Fisk …: “So I have a prediction. If the Trump regime collapses – for regime it is – I suspect it will not be his frolics with the Russians which destroy it. Nor his corruption, nor his domestic lies. Nor his misogyny. Nor his anti-immigrant racism. Nor his obvious mental instability, though this clearly connects him to his friends in the Arab world. The Middle East has already got its coils into the White House. Trump is a friend of a highly dangerous state called Saudi Arabia.
He has adopted Israeli foreign policy as his own, including the ownership of Jerusalem and wholehearted support for Israel’s illegal colonisation of Palestinian Arab land.
He has torn up a solemn treaty with Iran. He has joined the Sunni side in its sectarian war with the Shias of the Middle East, in Iran, in Lebanon, in Syria, in Bahrain and, of course, in Saudi Arabia itself.
Many countries have gone to war on behalf of other nations. Britain drew the sword for Poland in 1939, albeit a little late in the day. But to actively seek participation in someone else’s sectarian war for no other reason than to continue to sell weapons to a wealthy and unstable autocracy, to amalgamate your own country’s foreign policy with that of the most militarily powerful state in the Middle East — to the point of depriving an entire people of a share in its capital city –
– and to wilfully ignore the long and lucrative support that our Gulf “allies” have given to the most frightful of our cult enemies – those who have indeed struck in the streets of London and New York – is beyond the usual lexicon. It is beyond shameful. Beyond wicked. Were it not for the insanity of the man responsible, the word “depravity” comes to mind.”
One; the generation that Philip Neal here complains about has been raised by his own generation, being the parents.
Two; the generation that Philip Neal here complains about has been raised under his own politics – voting as they did the for the Nats and Bill English through the nineties which this generation was born into and raised under.
If there is a “useless” generation (and I no way accept there is), then it is the result of Philip Neal and his own generation… what a frikkin’ dipstick.
Frankly that is made up bullshit to ‘create a divide’ that can be used by the likes of useless double dipping welfare benefit abusing men like bill english.
NZ is a very small country with a really small population. Literally everyone other then a really new migrant is related to someone somewhere by marriage etc.
Rural useless children end up going to Uni in the big urban centers and some might even end up in towns, like useless Bill English whose only link to rural existence is his father who was a farmer.
Urban useless children end up working on farms or moving rural and create businesses there.
These guys don’t live in isolation, they live for divide and conquer and they do a real good job there.
Mr Neal got a serve from Jill Hawkey, Methodist Missin director, in the same article. She said that the comments were “really, really unhelpful” because they fed stigma around people receiving social supports. “The majority are only on there for a short period of time and the benefit just helps them through a difficult period.”
“The sign of a healthy society is how we treat our most vulnerable,” she said.
Jill Hawkey has a better handle on the situation, She runs Blenheim’s only emergency housing provider.
Mr Neal said, “we do need benefits but there’s lots of people who abuse the system”.
Well, he’s right there. In all the tax debate I’ve not heard much from the wealthy about tax evasion necessitating tax reform, in other words about “lots of people who abuse the system.”
we pay for superannuation
we pay for unemployment benefits
we pay for ACC
we pay for social welfare for those who can’t finance their own lifes fully
we pay for the accommodation benefit
we pay for the state houses
we pay for the roads
we pay for the hospitals
we pay for the schools
we pay for street lightning, for parks, for public buildings
we pay for the infrastructure that is used by the public, businesses and farmers
we pay for all of it via our income taxes, GST, business taxes.
Non of the things we pay for is ‘welfare’, it is a prepaid service.
Maybe its time to list up again on our pay slips just what hte percentage of each of hte tickets on our wage is .
Superannuation 5 %, Unemployment 5 % , ACC 5% …..until we understand that we don’t get Hand Outs from government (which is also financed by us – urban and rural useless people) we get to claim back a service we paid for.
And then maybe men like the useless pencil pusher from the federated farmers would learn to think before sprouting hate.
Farmers need workers, but workers get paid better in oz, why. Well farmers here have a extra incentive to push down wages, capital gains. Nz has a skill shortage, as it’s obvious easier to get ahead in oz when the owners aren’t farming the capital gains at 0% tax. So farmer whinning about the need for those lazy bennies to get a job, turns out its just greed as they have a worker shortage.
Mr Neal is simplistic in his statements and very generalising. He says that some government members “would like to see farming put down altogether.” Such a view is very exaggerated.
He talks about sponging beneficiaries.
Here is a question for him. What is the amount stolen by beneficiaries convicted of beneficiary fraud as opposed to the amount stolen by tax evasion?
“New research reveals tax dodgers are ripping off the country at up to 150 times the rate of welfare fraudsters, but are being jailed much less often. Last year, tax evaders cheated the country of between $1 and $6 billion, while welfare fraud cost $39 million.” Excerpted from a post on The Standard July 18 2017 titled “Benefit fraud vs white collar crime.”
In 2018 IRD reported that it was owed $3 billion in unpaid taxes, with $1.7 billion owed for more than three years.
The letters to the Editor might get a tad more interesting, too, ianmac.
“so the Government can then redistribute money to those they perceive as the helpless and needy, but in my opinion, useless.”
That will be a statement that will return to haunt Mr Neal. He mentions recent events in Christchurch as having distracted him from his opining on taxation.
What he doesn’t seem to get is the distance between what that man did in ChCh and where most Kiwis are. He uses the same language of divisiveness, of ‘the other” by calling our people on benefits ‘useless’. I should hope that most Kiwis will also regard his opining as a form of hate speech. To call someone useless is to deny their humanity. Every human being has value.
I wonder how much direct and indirect, taxpayer or ratepayer funded support Mr Neal, his family and his business receive. He might go strangely quiet at the answer.
Two bail outs for the farming (mostly) sector in recent years come to mind.
Mycoplasma bovis
South Canty Finance
AND
What about the agricultural worker being ripped off by the sector as well.
Maybe if a living wage was paid, then there would be fewer seeing benefits.
I would actually go far to say that beneficiaries and working people have been used as ATMs for the countries landlords, banks and power companies for a very long time.
“USELESS” beneficiaries how very Hitleresque of Mr. Neal someone should educate him on the Nazis extermination of the mentally ill and disabled described by Hitler as “USELESS MOUTHS”
Bit of a joke from the most featherbedded, by tax dollars, community in New Zealand.
Not to mention the almost total destruction of non commodity manufacturing and service sector of our economy, and the resultant billions in costs, unemployment and poverty, to obtain “free trade” agreements to benefit farmers.
I am not necessarily against State subsidies, but some acknowledgement of the real “hard working Kiwi’s” who pay the taxes, instead of moaning about the little they, farmers, pay, would be nice.
Muslims do not hate us for our freedoms and values …. its our actions and history in the middle east that creates extremist ‘blowback’. …. and refugees fleeing violence and extremism
“From Washington’s perspective, peace in Syria is the horror scenario. Peace would mean what the United States sees as a ‘win’ for our enemies: Russia, Iran, and the Assad government. We are determined to prevent that, regardless of the human cost.”
“Just consider for a moment the UK’s support for, and involvement in, the horrifying Saudi war against Yemen, or US politicians’ blanket silence on Israel’s massacre of unarmed demonstrators in Gaza. Our leaders have no moral high ground to stand on. Their foreign policy decisions are about oil, defence contracts and geo-strategic interests, not about protecting civilians or fighting just wars.
However bad Assad is, and he is a dictator, he is responsible for far fewer deaths and much less suffering in the Middle East than either George W Bush or Tony Blair.
Former New York Times correspondent Stephen Kinzer sets out a very plausible reason why the US, UK and France keep intervening in Syria. It is not about children or chemical weapons. It is to prevent the Syrian government and Russia triumphing over the jihadists, as they have been close to doing for some time.
These western states are adamantly opposed to allowing a peaceful resolution in Syria, Kinzer observes, because it:
“might allow stability to spread to nearby countries. Today, for the first time in modern history, the governments of Syria, Iraq, Iran and Lebanon are on good terms. A partnership among them could lay the foundation for a new Middle East.”
“That new Middle East, however, would not be submissive to the United States-Israel-Saudi Arabia coalition. For that reason, we are determined to prevent it from emerging. Better to keep these countries in misery and conflict, some reason, than to allow them to thrive while they defy the United States. “…
“From Washington’s perspective, peace in Syria is the horror scenario. Peace would mean what the United States sees as a ‘win’ for our enemies: Russia, Iran, and the Assad government. We are determined to prevent that, regardless of the human cost.”
“However bad Assad is, and he is a dictator, ”
That’s not correct. Elections were held in Syria in 2014 attended by numerous UN observers. Bashar al Assad won by a considerable majority.
The UN observers report is here:
“reporters representing Time magazine and the New York Times referred to the government as having broad support, of critics conceding that Assad was popular, and of Syrians exhibiting little interest in protest. At the same time, they described the unrest as a series of riots involving hundreds, and not thousands or tens of thousands of people, guided by a largely Islamist agenda and exhibiting a violent character.”
“Bashar al-Assad’s refusal to renounce Arab nationalist ideology dismayed Washington, which complained about his socialism,”
“Time’s correspondent Rania Abouzeid attributed the failure of the protest organizers to draw significant support to the fact that most Syrians were not opposed to their government. Assad had a favorable reputation, especially among the two-thirds of the population under 30 years of age, and his government’s policies were widely supported. “Even critics concede that Assad is popular and considered close to the country’s huge youth cohort, both emotionally, ideologically and, of course, chronologically,”
“That the government commanded popular support was affirmed when the British survey firm YouGov published a poll in late 2011 showing that 55 percent of Syrians wanted Assad to stay. The poll received almost no mention in the Western media, prompting the British journalist Jonathan Steele to ask: “Suppose a respectable opinion poll found that most Syrians are in favor of Bashar al-Assad remaining as president, would that not be major news?”
Steele described the poll findings as “inconvenient facts” which were” suppressed “because Western media coverage of the events in Syria had ceased “to be fair” and had turned into “a propaganda weapon.”[66
Well, I watched the chief censor on the AM show rationalising his decision to ban the shooter’s manifesto & agreed that propaganda from violent groups ought not to be given a platform in the msm.
Then I saw the rep from the FSM explaining that we need to understand what motivates such groups and suppressing the manifesto stops folks learning, and agreed with that.
So there’s merit on both sides of this divide. I suspect a medial line will have to be taken, in which people are free to selectively examine the group’s advocacy on a point-by-point basis. Why bother? Consider the weakness of the censor’s position: public policy ought to be evidence-based, and he failed to cite a single piece of evidence to validate his stance.
I’ve noticed the same failing in those here who stridently demonise the alt-right. None have provided a single example of incitement to violence in the manifesto. I’m not saying none exists – just that laziness isn’t good enough.
The censor’s stance is to treat the public with contempt by assuming they don’t need to know. Maybe tacit rather than conscious (like Trump) but still evident. Paternalism. Unlikely to fly well in the new millennium.
For those of us who have been fighting racism and injustice, bigotry and hate over the years we don’t have to read the specific cut and paste jobbie from this murderer because we already know what they think – it’s all over the internet, it’s all over their low impact support sites from those with like mind. It is good others want to join the fight – may I suggest – read and follow those fighting these people and you will learn a lot. Reading their rambling tomes you’ll learn not so much just how to hate more.
Shradrach is all over the internet …. spreading victim blaming shit like this ….
Special Report: The Ladder Down to Hell : “The ( NZ ) killings also coincided with a surge of anti-Muslim hate crimes in other regions of the world, including the United Kingdom and Canada, while in the U.S., such crimes have spiked to all-time highs. ”
Shradrach s response : “If that is true, it is hardly surprising given the hatred being preached across the US by Islamic leaders, particularly anti-Semitic diatribes.”
This is the truth versus Shradrachs angry fear-mongering arguments.
These Muslim New Zealanders …. and the restraint and love shown by the bereaved …… show Shadgag to be a very very ugly member … of us
Mucad Ibrahim was 3 years old when the white supremacist in the #ChristchurchTerrorAttack took his life. Too young to know to play dead like his father, or run fast enough to escape like his brother, young Mucad will never play soccer, struggle with homework, or marry.#50livespic.twitter.com/nFR4OWtezH
I often find that when someone quotes another without providing links, they are being dishonest. Like you were here /open-mike-21-03-2019/#comment-1600348.
Yes your deliberately shortened the quote from’ the ladder to hell “….to leave out christchurch …. we can all see that.
Why did you shorten it ????
So you could push your “: “If that is true, it is hardly surprising given the hatred being preached across the US by Islamic leaders, particularly anti-Semitic diatribes.” ….. without making us all vomit at your sentiments.
How about your bullshit statement when you conflate extremist fundamentalist Muslims …… with normal peaceful Muslims ….
“Islam as an ideology, as practised in Islamic nations and as taught in many western countries, is fundamentally incompatible with a modern liberal democracy. There are many Muslims who are calling for an Islamic reformation, unfortunately their voices are, as yet, not being heard.”
So according to Shradich a good portion of our Muslims murdered in Christchurch were incompatible with New Zealand life.
Could you identify the ones we are better off without shradarch
Here they are ….. strangely they seem like better New Zealanders than you
Here are the profiles of the #50lives lost in the #NewZealandMosqueAttacks: Read about them. Remember them. Say a prayer for them and their families. And then take action to help fight anti-Muslim racism. https://t.co/coyueBsOOh 50/End.
“So according to Shradich a good portion of our Muslims murdered in Christchurch were incompatible with New Zealand life.”
No, never said that.
Take a deep breath and contemplate for a moment the notion that it is possible to critique an ideology (in this case Islam) without wishing it’s followers ill. Are you suggesting that criticising Nazi ideology should not be allowed because it is attacking German people?
