board and is thus more expensive. The potential health risk of keeping prefrozen meals for reheating, means this outsourcing may prove to be a false economy for the SDHB if the recipients of Compass’ food end up needing more hospital treatment. Your point about the safety risk of unsupervised cooking by (some of) the eldery is a good one.
Aileen Baker (89), of Dunedin, said she was likely to cancel the ‘‘dreadful” meals. Her neighbour received St Barnabas Trust meals on wheels, which were excellent but more expensive than the health board service. Mrs Baker was considering her options.
‘‘I’ve never complained in my life about anything.”
The meals were not supposed to be reheated, but Mrs Baker was doing so anyway, as she was used to eating a portion later in the day. Anne Marie Parsons (74), of Dunedin, said she had no choice but to continue with the meals, as at $5 a day they were cheaper than alternatives. She said the meals had shrunk in size and deteriorated in quality.
Thanks for the link, I didn’t realise that Heatly had ever been a nurse. She is quite the posterchild for management culture these days. It is telling that she identifies more with bankers than with healers:
Shortly after starting as the £230,000-a-year chief executive of its Southern District Health Board, she implied in an interview that those concerned by her pay-off were motivated by jealousy.
She said: “There’s not many bankers in Cumbria, so the focus is on the public sector.”
[edit: Following that interview link leads to this 2012 ODT piece:]
As a public servant, she expected to be accountable to the community, which included an “open and honest” approach to media inquiries.
However, direct media access would no longer be direct in the first instance, as it had been under Mr Rousseau, with reporters advised to send inquiries through communications manager
FYI – just posted this (and my previous comment) up on the Facebook page of Larry Williams – so hopefully he can see my response to his post.
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Also Larry – I really do think that you should ‘bone up’ on your Auckland ‘electoral maths’ – as it were?
How many Aucklanders actually bothered to vote in the 2013 Auckland local body elections Larry?
36%.
Which leaves how many Aucklanders – who didn’t bother to vote Larry?
64%.
How many candidates standing for the 2016 Auckland Mayoralty effectively, (in my view) support the pro-business, corporate-controlled Auckland ‘Supercity’ (for the 1%)?
Apart from myself – in my view – ALL of them.
So – who is the 2016 Auckland Mayoral candidate that effectively, in my view, that stands out from the rest, in defending citizens’ LAWFUL rights to ‘open, transparent and democratically accountable’ local government in Auckland?
Don’t YOU believe in transparency when it comes to the spending of public rates monies Larry?
I do.
And I have put my freehold home on the line to defend my (and YOUR) lawful rights to transparency.
I am Bi-polar, rapidly cycling. I have not found a combination of medications that allow me to function normally with Epillim and Fluoxitine the best I get is a smoothing of the worst of it, not a symptom suppression.
3 years ago I saw a panel of three Dr’s through Winz and was granted invalids benefit, however the seed of doubt were sewn and I went and found full time work in an engineering Co. I make good stuff don’t get me wrong. I’m a good worker, work hard do good quality. That’s not the issue.
The issue with bi-polar is health and safety, i’m impulsive. I’ve attacked a police officer whilst I had Hep C and tried to kill him because I warned him I was having a mental health turn and to handcuff me till I calmed in the few seconds I knew what was happeneing to my body, I had a 36 hour flight stuffed up my med times and lost the plot, my bad, completely, but I was technically insane at that moment. I spent time in jail when I was supposed to be attending my sisters wedding.
When I went to work, I had soooo many days off due to being sick half the time, not sleeping from anxiety of work and other pressures, sending me into massive depression episodes, I barely made my mortgage payments as I used up all my holidays and sick days being sick I had no cover for all the other times, that’s not on.
So at this job eventually a real bad incident occurred straight from left field never got a warning with my body some guys at work were acting complete immature dicks and were trying to kill a bird in the factory rafters and I lost it again, how can I describe it, I had to save that bird it was like my whole meaning in life. I nearly killed a guy over that. I cannot trust myself in the workplace. It’s because I cannot predict what is going to cause a moment of complete irrationality like that. And it happens all the time i’m forever at work having issues with people over my incorrect at that moment rational of others actions. I go into a complete irrationality and I justify things(my actions) at that time, that I would not at others when i’m stable.
I lost my job over the bird incident, my employer who is a bloody good bloke, once I had calmed down after a week or so explained, I am a good worker, no doubt about that, but he didn’t know what job there was for me with my issues. Bluntly these outbursts and constant time off with no predictability of them, is my issue amongst others, like working for a week with no sleep(well maybe a couple hours if i’m lucky a night)
I went back to winz. 2.5 years of trying a job. I didn’t give up, but I cannot keep saying it won’t happen again boss, when I damn well know it will. Anyways I got asked for my letter of resignation, he was kind enough not to sack me and he was right. It’s not my work it’s a Health and Safety issue.
They are making me suicidal seriously. It’s rude as hell. I got interviewed by Sue the Waikato decision maker for winz. Told by Bridget at Tokoroa Winz she makes the decisions on living support / medical certificates, but is not a Dr or anything.
Meet Sue she goes on for the whole meeting about how she’s a nurse and knows these things, raving on how much she new.. (lady ur a Nurse FFS and i’m a psychologist since I know a little about the subject). Well i’m fit for work, straight away. She’s going to prop me up on sleeping tablets and medications that will basically mong me out i’m therefore fit for some partime job I can attend whenever i’m feeling ok, that therefore means i’m fit for work as that’s possible if I don’t like it I have to go see a Winz Dr again she’ll give me a list of bought and paid for Dr’s that will follow her recommendation as we know it works she will also get winz to pay for a psychologist to treat me cure me and eventually i’ll be fit for work but at the moment I have an exemption for work, but i’m fit for work no supported living
I got a mortgage ya cheapskate winz bastards 271 comes in my account from winz, when auto payments go out I for 19 fkn dollars to feed myself on. IS that my lot for the rest of my life o
Failing to hear me at any point just talking over me, a nurse(or is she?) from Australia? WTF
I cannot take this much longer, that was the 9th, of feb, it’s 20th today never heard or received a letter as to outcome of meeting regards my medical cert and assessment for supported living payments application. Don’t I at least have the right to be informed? what the fuck is going on.
Seriously someone with clout, I need help bad, they are killing people. This constant questioning of integrity, knows better than me attitudes of what my issues are, belittling shit has to stop. How many of us are going to die from despair and suicide before it does?
Hi Richard, thanks for coming and sharing your story. I hope that some help can be offered here.
I’ve had a lot of personal experience with WINZ as an ill person. My main thought is that you need support to deal with WINZ, both in general but also in getting put back on Supported Living.
In the immediate term I would suggest finding a good benefit advocate. Try the bigger cities if you have to, they can work by phone (and email if you have access). They can phone you back so the call doesn’t cost you. If you aren’t able to phone them yourself initially, find a local agency who can pick up the cost of the call. Look at finding someone who you get on with and who gets your situation.
Benefit advocates can do things like chase up why WINZ haven’t contacted you and having them involved makes WINZ sit up and take more notice because ultimately the decisions they are making can end up before a judge.
If you can find someone locally who can also assist you as a support person, all the better. You’ve probably had all sorts of experiences with people in various parts of the system, so again, try and find someone you feel comfortable with.
Do you have a supportive GP? Are they on board with supporting you re WINZ (rather than supporting WINZ)?
Re WINZ, their staff are never qualified to be experts on medical issues, no matter what their background. Their job is to establish entitlements to payments based on external advice, and if you are looking for work, to help with that. They should never be involved in giving medical advice or making decisions based on their own interpretations of your medical needs. The only information they should be basing decisions on are what you and your medical people tell them.
If you can, always take someone with you to WINZ appointments. Refuse to talk with them on the phone, use email instead. Having a witness and a papertrail that you have at your end changes what happens.
IMO, what should be happening is that you should be on Supported Living and be allowed to work as an when you are well enough. That should be long term, without pressure to become independent. The system is capable of working with people with permanent disability, that’s what SLA is for.
Beyond all that, I think you have clear grounds for a complaint. I’m not suggesting that you do this, because you might be better off using your time to do things you enjoy or find other support for your health. But it can help to know that they are wrong in what they are doing.
Hey Richard, I have had trouble with anxiety in the past. I was also prescribed Fluoxetine, and it was good for improving my mood generally, although I did feel side affects like feeling really tired sometimes and I still had some depressive episodes.
To me it sounds like you know that work for you is not a goer right now, you could see a doctor that you trust and knows your history. I wouldnt think it would be much trouble for them to write you something saying that you are not fit for work and possibly won’t be long term.
I’m not a doctor or a professional, but I can suggest things that I think have helped me. What I think might have helped balancing out my mood was intensive exercise, like going out for for a 30 minute bike ride – riding almost as hard you can, or digging over the garden vigorously, going for a run where you do intermittent sprinting – the idea being to get yourself really puffed. Even better if you’ve got a type of exercise that you enjoy doing already, then you don’t mind going out and doing it even when you might be feeling down and not wanting to go out and do anything.
There’s also the concept of mindfulness (http://www.mentalhealth.org.nz/home/our-work/category/21/mindfulness), which could be useful, it’s one of those things that is easy to recommend and extremely hard to implement when you are actually in the moment though, and would take a lot of practice too.
I’m not sure if there are any mental health support groups in your area, it would probably help if you could meet with some others with bi-polar to share ideas, tips, and get support etc. But you can probably find an online group/forum which would be the next best thing.