Nice sentiments, but critiquing an ideology is not ‘violence’. Nor is it ‘racism’, ‘bigotry’, ‘islamophobia’ or any other word you may choose to try to shut down debate.
The censor’s stance is to treat the public with contempt by assuming they don’t need to know.
No different from the OIA. Openness, transparency, and trust are just buzzwords to pacify the great unwashed. They know best, Dennis, and they don’t even have to justify it because it is their job and it comes with fancy titles (and pay packages) that tells them they’re above us. This is the natural order and the so-called chain of command. No respect for the underlings.
This is the problem I have with hierarchical structures and institutions; it breeds a climate of non-communicative so-called managers and leaders who can’t (be bothered) to properly explain anything. And no, appearing on a morning show is not the same as actually properly communicating and explaining.
This is even more of a problem with complex sensitive and controversial matter. The harder it gets, the less communication and explanation will be forthcoming. IMO, it should be the exact opposite.
Marty. Would you have wanted the Urewera raids, censored by the Government?
Incognito is right about the authoritarian arrogance.
I admit to struggling with this. For example I want child porn, and other similarly objectionable stuff on the internet, totally gone.
Political speech. Where do you draw the line? To me Bennett’s welfare bashing is “Hate speech” which is used to justify the level of cruelty inflicted on people by the right wing, and WINZ. Violence which hurts 100,s of thousands of people. Refusing her a platform however, will not stop the hate.
To a large extent if you give these people enough rope, they eventually discredit themselves, to all but a few.
Brash, for example is unelectable, as is Seymour anywhere but a National electorate, which will vote for a blue gumboot, if they are told to.
I read about half of the terrorist’s wee missive and did not see it as instructional….a ‘how to’ manual. He assumed he would be killed or caught and anticipated being isolated. The manifesto…or the first 40 pages or so consists of this arsehole interviewing himself. Asking himself the questions he thinks he should be asked so he can explain/justify the horror he has wrought.
Most of it was copy and paste. I doubt an original thought or idea has ever escaped from his brain. The couple of references to his own personal experience give insight into just how faulty his thinking is.
The bulk of the content is ubiquitous…banning this particular manifestation of this ideology serves only to raise what is in actuality crap to mythical heights. Create a legend Censor. Good work. /sarc, btw
Child pornography…most definitely ban…and ffs increase the penalties for making and disseminating 100 fold, as at the moment the courts are being too soft.
I too have real issues with being told by my ‘betters’ what is appropriate for me to know/see/read/hear. All government business should be totally open and transparent, and so far this lot have fallen way short on that.
This is the problem I have with hierarchical structures and institutions; it breeds a climate of non-communicative so-called managers and leaders who can’t (be bothered) to properly explain anything.
A subject dear to my heart Incognito but I won’t start on it because I would still be going this time tomorrow. Suffice to say, times are a’changing and these upstarts who have goose-stepped around the corridors of the Public Service and other halls of power for the past umpteen decades are gradually becoming extinct.
That’s my impression too @Anne. I’d go a little further in one or two cases – and that is that a couple who’ve ‘goose-stepped around the corridors’ (anxious to preserve their status, career options and perceptions of their own might), and who’ve been pushing back since the change in government might well be shitting themselves about now. (And if they aren’t, they’re a little bit ficker than I originally thought they were)
“Well, I watched the chief censor on the AM show….”
Well that’s your problem right there Dennis.
For goodness’ sake, watching telly is hazardous at any time….first thing in the morning though? The producers rightly assume the audience is barely awake so they don’t have to bother with quality content.
Give it up…take your coffee outside and watch the sunrise.
It’s not a woolly line at all if a speech act directly incites violence. I am happy for the citations provided by the Chief Censor to be enough evidence for me.
So no, there is no merit in continuing then able that kind of speech.
I have no problem at all censoring death threats, and as far as I can tell I’m one of the most permissive free speech advocates here.
So where’s your proof, Ad? Where did you see him provide a citation? If you refuse to front up with evidence, you can’t complain if folks remain unconvinced.
We? Some of us believe officials are accountable to the public. Not just in theory, but in practice too. Shifting democracy in the direction of accountability is wise. That’s why many people are helping to do it…
Yes we. I thought youd been involved in politics – this line you’re pushing seems very juvenile to me. Note I am not saying YOU are juvenile just what you are SAYING is imo. What accountability are you actually talking about. He went on the idiotbox didn’t he? He answered the inane questions didn’t he? Do you want to interview him yourself? Trust Dennis is actually what makes democracy work. Distrust destroys it.
Evasion of accountability by mainstream politicians and public servant was one of the concerns that motivated my joining the Greens 29 years ago. Similar evasion by capitalists motivated me even more.
Dunno why you regard such widespread concerns as juvenile. Zillions of adults share them. Many contributors here keep proving that.
I agree that trust is crucial. I’m actually reading a very good about it at the moment: Who Can You Trust? I bought Fukuyama’s book Trust in the nineties and one with the same title by a different author a couple of years later.
Re the current book, this is what the publisher’s section About the Author says: “Rachel Botsman is a world renowned expert on trust, whose three TED talks on the topic have been viewed over 3.5 million times.” Named “a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. She writes for the Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Harvard Review, Wired, and more.”
Her chapter on how the dark web operates to build trust on a verified and validated basis is fascinating (she gives examples to illuminate that). She’s an academic with the University of Oxford’s business school.
Trust Dennis is actually what makes democracy work. Distrust destroys it.
So true. And in my view, accountability is a necessary ingredient to build trust. Accountability is more than telling you do your job well and follow instructions nicely. It is about providing some (…) justification and explanation as to why you doing things and with what intentions and outcomes.
It’s a grey area but instead of a whiter shade of pale they choose a blacker shade of beige 😉
yay we agree. Trust is built on accountability. No accountability no trust. In regards to the mechanisms of government I am okay with the level of accountability – to a point – I’d certainly like heads to resign after mistakes that hurt people or break the law or are racist or sexist or ageist or ableist and so on. I haven’t seen anything like that or even remotely like that. I’ve seen a banned manifesto after the darkest day of murder against innocent Kiwis this country has seen. White supremacist garbage should be consigned to the rubbish bin. There are ZERO redeeming qualities for it to be available imo.
Sure they get it wrong – if anyone thinks someone should be perfect well sadly people aren’t like that because that’s impossible. There are checks and balances as there should be. They seem to work mostly and the alternative is not a society that cares for the vulnerable imo.
Well the obvious would also suggest that the censor,who spends his days watching,(at the taxpayers expense )reading and listening to porn and violent games should be required to undertake psychological evaluation.
Always the trouble. Accepting enforced ignorance.
Pornography is outlawed.
So obtaining some to view what is being talked about makes you an
outlaw.
If a teacher has it then that is the finish to their good reputation, no matter if it is just a small amount – not tons of files.
But police will have evenings when they watch it, so they know about it,
can recognise it when they see it. Yet teachers have not the standing to also be shown it. (This is what I understand has been the case and probably still is.)
Therefore if their students have it and watch it, then they know more about this important mind and attitude-bender than the teacher and might feel rather superior. It puts teachers at a disadvantage.
I raise some points. It isn’t an all-encompassing idea. Just a pint that some people who are supposed to be knowledgable and capable of moral behaviour know some things and other, similarly important people, are prevented from even viewing them.
I can see why cops might need to know precisely what sort of things might be deemed objectionable in practise. It goes to grounds for making an arrest or giving the censors appropriate items to rule on.
Teachers probably don’t need to know that much. How does a teacher discovering a kid is watching r18 differ from discovering the kid is watching something a bit closer to R20 or even objectionable? Surely it goes to parents and maybe school counsellor. They might call in the cops depending on age and content. But is there any functional difference at the teacher end?
Wonderful, Gabby! I understand what you are saying even if some others don’t. Always appreciate your ability to get right to the crux of the issue in a very few words. It’s a skill many of us don’t have.
Recall that I made the same point myself re not wanting to have the manifesto on my computer. I mentioned that there is a contaminating effect on the psyche.
Today I’m making a different point. Public policy must be evidence-based nowadays, to seem credible, lot’s of folk are claiming. I agree that is desirable. Citation of evidence has been missing in the hate-speech debate. I’ve pointed that out several times. This morning I caught Ad pretending that the censor cited evidence – did you notice how he ducked for cover when I called his bluff?
Now you may wish to claim that nobody comes here to make a positive contribution to public policy. I’m inclined to disagree. I know I do. Why would anyone seek to participate in politics from an impotent position?
Sorry, just to clarify, theoretically-like, you want evidence that the 74-page manifesto released by a mass-murderer immediately prior to his rampage contains objectionable material?
I think most people would safely assume it’s not a recipe for cinnamon swirls.
To see if it is a feasible candidate for prosecution under our hate-speech law. Proof of incitement to commit violence. I note how many folk are happy to assume it does without proof. I just think it unwise to form public policy on the basis of unvalidated assumptions.
Like the unvalidated assumption that a document written in relation to committing 50 murders might contain some nasty-ass shit?
Do you need to see every image someone downloaded to agree whether they were watching child porn, or are you happy with the existence of a conviction on the basis that the defendant was found to be in possession of images classified as objectionable?
You could try applying to the censors for permission to read the manifesto on the grounds that you wish to verify for yourself that it does indeed contain objectionable content that justifies its banning.
Let us know how you get on.
Or if you’re sufficiently distrustful of the quality of the censors’ decisions, I’m sure you could find it online, read and print it before the cops got to your door. The absence of truly objectionable material should then be a pretty good defence at trial.
Go on, set yourself up to be a free-speech martyr. If teenage me could play my illegal copy of Marianne Faithfull’s Why’d Ya Do It, you can strike a blow for free speech today.
i don’t want to see the manifesto discussed to see evidence for mass murder – the evidence of mass murder was provided before the manifesto. So that point is moot.
i would like to see the manifest discussed to learn where we – our spy agencies, our police services, our gun shop owner, us the community, and all other that interacted with this fellow- have missed that he is so incited to hate the other that he would become a mass murderer.
And as state before, i don’t forcibly want to read it, but i would like to see certain people read it, Hoskins, Richardson, Bill English, the federated farmer dude, and all those that regularly diminish people as useless, as others, as undeserving, as not fit, as bludgers, etc etc etc.
And i would like them to be asked, publicly is there anything in your rhetoric over the past few years that you would take back.
As i firmly believe that the incitement to hate not only comes from radicalized people, but more importantly comes from our so called polite society that shapes the daily discourse of our public.
i.e. Donald Trump : all mexican are rapists and murderers. All muslims must be banned. All african nations are shit holes.
Is this any less hate speech? And should we ban Donald Trump?
Should we ban that federated farmer dude that declares that some people are ‘useless’? And if they are useless, what should then be done about them?
And again, i understand that to look at us and our own discourse – and i include myself – might not be fun, might not be easy, might actually be hurtful. But we can not ever change hate, and hateful behavior by banning manifestos and screeds and pretend it did not happen here and it was not one of us – one of us fellow white people. Because we would not have any gumption of demanding accountability from every Muslim we see if the perpetrator of the crime were a Muslim.
The thing is that we know that for at least the next while not only will it not be easy, we know that other fuckwits will draw solace and encouragement from that document. Because that’s what they do: cut and paste from previous fuckwits.
If you can demonstrate a genuine need and ability to process that material, apply for an exemption.
i don’t need to read it. I just want to see where we as a society failed.
So i list up whom i think needs to read it.
The man from the federated farmers who a week after a mass murder sprouts nonsense about ‘useless people’. He needs to read it.
Mike Hoskins who has been on record now for years sprouting nonsense about dole bludgers, people who have children who can’t afford it, and generally ‘useless people’.
Bill English who has been on record calling our young people ‘useless and pretty damned hopeless.
Sky News that showed the video.
The police that surveilled others and not white supremasits.
Our polititians that have hyped in one way or another our fear of the Muslim while the terror came from a non muslim.
And they should answer to us the public, as many of htese guys are paid for by us. And they should tell us if they think that they too might be part of the problem.
And unless you have read the thing you would not know what they copy and pasted or wrote themselves. Don’t you want to know : WHY and HOW did this happen. and WHY and HOW did we miss it? and WHAT can we do to prevent it from happening again.
As for the fuckwits drawing solace, they already have the video and the manifesto downloaded and your little attempt at censor ship is something that they are laughing about.
@McFlock – “we know that other fuckwits will draw solace and encouragement from that document. Because that’s what they do: cut and paste from previous fuckwits.”
We also know that they will find opportunities for recruitment and ‘righteous’ outrage from the restriction or deletion of said document.
So, either way, the hard part is dealing with the recognition of the presence of a supportive community and individuals with this mindset and perspective, and then, making efforts to counteract or engage with them so that they are not destructive.
Sabine’s comments so far have been straightforward and well reasoned, and despite the harm caused, what little I have seen of the manifesto shows it to be an embarrassment to the author. I think her reasons are more convincing so far, than any others put forward regarding the classification of the material.
What makes you think Hosking or whomever won’t agree with it?
In ten years, I might read a book by a forensic psychologist or someone else who talks about why this specific insecure little fucker did what he did. It might have some revelation (e.g. apparently Whitman had a brain tumour that might have accounted for his actions to some degree). Most likely it will be a similar story to most of the other sad, pathetic, weak, insecure, scared little fuckers who do shit like this.
The how is being rapidly addressed.
The why is something we will never truly going to understand. We missed it because we thought we were better, we thought we had gun control, we thought the problem came from people we didn’t realise we thought of as “other”.
But why he did it? How does any normal person comprehend why some insecure little fuck needs to murder defenceless people to feel good about himself?