It sounds like you have a good understanding of how your condition is effecting you and your life, and that is really good in my opinion. It means you’re more able to recognise and react and treat yourself as you notice yourself getting into an unhealthy frame of mind. So keep up the observations of how you feel and that should make life easier I reckon.
Hi Richard, I have a close family member who has mental problems so I can understand where you are coming from.
If I were you I think I would contact my local Member of Parliament immediately and DEMAND some help with your situation. If the MP won’t help then contact someone else (anyone) in the political sphere to see what they can do.
Can anyone help me find some graphs on long term party voting intention? I’ve tried google and it’s giving me flag referendum hits and some obscuring stuff.
I want something like the 4th chart in this link, only for preceding decades.
With Christchurch’s inhabitants finally waking up to the fact that John Key and his trolls don’t give a shit about them I thought I’d repost this to show how much they are being shafted by this ugly lot!
Sadly way too much damage done or un repaired by the time they get a chance to dump them and real change takes hold about a year after the next GE.
NATS know how to cripple areas, tying the hands of the next govt into at least 2 election cycles of rectifying their wilful destruction. It’s been their MO from the get go.
Someone mentioned recently what we already know happens but don’t stress enough – that progressive policies introduced by NZ governments are likely to be dumped on a change of government.
And if one govt ties the hands of another to do anything about it within their term, then there can be no change at all. Labour gets in, then tends to upset enough people to get thrown out, or the Opposition sets up some strawman arguments that the people get obssessed about and then Labour’s out and what is left as a memorial by the time the National vandals tear down their, usually, good works?
Probably most of us have been wondering how Kiribati people are getting on since our government decided not to accept a request to be a climate refugee from one man who has been deported.
Radio nz did a piece on Kiribati recently. http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/201789691
Kiribati people getting ready for “migration with dignity”
People in Kiribati are upskilling and preparing for the time when they might have to move because of the effects of climate change.
This is something that a progressive NZ has been able to do in a country that wanted help and welcomed it. (Now he might have a chance to help here.)
He was in the Values Party by the way, not the National Party.
8:12 Ron Layton http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/201790116/ron-layton-intellectual-property-in-africa
Ron Layton is an expatriate New Zealander who is the founder and CEO of LightYears IP, a board member of the African IP Trust, and a fellow of Ashoka, the largest worldwide network of social entrepreneurs. He is creating global mechanisms that provide poor producer businesses in developing countries with a full range of intellectual property tools that allow them to re-position for higher and more stable incomes.
By owning the property in a private superannuation scheme, the politicians can also use their taxpayer-funded superannuation subsidies to pay off the mortgage.
For every $1 placed in the private schemes by the MP, the taxpayer contributes $2.50 to a maximum of $28,920 – an annual superannuation total of up to $40,488.
Combined with the taxpayer-funded accommodation allowances, a minister like Mrs Tolley could pay off up to $77,988 of the mortgage each year while also making a capital gain as the property’s value increases.
That’s significantly more than the average wage every years in subsidies.
Really, it’s time to end these rorts that the MPS keep giving themselves.
The politicians have themselves to blame: allowing the value of wages to decrease naturally builds resentment.
Personally I think they deserve fair wages and conditions like everyone else.
It’s tempting to suggest that their salary should be means-tested, to level the playing field, and why not just give them a percentage (250%?) of the median wage divided by the population percentage of children in poverty (plus one percent so that it can never become infinite) 😉
Personally I think they deserve fair wages and conditions like everyone else.
So do I. I don’t think that giving them near $80k per year to buy their own houses and rental properties is fair and it’s bloody expensive for the rest of us.
It would be a damn site cheaper and easier if the government simply owned a 100 room hotel in the capital that the MPs from outside of the capital could use when there. Empty rooms could be used by foreign dignitaries and government guests.
All that would cost us is rates of a few thousand and a couple of million per year for maintenance and personnel. Far less than what it’s costing us in paying these people to become rich while they add to both the housing shortage and rising house prices.
“The opposite of addiction is not sobriety. The opposite of addiction is connection”
Interesting video on why physiological addiction theories are wrong, and why environment is critical. I think some of it is a bit simplistic, but it’s a good graphic wway to get across that we’ve been looking in the wrong direction.
I found this an interesting read in latest scientific America on how political symmetry corrupts science I suggest also answers some questions re constant attacks on Neo liberalism by the far left and academia, especially those in social sciences Well worth reading full article
2015 study by psychologist José Duarte, then at Arizona State University, and his colleagues in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, entitled “Political Diversity Will Improve Social Psychological Science,” found that 58 to 66 percent of social scientists are liberal and only 5 to 8 percent conservative and that there are eight Democrats for every Republican. The problem is most relevant to the study of areas “related to the political concerns of the Left—areas such as race, gender, stereotyping, environmentalism, power, and inequality.” The very things these students are protesting.
How does this political asymmetry corrupt social science? It begins with what subjects are studied and the descriptive language employed. Consider a 2003 paper by social psychologist John Jost, now at New York University, and his colleagues, entitled “Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition.” Conservatives are described as having “uncertainty avoidance,” “needs for order, structure, and closure,” as well as “dogmatism and intolerance of ambiguity,” as if these constitute a mental disease that leads to “resistance to change” and “endorsement of inequality.” Yet one could just as easily characterize liberals as suffering from a host of equally malfunctioning cognitive states: a lack of moral compass that leads to an inability to make clear ethical choices, a pathological fear of clarity that leads to indecisiveness, a naive belief that all people are equally talented, and a blind adherence in the teeth of contradictory evidence from behavior genetics that culture and environment exclusively determine one’s lot in life.
Cheers OAB I think you are further evidence on the findings of this study, as are many standards contributors Note the study is even handed and indicates the bias can go the other way re conservative bias but surely even just on statistic and group think their is something to it if only 5 to 8pc of social scientist are considered conservative.
I understood your first point albeit you write in riddles and not clear English, I am not sure why, I put it down to showing off. I just raised the article out of interest and not to go into indepth peer review and replication. The article has obviously pricked your reality bubble and got you thinking which is good 😊
You really aren’t getting it: a Psychology paper, attempting to
find a bias that Psychologists had been talking about for years, finds said bias and is instantly seized upon as evidence.
A dwindling and increasingly irrelevant field? Some say…
The funny thing is, if we listen to the drivel right wingers believe, NASA, the Otago School of Medicine, the Salvation Army, The Lancet, Nature, Marine Biology and the Problem Gambling Foundation are also hotbeds of Left-wing activism, and you’re whining about Psychology? Pfft.
All science has bias from what is chosen to study. It’s not necessarily a problem except where it is unacknowleged and where power structures prevent imbalance from being changed eg the amount of medicial research that is funded by big pharma and how this has led to a culture of lying about results. It’s hard to change because the power structure (neoliberalism) literally prevent other people from doing research (it’s more complicated than that).
If social science is biased towards liberalism because of more liberals doing the research, that’s a different thing than individual researchers having bias. You seem to be conflating the two and suggesting that the individual cited was biased and unscientific in their approach. Do you have any evidence of that?
No article was not picking on an individual, simply raised that specific research to contrast social cognitition as a scene setter re left and right I believe crux of article was as is the sum of the parts equal the whole, the whole equals the sum of the parts. The study simply opines due to to the lefts massive over representation in social science this results in social cognitive bias ( including in peer review) . Of course there will be individuals who may not be bias but on average the research is indicating the potential of such
I was saying that YOU are trying to make out that the numbers of social scientists being liberal means that individual scientists who are liberal are also biased in their work. Putting aside that there is bias in all science, I think your claim is meaningless unless you can demonstrate that indiviudal scientists are in capable of doing research that isn’t contaminated by their politics.
If your point is that more liberal social scientists means that more topics that are of interest to liberals is being done, that wouldn’t surprise me. But that’s a different thing than the research being corrupted by the individual
The lack of diversity causes problems for the scientific process primarily in areas related to the political concerns of the Left – areas such as race, gender, stereotyping, environmentalism, power, and inequality – as well as in areas where conservatives themselves are studied, such as in moral and political psychology.
However, the link gives the game away:
In the last few years, social psychology has faced a series of challenges to the validity of its research, including a few high-profile replication failures, a handful of fraud cases, and several articles on questionable research practices and inflated effect sizes… In this article, we suggest that one largely overlooked cause of failure is a lack of political diversity.
So yeah, fraud, lack of replication, questionable practices…oh but the real problem is the exams are too hard for Reddullish et al a lack of political diversity. Uh huh.
Spinning now OAB, agree with your first point but surely bias is amplified if one pursuit of science is massively over represented by one dominant political school of thought
You need to stop projecting and read my comments again. I’m not saying what you think I am. I’m saying that Psychology is almost completely munted: the majority of its findings are unreliable at best.
That includes this one.
Why do you care anyway: as I said, the right makes a virtue of despising science and academia. If wingnuts don’t want to study you only have yourselves to blame.
We can all agree on that. What I don’t get is how you can’t understand that the Right’s relentless negative rhetoric about academia might deter right wingers from taking up research.
Well, if you could pass the entrance exams, that is.
PS: just because scientologists say Psychology is munted doesn’t mean it isn’t: your cite supports the view.
Generally, research is concentrated around areas of ignorance. Sometimes it results in the areas of ignorance shrinking.
Where’s the put-down there? I said “sometimes” because quite often, in the hard sciences, further study debunks previous findings, thus increasing the unknowns.
I’m no more putting Psychology down than the research team you’re citing do in their own words, quoted at 17.2.1.2.1 above: fraud etc.
Lastly, I author my own put-downs, bud. Do you deny the vitriol aimed at academia from the Right? Do you challenge my assertion that it might put people off choosing study as a career?