@molly and Sabine
Fair call, there are good arguments both ways, I should be clear. But the other key thing about banning it is that anyone who gets caught possessing it immediately brings themselves to the close and public attention of the courts. So people have to be keen to read it, and it becomes a self-outing mechanism. And in the search for answers, most of the reviews indicate there is nothing particularly interesting compared to other right-wing terrorists.
What makes you think Hosking or whomever won’t agree with it?
i actually believe that he does agree with some of the shit the white supremacists peddle – oh surely not openly, cleverly disguised as ‘opinion’, a bit of not political correct fun you see, wink wink, nudge nudge.
But so long as they don’t have to affront their own biases and the results of their words they will not change.
Currently the main danger that i see is that the white supremacists laugh at us and our hurt feelings. Going to prison? Heck why not. They be heroes for their fellow white supremacists. Or do we believe we don’t have the Aryan Nation, Identity Europe and the likes here in NZ and in our prisons? so unless the guy is send to a prison full of maori he will have white supremacists in the public population with him and support. think of it.
That is why i think we need to have a open public discussion about what happened. So that people that would not think twice about dehumanizing someone for being brown, poor, unemployed, pregnant, handicapped, or of a different religion think twice about some political incorrect commentary and ‘wink wink nudge nudge’
. Lest they be held accountable if some fuckwit takes their words and goes on a killing spree.
cause at the end of the day, teh question really is: Why is a average white guy, average everything, good finances, good family support going to a different country to buy guns and slaughter people? Why? And how come our vast surveillance state that knows every pot smoker and grower, could not see this guy and realize that he is up to something. And What should we do different from now onward.
so to do nothing and just simply ‘who could imagine that this happens, well we don’t have to imagine it, in certain parts of the world this shit happens every day. do we want this to happen here every day and offer thoughts and prayers and nothing can be done, next?
I think the main danger is that we don’t know who they are.
I’m not saying that we should do nothing. This little fucker should be a lab rat for the rest of his life. But that’s different from distributing his rants.
Do you need to see every image someone downloaded to agree whether they were watching child porn, or are you happy with the existence of a conviction on the basis that the defendant was found to be in possession of images classified as objectionable?
Interesting analogy but flawed IMO. The defendant knows the images, the prosecution knows it too, as do the jury and the judge. In fact, the defense team can provide a counter-argument regarding the images if they choose to.
None of that applies to the Chief Censor and his office’s decision to declare something objectionable and unfit for public consumption, meat or vegetable. It is an asymmetric or unilateral decision rather based on authority.
My understanding is that the jury etc don’t actually judge the images. The censor classifies the images, and if they’re objectionable then the legal question is possession, not the nature of the images themselves.
But more to the point, everyone whose role in the trial requires it might see the images, but the public does not. And nor should we. It would defeat the purpose.
I think the criteria in the act itself are a bit prescriptive in places – most of them are clearly consent and public welfare issues (e.g. minors and animals), but damned if I can see that justification for urine. It’s not my scene, but crazier stuff has been done consensually.
I suspect the evaluation itself errs on the side of conservative when it comes to judging the public standard, but I’m hard-pressed to think of a better system to judge all publications etc. Because if we don’t have such a system, it all goes to the lowest denominator.
I find this discussion bizarre. Librarians and other groups have been disputing unhelpful OFLC decisions for a long time, eg this egregious example, but for some people it’s apparently all good until the OFLC bans a fucking white supremacist manifesto advocating the murder of their fellow citizens. Seriously, what the fuck? That’s the point at which the OFLC’s gone too far? Maybe the people whinging about the Chief Censor’s decision should take a break and think about their priorities.
Ok, but many of us are not librarians and would never have heard of this particular case and the reason being it did not attract as much attention. Duh! I find this bordering on false equivalence.
Looms like the Victoria University Council is going to go to the high court to try and get the name change it wants – see the post “A LETTER FROM HUGH RENNIE QC TO FRIENDS OF VUW” on this FB page:
Bugger That!
All power to Hugh, and hope that the VUW council take on board the huge opposition to this stupid proposed name change which will, actually harm, not enhance my alma mater
Auckland University
Canterbury University
Otago University
Eastern Institute of Technology is in the east, Hawkes Bay.
Victoria University. Where is Victoria in NZ?
(Perhaps it should establish itself as a separate entity from
Wellington, or get the area named a suburb so it has
connection with its place.)
VUW stands for Victoria University Wellington
and it’s actually not about where it’s physically located. It’s far more nuanced than that – but you need to read the scoop article to understand why.
I may think the name is a colonial hangover, but the majority of the people involved, such as alumni, staff and students appear to want to keep the name.
Democracy!
The mania for management driven, re-naming every thing, for no good reason is a characteristic of Neo- liberal managerialism. They like to call it “Re branding”.
Something new broom managers like to do, to give the appearance of doing something.
Now. If the impetus for change had come from the grass roots, gaining everyone’s support, that would be a different story.
KJT
The reason for changing the name is good, or so it seems. The argument is that Wellington as the university’s name will stand out and its mana and that of the research that comes from it will be noticed and not just disappear in the mix of Victoria Universities around the world.
If past students and others look at things in an academic manner with a statistical bent about whether being connected with other Wellingtons is going to give them a leg-up compared to being swamped by other Victorias then there might be light on this.
It is a bit like the Christchurch Cathedral, apparently we are clinging on to the 1800s, and while we aren’t looking the powers that be are taking away the chunks of the 2000s till we have a few sun-bleached rocks.
If I was there I may have argued for changing the name. Trying for consensus on the change. . For post colonial reasons.
I don’t know how many Wellingtons and Victoria’s there are around the world, but a cursory google finds rather a lot.
However it doesn’t seem to be what the VUW community want.
The reasoning appears to me more from the “marketing” angle.
Driven by the “bums on seats” crowd.
Well that’s more disturbing that the fake “live video” of the NZ attack that I saw. It will be an awkward moment if they are allowed to show it in the trial.
[Corodale. This is your third comment in recent hours hinting at a false flag event in Christchurch. It’s also going to be your last word on the matter. This site is not infowars and you are not Alex Jones. Show some respect or you’ll be moved on. TRP]
There’s a mod note on Corodale’s comment already WTB and any further attempts to go down this path will be dealt with in the usual manner. Generally speaking, false flag claims are fodder for the intellectually weak; people who can’t deal with the world as it is. Pity is probably the correct response.
False narratives are the life-blood of terrorism. 1 part truth, 10 parts hysteria. This particular narrative is just trolling. Not feeble minded, deliberate provocation.
well the ‘fake attack’ line is out there and will not be put to rest.
As i said before, i am happy to repeat it again.
We can set the tone of the discussion, or we can ban everything related to the mass murder in christchurch and pretend -it did not happen- once the guy is locked up in Prison.
in the meant time others will not have such qualms.
This country needs to discuss these events. Publicly, openly, ideally televised (as that is the means of information for most), PM, Police, First Emergency Responders, clerics etc etc etc so that people like Corodale are literally just laughed out of the room as the cowards that don’t want to acknowledge the truth.
But here we are discussing how we applaud the banning of the manifest (cause it does not teach us anything !), we don’t publicly discuss the failings of our security apparatus (cause Spies!), we don’t discuss how we are incited to hate and dislike of others – muslims, single mothers, disabled people, useless people (Bill English), old people, young people, brown people, white people, urban people, rural people – by those who make a pay cheque out of ‘talk back shock radio and politics (Hoskins, Bill English, Paula Bennet etc) and the dividing of our country in to ‘us’ vs ‘them’.
So either we want to and realise even we MUST freely discuss the events of March 15th, or we are bound to repeat them again and again until we find the courage to look at us and our society openly and freely.
1 minute in and it’s just a lot of loud mouths talking over each other. Is this supposed to be something worthwhile? Do you have to be smoking something to appreciate it?
‘Islamist Attack Plot’ Foiled By German Police; 11 Arrested For Planning “To Kill As Many Infidels As Possible” https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-23/islamist-attack-plot-foiled-german-police-11-arrested-planning-kill-many-infidels As nice as my Muslim friends are, its still easy from me to see where Islamophobia comes from. They aren’t all nice, for example: Muhammad of Mecca was a war-lord who took slave-wives from the Jewish/Pagan tribes he _______. And Allah is historically the god of the Moon, as opposed to Christ, which is historically a god of the Sun. Sorry, just trying to keep things balanced and honest here in this little echo chamber. Yeah, truth. It hurts, I know.
Are you alleging this story is a complete fabrication on the part of the news site or the German police? Or alternatively that we discount the plot because the target was just presumably white ‘infidels’? No need to waste any good outrage?
You might reasonably argue that a foiled plot in Europe has little relevance to NZ, and some decades ago this would have been reasonable. But given the ChCh terrorist was clearly radicalised in Europe, and given that many have pointed to the internet as having eliminated distance when it comes to psychological connections and threat … then evidence pointing out that the radical Islamic threat is as alive as ever is pertinent.
Of course this would be nothing more than a tiresome ‘whattaboutism’ if I was attempting to justify ChCh because say Bali. Quite the contrary, all extremists start as a tiny pathological minority, their core strategy, their only hope for victory entirely rests on escalating the atrocities, forcing more and more people to ‘choose sides’ and participate in the conflagration they so deeply desire … and that I openly condemn.
I am very happy that the police did manage to take this group out before they could do any harm.
and did you see, names were named, locations were named, and everyone gets to read about it. Transparency is needed if we want to prevent this from happening. The public is needed to help prevent these types of terrorist attacks.
the only difference between this plot and the attack on March 15th is that we in NZ we kind of expected an attack by Muslims, or basically had been conditioned to expect a terror attack by Muslims, and much to our surprise it was a white average guy with average looks, average heights, average intelligence and a bit more then average access to funds.
Cold-hearted orb that rules the night
Removes the colours from our sight
Red is grey and yellow, white
But we decide which is right
And which is an illusion
Is it ironic …. that in the usa it takes a black Somali refugee to stick up for the people of Venezuela … and call out the death squad activity s of the people Trump has appointed to ‘deal with’ Venezuela ???
Is it coincidence … when she talks of the biggest buyers of influence over us democracy …. and their Govts foreign policy …. she gets attacked as anti-Semite ???
“Congressional Democrats are attempting to discipline Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar for speaking critically about the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — and more generally in defense of Palestinian rights — after smearing her as “anti-Semitic.” This comes at the same time that Omar, one of the only Muslim representatives in Congress, has been targeted for death threats and Islamophobic propaganda likening her to those who carried out the 9/11 attacks.” https://socialistworker.org/2019/03/06/jews-stand-against-the-smearing-of-ilhan-omar
“An Islamophobic sign made by the Republican Party of West Virginia and falsely linking the congresswoman to the 9/11 attacks was posted at the Capitol. The same party accusing Omar of perpetuating anti-Semitic myths felt it was completely appropriate to do the same to Muslims.”
See the usa heartland hate directed against her on twitter
“BDS is a non-violent movement calling on governments and corporations to exert financial pressure on Israel in an effort to recognize the rights of Palestinians. The campaign draws parallels to the South African anti-apartheid movement.
McCarthy has decried Omar and Tlaib’s support for BDS as anti-Semitic, attributing their opposition to the nation-state of Israel to anti-Jewish bigotry.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is Jewish, has defended BDS as constitutionally protected free speech. ”
Ilhan Omar seems like a a nice human …..the same as those murdered in christchurch ….. who you smear and fear-monger against.
People can read Ilhan Omars words …. and compare them to yours shradlophobe …. once more you will look very very ugly.
Your argument appears to be dishonest hate …. do you have a gun license ?
Your usa comrades of dishonest Islamophobia hate speach pollute her twitter .
“We all know what your doing. The same thing that has been done in NZ, UK, SWITZERLAND, BRUSSELS and Germany. Remember this: Land of the Free and Home of the Brave Sharia Law will NOT happen in the USA! ”
Which Palestinians? Jewish Palestinians? Samaritan Palestinians? Arab Palestinians? And since when? Since the Arab invasion of modern Israel hours after it was formed? Or for the thousands of years of Jewish rule back to the twin kingdoms?
So. If in New Zealand we drove Maori into Northland, walled them off, and bombed them at intervals, that would be fine.
Because “God told us we owned the land”. FFS.
In the aftermath of a world incident massacre in New Zealand, the shill media is peddling some good ole eugenics connotative ”news”, isn’t that strange.
Hey, are you still supporting NZF? I noticed Garner & Richardson this morning opining that Winston was past it & ought to retire due to wimping out of presenting our nation strongly to the Turkish leader & people. What do you think of that?
A jet-lagged Winson Peters was caught not only napping, but back-pedalling during an urgent trip to Istanbul, which was supposed to sort Erdogan out over his use of the graphic footage of the Christchurch terrorist attacks.
Instead of confronting Erdogan, Peters admitted he hadn’t questioned the president over the footage because he didn’t think it was going to be shown again. But only a few hours after his bilateral meeting with Erdogan, the video was rescreened at an Erdogan political rally.
Peters defended his conciliatory tone by implying that, in the early days following the terrorist attacks, some “misinterpretation” may have occurred. Peters was referring to Erdogan’s allegations that Anzac soldiers were anti-Muslim, and the Turkish president’s threat, that anyone attacking Turkey would be sent home in coffins, like their grandfathers.
Now that the Mueller report has found not enough evidence for a conspiracy between Donald Trump and the Russian government, we can get on with sifting through the best candidate to beat him on his performance, and on Democratic policies.
“The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities,” the special counsel wrote in his findings.
As expected by me. Leftist hallucinations will need to focus on the Maduro justification program now. Falsifications of history just don’t seem to be working.
Was that a two for one post dennis ? …. you should have stuck to just Trump …. then you wouldn’t be bullshitting with your left stereotypes.