PS: Someone with a handle like yours might think twice before calling the kettle black.
David Stuckler: health and austerity
10:10 AM. Professor of Political Economy and Sociology at Oxford University, where he researches how social policy and economic changes influence health across the globe, and co-author of –
The Body Economic: Why Austerity Kills.
He is visiting New Zealand for the February lecture series
at the 20th Public Health Summer School,
run by the University of Otago, Wellington.
The federal regulator issued the hoverboard notice following a months-long investigation involving “reports, from consumers in 24 states, of 52 self-balancing scooter fires resulting in over $2 million in property damage, including the destruction of two homes and an automobile.”
Yet more proof that things need to be properly tested and regulated before being allowed on the market.
The report is not flattering for the government. For a start, our action plan cannot sensibly be described as a “co-creation” with civil society. The government decided very early on what it wanted to put in it, and then conducted a very limited consultation exercise. For instance, it never even put out a press release about consultation. It even breached its obligation to publish, in advance, a list of its consultation activities. (In comments on the report, the government said I’d got this wrong. It pointed to a list it had posted on the State Services Commission website. That list was posted after all the consultation had taken place.)
More lies and disinformation from this government about what it’s doing.
Ok dug it out…
No Pride in Prisons to Protest Auckland Pride Parade
Queer and transgender prison abolitionist group No Pride in Prisons is holding a rally today at 5:30pm on the Karangahape Road Overbridge, in protest of the Auckland Pride Parade.
The rally follows the Auckland Pride Board’s decision to allow members of the police and the Department of Corrections to march in uniform in the parade.
“We are holding a counter-rally to take a public stand against the Auckland Pride Board’s decision to include violent, racist and transmisogynist institutions in its parade for the second year in a row,” says No Pride in Prisons spokesperson, Emilie Rākete.
“Given recent reports of racist police brutality and Corrections’ announcement to extend its ‘double-bunking’ policy, it is disgraceful that the Auckland Pride Board decided to include Corrections and police in the Pride Parade.”
“Corrections’ policies directly contribute to physical and sexual violence against trans and queer prisoners.”
Earlier this month, the Pride Board came out with its decision to allow Corrections officers to march in uniform as they did in 2015. This decision was made on the agreement that the Department of Corrections would take steps over the coming year to improve the policies affecting trans prisoners.
“To this date, the Department of Corrections has shown a blatant disregard for the treatment of all incarcerated people, especially queer and trans prisoners. The board should not have made this decision based on the Department’s vague promises for improvement.”
No Pride in Prisons believes that the effects of Corrections’ placement and double-bunking policies on queer and trans prisoners are perfectly clear.
“This year alone, No Pride in Prisons has heard from multiple transgender prisoners who have been either raped or brutally attacked while in Corrections’ custody.”
The group points to an incident late last year where a trans woman was raped after being placed in a cell overnight with a man. The group argues that this incident would not have taken place if not for the double-bunking policy.
“Corrections has introduced and massively expanded double-bunking policies despite advice that doing so would put prisoners at greater risk of physical and sexual assault. These policies have directly led to the rape of trans women and others,” says Rākete.
“Corrections has proven, time and time again, that it has no regard for the safety or bodily autonomy of inmates.”
According to No Pride in Prisons, the police have no better a track record. “A report released by the New Zealand Police in 2015 found that police officers use force against Māori at eight times the rate they do Pākehā,”[1] says Rākete.
“Last year, the New Zealand Police admitted to having an ‘unconscious bias’ against Māori.[2] While the police may call it a mere ‘bias’, these biases can be more accurately described as racism.”
“Māori currently make up about 51% of New Zealand’s prison population, despite being only 15% of the general population. This is because of the police decisions to apprehend and then charge Māori at a far higher rate than Pākehā for the same crimes.[3] What this proves is the police’s active role in perpetuating structural racism.”
“The participation of police and Corrections in the Pride Parade is a form of pinkwashing, using LGBTQI issues to mask their everyday violence and brutality, especially towards tangata whenua.”
“We encourage everyone who has been disappointed and angered by the Auckland Pride Board’s decisions to join us for the counter-rally.”
“The fact of the matter is that prisons and police are violent, racist institutions that have no place in any pride parade.”
stuff story 19/2/2016
Apartment owner blocked out of her unit in dispute with body corporate
MARIA SLADE
Last updated 14:22, February 19 2016
The Landings complex in Parnell, where owner Christine Rogerson says the body corporate is stopping her from entering her apartment.
Christine Rogerson was amazed to find a new wall and door blocking her out of her own apartment.
The owner of a seventh floor unit in The Landings complex in Auckland’s Parnell had been told she could have supervised access as the building underwent major weathertightness and other repairs.
But when she asked to retrieve personal belongings stored in a locked room, she was informed she would have to wait till the work was completed.
Then she discovered a temporary barricade had been built in the corridor outside her unit blocking her way.
“Because I’ve asked for access, they’ve denied it and I’ve said why. This is what they do.”
READ MORE:
* Deregulation non-compliance turns home into house of horrors
* Apartment owners face maintenance timebomb
“They” are the complex’s body corporate, an administration that owners say is non-communicative, inconsistent, and aggressive.
A door has been built in the corridor leading to Rogerson’s apartment blocking her access.
A door has been built in the corridor leading to Rogerson’s apartment blocking her access.
Rogerson said she was originally told the work would take a month. That has stretched to three months with no end in sight.
Owners of the 220 apartments paid an original repair levy of $8 million, then a second of $4m, she said.
“I reckon there’s going to be another $4m, but you won’t know that until the AGM. It’s likely that we’ll be hit with another $4m and they’ll give you 30 days to come up with (it).
The Home Owners and Buyers Association chair has big concerns about the law surrounding bodies corporate, chair John Gray says
The Home Owners and Buyers Association chair has big concerns about the law surrounding bodies corporate, chair John Gray says
“It’s a group of 10 people maximum controlling a group of 200 people,” Rogerson said.
Fellow owner Roberta Budvietas said she was told her apartment had to be empty by March to make way for the workmen. When her tenants unexpectedly left in October she let her grandson stay temporarily for a peppercorn rent.
“Now they’re telling me it’s November. So every week I have lost $200 in potential rent on that apartment, and I can’t actually kick the kids out now.”
The Landings owner Roberta Budvietas says information doesn’t flow from the body corporate.
Dysfunctional administration had added to the already considerable stress of the repairs, Budvietas said.
“We’re paying for all kinds of costs… and then the fact the information doesn’t flow well and questions aren’t answered.
“When you have a body corporate secretariat who tells you one set of things and you don’t know because you’re just ordinary people trying to do your best… there’s no real resource to go to.”
The Landings body corporate said the temporary wall had been put in place to comply with health and safety requirements, and a visit to the apartment could be arranged with the head contractor.
Delays in getting council consents and the discovery of additional repair work required had pushed back the finish date in some cases, and owners had been kept informed, it said.
The dispute comes as Auckland Central MP Nikki Kaye conducts a campaign to assess whether rules around bodies corporate need to be changed.
She is holding a public meeting on Friday afternoon.
“I think if Auckland is going to have intensification, which we are and we need to… then we’ve got to have absolute confidence in the ownership and management structure of those dwellings.”
Some clear themes had emerged from the response to her campaign, she said:
– issues over long term maintenance plans, which every unit title complex must have, and transparency around them;
– body corporate managers versus property managers and their role, and whether it needs to be better regulated;
– whether the rules around bodies corporate and their committees likewise need to be tightened;
– access to up to date information and transparency.
Kaye says the Unit Titles Act was improved in 2010, but may need further enhancements.
However there was a balance between adequate regulation and not adding costs, she said.
“For example, if you did decide that there needs to be greater regulation around body corporate managers, then one, you might discourage people from taking that role, and two, you might add costs to that.”
But chairman of the Home Owners and Buyers Association, John Gray, is sceptical about Kaye’s efforts.
Hobanz has a host of concerns about the Unit Titles Act.
It was devoid of basic governance guidelines that other laws such as the Charities Act and the Companies Act contained, he said.
The only criteria for sitting on a body corporate committee was being an owner in the complex.
“You can have people who have been convicted of criminal conduct, bankrupted, and the sort, actually put themselves forward for election.” Gray said.
The organisation was also particularly concerned about long term maintenance plans, which were usually either inadequate or not in place at all.
On top of that bodies corporate could and did opt out of fully funding them, meaning future owners could be hit with massive repair bills, he said.
– Stuff.co.nz
Landlords lose thousands
Farmers face waterways fines video
Beer festival canned
Beetle saving farmers $44 million
“Nick Dearden, the director of Global Justice Now, said: “Despite the enormous public outcry over companies like Google and Amazon paying ridiculously small amounts of tax in the UK, the government is trying to sign us up to a trade deal that could effectively prevent us from bringing about laws that could address tax injustice.
“The ability to enact effective and fair tax systems to finance vital public services is one of the defining features of sovereignty. The fact that multinational companies would be able to challenge and undermine that under TTIP is testament to the terrifying extent of the corporate grab embedded in this toxic trade deal.”
What a pigs muddle the government move to deregulation of builders has led us to. In some other countries, the government MPs concerned would be taken to Court and with luck, imprisoned or worse. Perhaps they should be stripped of their nationality and left stateless to go from place to place spreading their stealing and criminal activities around the world instead of finessing them here on we unlucky people.