So Ilhan Omar was spouting ” Leftist hallucinations ” about war criminal Eliot Abrams ….. who while in the Reagan Govt played a crucial role in propping up murderous south American dictators …. as well as the Contra death squads in Nicaragua…..
Abrams also helped perpetrate the cover up of the El Mozote massacre … where even the children were killed and raped
Evil History you dennis never refer to …. when spouting Trump /Abrams made in the usa bullshit about ” Leftist ” Venezuela ………
Tell us all Dennis …… is Maduro as evil as Trump /Abrams…….. and past usa south American policy ….since forever
Or is that fantasy crap … spouted by a anti Semite back Muslim Somalian refugee woman not fit to live in the usa.
Your always rooting for the good guys …. eh dennis ??????
“USAID had trained over 100,000 of Brazil’s police in the dark arts of rule-by-terror; another 600 Brazilian police were brought to the US for special USAID training in explosives and interrogation techniques.
Brazil’s military dictatorship murdered or disappeared hundreds of dissidents, and tortured and jailed thousands more. Among those tortured: a Marxist student named Dilma Rousseff, arrested in 1970 and subjected to beatings to her face that distorted her dental ridge, and electrical shocks from car batteries, resulting in the hemorrhaging of her uterus. Today, Rousseff is Brazil’s president — and she’s not too happy about the NSA tapping her phones.”
Mitrione taught local police specialized forms of electroshock torture, introducing wires so thin they could fit between the teeth and gums. He also demonstrated drugs that induced violent vomiting fits, and advised on psychological tortures, such as playing tapes of a woman and child screaming in a room next to the interrogation room, and telling the detainee those are his wife and child. And it was all done under the aegis of USAID.”
“According to Victoria Sanford’s “Buried Secrets: Truth and Human Rights in Guatemala,” USAID programs supported the death squads as they carried out the genocide:”
etc etc
See if you can be more honest than Gosman Dennis …..
What would happen to the NZ economy if we were labeled a hostile state to the usa …and received the sanctions / cut of from international finance treatment …. that the usa has been giving Venezuela …. since Chavez kept winning all those elections …. after the failed usa backed coup to remove him.
Are you denying such actions against us ……would 100% make our economy shit itself and die ???
Try and be more honest than Gosman or wayne mapp now ……………….
Is whataboutism really such a thrilling experience? You think blog commentators don’t routinely ignore straw men? Wise up. Some of us were alienated from supporting US foreign policy long before you were in nappies – exactly for those reasons you listed.
If nobody was warning us about the stuff you compiled, I’d be doing it. I’ve moved on. Now I prefer to focus on leftist evil-doers because many leftists are in denial of that. Someone has to blow the whistle. I agree the Trump regime is bad news. Hilary would have been worse – most politically aware commentators know that now.
My personal stance on the prospect of yank invasion of Venezuela is that it has no moral basis, therefore I oppose it. However, there’s a tipping point that applies: if the other countries in the region agree to support it, the notion acquires some validity. Not enough for me to support it, but enough to get me neutral. If the targeted killing of the Venezuelan people by the Maduro regime escalates to the tipping point, I will join others in support of the victims.
My personal stance on the prospect of yank invasion of Venezuela is that it has no moral basis, therefore I oppose it. However, there’s a tipping point that applies:
“However”… is a fancy way of saying ….’ but’ … dennis
But is the word you use when you are being insincere
I apologize BUT
I didn’t mean to hit you honey … But
And from me …. I would believe you dennis … But you keep repeating usa propaganda….. ie” the victims of Maduro”
Instead of talking about coup justifying tipping points …. why didn’t you just admit you thought Abrams may not be as evil as Maduro.
As part of your ongoing coup justification and leftist slandering program.
No ifs or buts about it … imo your a bullshitting weasel dennis ….no better than gosman or wayne mapp.
“If nobody was warning us about the stuff you compiled, I’d be doing it. I’ve moved on. Now I prefer to focus on leftist evil-doers”
The first bits bullshit ….” I’d be doing it” ….
And you admit to being one eyed in your ” focus on leftist evil-doers”
To which I’d add unbalanced, biased, spreader of Trump / Abrams dishonest rhetoric …. have you ever mentioned the Venezuelan victims of the usa actions in Venezuela ??? … or just those of Maduro.
I seem to recall you as an Islamophobe in the Wayne mapp mold …. could you direct me to anything positive you have ever said about Muslims / Afghanistan people / Libya etc.
If he was really a ruthless dictator, do you think Guido, and the right wing thugs behind him, who have already attempted an armed coup, would still be alive.
Hell, most of them haven’t even been arrested.
Even the accusation of blowing up food trucks turned out to be fake news. Though I wouldn’t have blamed his supporters, given the US history of aid, with guns in it.
frankly i prefer a range of people running – knowing that many will peter out soon enough, compared to the RNC who literally is advocating for no one to run but the orange colored vulgarian.
Mr. Pete Buttigieg is a long shot, but if he can change the discourse – as a vet, a mid westerner, white working class male, as a man living in a same sex marriage etc then i can’t see the issue with that.
The more people – all of us – see men like Pete Buttigieg, the more it becomes normal. The same can be said of women running for president. Or men and women of color.
i think it is good, and i can’t see how a dog can do more damage then the orange colored vulgarian. I mean some carpets might suffer, some furniture might suffer, but people?
My preference is premature to be honest there’s a lot of people I’ve only looked at a few and even then I don’t really know anything. but I got a feeling about Pete, he seems like the real deal.
“We will continue to fight for this, for the safety of our children, for the safety of our lands, for the safety of our Muslim whānau, and all communities of colour.”
One of the things that can help bring us all together is appreciating each others’ culture and that may start with the music – perhaps Womad is a good example.
Here is a link from a Japanese man brought up in NZ and he learned the Maori song E Papa which he finds soothing for his baby. His wife asked him to write down the words and he has in Japanese Katakana. Singing E Papa has made him think of certain similarities in the languages. http://www.hikosaemon.com/2010/02/new-zealand-maori-folk-songs-as.html
Here is a link about E Papa and shows how it would be performed for a public display, clever and everyone enjoying themselves. http://folksong.org.nz/epapa/
Thanks grey was lovely to listen to that waiata again, been ages since I heard or sang it. Womad is awesome and yes a great model. Haven’t been myself but lots of friends go.
I’m pleased that you like it. Now I have had another thought. I have just seen Alan Duff’s book 50 Maori Heroes. Have you seen this? It was one of Duffs Books in Homes series. Would it be helpful for work you are doing to have this to show young people but particularly Maori, what others have done with their natural talents and skills as a reminder that they have their own abilities?
Shame that you had to tack that on to my comment which was meant to be in the positive patch. We don’t need to have something negative tacked on to everything we discuss. There are more negative things in the present than positive. Let’s try to build on positive steps to a better
future.
Reading this, I wondered why I had never heard of Rangiaowhia – then thought, maybe I have, and dismissed it as not true as it destroys the illusion of our ‘civil society.’
The bubble is convenient to live in, it has moonbeams and lambs (for export).
“Rangiaowhia for example, where u the crown attacked an unarmed village full of women, children & elderly – the men were away (& the crown knew this)… you burned their homes so they fled to shelter in Saint Paul’s, a church of a religion u taught us. As we/they huddled in the church – no doubt praying, u the crown nailed the door shut and set the building on fire. While it burned full of people, u the crown stood outside & shot any1 who tried to evacuate, some of them were on fire – don’t fucking say “it’s unprecedented”. For our combined benefit please learn our/your history so we feel included.”
For obvious reasons the discourse around hate in NZ society is focused on racism, and to a degree religion. But let’s also not forget about the other forms of hate that have been actively encouraged in our country over the last 30 years (note the timing) as part of the great divide and conquer campaign mostly by political interests, and with the full support of mainstream media.
*Beneficiary bashing. Especially popular with right ring politicians when they need to distract the populus from some scandal. The rest of the time, any means possible to turn anyone working against anyone who needs benefit assistance for whatever reason. Thankfully we haven’t quite reached the extreme situation as in the UK where the tabloid press created an atmosphere of disability related hate crimes based on the idea that “all disabled are bludgers”. Readesr here are well aware of the consequences of bashing in the NZ context, and it has contributed to suicides.
* Hate landlords/hate tenants. This has been one the medias been having fun with for the last few years since the housing crisis really took hold. Lets keep finding examples of extreme situations and publishing them, then open the comments sections. Improve standards for rentals? Play the property investors off against struggling tenants. Play the struggling tenants off against the slumlords. be unable to report the actual situation without resorting to hyperbole. Scare a lot of people in the meantime.
*Class warfare. Encourage each tax/wage bracket to resent the next one either above or below them because they either get more money that they do, or pay less tax. And in the case of minimum wage workers, get them to hate beneficiaries for getting well paid to live a cushy life while you’re slugging your guts out and still can’t pay the bills.
All of the above is hate. We’re probably all guilty of one of these at some point, and probably because of a reaction to something we read online, or heard in the media. Are people likely to get physically hurt over it? Well they have, as I’ve said in example one. Words can be lethal when you’re exposed to them often enough.
We’ve let ourselves become victims of this political divide and rule game, probably without realising. So now that at least some of us have clicked on, while we can do our best not to participate in the game, how do we stop it altogether? Politicians here are going to be bloody careful from now on talking about topics like immigration. But it’s only a matter of time before they start reverting to type with encouraging this type of hate.
and we need to start talking about us and how we get manipulated in ‘hating’ the other.
I am less worried abut the politicians (we view them through the lens of Party Manifesto which generally are public) then i am about talk radio, certain opinion writers that seem to be given a rather large mega phone when bashing certain groups and then go silent when shit hits the fan (how many editorial did Hoskins write last week?) , and the training of our police and security forces that seem also to be a one way street only myopic look upon the world.
thank you for saying so much better what i would like to say.
‘Manipulated’- that’s the word I was after, thank you Sabine 🙂 And I totally agree about the media opinion- or should that be ‘clickbait’- writers. It may have been politicians who initially lit the flame but the media can take the blame for the spreading.
I’ve just noticed something interesting on Stuff on my laptop- the up/down votes have been removed in the comments section. Cant see on my phone because an update won’t let me open comments at all (probably not a bad thing!). Anyone else notice this? If so, maybe this is a very small silver lining from recent events, Stuff finally getting the message on that particular issue.
Most NZers do not bear witness to what is happening to our society…. and our media generally misinforms us.
Bearing pressure to reverse the wrongs and injustices is the next challenge.
It would be a great tribute to those murdered in christchurch if they were the lightning rod for a surge of inspiration …. giving traction and momentum …. in our quest to regain our humanity ….
A kind of reverse shock doctrine …. where our terrorist mass murders disaster, is used for good……
Putting us firmly on the path to roll back the wrongs legislated for by our bad politicians. …. who pandered to and encouraged hate, racism, greed, war, exploitation and other injustices in our society.
The alternative is we continue our race to the bottom.
Kay
Your comment has a lot of stuff in to deeply think about. Really good points. Has anyone noticed that the negativism/divide between different POV has deepened in the last week or so? I am feeling sad about that, as well as the shooting tragedy.
It’s a double tragedy when people start carping at each other and reaching for the sneering and deriding lever as an automatic reaction.
Grey, can’t say I’ve noticed that sort of thing, but very sad if you’ve experienced it. If anything, in my area I’ve noticed more people smiling at strangers in the street and in the supermarkets than usual. What have you noticed in particular?
I’m referring to what I have noticed on this blog and on another as well.
In the street I think people generally are wanting to create a friendly and connected-community approach.
Me using bad language and having zero tolerance for proliferation of terrorist materials and ideas.
Also, me using bad language after politely asking people not to micromanage me and others.
Also. Me.
I am proud to have stood up to these mealy mouthed types, (GWS is not a creep is a good person who only means well). I hate fighting but I will not lie down and play doormat. I am also quite open to apologizing for MY part.
I feel I owe you an apology as your intentions are good, despite your annoying the hell out of me constantly picking at my and others language. This detracts from their messages and makes it about your feelings. That’s what angers me, trying to discuss terrorism and you are upset I said f***.
Recall that I also asked politely before that for you to leave me alone. I am not the names you’ve called me.
GWS I’m sorry I cussed you out. If you can refrain from being pedantic about my language I will refrain from directing it at you.
Sorry WtB I wasn’t even thinking of you. You try to think your way through the problems as so many do here.
There are many though with nothing but short, nasty little jabs to the body and mind and who seem to have nothing but negativity and hostility whatever is suggested towards finding an answer. The suggestion of a better approach, reaching for a positive path even if it involves seeing some fault that then needs thought-work. Instead they would have us wallow in unhappiness and fix blame on somebody, and focus on that. Positivity as to ways we can do better is needed, the trolls way means we won’t find a way out to higher ground.
It’s hard to take other’s aggressive jabs without feeling insulted when you’ve campaigned for calm, reason and peace this whole time huh. I hear you, I’m sorry you’ve been exposed to too much crap, and my part must be owned if I am to improve.
There are certainly many trolls and I struggle not to rise to them. It is my estimate, judging by how most of them argue online (regurgitate foul memes and exit) that most are kids directed by nasty adults.
Kids sense of humor can be largely ‘unrefined’, to put it mildly. But do they learn it from their elders? It carries on to adulthood e.g.
When you go to raw (wannabe comics) nights in comedy clubs there’s lots of really dumb stuff adult people (on stage, and a small part of adult audiences) think is funny. Racism, sexism, etc. The new comic often thinks a joke is a punching down as practised at school. Some people come out of the gates ready for stardom (nuanced idiocy), but that is rare – See Rhys Matthewson.
The comedian trolls their audience, but (one would hope) not with spite.