I put up a case earlier in Open Mike where a woman owner was shut out of her apartment so it could be doctored, for increasing months with an end not shortly in sight. This article is much the same, and goes into compliance, refers to legislation and gives warnings for future home buyers, especially apartments, built between 1995 and 2005.
Burrell said better legislation, to allow for a higher level of due-diligence, would be one way to minimise and assess costs in leaky buildings.
“Under current legislation we cannot even remove one piece of cladding before the remedial work starts.
“If we had legislation that allowed us to look at what is lying internally then it would be a lot easier to determine any non-compliance issues,” Burrell said.
Levie said HOBANZ believes the the lack of financial assistance to cover the faults is going to become a significant financial burden on apartment owners in the coming years.
“It is significant as it is going to become difficult for owners to borrow against weather tight projects because of the risks that lie internally,” Levie said.
He said it will also become more common for weather tight remediation to only be carried out on apartments where the work justifies a gain in property value.
“The concern is that with areas further out of the city, where the work costs the same yet the values of the apartments are not there.
“Then there will be hesitation to have external work carried out because there could be internal non-compliance issues the will add to the cost,” Levie said.
Burrell believes the only other way the non-compliance costs could be funded is if the Government went back to its original plan of covering two-thirds of the leaky building remediation costs.
PETER MEECHAM / FAIRFAX NZ.
(Andi Burrell Remedial Specialist from Anoroc Remediation )
(Home Owners and Buyers Association (Hobanz) chief executive Roger Levie)
edited
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Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
Te Rangi e tu nei (The sky above us) Te Papa e takoto nei (The land beneath us) Tatou katoa te hunga ora (To us all the living) Tena koutou katoa (Greetings) ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
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 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Heynen, Program Coordinator, Sustainable Energy, The University of Queensland A temporary stadium in the Champ-de-Mars, ParisEkaterina Pokrovsky/Shutterstock As Paris prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the sustainability of the event is coming under scrutiny. The organisers have promoted ...
A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurie Berg, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney defotoberg/Shutterstock Migrant worker exploitation is entrenched in workplaces across Australia. Tragically, a deep fear of immigration consequences means most unlawful employer conduct goes unreported. On Wednesday, however, the government officially launched a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vaughan Cruickshank, Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education, University of Tasmania Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Deputy Director, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Griffith University In the wake of the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, there were calls from bothsides of US politics, as well as internationally, to reduce the brutal, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Keith Rathbone, Senior Lecturer, Modern European History and Sports History, Macquarie University Two high-profile assaults on Australians in Paris have raised concerns about security ahead of the Olympic Games. On Saturday evening, a young woman was allegedly sexually assaulted by a ...
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http://bennorton.com/adolph-reed-identity-politics-is-neoliberalism/
“…[Identity] politics is not an alternative to class politics; it is a class politics, the politics of the left-wing of neoliberalism. It is the expression and active agency of a political order and moral economy in which capitalist market forces are treated as unassailable nature.
An integral element of that moral economy is displacement of the critique of the invidious outcomes produced by capitalist class power onto equally naturalized categories of ascriptive identity that sort us into groups supposedly defined by what we essentially are rather than what we do. As I have argued, following Walter Michaels and others, within that moral economy a society in which 1% of the population controlled 90% of the resources could be just, provided that roughly 12% of the 1% were black, 12% were Latino, 50% were women, and whatever the appropriate proportions were LGBT people.
It would be tough to imagine a normative ideal that expresses more unambiguously the social position of people who consider themselves candidates for inclusion in, or at least significant staff positions in service to, the ruling class…”
What’s the point? That Walter Michaels is incapable of noticing more than one kind of injustice?
It seems to me that identity politics is a sort of MMP thrust at the usual left wing advance onto right wing policies. When identity politics develop it is to get other people’s needs looked at, included and acted on. Without the theoretical language, that is how I see it in plain terms and without a lobby championing identity politics nothing gets done for the people in the group, they get vague promises but no action. Identity politics forces the hand of government to act.
The problem is when people in that identity group continue to be fused totally to their own demands, to be carried out to their own prescription, and stop looking at the whole range of problems facing us all, with themselves as part of the whole.
These days it is climate change and the commodification of people, loss of jobs, loss of job conditions, loss of regulation and control governing employers, the desire to increase poverty by neo liberal wealth screwers, automation, loss of humanity and the progress towards a better world, that loom as the large, inescapable challenges.
A driver in identity politics is the memory of past wrongs, added to present failures to better conditions for the particular lobby group, and the tendency to ignore the other disastrous memes and practices that threaten us all. That results in a neglect to face and fight the dragon menacing the village but sacrificing all to help the one vulnerable female in its jaws.
This is how I see it and I haven’t any links or quotes to provide other people’s thinking.
It is interesting to see Adolph Reed appears to be a black man. I haven’t time at present to read all of his essay and background and I don’t yet understand why he would take the stance he has adopted.
“The problem is when people in that identity group continue to be fused totally to their own demands, to be carried out to their own prescription, and stop looking at the whole range of problems facing us all, with themselves as part of the whole.”
Except that’s not how it generally works. If you look at feminism for instance, you can easily find a variety of feminists who are actively working on issues far beyond what the mainstream perceive women’s rights to be. Many feminisms are working for equal rights of all people, not equal rights for just women. And feminists working as activists are acutely aware of the bigger picture. Likewise for other things named as identity politics in a derogatory way.
The problem arises when you have superficial and in fact misleading analysis of the likes that CV gives eg the identity politics has ruined Labour. The reality is that Rogernomics ruined Labour, Labour members and activists and the rest of NZ let it happen. Of course one of the consequences to that is that certain inividuals of identity groups will be privilged and given more of a hearing than others (the ones who support neoliberalism and can work within that framework). Because co-option is a big part of how neoliberalism works.
But even where some groups are focussed in their needs to the exclusion of other things, it’s usually because they’ve been forced into that situation by the people in power and the general culture marginalising them. You only have so much time and energy and often the political climate means you have to use that shouting until you get heard.
Well my take on the problem of focus within identity politics is that to succeed within the ruling ideology it must first become, to some degree, complicit within the ideology.
A detailed argument in support of this contention requires more time than I have available however consider the following simile. In much the same way as union officials/spokespeople were feted by employer groups with the sole intention of wooing and personally obligating them to the employers purpose before then sending them back to the worker group with a resolution that was much less than that which was being demanded, so it is with identity groups within neoliberalism. Firstly the must surrender to the supremacy and inequality of the system. They must side with the ideology and walk over the needs of others before they are allowed to gain anything.
Interesting point.
The extent to which one surrenders to, resists, avoids or escapes the system varies across any identity group doing political work, and the dynamic you describe applies to all politics, including those politics based on working class identity, and on economics.
I think more of an issue is to what extent a group’s politics are co-opted and where the indiviudals have bought into the system the most. Hence we have Margaret Thatcher and Jenny Shipley having been helped by feminism but having coopted feminism for anti-feminist work. The Māori Party could be seen as a group based on identity politics that has chosen to work within the system far more than most of us are comfortable with. But equally there are many feminists and Māori whose work is actively and even primarily working to replace the system.
Further, if we look at the place that second wave feminism arose from, many women were leaving traditional socialist groups precisely because the men working there were privileged by the patriachal system and not willing to look at that privilege as part of the politics of replacing ‘the system’. It’s pretty easy to argue that those men were affected by the dymnamic you name.
Weka my point is:
– that within neoliberalism the identity or any clique within the identity that gain success have not “won” that success but have been allowed it within a managed power framework. The extent and the terms of that success are always determined by the powerful. Then as its own strategy the Powerful adopts aspects of the identity, mainstreams it and make use of it for political and economic ends. At the same time it changes but never undermines an ongoing requirement for groupings of identified undeserving others.
I largely agree with that except that you are talking in absolutes. And that real change happens despite neoliberalism even where neoliberalism still exists.
Do you included class politics in what you are saying? Politics based on economic revolution? Politics based on ending capitalism?
Other than that I’m not sure what your point is. Are you saying that identity politics are a problem?
Hi Weka,
My point is basically one of solidarity in the pursuit of equality.Negotiated concessions to identity factions within the framework of neoliberalism acts to undermine the position of other disadvantaged in ways that make the concession politically pointless.
From the same article: This should not by any means be interpreted as a blanket condemnation of anti-racism, feminism, or other movements for social equality. Rather, it should be construed as a condemnation of a politics that is centered on social constructs like race or gender, rather than on material conditions.
it is not as if the author thinks that these movements are wrong in themselves, just that they cannot replace the more general struggle against entrenched material hardship. Moreover, in their early stages, anti-racist, anti-sexist, etc, movements focused largely on the link between social exclusion and material hardship. Under neoliberalism identity concerns have been slid into place as replacements for, rather than aspects of, the struggle for material justice. That is what the mantra “I am socially liberal but economically conservative” just means.
Thanks for the explanation Olwyn. I understand now, and it was plain to see but it is so confusing trying to sort out what effects and reasons each policy has.
The point of posting it was simply to open up a discussion of ideas. I don’t profess to totally agreeing with the link (although I am very sympathetic). More generally posting controversial views in good faith can hopefully stimulate a proper debate, and set readers thinking for themselves. Given the intellectual state of NZ in the current ambient dominant media-cultural environment my personal POV is that a blog like the Standard could productively host a separate (good faith and well moderated) forum for links to left wing intellectual discussions from the web. 🙂
I agree.
The premise seems to be that identity politics is the wrong lens through which to look at societal problems. As though people must choose one lens and stick to it.
I think using the lens as a point, when looking at what needs to be done it should be with binoculars, not a telescope. I think that sizes up a lot of the misgivings felt about lobby groups sector divisions.