Internet trolling is schoolyard level wit with evil adult supervision. Those who know what they’re doing, and their gullible cling-ons.
There’s also a lot of pain that has simmered beneath the surface for a long time for a lot of people. And it is coming out sideways. I’ve barely kept it together. The voluntary work and assistance of others the past few days has brought me back to Earth – that place I love. It is difficult to describe how being minimised or the brunt of ‘jokes’ your whole life feels, much easier to throw a finger in the air, and stamp feet loudly.
Absolutely justified and understood. Uncomfortable, yes.
I’m very relieved we’re able to extend olive branches here, it weighed heavily on me that we’d fallen out.
With you there WTB. This one still amazes me, given the well known statistic of 1 in 5 (or is it 4) NZers live with some type of disability. Everyone in this country knows someone with something and they’d be lying if they said otherwise. One would think on this occasion our village size would offer more compassion- it’s not like the bad old days where anyone with an obvious disability was locked away out of sight; mainstreaming is commonplace at most schools so children now grow up knowing that there is variety to the human spectrum, although their parents didn’t so much- there was a tiny bit of mainstreaming just starting at my high school mid-1980s.
Yet, there are those in our society who for whatever warped ideological idea think that we’re a drain on society (sound familiar?) just because a little extra help/adjustment is needed to participate in society, or a benefit is needed because working is impossible. And they’ve somehow learned to ‘hate’ the fact their hard earned taxes are propping up non-economic units. Not that those words will ever be used specifically, but they’re there when you read between the lines.
Governments fall over themselves to say there will always be some people who do need benefits (ie severely ill/disabled) and they they have no problem with that, so their supporters think they’re only going to attack solo mums and those feckless unemployed, not realising welfare ‘reforms’ have made life even worse for disabled. But the supporters have been so well trained to hate on beneficiaries it makes no difference to them. As I mentioned in my original post, I’m just extremely relieved that disabled here haven’t been experiencing the vicious physical and other abuse (now classed as hate crimes) as is happening in the UK. One hopes we are better than that, but also have to call out anyone on this .
You missed the hate towards all farmers from vegans and segments of the left.
Go back to the standard archives for 6 months leading up to the last election if you doubt me.
Valid point. I prefer to attack their (destructive) methods unless they arrive here and get personal then I’ll have at em. Sometimes I go over the top and say stuff that isn’t fair.
I’m also an avid cheerleader when they get it right. I want to help Farmers in the inevitable transition coming.
Some do love to hate em for the sole reason they’re ‘Dairy’ though. 😀
A world without cheese, would it be worth living in?
If it’s a choice between frying the planet and me giving up cheese, well, sorry planet. It’s not even close.
But I’d be quite happy for the cheese to be made from from an engineered mix of proteins, fats, sugars etc produced in vats by engineered microbes, rather than what’s squeezed from cows immediately downhill from their sewage outfalls.
bwaghorn
Do you think that farmers are that vulnerable that they feel they are helpless and disabled? It doesn’t seem an equivalence comparing farmers problems, most brought about by themselves, to those who have congenital problems, or drug problems – there could be some farmers disabled from alcohol I suppose.
I know it causes deterioration and booze and rural males have gone together for a long while.
You been down south ? They pretty inbred down there. !!!
But seriously you seem to be fine with hating on people as long as they are fortunate enough to be wealthy . ?
It took about 5 minutes, before unthinking stereotyping of the mentally Ill started.
With those doing it seemingly blissfully unaware of their repetition of bias.
“Othering” is used to hide or justify cruelty all the time. It is habitual with Politicians, and their useful idiot mouthpieces, normalising policies which harm many people.
The repeated falsehoods about those on welfare, for one.
I bet this guy would the first to complain about not getting a handout when something goes wrong within his industry aka M Boivs or a outbreak of foot and mouth when farmers haven’t or couldn’t comply with the law or complain about reduced public funding services like education, health, MPI, Trade or the lack of Police action over cattle/ sheep rustling etc.
How much profit does NZ actually get from tourism, when we have so many tourists that actually spoil the attractive aspects of the country, damage it and move on while we have to restore it, cause congestion and difficulties in remote parts of the country (man died after vehicle fell to the left while trying to make way for a large van on narrow rough road). Now quad bike riders needing aid. People have to turn their lives inside out to rescue these people. https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/385481/quad-bike-deaths-tour-group-did-not-have-permission-to-be-on-land-owner
And this is on top of a heavy cost rescuing sports and outdoor enthusiasts who fail
to cope with the conditions; have accidents in remote places and find that they aren’t the all purpose supermen they thought they were. And then they need medical care. https://www.stuff.co.nz/nelson-mail/news/111503965/nelson-marlborough-rescue-helicopter-crew-has-busy-morning
(Four callouts kept the Nelson Marlborough Rescue Helicopter in the air on Saturday. A 45 year old man on a motorbike, another up a mountain had a
medical event, two more motorbike riders from the same area as the first.)
Perhaps user pays needs to be brought in for such situations. Those that can afford to bikes and play in the backblocks can pay for the facilities from the Nanny State, when it shows how necessary it is for them to have a Nanny State that cares and serves the people. New slogan for tax – Play and pay. Then we might have more money for providing better standards for the low income, and maintain the services we need for all such as hospitals.
And we need to respond with intelligence to the obvious – we have too many tourists. The people of this country need to take it back into their own hands again and not keep voting in a government that doesn’t care about anything except high house prices. No wonder Labour Coalition is struggling to get stuff done.
For so long previous governments have bent over backwards to advance some, and diminish others, and the people who convince themselves we are doing well haven’t looked at the immoral way that appearance has been achieved , and the economically dangerous cost yet to present its final bill. But blame Labour, don’t think about details. Easy-peasy go-for of the fashionable scapegoat from people who believe in magic, with the mindset of Carroll’s mad White Queen who could believe in six impossible things before breakfast and who also is in a time-warp – ‘The White Queen lives backwards in time’. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Queen_(Through_the_Looking-Glass)
I guess it would another impossible thing for responsible people around government to understand arithmetic when it comes to tax and our complete economy; The different branches of Arithmetic — Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision. Alice in Wonderland.
Wellington Bus services – oh dear. Rates City and Regional – oh dear, dearer, dearest?
Scoop – http://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=117243 It’s been a bad week for the Regional Council. (The one that refers to itself as “Greater Wellington.”) It had to deal with scores of unplanned bus cancellations, and there was derision at its request to be told what’s wrong with its bus services. Then came its announcement that it was increasing the rates by 6.5 per cent, which was quickly followed by the discovery of something it had chosen not to mention: for Wellington city the increase was to be much more than that.
Much much more. If you had the time and the patience to read the 144 page agenda for this week’s meeting, you discovered a table which revealed that the rates increases in Wellington were planned to be more than 16 per cent.
Hard to reconcile that proposal with the later statement from chair Chris Laidlaw who said “It’s been our consistent position that we must minimise the impact of rates on regional ratepayers.” Perhaps he overlooked the 16 per cent in the 144 pages of information.
From the people who brought you the Wgtn bus fiasco… we have the latest Wellington thrill ride! Bus routes 31 and 36.
Personally I can’t wait to shit myself as we hurtle through the Haitaitai tunnel in a Double Decker within centimeters of the tunnel wall. We can amuse ourselves further by making bets about whether or not we come out the other end unscathed.
Testing had been going on since before Christmas. He confirmed a double-decker “grazed” the tunnel side in testing.
A range of safety features such as red cat’s eye and bollards had been installed to help the drivers stay on the correct line through the tunnel.
“There’s definitely margin for error. We wouldn’t be employing buses that weren’t safe,” he said.
That margin of error was 37cm at the tightest point but it opened out to 41cm he said.
But Tramways Union secretary Kevin O’Sullivan said that, from the top corners of the bus to the edge of the tunnel, there was just 30cm of clearance.
Nick Focas, who lives in Pirie St, near the Mount Victoria end of the tunnel, had seen one of the trial double-deckers going through.
Feasibility Study concludes Sustainable Agriculture can feed Europe.
Why is this good news – climate change. We don’t want to stop the planet overheating us just to starve… Diets will move to more plant based consumption, but not wholly vegetarian.
It’s a large document so here’s a few sound bites.
“The idea of an entirely agroecological Europe is often considered unrealistic in terms of food security because agroecology sometimes means lower yields. But this new research shows that by refocusing diets around plant-based proteins and pasture-fed livestock, a fully agroecological Europe is possible.”
“Pesticide-hungry intensive production is not the only way to feed a growing population. This study shows that agroecological and organic farming can feed Europe a healthy diet, while responding to climate change, phasing out pesticides, and maintaining vital biodiversity.”
“This is the first component of a foresight exercise that will successively deal with the socioeconomic challenges and the policy levers for an agro-ecological transition.”
Europe is around 500 million people, so this is a big deal. Here’s hoping they take notice.
I’m getting this strong feeling that you are trying your hardest to duck that debate I challenge you to the other day, was looking forward to it. Any time you want to get off these low tier assumptions and challenge your self I would be more than willing to accomodate your needs. Just say my name and I’ll sharpen my pencil while you chit chat.
I don’t see the purpose of this blog as a playground for the bored or hungry intellect…As times get harder and quality input becomes more valuable the jaunty jester will be a disadvantage,
Well I think gobbys attitude is questionable and your one word answer is laughable. Do you even realize European farmers receive 40c-60c in the dollar from the government, mess with that and European agriculture stops being a thing. I’d love to see you try and get that past Brussels mr funny man.
Funny you’d ask. I’d assumed the more hetro normative guys would have turned and run at the thought of packing me with all the meat, nice of you to inquire though. You’d be surprised how much meat I can handle, more than willing to come back for more.
Really? You were surprised to be asked? It was a pretty obvious question, begging to be asked, I thought. And it remains unanswered, at least so far as I can discern. Why the demeaning name-calling, I ask a second time?
Yeah well, no homo of course. Gobby interested me when she started leaving these strange comments underneath mine so I inquired a bit to see if there was some logic or reason behind her little quibbles and she didn’t want to give it up so I challenged her to a debate and she hasn’t replied back since. Been ducking me ever since and Iv lost all respect for the thing and I’m not about to second guess myself.
Handle all the meat you like sambimbo and if you do it in private nobody will bother. But if you go round in public waving your floppy meat in people’s faces I’m saying OI! SAMBIMBO! NAO! That might pass muster in the gents at the young nats xmas disco, but it won’t fly around here.
I’m more of a pay a teppanyaki chef to cook it up for me kind of guy. What I was implying is that I’m unafraid to debate controversial topics. That you could make that about young nays and Christmas disco proves how ideologically driven you are.
I can say more with one word than you can with lots of puff. If you have a point about European farmers and subsidies or whatever say so.
Instead you have to wrap it up in a mud pie to throw at someone. Kids have kinder toys that they break open to get at the contents. We grown ups shouldn’t have to search yours to get the gist, not your attempt at tantalisation. That’s your weakness. Mine is fitting the situation to a song which you can listen to if you choose.
Apparently people like you and gobby misunderstand what I say or mean and here you are again advancing more retarded arguments after getting stomped last time.
So you want to @me about a topic you feel strong on, pfft, that’s fine, nig I was born hungry. I’ll come to your place, I’ll slap you, it ain’t nothing.
So I’m going to start at just after WW1 so 1919-1939 the price of food droped to all most nothing, because during the war farmers, farmed as much land as possable.
This made the price of food go down to nothing, force the farmers to farm even more land, starting a vitious cycle. Many farms could not keep up and went under, this contined until they’d farmed the land so completly that not even grass would grow. So eventally their were great areas of Europe covered with dead dirt fields.
So now the European Union has to burn approx. 25 – 40% of its surplus agricultural produce a year (differing between different areas). That is because they have nothing to do it with. The burning of surplus is part of the plan to keep the prices high as to prevent another Dust Bowl cyle of price fall, heavy farming and then great amounts of dead over farmed land, wich would fuel another Dust Bowl.
So, would you like another slap or are you fine with this one. I have to do it like this by putting the nuts and bolts in the middle because the regulars around here and especially authors and super moderators are especially insecure and emotional when ever I point out well hey look, this this and this is wrong for this this and this reason, perhaps you might want to correct yourself and then it all comes out, it’s all but what about muh feelings and reasons. So if you want another slap then @me I’d be happy to explain more to you.
“Losing encourages children to reflect on their actions and attitudes.”
I’d be too embarrassed/cowardly to simply demand/suggest that another commenter here “concede” – not on a blog. And certainly not in real life. But I concede that might just be me.
“Concede and we can keep discussing.”
thestandard.org.nz/bad-the-michael-jackson-hysteria/#comment-1591948
“Was debating towards tolerance and peace. You toke the opposing side. Concede.”
thestandard.org.nz/the-trouble-with-hate-speech/#comment-1596194
“Prove it. Edit: Prove that I’m doing a good job or concede.”
thestandard.org.nz/the-trouble-with-hate-speech/#comment-1595692
“Don’t have to question me about who you decide is friend or foe. Concede.”
thestandard.org.nz/the-trouble-with-hate-speech/#comment-1595993
“Do you concede?”
thestandard.org.nz/daily-review-05-03-2019/#comment-1590935
“Do you want that form or do you concede?”
thestandard.org.nz/mafs-national-style/#comment-1589934
“You ducking or did you concede earlier?”
thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-25-02-2019/#comment-1587728
“Fine. If you want to change the subject then you concede.”
thestandard.org.nz/kim-hill-eviscerates-chris-christie-on-national-radio/#comment-1589906
So you’d like to start a little deviation to prove how virtuous and reserved you are. I mean fine, what ever floats your boat. That you start out by repeating what I said before and listed it nicely and all is really nice, I guess. All though deviating from my point that Brussels is so large and slow to react is like death to utopian dreamers imagining some European permaculture utopia. I mean no one has to try that hard to show how stupid that is so I guess it’s understandable why you’re starting out the way you did.