Is it possible to have a caption competition for the picture in the article from Audrey Young -NZ Herald – “Brave concession a real boost for NZers” from this morning 5am. It took me a long time to wipe the tears of laughter….
Malcolm Turnbull must have farted…
That is the second time that brave has been used by the herald for political issues recently!!
I note that the costs are high
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/77076257/how-to-get-your-head-around-the-landmark-aussie-citizenship-announcement
i mean it’s a win-win right?, incidentally, those guys can vote right?
Can Hillary Clinton be trusted to look after the interests of ‘everyday Americans’ when she won’t tell them what she told the BIG banks in the speeches they paid her to make?
In my view – no.
https://theintercept.com/2016/02/19/hillary-clinton-goldman-sachs-transcripts/
Hillary Clinton Again Declines to Disclose What She Told Big Banks in Her Paid Speeches
Lee Fang
Feb. 20 2016, 4:34 a.m.
The guy in the audience said it was a matter of trust. “Please just release those transcripts so we know exactly where you stand,” he said.
But Hillary Clinton wasn’t going there. At the MSNBC town hall with the Democratic presidential candidates on Thursday evening in Las Vegas, Clinton once again refused to release transcripts or recordings of the secret speeches she was paid millions of dollarsto make to Wall Street banks.
……..
_________________________________
Penny Bright
2016 Auckland Mayoral candidate.
Is Larry Williams ‘projecting’ when calling Auckland Mayoral candidate Penny Bright a ‘numpty’?
http://m.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11592451
Auckland mayor candidates
Auckland mayoral candidates had their first hit-up in front of the public but nothing much of substance came out of it.
Sure there’s a bunch of candidates, but right now Phil Goff will romp in – even if he can’t work up the courage to cut loose from Labour ideology.
Goff is up against minnows.
The centre-right candidate I’m told is Victoria Crone, but I have no idea what she stands for beyond politic-speak cliches.
Then you have the numpties, like rates defaulter Penny Bright – who in my opinion is a sideshow who should be banned from running.
______________________________
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/numpty
numpty
Scottish informal
A stupid or ineffectual person.
_________________________
Really Larry?
If I’m supposedly so ‘stupid or ineffectual’ – why even bother mentioning my name – let alone stating that you think I should be ‘banned from running’?
You old silly billy ‘numpty’?
Kind regards
Penny Bright
2016 Auckland Mayoral candidate.
Emmerson
PJ party at the Turnbulls.
Max, can you play Abba?
http://media.nzherald.co.nz/webcontent/image/gif/20168/200216WEHcartoonRE.gif
Even with every factor tilted to their advantage, Compass’ Meals on Wheels food is pretty unappealing:
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/373816/frozen-meals-underwhelm-video
Note that this was a taste test done; under the supervision of Company reps (“Compass national development and innovation manager” shown in pics); at the hospital where the reheating kitchens are located, and; served onto plates with some care for appearance. In practice, with the reheated food; slopped into aluminium trays, then transported around town by community volunteers, the results look more like this:
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/371838/44-cancel-meals-wheels
At the time of that article; 44 of the 250 receiving meals on wheels had cancelled, although only the day before the SDHB had been trying to claim that as; only 11 cancellations, by selectively reporting only those cancellations processed by Compass itself. I imagine this is well over 20% cancellations by now if this comment from the above link is anything to go by:
Thinking about food. This is a contrast to the meals being criticised above.
Radionz had a piece on wild food from some vineyard event this morning interesting.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/countrylife
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/201790033
THE Forage North Canterbury event was created by five North Canterbury vineyards; Bellbird Spring, Black Estate, Greystone, Pegasus Bay and Tongue in Groove which, as it turns out, make wine in environments rich with seasonal wild food.
To celebrate the relationship between local grapes and food, the vineyards invited cooks, sommeliers and writers from as far afield as China and England to hunt in the hills, forage in the fields and forests, fish in the ocean and gather from the seashore in and around the Waipara Valley.
And let’s not forget that a significant chunk of people have no options other than Meals on Wheels. If they cancel they have to eat out of the cupboard.
I’d also like to know of the people cancelling, how many can prepare food safely? I’ve had elderly relatives rely on Meals on Wheels when they reached the point they couldn’t remember they’d left something cooking on the stove and where burning things. That’s a recipe for disaster.
weka
There is another locally prepared Meals on Wheels program, but it isn’t subsidised by the health board and is thus more expensive. The potential health risk of keeping prefrozen meals for reheating, means this outsourcing may prove to be a false economy for the SDHB if the recipients of Compass’ food end up needing more hospital treatment. Your point about the safety risk of unsupervised cooking by (some of) the eldery is a good one.
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/371588/better-meals-under-nazis-87-year-old-says
… and in France the school children are provided meals like this.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/9203575/Former-NHS-chief-exec-received-150000-pay-off.html
integralenz
Thanks for the link, I didn’t realise that Heatly had ever been a nurse. She is quite the posterchild for management culture these days. It is telling that she identifies more with bankers than with healers:
[edit: Following that interview link leads to this 2012 ODT piece:]
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/200218/new-ceo-ready-listen-and-learn
Her response to media inquiries is unlikely to be called “open and honest” by anyone who has experiece of it.
Re: Cancellation Numbers
Hadn’t seen this when I made my earlier comment:
http://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/373815/quarter-recipients-opt-out
FYI – just posted this (and my previous comment) up on the Facebook page of Larry Williams – so hopefully he can see my response to his post.
__________________________________________________
Also Larry – I really do think that you should ‘bone up’ on your Auckland ‘electoral maths’ – as it were?
How many Aucklanders actually bothered to vote in the 2013 Auckland local body elections Larry?
36%.
Which leaves how many Aucklanders – who didn’t bother to vote Larry?
64%.
How many candidates standing for the 2016 Auckland Mayoralty effectively, (in my view) support the pro-business, corporate-controlled Auckland ‘Supercity’ (for the 1%)?
Apart from myself – in my view – ALL of them.
So – who is the 2016 Auckland Mayoral candidate that effectively, in my view, that stands out from the rest, in defending citizens’ LAWFUL rights to ‘open, transparent and democratically accountable’ local government in Auckland?
Don’t YOU believe in transparency when it comes to the spending of public rates monies Larry?
I do.
And I have put my freehold home on the line to defend my (and YOUR) lawful rights to transparency.
Your fellow ZB host Leighton Smith ‘gets it’.
But then – maybe he’s not a ‘numpty’?
Kind regards
Penny Bright
2016 Auckland Mayoral candidate.
Just watched The Civillian on where the Media on TV News is heading. Funny satire but with some interesting bits too. Worth a watch.
http://www.watchme.co.nz/the-civilian/season-1/episode-5/
Help sought.
Guys this is a plea for help.
I am Bi-polar, rapidly cycling. I have not found a combination of medications that allow me to function normally with Epillim and Fluoxitine the best I get is a smoothing of the worst of it, not a symptom suppression.
3 years ago I saw a panel of three Dr’s through Winz and was granted invalids benefit, however the seed of doubt were sewn and I went and found full time work in an engineering Co. I make good stuff don’t get me wrong. I’m a good worker, work hard do good quality. That’s not the issue.
The issue with bi-polar is health and safety, i’m impulsive. I’ve attacked a police officer whilst I had Hep C and tried to kill him because I warned him I was having a mental health turn and to handcuff me till I calmed in the few seconds I knew what was happeneing to my body, I had a 36 hour flight stuffed up my med times and lost the plot, my bad, completely, but I was technically insane at that moment. I spent time in jail when I was supposed to be attending my sisters wedding.
When I went to work, I had soooo many days off due to being sick half the time, not sleeping from anxiety of work and other pressures, sending me into massive depression episodes, I barely made my mortgage payments as I used up all my holidays and sick days being sick I had no cover for all the other times, that’s not on.
So at this job eventually a real bad incident occurred straight from left field never got a warning with my body some guys at work were acting complete immature dicks and were trying to kill a bird in the factory rafters and I lost it again, how can I describe it, I had to save that bird it was like my whole meaning in life. I nearly killed a guy over that. I cannot trust myself in the workplace. It’s because I cannot predict what is going to cause a moment of complete irrationality like that. And it happens all the time i’m forever at work having issues with people over my incorrect at that moment rational of others actions. I go into a complete irrationality and I justify things(my actions) at that time, that I would not at others when i’m stable.
I lost my job over the bird incident, my employer who is a bloody good bloke, once I had calmed down after a week or so explained, I am a good worker, no doubt about that, but he didn’t know what job there was for me with my issues. Bluntly these outbursts and constant time off with no predictability of them, is my issue amongst others, like working for a week with no sleep(well maybe a couple hours if i’m lucky a night)
I went back to winz. 2.5 years of trying a job. I didn’t give up, but I cannot keep saying it won’t happen again boss, when I damn well know it will. Anyways I got asked for my letter of resignation, he was kind enough not to sack me and he was right. It’s not my work it’s a Health and Safety issue.
They are making me suicidal seriously. It’s rude as hell. I got interviewed by Sue the Waikato decision maker for winz. Told by Bridget at Tokoroa Winz she makes the decisions on living support / medical certificates, but is not a Dr or anything.
Meet Sue she goes on for the whole meeting about how she’s a nurse and knows these things, raving on how much she new.. (lady ur a Nurse FFS and i’m a psychologist since I know a little about the subject). Well i’m fit for work, straight away. She’s going to prop me up on sleeping tablets and medications that will basically mong me out i’m therefore fit for some partime job I can attend whenever i’m feeling ok, that therefore means i’m fit for work as that’s possible if I don’t like it I have to go see a Winz Dr again she’ll give me a list of bought and paid for Dr’s that will follow her recommendation as we know it works she will also get winz to pay for a psychologist to treat me cure me and eventually i’ll be fit for work but at the moment I have an exemption for work, but i’m fit for work no supported living
I got a mortgage ya cheapskate winz bastards 271 comes in my account from winz, when auto payments go out I for 19 fkn dollars to feed myself on. IS that my lot for the rest of my life o
Failing to hear me at any point just talking over me, a nurse(or is she?) from Australia? WTF
I cannot take this much longer, that was the 9th, of feb, it’s 20th today never heard or received a letter as to outcome of meeting regards my medical cert and assessment for supported living payments application. Don’t I at least have the right to be informed? what the fuck is going on.
Seriously someone with clout, I need help bad, they are killing people. This constant questioning of integrity, knows better than me attitudes of what my issues are, belittling shit has to stop. How many of us are going to die from despair and suicide before it does?
Hi Richard, thanks for coming and sharing your story. I hope that some help can be offered here.
I’ve had a lot of personal experience with WINZ as an ill person. My main thought is that you need support to deal with WINZ, both in general but also in getting put back on Supported Living.
In the immediate term I would suggest finding a good benefit advocate. Try the bigger cities if you have to, they can work by phone (and email if you have access). They can phone you back so the call doesn’t cost you. If you aren’t able to phone them yourself initially, find a local agency who can pick up the cost of the call. Look at finding someone who you get on with and who gets your situation.
Benefit advocates can do things like chase up why WINZ haven’t contacted you and having them involved makes WINZ sit up and take more notice because ultimately the decisions they are making can end up before a judge.
If you can find someone locally who can also assist you as a support person, all the better. You’ve probably had all sorts of experiences with people in various parts of the system, so again, try and find someone you feel comfortable with.
Do you have a supportive GP? Are they on board with supporting you re WINZ (rather than supporting WINZ)?
Re WINZ, their staff are never qualified to be experts on medical issues, no matter what their background. Their job is to establish entitlements to payments based on external advice, and if you are looking for work, to help with that. They should never be involved in giving medical advice or making decisions based on their own interpretations of your medical needs. The only information they should be basing decisions on are what you and your medical people tell them.
If you can, always take someone with you to WINZ appointments. Refuse to talk with them on the phone, use email instead. Having a witness and a papertrail that you have at your end changes what happens.
IMO, what should be happening is that you should be on Supported Living and be allowed to work as an when you are well enough. That should be long term, without pressure to become independent. The system is capable of working with people with permanent disability, that’s what SLA is for.
Beyond all that, I think you have clear grounds for a complaint. I’m not suggesting that you do this, because you might be better off using your time to do things you enjoy or find other support for your health. But it can help to know that they are wrong in what they are doing.
Beneficiary Advocacy Groups,
Auckland http://www.bais.org.nz/
Wellington http://yellow.co.nz/y/wellington-benefit-rights-service
You could also try your local Citizens Advice Bureau (for who the local advocacy services are) or Community Law Centre.
Hey Richard, I have had trouble with anxiety in the past. I was also prescribed Fluoxetine, and it was good for improving my mood generally, although I did feel side affects like feeling really tired sometimes and I still had some depressive episodes.
To me it sounds like you know that work for you is not a goer right now, you could see a doctor that you trust and knows your history. I wouldnt think it would be much trouble for them to write you something saying that you are not fit for work and possibly won’t be long term.
I’m not a doctor or a professional, but I can suggest things that I think have helped me. What I think might have helped balancing out my mood was intensive exercise, like going out for for a 30 minute bike ride – riding almost as hard you can, or digging over the garden vigorously, going for a run where you do intermittent sprinting – the idea being to get yourself really puffed. Even better if you’ve got a type of exercise that you enjoy doing already, then you don’t mind going out and doing it even when you might be feeling down and not wanting to go out and do anything.
There’s also the concept of mindfulness (http://www.mentalhealth.org.nz/home/our-work/category/21/mindfulness), which could be useful, it’s one of those things that is easy to recommend and extremely hard to implement when you are actually in the moment though, and would take a lot of practice too.
I’m not sure if there are any mental health support groups in your area, it would probably help if you could meet with some others with bi-polar to share ideas, tips, and get support etc. But you can probably find an online group/forum which would be the next best thing.
It sounds like you have a good understanding of how your condition is effecting you and your life, and that is really good in my opinion. It means you’re more able to recognise and react and treat yourself as you notice yourself getting into an unhealthy frame of mind. So keep up the observations of how you feel and that should make life easier I reckon.
Hi Richard, I have a close family member who has mental problems so I can understand where you are coming from.
If I were you I think I would contact my local Member of Parliament immediately and DEMAND some help with your situation. If the MP won’t help then contact someone else (anyone) in the political sphere to see what they can do.
Hope this helps.
Good luck to you.
Can anyone help me find some graphs on long term party voting intention? I’ve tried google and it’s giving me flag referendum hits and some obscuring stuff.
I want something like the 4th chart in this link, only for preceding decades.
http://www.roymorgan.com/findings/6678-roy-morgan-new-zealand-voting-intention-february-2016-201602190455
With Christchurch’s inhabitants finally waking up to the fact that John Key and his trolls don’t give a shit about them I thought I’d repost this to show how much they are being shafted by this ugly lot!
Here is how John Key fattens his mates
Sadly way too much damage done or un repaired by the time they get a chance to dump them and real change takes hold about a year after the next GE.
NATS know how to cripple areas, tying the hands of the next govt into at least 2 election cycles of rectifying their wilful destruction. It’s been their MO from the get go.
Someone mentioned recently what we already know happens but don’t stress enough – that progressive policies introduced by NZ governments are likely to be dumped on a change of government.
And if one govt ties the hands of another to do anything about it within their term, then there can be no change at all. Labour gets in, then tends to upset enough people to get thrown out, or the Opposition sets up some strawman arguments that the people get obssessed about and then Labour’s out and what is left as a memorial by the time the National vandals tear down their, usually, good works?
Probably most of us have been wondering how Kiribati people are getting on since our government decided not to accept a request to be a climate refugee from one man who has been deported.
Radio nz did a piece on Kiribati recently.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/201789691
Kiribati people getting ready for “migration with dignity”
People in Kiribati are upskilling and preparing for the time when they might have to move because of the effects of climate change.
From Dateline Pacific on 17 Feb 2016
This is something that a progressive NZ has been able to do in a country that wanted help and welcomed it. (Now he might have a chance to help here.)
He was in the Values Party by the way, not the National Party.
8:12 Ron Layton
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/201790116/ron-layton-intellectual-property-in-africa
Ron Layton is an expatriate New Zealander who is the founder and CEO of LightYears IP, a board member of the African IP Trust, and a fellow of Ashoka, the largest worldwide network of social entrepreneurs. He is creating global mechanisms that provide poor producer businesses in developing countries with a full range of intellectual property tools that allow them to re-position for higher and more stable incomes.
MPs’ property loophole ‘stings taxpayers’
That’s significantly more than the average wage every years in subsidies.
Really, it’s time to end these rorts that the MPS keep giving themselves.
The politicians have themselves to blame: allowing the value of wages to decrease naturally builds resentment.
Personally I think they deserve fair wages and conditions like everyone else.
It’s tempting to suggest that their salary should be means-tested, to level the playing field, and why not just give them a percentage (250%?) of the median wage divided by the population percentage of children in poverty (plus one percent so that it can never become infinite) 😉
So do I. I don’t think that giving them near $80k per year to buy their own houses and rental properties is fair and it’s bloody expensive for the rest of us.
It would be a damn site cheaper and easier if the government simply owned a 100 room hotel in the capital that the MPs from outside of the capital could use when there. Empty rooms could be used by foreign dignitaries and government guests.
All that would cost us is rates of a few thousand and a couple of million per year for maintenance and personnel. Far less than what it’s costing us in paying these people to become rich while they add to both the housing shortage and rising house prices.
“The opposite of addiction is not sobriety. The opposite of addiction is connection”
Interesting video on why physiological addiction theories are wrong, and why environment is critical. I think some of it is a bit simplistic, but it’s a good graphic wway to get across that we’ve been looking in the wrong direction.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao8L-0nSYzg (5 mins)
http://www.addiction.mobydigg.de/
I found this an interesting read in latest scientific America on how political symmetry corrupts science I suggest also answers some questions re constant attacks on Neo liberalism by the far left and academia, especially those in social sciences Well worth reading full article
2015 study by psychologist José Duarte, then at Arizona State University, and his colleagues in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, entitled “Political Diversity Will Improve Social Psychological Science,” found that 58 to 66 percent of social scientists are liberal and only 5 to 8 percent conservative and that there are eight Democrats for every Republican. The problem is most relevant to the study of areas “related to the political concerns of the Left—areas such as race, gender, stereotyping, environmentalism, power, and inequality.” The very things these students are protesting.
How does this political asymmetry corrupt social science? It begins with what subjects are studied and the descriptive language employed. Consider a 2003 paper by social psychologist John Jost, now at New York University, and his colleagues, entitled “Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition.” Conservatives are described as having “uncertainty avoidance,” “needs for order, structure, and closure,” as well as “dogmatism and intolerance of ambiguity,” as if these constitute a mental disease that leads to “resistance to change” and “endorsement of inequality.” Yet one could just as easily characterize liberals as suffering from a host of equally malfunctioning cognitive states: a lack of moral compass that leads to an inability to make clear ethical choices, a pathological fear of clarity that leads to indecisiveness, a naive belief that all people are equally talented, and a blind adherence in the teeth of contradictory evidence from behavior genetics that culture and environment exclusively determine one’s lot in life.