Yeah, I take conssesions. Normies who can’t handle an argument directly is no way to objectively access whether one argument is stronger than another. That’s why I take conssesions when people try and weasel there way out of making false claims or statements or are just being ideologicalay driven. If you want to lose to that well that’s just a stupid strategy. The sign of a true master is when the student surpasses the master, that’s not losing at all, being magnanimous in defeat is great mentoring, not losing. If you want a right of reply to promote the virtues of losing by all means, fill ya boats.
Been waiting for you to pick a topic and starting point for days but you keep on acting dumb about it. I just want to take you on at your overwhelming best but you seem to be a bit shy it. Like I said. So choose your strongest subject. I don’t want any excuses like oh, I didn’t research enough. I just want to debate really strong talkers.
Why you being so evasive sambimbo? Come ON. Research is for high school babies. You forgotten that explaining is losing? Put your money where your meat is.
Fine. So you want to replace the language of explaining with the language of training for different principles and for different goals and you began that by asking me to acknowledge your presence and you’d talk about a kind of soft vigilance that’s conducive to a particular insight that you discuss. This kind of involvement is indicative to and being deeply interested in the structural functional organisation of something and not that that’s taking you into paying attention. And all the while remembering to get the correct tuning and optimization, for awhile now I’v been talking about attention and my argument is attention is not very well served by your spotlight metaphors. While attention to your spotlight metaphors does give attention to alternate salience your metaphors misses a lot of what attention is doing.
So I began by investigating what attentions you are missing with the idea that attention isn’t a direct action you do to being physically alert to threats, it’s something you do to modify something else. That’s why you can successfully pay attention to something else by saying many desperate and different kinds of things, you can pay attention by optimising words into different meanings, and by optimising your hearing into listening, and by optimising your seeing and listening into a coordinated tracking of what some one is saying like what you are doing right now.
All those are different ways of paying attention so what is needed is a different understanding of paying attention that can captures an optimisation strategy and aligns and tunes your ideas about how something might be linked to a response to existential model confusion and the elevation of the suffering there in.
So now that I’v put what in think you’re doing into words I’ll predict that you’re about to restart your premiss, do you agree?
honestly if Europe could produce organically, humanly all the food to feed its own population it would be great.
and in saying that, it would probably help food poor regions as they rather then export what little they grow for cash can actually keep their food for themselves.
a bit like here in NZ where many people actually can’t afford milk, butter, cream, cheese and yet we are a high yield producing dairy country with all the mess that comes with industrial dairy production.
We would need to preserve a trade in food though if only so that poor countries could sell so they could buy needed goods from more developed countries.
i.e. south of europe has a different growing season then mainland Europe and northern Europe.
so the exchange of goods or the trade of goods would manifest naturally as it did all throughout history.
surplus would always get either stored or traded. And if one is clever enough to change raw materials in a finished product……there is ample opportunity for trade.
Gabby. You can’t make that comment without reading the report. And if you read the report you would not be making that comment.
On the whole we’ve produced excess all through my lifetime. It’s not production that’s the problem, it’s (fair) distribution. Many countries grow lots of food while their people go hungry. The food goes on a world cruise, then winds up in a skip bin.
Thanks. I miss his thundering comments full of explanations of capitalistic faults. Which I have thought about and agree with but can’t see how it would be changed. It seemed that some of the peeps here might have been ambushing him.
but then, do we really want to have this conversation?
This is the REAL conversation we need to have as a country.
As horrific as this president is, he is a symptom of much deeper problems.
Even foreign influence plays on nat’l wounds that we refuse to address: income inequality, racism, corruption,a willingness to excuse bigotry. https://t.co/wtebX4Tfld
Dear Folk, my apologies for challenging ye all in these challenging times, may I express my respect and empathy for your perspectives.
Here is my concrete point: What the fake video means, is that this wasn’t a lone-wolf attack. That is all I’m saying.
Officially its a “terror attack”, so guess the police etc are obliged to conceal facts in the name of national security. Like, don’t alarm the people by saying, “attackers where networked with who-knows-what…” Or have I got that wrong?
What I find concerning is global media coverage that has nothing to go on other than that fake video eg. NYTimes. Which all dribbles into either blind assumptions, or at best that BS manifesto.
Guess we will never know the truth regarding who did it and why, I’m sure the censorship etc has been world-class. But the public will be happy to hear that that patsy with the buzz-word manifesto was alone responsable, and most of us will get back to our busy lives, full of austerity, in a highly destabilised world, well over-due for a complete financial collapse.
(Hey, the Allah moon-god isn’t bad, but can be a bit “tricky” as they say themselves, from the Quran. Note that the Hindu worship the moon god too, but just as one of many gods. Muhammad didn’t much like the Pagan hindu-type (or Jews, same-stuff). Ya see the moon goes in cycles, more of a passive-creative governance, which does have limits regarding access to spiritual freedoms and full comprehension of spritial-beauty. The Christian sun-god is more of a constant alignment, connecting purely and positively to The Way, The Light and The Truth. Naturally the Christian churches are far from pure, and not automatically more positively creative than the Islamic groups, but that’s the game we live in. Hey, I welcome folk to correct me on detail here, I’m a farmer not a scholar, but the truth is approximately as above (so-below) 🙂
One of the themes that runs through all fascist ideologies is one of ‘victimhood’.
Sometimes this ‘victimhood’ is based on some real perceived grievance. Sometimes it is based on pure myth. Most times it is a mix of both.
The German nazis played up on the so called ‘Stab in the back’ – the allies taking advantage of the mass democratic anti-war revolt that overthrew the Kaiser, and ended the First World War, to take advantage of the weakened German state to extract crippling reparations, while painting Germany as the main aggressor in that international imperial conflict. Mixed with mythology of a so called suppressed Aryan culture and race.
Some real go-no-where half-truths there Jenny. It would be not less true for me to say “Rhodes and King George where instrumental in getting WW1 rolling”, “WW1 never ended, it just deadlocked and took a 20year timeout for another generation of children to reach fighting age.” I’ve also no real message to my story above, expect perhaps to hint that the only real truth is empathy. Empathy is the Truth.
“WW1 never ended, it just deadlocked and took a 20year timeout for another generation of children to reach fighting age.”
corodale
Indeed.
Not just the German nazis were unhappy with the Armistice, the ruling elites of the other warring powers were also unhappy with Armistice, and would have preferred to continue the slaughter to achieve a definitive victory. What stopped the other warring powers continuing the slaughter, and which forced them to the negotiating table, were the mass mutinies and fraternisation among front line troops, admittedly beginning on the German side, but not exclusively. The greatest fear of the allied powers was that if they continued to prosecute the war, the mass soldier and sailor revolts could spread to the allied forces.
What was needed to continue the war, was an ultra-nationalist movement, that could engender and then exploit a feeling of victimhood.
ar·mi·stice
[ ahr-m uh-stis]
NOUN
1. a temporary suspension of hostilities by agreement of the warring parties; truce: World War I ended with the armistice of 1918.
Related Question: What are the synonyms for armistice?
Which takes me back to my original point; that what is common to all fascists is their exaggerated and mostly false claims of victimhood, by some hated minority, who usually have nothing at all to do with the claimed victimhood of the fascists.
….Members of the secretive ‘Dominion Movement’, who hide their identities online, have deleted posts and Facebook accounts touting their message.
The group has previously claimed to be growing across the country, “bound by blood” and unwilling to surrender New Zealand to “immigrant masses”…..
…..”They profess to be standing up for victims, they see themselves as victims of a grand conspiracy … but of course you then have off-shoots going off and doing violent things….
….A common thread in the group’s material, still visible on a cached version of the website, is a shared sense of victimhood and sought “rebirth of traditional Kiwi society” – or what amounts to a white nationalist state.
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Last year, California burned. This year, to stop it happening again (or rather, to stop themselves from being found liable if it happens again), Pacific Gas and Electric is cutting power to half the state for a week:Schools are closed. Traffic lights down. Tunnels dark. Businesses unopened. Hospitals running on ...
The Best Way: Missing from the on-line voting debate is any reference to the voting system that produces turn-out figures ranging from 77 to 93 percent of registered voters. The voting system used to collect and count the votes cast in our parliamentary elections. The system that involves citizens making ...
Among the great new bunch of political friends we have been making recently is the excellent Australian-based Marxist gender-critical site, Freer Lives. So we asked the comrade who set up that blog to write something for Redline on the blog, himself, his analysis of the rise of gender politics and ...
by Don Franks The Auckland City Mission is struggling with a 40 percent increase in demand for food parcels this year. A total of 23,020 were needed by June. Last month Missioner Chris Farrelly told the Herald the “cupboards are bare” and without an emergency food drive, he can’t see ...
by The Council of Disobedient Women Massey Wellington Student Association had a sit-in today. Imagine a sit-in. On a campus. Against a women’s rights meeting. Did the ’60s really happen or did we fucking dream it? They gathered in the student square, an echo chamber. Sitting on soft pillows ...
For some reasons, my post about the mystery message from inside the Downing Street bunker seemed to catch people's attention. Quite a lot of hits from NZ (unsurprisingly) and the USA (a bit more puzzlingly, but hi there, USAians!!) and 76 views from the Ukraine.I've celebrated my Ukrainian readers in ...
First, almost a score of Labour MPs seem to have sent a letter to the EU basically begging them to accept a deal - any deal - just so Britain can get the Heck on with Brexiting instead of being trapped in limbo:
by Phil Duncan In 2016 the National-led government suspended the Parent Visa Category, through which migrants were able to bring their parents into New Zealand. Since then over 5,700 people have been in immigration limbo, stuck on the visa wait list. Labour is now bringing back the scheme. Well, sort ...
The following was released yesterday (Tues, October 8) by the women’s liberation organisation Speak Up for Women. On 23 September Speak Up For Women announced that we would be holding an event at the Massey University Theaterette in Wellington. The event is called Feminism 2020. The intention of the event ...
The government is currently consulting on plans to improve freshwater quality. So naturally, farmers oppose it:South Taranaki farmers are preparing to fight proposed national freshwater changes that some fear will bankrupt them. The Government's proposed National Environment Standard on Freshwater Management, released in September, rated the Waingongoro River as one ...
Yesterday was the last day for (reliably) posting your vote away in local body elections. Turnouts are mostly much lower than the equivalent time last year (Palmerston North is down 2.3%), and so naturally people are pushing their online-voting snake oil again. Because the online census worked so well, lets ...
This essay, on the political legacy of the eugenics movement, by Kenan Malik was originally published in the Observer on 6 October 2019, under the headline ‘The spirit of eugenics is still with us, as immigrants know to their cost’. Birth control. Intelligence tests. Town planning. Immigration controls. It’s striking how ...
Another year, and the government has announced another enormous government "surplus". And just like last year, its nothing of the sort. When we have people homeless and sick and hungry, when we have schools and hospitals still falling down, when we have underpaid public servants and infrastucture unmaintained or unbuilt, ...
James Forsyth at The Spectator (I know, I know) has tapped one of his contacts inside Number Ten for an insight into the Johnson administration's thinking and strategy.It is fascinating, unsettling and quite, quite mad. Some key points:Negotiations have stalled and the Johnson administration are keen to blame the EU: ...
Fatal Contact: With the arrival of captain James Cook in October 1769, the islands of what would become New Zealand ceased to be the preserve of Polynesian navigators and settlers and became a part of both the world’s map and the world’s history.THE MAORI NATIONALIST assault upon the historical meaning ...
Another round of tactical talks about forming a Government of National Unity have come to nothing with the Liberal Democrats still refusing countenance putting Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street:Opposition talks on Monday made little headway over when to try and vote down Boris Johnson's government and who might succeed him as ...
by Nick Rogers The debate around the meaning of sex and gender made an appearance at this year’s British Labour Party conference in Brighton. Women’s Place UK – an organisation that questions the demand that biological males who self-identify as woman should have access to women’s spaces, to all-women shortlists, ...
Yesterday I went down to Wellington to participate in the Extinction Rebellion protest. Its part of the latest global wave of XR actions, with actions happening all over the world. Some of those protests are massively disruptive: in Canada, XR is blocking major bridges, stopping people from getting to work. ...
The Workshop is a charitable trust for public good. The Workshop undertake research to find ways of communicating that will build support for the solutions that work to solve complex social and environmental problems. See their Report on Talking about Poverty and Welfare Reform below. ...
Being and Being Bought (Spinifex Press, 2013) by Kajsa Ekis Ekman A synopsis and commentary of Chapters 1-2 by Daphna Whitmore Ekman, a Swedish journalist and critic, brings together a Marxist and feminist analysis of prostitution and surrogacy in this groundbreaking book She opens the discussion with a definition of ...
I make no claims to having much legal knowledge, so I defer to those trained in this area.I am very much enjoying this twitter stream from m'learned friend in Edinburgh, deciphering the legal arguments around the Scottish court challenge to Boris Johnson, based on the charmingly obscure principle of Nobile ...
Ivory Folly? The University of Auckland’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Stuart McCutcheon, upheld the right of the radical nationalist group, Action Zealandia to exercise their freedom of speech – not matter how distasteful that speech might be. A wiser community of students and scholars would have nodded their agreement and moved on. ...
If you are not convinced terrorist Organisation ‘Extinction Rebellion’ is very, very dangerous – watch this video at one of their recent meetings. Not only is this obviously mentally ill Woman begging the other terrorists to promote killing and “eating” babies and children, if you watch carefully other members nod ...