97% of peer-reviewed psychology papers confirm their hypotheses. 1% of psychology papers are attempts at replication.
Basically, treat all psychology with a bucket of salt. Or take Hodson & Busseri’s findings as read. Your call.
Kanai et al 2012 might interest you too.
Nah, you won’t like those results. Better set up a “think” tank to employ some academics who are just like lawyers.
Cheers OAB I think you are further evidence on the findings of this study, as are many standards contributors Note the study is even handed and indicates the bias can go the other way re conservative bias but surely even just on statistic and group think their is something to it if only 5 to 8pc of social scientist are considered conservative.
Breaking news! Lefties think lefty thoughts!
You are assuming that the majority of social scientists who are liberal do research from their bias. What evidence to you have for that?
Psychology is full to the brim with Lefties. Economics is full to the brim with Wingnuts.
Perhaps what’s really going on here is that strongly political people are attracted to fields that tolerate magical thinking.
Not being a social scientist, I can’t be further evidence.
Your cite is a Psychology paper – has anyone attempted to replicate its findings? You do understand my first paragraph above, eh.
If we’re going to treat your Psychology cite as accurate, then Hodson & Busseri deserves equal treatment.
Kanai et al, on the other hand, is a Biology paper, not Psychology, and hence carries far more weight.
I understood your first point albeit you write in riddles and not clear English, I am not sure why, I put it down to showing off. I just raised the article out of interest and not to go into indepth peer review and replication. The article has obviously pricked your reality bubble and got you thinking which is good 😊
You really aren’t getting it: a Psychology paper, attempting to
find a bias that Psychologists had been talking about for years, finds said bias and is instantly seized upon as evidence.
A dwindling and increasingly irrelevant field? Some say…
The funny thing is, if we listen to the drivel right wingers believe, NASA, the Otago School of Medicine, the Salvation Army, The Lancet, Nature, Marine Biology and the Problem Gambling Foundation are also hotbeds of Left-wing activism, and you’re whining about Psychology? Pfft.
All science has bias from what is chosen to study. It’s not necessarily a problem except where it is unacknowleged and where power structures prevent imbalance from being changed eg the amount of medicial research that is funded by big pharma and how this has led to a culture of lying about results. It’s hard to change because the power structure (neoliberalism) literally prevent other people from doing research (it’s more complicated than that).
If social science is biased towards liberalism because of more liberals doing the research, that’s a different thing than individual researchers having bias. You seem to be conflating the two and suggesting that the individual cited was biased and unscientific in their approach. Do you have any evidence of that?
No article was not picking on an individual, simply raised that specific research to contrast social cognitition as a scene setter re left and right I believe crux of article was as is the sum of the parts equal the whole, the whole equals the sum of the parts. The study simply opines due to to the lefts massive over representation in social science this results in social cognitive bias ( including in peer review) . Of course there will be individuals who may not be bias but on average the research is indicating the potential of such
Yawn. You’re at liberty to attack anyone’s findings any time you like, if you can pass peer review.
You may have difficulty with that in at least one respect: your list of the things Lefties believe (17) is pure projection.
You may also be asked to improve your spelling and grammar; perhaps you can find a sympathetic editor.
I note that the Right despises the social sciences, and academics in general. Couldn’t pass the exams, I guess.
more spin and revert to type, so boringly predictable
“No article was not picking on an individual”
I was saying that YOU are trying to make out that the numbers of social scientists being liberal means that individual scientists who are liberal are also biased in their work. Putting aside that there is bias in all science, I think your claim is meaningless unless you can demonstrate that indiviudal scientists are in capable of doing research that isn’t contaminated by their politics.
If your point is that more liberal social scientists means that more topics that are of interest to liberals is being done, that wouldn’t surprise me. But that’s a different thing than the research being corrupted by the individual
Duartes has a point that Reddullish has fixated on:
However, the link gives the game away:
So yeah, fraud, lack of replication, questionable practices…oh but the real problem is
the exams are too hard for Reddullish et ala lack of political diversity. Uh huh.Not sure what the term ‘social psychology’ refers to but it’s not equivalent to ‘social science’ right?
edit, your first draft without the ad hominem was better.
I think the entrance exam may well be an issue: not everyone is academically skilled, or capable of constructing a reasoned argument.
Social Science encompasses a range of fields:
Wikipedia.
All science has bias from what is chosen to study.
Generally, research is concentrated around areas of ignorance. Sometimes it results in the areas of ignorance shrinking.
Spinning now OAB, agree with your first point but surely bias is amplified if one pursuit of science is massively over represented by one dominant political school of thought
Reality has a Left wing bias.
You need to stop projecting and read my comments again. I’m not saying what you think I am. I’m saying that Psychology is almost completely munted: the majority of its findings are unreliable at best.
That includes this one.
Why do you care anyway: as I said, the right makes a virtue of despising science and academia. If wingnuts don’t want to study you only have yourselves to blame.
I choose to ignore the findings or rantings
of the church of Scientology as evidence
By the way OAB I suggest I may hold more degrees than you, albeit i have not majored in English re your bag of cut and paste put downs
We can all agree on that. What I don’t get is how you can’t understand that the Right’s relentless negative rhetoric about academia might deter right wingers from taking up research.
Well, if you could pass the entrance exams, that is.
PS: just because scientologists say Psychology is munted doesn’t mean it isn’t: your cite supports the view.
…cut and paste put downs.
Generally, research is concentrated around areas of ignorance. Sometimes it results in the areas of ignorance shrinking.
Where’s the put-down there? I said “sometimes” because quite often, in the hard sciences, further study debunks previous findings, thus increasing the unknowns.
I’m no more putting Psychology down than the research team you’re citing do in their own words, quoted at 17.2.1.2.1 above: fraud etc.
Lastly, I author my own put-downs, bud. Do you deny the vitriol aimed at academia from the Right? Do you challenge my assertion that it might put people off choosing study as a career?
PS: Someone with a handle like yours might think twice before calling the kettle black.
The abstract noun count is strong in this one.
Probably someone has already talked about this book looking at austerity.
This talk on Radionz this morning.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/201790117
David Stuckler: health and austerity
10:10 AM. Professor of Political Economy and Sociology at Oxford University, where he researches how social policy and economic changes influence health across the globe, and co-author of –
The Body Economic: Why Austerity Kills.
He is visiting New Zealand for the February lecture series
at the 20th Public Health Summer School,
run by the University of Otago, Wellington.
‘Unreasonable risk of fire’: Feds rule hoverboards unsafe
Yet more proof that things need to be properly tested and regulated before being allowed on the market.
Is that a toy?
Yeah, pretty much.
Yes. They’re one of the latest fads. Dunno why they call them hoverboards, they have wheels as well as this unfortunate tendency for some of them to spontaneously combust. Russell Crowe famously spat the dummy at Virgin Airlines when they refused to let him and his two sons take their Christmas prezzie hoverboards on an aircraft because sensible airlines were banning them as a potential fire risk.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/russell-crowe-launches-twitter-rant-at-virgin-australia-airline-after-being-stopped-boarding-flight-a6789391.html
The problem really seems to be the flood of cheap knock-offs on the market though.
more fodder for the landfill then.
Exploring Point Chevalier’s forgotten working class and left-wing history, with a busload of brilliant pensioners: http://readingthemaps.blogspot.co.nz/2016/02/cruising-point.html
Open Government Partnership report
More lies and disinformation from this government about what it’s doing.
Anyone know who the protest group is at the end of the pride parade on Ponsonby road? All I can see or hear is Fuck you…
The hairy iridescent bikers are more interesting…
Ok dug it out…
No Pride in Prisons to Protest Auckland Pride Parade
Queer and transgender prison abolitionist group No Pride in Prisons is holding a rally today at 5:30pm on the Karangahape Road Overbridge, in protest of the Auckland Pride Parade.
The rally follows the Auckland Pride Board’s decision to allow members of the police and the Department of Corrections to march in uniform in the parade.
“We are holding a counter-rally to take a public stand against the Auckland Pride Board’s decision to include violent, racist and transmisogynist institutions in its parade for the second year in a row,” says No Pride in Prisons spokesperson, Emilie Rākete.
“Given recent reports of racist police brutality and Corrections’ announcement to extend its ‘double-bunking’ policy, it is disgraceful that the Auckland Pride Board decided to include Corrections and police in the Pride Parade.”
“Corrections’ policies directly contribute to physical and sexual violence against trans and queer prisoners.”
Earlier this month, the Pride Board came out with its decision to allow Corrections officers to march in uniform as they did in 2015. This decision was made on the agreement that the Department of Corrections would take steps over the coming year to improve the policies affecting trans prisoners.
“To this date, the Department of Corrections has shown a blatant disregard for the treatment of all incarcerated people, especially queer and trans prisoners. The board should not have made this decision based on the Department’s vague promises for improvement.”
No Pride in Prisons believes that the effects of Corrections’ placement and double-bunking policies on queer and trans prisoners are perfectly clear.
“This year alone, No Pride in Prisons has heard from multiple transgender prisoners who have been either raped or brutally attacked while in Corrections’ custody.”
The group points to an incident late last year where a trans woman was raped after being placed in a cell overnight with a man. The group argues that this incident would not have taken place if not for the double-bunking policy.
“Corrections has introduced and massively expanded double-bunking policies despite advice that doing so would put prisoners at greater risk of physical and sexual assault. These policies have directly led to the rape of trans women and others,” says Rākete.
“Corrections has proven, time and time again, that it has no regard for the safety or bodily autonomy of inmates.”
According to No Pride in Prisons, the police have no better a track record. “A report released by the New Zealand Police in 2015 found that police officers use force against Māori at eight times the rate they do Pākehā,”[1] says Rākete.
“Last year, the New Zealand Police admitted to having an ‘unconscious bias’ against Māori.[2] While the police may call it a mere ‘bias’, these biases can be more accurately described as racism.”
“Māori currently make up about 51% of New Zealand’s prison population, despite being only 15% of the general population. This is because of the police decisions to apprehend and then charge Māori at a far higher rate than Pākehā for the same crimes.[3] What this proves is the police’s active role in perpetuating structural racism.”
“The participation of police and Corrections in the Pride Parade is a form of pinkwashing, using LGBTQI issues to mask their everyday violence and brutality, especially towards tangata whenua.”
“We encourage everyone who has been disappointed and angered by the Auckland Pride Board’s decisions to join us for the counter-rally.”
“The fact of the matter is that prisons and police are violent, racist institutions that have no place in any pride parade.”
+1
Human rights abusers belong at The Hague.
@Weka
This issue appers to be an example of our discussion 1.1.1.1.1. above
They need better signs to communicate the message..
Lyn asked, I researched
Amnesty, Pacifica…
This parade is Damnup big
Good to see Fran Wilde pop up for a few words. She pushed through the homosexual law reform in the late 80s.
The parade is finally up towards the end of the road.
Armed forces, universities, Westpac, coca cola, air nz, and of course a few corraled protesters after the police go through..
Churches, political parties including the Nats (passing in silence), Labour ( Andrew Little does a few words)…. ummm..
ANZ have amazing balloons. Greens. BNZ. Vegans. ASB. Sports – proud to play. St John’s ambulance. Fletcher building and Winstones
I am ambivalent about seeing Auckland towing at the end. Cleanup squad?
http://i.stuff.co.nz/world/south-pacific/77096084/Fiji-warned-of-grievous-ordeal-as-category-five-Cyclone-Winston-bears-down
Spare thought for our neighbours tonight.
325 kph gusts.. poor buggers…what could survive that?
Cyclone Winston
Category 5 to hit Fiji
good grief.
Umberto Eco has died.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/20/italian-author-umberto-eco-dies-aged-84
stuff story 19/2/2016
Apartment owner blocked out of her unit in dispute with body corporate
MARIA SLADE
Last updated 14:22, February 19 2016
The Landings complex in Parnell, where owner Christine Rogerson says the body corporate is stopping her from entering her apartment.
Christine Rogerson was amazed to find a new wall and door blocking her out of her own apartment.
The owner of a seventh floor unit in The Landings complex in Auckland’s Parnell had been told she could have supervised access as the building underwent major weathertightness and other repairs.
But when she asked to retrieve personal belongings stored in a locked room, she was informed she would have to wait till the work was completed.
Then she discovered a temporary barricade had been built in the corridor outside her unit blocking her way.
“Because I’ve asked for access, they’ve denied it and I’ve said why. This is what they do.”
READ MORE:
* Deregulation non-compliance turns home into house of horrors
* Apartment owners face maintenance timebomb
“They” are the complex’s body corporate, an administration that owners say is non-communicative, inconsistent, and aggressive.
A door has been built in the corridor leading to Rogerson’s apartment blocking her access.
A door has been built in the corridor leading to Rogerson’s apartment blocking her access.
Rogerson said she was originally told the work would take a month. That has stretched to three months with no end in sight.
Owners of the 220 apartments paid an original repair levy of $8 million, then a second of $4m, she said.
“I reckon there’s going to be another $4m, but you won’t know that until the AGM. It’s likely that we’ll be hit with another $4m and they’ll give you 30 days to come up with (it).
The Home Owners and Buyers Association chair has big concerns about the law surrounding bodies corporate, chair John Gray says
The Home Owners and Buyers Association chair has big concerns about the law surrounding bodies corporate, chair John Gray says
“It’s a group of 10 people maximum controlling a group of 200 people,” Rogerson said.
Fellow owner Roberta Budvietas said she was told her apartment had to be empty by March to make way for the workmen. When her tenants unexpectedly left in October she let her grandson stay temporarily for a peppercorn rent.
“Now they’re telling me it’s November. So every week I have lost $200 in potential rent on that apartment, and I can’t actually kick the kids out now.”
The Landings owner Roberta Budvietas says information doesn’t flow from the body corporate.
Dysfunctional administration had added to the already considerable stress of the repairs, Budvietas said.
“We’re paying for all kinds of costs… and then the fact the information doesn’t flow well and questions aren’t answered.
“When you have a body corporate secretariat who tells you one set of things and you don’t know because you’re just ordinary people trying to do your best… there’s no real resource to go to.”
The Landings body corporate said the temporary wall had been put in place to comply with health and safety requirements, and a visit to the apartment could be arranged with the head contractor.
Delays in getting council consents and the discovery of additional repair work required had pushed back the finish date in some cases, and owners had been kept informed, it said.
The dispute comes as Auckland Central MP Nikki Kaye conducts a campaign to assess whether rules around bodies corporate need to be changed.
She is holding a public meeting on Friday afternoon.
“I think if Auckland is going to have intensification, which we are and we need to… then we’ve got to have absolute confidence in the ownership and management structure of those dwellings.”
Some clear themes had emerged from the response to her campaign, she said:
– issues over long term maintenance plans, which every unit title complex must have, and transparency around them;
– body corporate managers versus property managers and their role, and whether it needs to be better regulated;
– whether the rules around bodies corporate and their committees likewise need to be tightened;
– access to up to date information and transparency.
Kaye says the Unit Titles Act was improved in 2010, but may need further enhancements.
However there was a balance between adequate regulation and not adding costs, she said.
“For example, if you did decide that there needs to be greater regulation around body corporate managers, then one, you might discourage people from taking that role, and two, you might add costs to that.”
But chairman of the Home Owners and Buyers Association, John Gray, is sceptical about Kaye’s efforts.
Hobanz has a host of concerns about the Unit Titles Act.
It was devoid of basic governance guidelines that other laws such as the Charities Act and the Companies Act contained, he said.
The only criteria for sitting on a body corporate committee was being an owner in the complex.
“You can have people who have been convicted of criminal conduct, bankrupted, and the sort, actually put themselves forward for election.” Gray said.
The organisation was also particularly concerned about long term maintenance plans, which were usually either inadequate or not in place at all.
On top of that bodies corporate could and did opt out of fully funding them, meaning future owners could be hit with massive repair bills, he said.
– Stuff.co.nz
Landlords lose thousands
Farmers face waterways fines video
Beer festival canned
Beetle saving farmers $44 million
“Nick Dearden, the director of Global Justice Now, said: “Despite the enormous public outcry over companies like Google and Amazon paying ridiculously small amounts of tax in the UK, the government is trying to sign us up to a trade deal that could effectively prevent us from bringing about laws that could address tax injustice.
“The ability to enact effective and fair tax systems to finance vital public services is one of the defining features of sovereignty. The fact that multinational companies would be able to challenge and undermine that under TTIP is testament to the terrifying extent of the corporate grab embedded in this toxic trade deal.”
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/feb/18/mps-can-view-ttip-files-but-take-only-pencil-and-paper-with-them
What a pigs muddle the government move to deregulation of builders has led us to. In some other countries, the government MPs concerned would be taken to Court and with luck, imprisoned or worse. Perhaps they should be stripped of their nationality and left stateless to go from place to place spreading their stealing and criminal activities around the world instead of finessing them here on we unlucky people.
I put up a case earlier in Open Mike where a woman owner was shut out of her apartment so it could be doctored, for increasing months with an end not shortly in sight. This article is much the same, and goes into compliance, refers to legislation and gives warnings for future home buyers, especially apartments, built between 1995 and 2005.
This from stuff.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/business/76513562/Deregulation-non-compliance-turns-home-into-house-of-horrors
He said he personally believes only about 15 per cent of the nation’s leaky buildings have been remediated.
Burrell said most non-compliance faults in leaky buildings come out of the blue for owners as they are hidden internally.
Burrell said better legislation, to allow for a higher level of due-diligence, would be one way to minimise and assess costs in leaky buildings.
“Under current legislation we cannot even remove one piece of cladding before the remedial work starts.
“If we had legislation that allowed us to look at what is lying internally then it would be a lot easier to determine any non-compliance issues,” Burrell said.
Levie said HOBANZ believes the the lack of financial assistance to cover the faults is going to become a significant financial burden on apartment owners in the coming years.
“It is significant as it is going to become difficult for owners to borrow against weather tight projects because of the risks that lie internally,” Levie said.
He said it will also become more common for weather tight remediation to only be carried out on apartments where the work justifies a gain in property value.
“The concern is that with areas further out of the city, where the work costs the same yet the values of the apartments are not there.
“Then there will be hesitation to have external work carried out because there could be internal non-compliance issues the will add to the cost,” Levie said.
Burrell believes the only other way the non-compliance costs could be funded is if the Government went back to its original plan of covering two-thirds of the leaky building remediation costs.
PETER MEECHAM / FAIRFAX NZ.
(Andi Burrell Remedial Specialist from Anoroc Remediation )
(Home Owners and Buyers Association (Hobanz) chief executive Roger Levie)
edited