The Ombudsman has been surveying people about their knowledge of the OIA and the right to information. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem that widespread:The Chief Ombudsman says too many New Zealanders were in the dark over their right to access official information. Peter Boshier said an independent survey released yesterday on ...
In the wake of last Friday's climate strike, Peter McKenzie had an article in The Spinoff about protest strategies. The school strike movement is "polite" and cooperates with those in power because that's its kaupapa - its led by schoolkids who understandably don't want to risk arrest. But there's more ...
So, the latest ruminations on the gnews from Westminster (Again, sorry; I'll stop making that pun right now). This follows on from, and likely repeats bits of, my last post, on the suggestion that a Government of National Unity (GNU) should be set up and then oversee a referendum before ...
New Zealand likes to think of itself as not a racist country (despite being founded on the racist dispossession and subjugation of Maori). But for years, we've had a racist refugee policy, which basicly excludes refugees from Africa and the Middle East unless they already have relatives here. Now, the ...
Several people have asked me whether a particular repeat litigant could be declared a vexatious litigant, in light of their recent decision to appeal an adverse High Court ruling. My nascent tweet thread was getting ridiculously long, so it became this blog post instead.The short answer is: no. The particular ...
Appealing To The Past: Action Zealandia, like so many of the organisations springing up on the far-Right, across what they call the “Anglosphere”, is born out of the profound confusion over what a man is supposed to be in the twenty-first century and, more importantly, what he is supposed to do.THE STATUE OF ...
The attempts of anti-democratic transactivists to (often violently) disrupt women’s rights organising is largely ignored by those sections of the left most prone to misogyny and authoritarianism in New Zealand. In Britain, however, scores of trade union and left activists added their names to a letter in July, defending ...
The Justice Committee has reported back on the Criminal Cases Review Commission Bill. The Bill would establish an independent, quasi-judicial body to investigate and review potential miscarriages of justice, and refer them back to the Court of appeal if required. It would be a vital backstop to our judiciary, help ...
by The Spark On September 14, a total of 22 drones and cruise missiles struck two oil installations in Saudi Arabia, the Abqaiq processing facility and the Khurais oil field. Abqaiq is the largest oil production facility in the world. For a few days afterwards, Saudi Aramco, the Saudi national ...
How much will NeoLiberal irregulation of the building sector and subsequent leaky homes crisis cost us? $47 billion, according to a new book:The total cost to fix all of New Zealand's leaky homes would be $47 billion, probably. The estimate comes from a new book, Rottenomics written by journalist Peter ...
Below is the start of another excellent article on the Freer Lives blog. Click onto the link at the end of this extract to read the full article. The punch-a-terf, kill-a-terf message pervades social media, always righteously delivered, chin held high. By contrast, the dehumanised “terfs” themselves, that is gender-critical ...
The Reserve Bank is currently planning tighter banking regulation, requiring banks to hold enough local capital to survive a 1-in-200 year financial crisis in order to protect consumers. The big Aussies banks, those foreign leeches who suck $5 billion in profit out of our economy every year, don't like that, ...
Its the usual story: a police officer beats a handcuffed suspect so hard they break one of their own fingers. The IPCA investigates and concludes that the use of force was unlawful. And the police refuse to do anything about it:A man punched repeatedly in the face by a police ...
From time to time we add links to our blogroll. The latest blog we have added is Freer Lives. This is a Marxist gender-critical blog, based in Melbourne, Australia. On it you will find a bunch of excellent articles which use the tools of Marxist analysis to critique the rise ...
Last Friday say the largest protest in a generation, as 170,000 people joined the school strike and marched to demand real action on climate change. The demands of the school strike were simple and clear: declare a climate emergency, set a climate target of net-zero by 2040, impose a total ...
Labour is a rather middle of the road capitalist party and earlier this year we discussed how far from being ‘transformative’, Ardern’s government is. An article published this week in the Guardian, by Bryce Edwards (political scientist and commentator at Victoria University), looks at Ardern’s business as usual performance. Where ...
In the hours since my last interminable wittering about the possibility of a Government of National Unity (GNU) in Britain, there has been a slight maybe development:A Corbyn-led caretaker government could then sit for several months while it enacted and delivered a referendum with the support of smaller parties and ...
Speaking at the Council of Trade Unions' (CTU) biennial conference, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters told unionists that any future attacks on the Government won't work. "Now, we are being attacked by the union movement in this country. You can have your views but I'm here to say standing ...
We want every New Zealander to be happy, safe, and healthy. To do this, we need to support strong, safe communities, and a robust and efficient health system. ...
Defence Minister Ron Mark has used his powers to overrule a noise complaint ruling against Whenuapai airbase on the grounds of "national security". The Environment Court last month released a ruling in favour of a private developer, declaring the Auckland airbase had to comply with noise restrictions when it performs ...
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has opened fire against "unreconstructed morons" after NZ First MP Shane Jones was photographed on holiday holding an AR-15 rifle. Mr Peters is defending Mr Jones, telling Magic Talk host Peter Williams that his MP was just having fun "like most people do". "The ...
New Zealand First Deputy Leader and Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau was in attendance during the morning blessing of the Rotorua Lakefront development project. Around 60 people gathered on the shores of Lake Rotorua, including city mayor Steve Chadwick and deputy Dave Donaldson. The Lakefront development is a ...
Forestry Minister Shane Jones is considering reining in on conversions of farmland to forestry, and also issued a warning to foreign-owned forestry companies that make up nearly 75 per cent of the industry. He said too many foreign companies had not provided enough access for domestic processors to get timber. ...
Speaking to Radio NZ, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters said the tightening of the parental category visa is a direct result of the Party’s coalition negotiations with the Labour Party. He said the new changes switch the financial onus from the parent moving to New Zealand to the child ...
The Coalition Government is set to cut red tape in the building and construction sector in an effort to allow more houses to be built, including prefabricated houses. The changes will enable the mass factory production of "high quality" buildings, slash the likely number of building inspections for factory produced ...
Since coming into Government, we’ve worked hard to tackle homelessness and make sure everyone has a warm, dry home. And today, on World Homeless Day, we want to report back and update you on our progress so far. ...
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has hit back at National Party leader Simon Bridges who criticized the Coalition Government’s approach to crime, and said that the latter isn't credible in his attack on the Government over gang recruitment. "We've got as massive drug problem in this country. It is ...
New Zealand Mānuka honey exporters have welcomed an initiative by the Coalition Government to help secure the term “mānuka honey” to be used exclusively by Kiwi exporters, ensuring that our multimillion-dollar industry is protected. Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones had recently announced that a Provincial Growth Funding of $5.7 ...
Political commentator Mike Hosking has labelled New Zealand First leader Winston Peters as “the voice of reason in a government soft on drugs”, for the Party’s stance on drug testing at music festivals. “If common sense is worth a vote, Winston Peters is quids in,” Mr Hosking said. The Labour ...
Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau has announced Provincial Growth Funding to ensure work opportunities in Turangi and Whanganui, through its skills and employment programme, Te Ara Mahi. A fund of $500,000 will go to Rafting NZ in Turangi for a 16-week river guide training course to train ...
Treasury has shown that the Coalition Government has a $7.5 billion surplus, which is $4 billion higher than what was expected in the 2019 Budget unveiled last May. It is also $2 billion higher than the actual surplus unveiled this time last year, and at a size that has not ...
Official Information Act figures released to NZME show there were 350 assaults on officers in the year to the end of June, 79 more than the year before. The increase in attacks have sparked calls for more legal protection for first responders to be enacted. The assaults included officers being ...
“Nobody wants to see babies uplifted”, this was the pronouncement of Minister for Children Hon. Tracey Martin as her department, Oranga Tamariki, faces multiple inquiries into the number of babies being taken from their families. “But a baby can die with a single punch, “the Minister continued. “So sometimes, Oranga ...
We're making progress on tackling the long-term challenges: from homelessness, to strengthening border security, to bringing banking back New Zealand's small towns. ...
Associate Transport Minister Shane Jones has backed the ambitious plan to move Auckland’s port to Northport, at Whangarei harbour, which he says will be the “King Kong of infrastructure”. The plan is part of the recommendations of a six-person independent working group, which has recommended the Ports of Auckland be ...
A six-member independent working group selected the option of moving Auckland’s port to Northport, in Whangarei, ahead of other options. In what could be New Zealand’s most ambitious infrastructure project yet, a major expansion of the Marsden Point port could happen within 15 years. The project, officially called the “Upper ...
The final Electricity Price Review recommended prohibiting prompt payment discounts but allowing “reasonable” late fees. The findings of this review was welcomed by the Coalition Government, but they hope companies will follow through with its recommendations without regulations needed to be passed. Meridian Energy had already stopped prompt payment discounts, ...
Fletcher Tabuteau, Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Regional Economic Development The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF)through its skills and employment programme, Te Ara Mahi,will invest nearly $600,000 to ensure work opportunities for locals in Turangia and Whanganui, Parliamentary Under Secretary for Regional Economic Development Fletcher Tabuteau announced today. “I’m pleased to announce the PGF ...
An export-led economy is one of New Zealand First’s key principles, and our commitment to achieving this is shown by the continuing skyrocketing demand for our beef and sheep meat exports. Beef + Lamb New Zealand's New Season Outlook 2019-20 report forecasts beef, lamb and mutton prices to lift from ...
Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today in Gisborne an investment of $17.27m into bringing “world-leading” food-growing technology and the creation of more than 100 new jobs in the East Coast city. The funding comes from the Provincial Growth Fund, and included a $15 million loan to LeaderBrand, a ...
Hon Shane Jones, Minister for Regional Economic Development More than 100 people in Tairāwhiti’s Tolaga Bay will benefit from two employment initiatives supported by the Provincial Growth Fund, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones and Employment Minister Willie Jackson announced today. “Tolaga Bay is an incredibly tight-knit community, but one in ...
Hon Shane Jones, Minister for Regional Economic Development The Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) is supporting Gisborne business Leaderbrand to produce salad vegetables year round and create more jobs in the Tairāwhiti region, Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones announced today. “Our support for Leaderbrand will help them build large greenhouses ...
“Nobody wants to see babies uplifted”, this was the pronouncement of Minister for Children Hon. Tracey Martin as her department, Oranga Tamariki, faces multiple inquiries into the number of babies being taken from their families. “But a baby can die with a single punch, “the Minister continued. “So sometimes, Oranga ...
Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones has praised the promise by New Zealand’s biggest banks not to close any provincial branches while the Coalition Government trials regional banking hubs across the country. The Minister said the announce was the “first sign of hope for regional communities”, many of which have ...
Rt Hon Winston Peters, New Zealand First Leader New Zealand First is proud to have delivered an upgrade of the SuperGold Card website and a new smartphone app, which will help unlock the full benefits of the SuperGold Card for 750,000 New Zealand seniors.Party Leader Rt Hon Winston Peters, ...
Delivering a key election campaign promise, New Zealand First is proud to have accomplished a long overdue upgrade of the SuperGold Card today. At an event in Auckland, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters joined Minister for Seniors Hon. Tracey Martin in unveiling the new website and smartphone app which ...
Another busy week, from speaking with world leaders on the world stage about climate change, to equipping our school leavers with everything they need to get ahead in life. ...
New Zealand First MP Shane Jones says Air New Zealand has "an obligation to look after Kiwis", and urged the national carrier not to hike up their prices after Jetstar airline announced their withdrawal from regional flights this week. The Provincial Champion also expressed his disappointment at Jetstar’s decision on ...
At 1.30pm tomorrow, hundreds of thousands of Kiwis will join about 65 million people around the globe in ShakeOut, the world’s biggest earthquake drill. The annual drill is to remind people of the right action to take during an earthquake which is to Drop, Cover, Hold, and to practise their ...
Kiwis are benefiting from higher wage growth and low inflation under the Coalition Government. Stats NZ data out today shows the rise in the cost of living remains low, as annual Consumers Price Index (CPI) inflation fell to 1.5% in September from 1.7% in June. “The low inflation comes as ...
New Zealand’s economic strength and resilience has been recognised in a major update on the state of the global economy. The IMF’s latest World Economic Outlook released overnight shows a reduced global growth forecast over the next two years as issues like the US-China trade war and Brexit take hold. ...
Justice Minister Andrew Little has today introduced a new Bill to prevent terrorism and support the de-radicalisation of New Zealanders returning from overseas. The Terrorism Suppression (Control Orders) Bill gives the New Zealand Police the ability to apply to the High Court to impose control orders on New Zealanders who ...
A Bill that proposes targeted changes to simplify the processes for Māori land owners when engaging with the Māori Land Court has had its First Reading today. “The approach taken by the Government is to ensure that the protection of Māori land remains a priority as we seek to improve ...
Let me first thank all the new unionists and members in the room. There is nothing more important to improving people’s working lives than people making the decision to care, to get on board and help, to take up the reins and get involved. Congratulations to you. You bring the ...
Minister of Defence Ron Mark has signed a certificate exempting the activity of engine testing at Whenuapai Airbase from the Resource Management Act 1991. The Act gives the Minister of Defence the power to exempt activities for the purposes of national security. The certificate will mean the recent Environment Court ...
Finance Minister Grant Robertson has announced New Zealand will join the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action while attending APEC meetings in Chile. The objective of the 39 member Coalition is to share information and promote action to tackle climate change. It was formed in April this year, in ...
Ladies and gentlemen, NZCTU President Richard Wagstaff, members of respective unions – thank you for the invitation to speak to you today. This might be preaching to the choir, but the importance of trade unions in New Zealand’s historical arch is difficult to understate. And it is my belief that ...
"Let’s start by acknowledging that it has been a huge year. " Police Association Annual Conference James Cook Grand Chancellor Hotel Wellington Nau mai, haere mai. Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, ka nui te mihi, ki a koutou katoa. President of the Police Association, Chris Cahill; Members of the Association and ...
Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters and Minister of Defence Ron Mark have announced the New Zealand Government’s decision to again deploy a Royal New Zealand Air Force P-3K2 (P-3) maritime patrol aircraft to support the implementation of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions imposing sanctions against North Korea. New ...
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says New Zealand continues to have serious concerns for peace and stability in north-east Syria. “Recent reports that hundreds of ISIS-affiliated families have fled from a camp are deeply concerning from a humanitarian and security perspective”, Mr Peters says. “While we acknowledge Turkey’s domestic security ...
Biosecurity Minister Damien O’Connor is warning travelling Kiwis to be vigilant as the high-season for the crop-eating brown marmorated stink bug (BMSB) is under way. “We’re on high alert to stop BMSB arriving in NZ. The high season runs until April 30 and we’ve strengthened our measures to stop stink ...
The Government is moving swiftly to change the law to improve the welfare and pastoral care of students living in university halls of residence and other tertiary hostels. Cabinet has agreed to several changes, including creating a new mandatory Code of Practice that sets out the duty of pastoral care ...
The Minister for Conservation Eugenie Sage has launched a new comprehensive trapping guide for community trappers to help them protect our native birds, plants and other wildlife, at Zealandia in Wellington today. ‘A practical guide to trapping’, has been developed by the Department of Conservation (DOC), and was launched during ...
Associate Health Minister Julie Anne Genter welcomes PHARMAC’s move to improve access to long-acting reversible contraception (LARCs). PHARMAC has today announced it will fund the full cost of Mirena and Jaydess for anyone seeking long term contraception, lifting previous restrictions on access to Mirena. “I welcome women having greater choices ...
The Government has approved the next stage of a major redevelopment of Taranaki Base Hospital, which will deliver new and improved facilities for patients. Health Minister Dr David Clark has announced details of a $300 million dollar project to build a new East Wing at the New Plymouth hospital. It ...
Extra funding will allow Rural Support Trusts to help farming families, says Minister for Rural Communities and Agriculture Damien O’Connor. “I know that rural families are worried about some of the challenges facing them, including the ongoing uncertainty created by the Mycoplasma bovis outbreak. “Those concerns sit alongside ongoing worries ...
Thank you for the opportunity to be here to present certificates to the 16 graduates who have completed a beekeeping course delivered by the Howard League. Let us start by acknowledging Auckland Prison’s Deputy Prison Director Tom Sherlock, and Acting Assistant Regional Commissioner of Corrections Northern Region Scott Walker - ...
Finance Minister Grant Robertson leaves this weekend to attend the APEC Finance Ministers meeting in Santiago, Chile. Discussions between APEC Finance Ministers at the meeting will include the effects of the current global economic uncertainty, risks for APEC economies and sustainable development of the region. While at APEC Grant Robertson ...
The Minister for Pacific Peoples Aupito William Sio says for Pacific people, language can be a source of strength. It can help ground us and give us confidence. When we speak them, our languages provide us with an immediate and intimate access to our identity and our story - and ...
The Coalition Government has announced an action plan to improve the wellbeing of disabled New Zealanders by addressing inequalities in play, active recreation and sport. The initiative includes training to develop a workforce that understands the needs of children and young people with a range of impairments, advocacy for fit ...
The construction sector is being freed up to allow more homes to be built more quickly as the Government cuts through some of the red tape of the Building Act. “Every New Zealander deserves a warm, dry, safe home and old inefficiencies in the Building Act make building slow and ...
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has welcomed further details on the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall’s visit to New Zealand next month. Their Royal Highnesses will visit New Zealand from 17-23 November – their third joint visit to New Zealand and first in four years. They arrive in Auckland ...
Minister of State for Trade and Export Growth and Minister of Agriculture, Damien O’Connor, heads to Thailand today to attend the final Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) Ministerial meeting, as negotiations enter their final stages. “The RCEP Agreement would anchor New Zealand in a regional agreement that covers 16 countries, ...
Pacific young people living in the Hawke’s Bay, Southland and Otago regions will have access to support services that have proved successful in helping young people find new earning and learning opportunities. “Tupu Aotearoa is about changing Pacific young peoples’ lives. Our young people are talented, they are smart, they ...
Introduction As the Minister for ACC I thank you all for the work that you do supporting New Zealanders in their literally most vulnerable moments. From those who hold people’s lives in their hands, to the people who research technique, technology and trends, your work is highly valued. A special ...
Notes prepared for speeches in Christchurch – Wednesday 9 October 2019 Today’s topic, “trends and opportunities for the New Zealand economy,” is certainly one getting a great deal of commentary at the moment. Looking across the media landscape lately you’ll notice we aren’t the only ones having this discussion. There ...
Minister of Health Dr David Clark and Associate Minister of Health Peeni Henare say this year’s World Mental Health Day theme is a reminder of why the Government’s work on mental health is so important. “This year the World Federation for Mental Health has made suicide prevention the main theme ...
Associate Arts, Culture and Heritage Minister Carmel Sepuloni will represent the government at Australia’s Meeting of Cultural Ministers in Adelaide this week. “This year’s meeting is special because New Zealand is expected to become an International Member of the Meeting of Cultural Ministers at this Australian forum,” Carmel Sepuloni said. “The meeting is an opportunity to ...
The Greater Christchurch Claims Resolution Service has resolved 608 insurance and EQC claims in its first year in operation, Minister Megan Woods has announced. The government service, which celebrates its first birthday today, provides a one stop shop to help Cantabrians still battling to get their homes repaired or rebuilt ...
Today’s topic, “trends and opportunities for the New Zealand economy,” is certainly one getting a great deal of commentary at the moment. Looking across the media landscape lately you’ll notice we aren’t the only ones having this discussion. There has been an increasing amount of attention paid to the outlook ...
The Government is acting swiftly to strengthen NZTA’s regulatory role following a review into the Transport Agency, and Ministry of Transport’s performance as its monitor, Transport Minister Phil Twyford said today. An independent review by Martin Jenkins has found NZTA failed to properly regulate the transport sector under the previous ...
The Netherlands and New Zealand have a long-standing and close relationship based on many shared interests and values. We value the rule of law, our democracies, and multilateralism. And we value our environment – at home and globally. Right now there are major global challenges in all of these areas – ...
The Government is putting right a decade’s worth of underpayment to nurses, doctors and other health workers, says Health Minister Dr David Clark. Initial sampling of District Health Boards payroll records has found that around $550-$650 million is owed to DHB staff to comply with the Holidays Act. It’s expected ...
A strong surplus and low debt show the economy is performing well, and means the Government is in a good position to meet the challenges of global economic uncertainty. “The surplus and low levels of debt show the economy is in good shape. This allows the Government to spend more ...
New applications from mining company OceanaGold to purchase land in Waihi for new tailings ponds associated with its gold mines have been approved. Minister of Finance Grant Robertson and Associate Minister of Finance David Parker considered the applications under the Overseas Investment Act. Earlier this year, applications from OceanaGold to ...
New Zealanders in Tūranganui-a-Kiwa / Poverty Bay will witness Māori, Pākehā and Pacific voyaging traditions come together today as the Tuia 250 Voyage flotilla assembles for the first time, Māori Crown Relations: Te Arawhiti Minister Kelvin Davis says. “Tuia 250 is a national commemoration and an opportunity for honest conversations ...
Minister for Trade and Export Growth David Parker leaves tomorrow for Dubai, London and Berlin for a series of meetings to advance New Zealand’s trade interests. In Dubai he will visit New Zealand’s Pavilion at Expo 2020 where construction is underway. There he will meet Minister of State for International Cooperation, Her ...
Confirmation that PHARMAC will fund two new cancer drugs is further evidence of the good progress the Government is making to improve the treatment of New Zealand’s leading cause of death, Health Minister David Clark says. From 1 December PHARMAC will fund alectinib (Alecensa) for ALK positive advanced non-small cell ...
Josie Adams is in tonight’s episode of Have You Been Paying Attention. Specifically, she is in the audience.When you watch Have You Been Paying Attention? tonight, please consider the bladders of audience members watching it live. They offer beverages, but my God it’s a dangerous offer. As I found out ...
Despite comments from Auckland City Council CCOs Board Chairs re pay and performance bonuses for top managers—Herald Newspaper Tuesday Oct 15th--there is very little evidence that says high pay and bonuses improve the performance of a company. Most ...
By Michael Andrew Pacific diplomats, academics and youth leaders will gather in Auckland this week to discuss security, economic development and other pressing issues shaping the region’s future. Pacific Futures will be held on October 18 and will feature speakers from across the region, including Samoa’s Deputy Prime Minister ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Hutchinson, PhD Candidate, Australian National University It has been more than two years since “clearance operations” by Myanmar’s security forces, the Tatmadaw, forced more than 700,000 Rohingya across the border to neighbouring Bangladesh. During this time, the UN Security Council has ...
Fast food company Restaurant Brands has made a smaller half year profit largely because of accounting changes as it prepares to invest heavily in the launch of Taco Bell in New Zealand. ...
Pacific Media Centre Newsdesk Papua New Guinea police have issued a warrant for the arrest of former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill. According to EMTV News, the Waigana district court issued the warrant which was based on evidence previously compiled by police investigators. Acting Police Commissioner David Manning said he ...
Patient Voice Aotearoa welcomes the comments made by the Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters on ‘The Project’ on Friday last week. Peters stated “Right now…we know we are not spending nearly enough on pharmaceuticals and first world drugs…the ...
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is calling on outgoing Porirua Mayor Mike Tana to repay money clocked up on his ratepayer-funded fuel card for personal travel. The Ernst and Young report released yesterday reveals that, within less than three ...
We review the entire country and culture of New Zealand, one thing at a time. Today, a new hole-in-the-wall eatery in Auckland dedicated to New Zealand’s favourite snack.Cheese On Toast has unsavoury connotations for a lot of New Zealand music fans, but now you can wash that bad taste out ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Md Arif Hasan, PhD candidate, Victoria University of Wellington CC BY-NDClimate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.If you have a question you’d like an expert ...
There’s an innovation renaissance brewing in post-earthquake Christchurch as multicultural entrepreneurship replaces the old boys’ network. This required a new name, writes Steven Moe.An unusual name that evokes images from Harry Potter is fine by the Ministry of Awesome, because it immediately sets it apart. Founded in the aftermath of ...
Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) and Ngā Tāngata Microfinance endorse the Salvation Army’s call for tougher regulations on debt collectors and mechanisms to provide forgiveness or waivers for debts to private lenders and Government that are "effectively ...
Cotton On members are currently negotiating a new Collective Agreement with their employer, but despite the company’s repeated claims that they will provide “a pathway to the living wage”, a “people first focus” and a “commitment to ...
Today the Wellington Howard League releases the results of its fourth annual Wellington Howard League prison survey. The survey suggests a variation in the conditions experienced across prisons in New Zealand and an overall decline in most aspects surveyed. This ...
Some people go for a run to let off steam after work, while others try their hand at ballroom dancing or hit up a pub quiz. And some, as Greta Yeoman discovers, throw sharp objects at walls. She gives it a go.An uncoordinated, anxious journalist with terrible aim is probably ...
A move by Australia's financial regulator could be enough to turn the big banks' threat to ditch New Zealand into a reality - or at least see them charge customers more. ...
A staffing survey carried out by the senior doctors’ union, the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, has found a gaping shortfall of hospital specialists at the Northland DHB. ...
Iain Lees-Galloway has defended granting residency to a man with multiple drink-driving convictions saying the person had been in the country for 20 years and had kept out of trouble for a long time. ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s content by Dr Bryce Edwards.Industrial relations Luke Malpass (Stuff): Winston Peters holds the keys to new union laws. Will ...
Yes we fully support Minister of transport plan to use special speed cameras finally catching all speeding trucks, and other vehicles on our narrow single lane roads that are not fit to use as a speedway by any vehicle. ...
This afternoon Fish & Game posted a public statement responding to my email to supporters this morning – specifically rejecting our claim that steel shot is now deemed "enhanced penetration ammunition" and therefore possession of ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mandie Shean, Lecturer, School of Education, Edith Cowan University Two-thirds of young people experience levels of exam stress that mental health organisation ReachOut describes as “worrying”. Research shows high levels of exam stress can interfere with attention and reduce working memory, leading ...
The National Party's outrage that the Immigration Minister granted residency to a protected person and recidivist drink driver, entitling them to the same benefits as New Zealanders, has backfired. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jennifer Beckett, Lecturer in Media and Communications, University of Melbourne Reports of Facebook moderators’ appalling working conditions have been making headlines worldwide. Workers say they are burning out as they moderate vast flows of violent content under pressure, with vague, ever-changing guidelines. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Lycett, Senior Research Officer, Deakin University; Honorary Fellow, The University of Melbourne, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute Three simple factors can predict whether a child is likely to be overweight or obese by the time they reach adolescence: the child’s body mass ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Marshall, Lecturer, Landscape Architecture and Urban Ecology, University of Melbourne You may mock the national anthem by singing “Our land abounds in nature strips” but what you might not know is how true that is. In Melbourne, for example, more than ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Keith Rathbone, Lecturer, Modern European History and Sports History, Macquarie University It’s unlikely Daryl Morey, general manager of the Houston Rockets basketball team, realised he’d be sparking an international diplomatic incident when, on October 4, he tweeted the following Stand with Hong ...
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Pressure on government from unions, mosque attack victim widows turned down for residency, and another Nat eyes safe Botany seat nomination.Pressure is being put on the government to deliver on one of their major promises to the union movement, reports the NZ ...
It’s the end of an era at Three as MAFS NZ and Guy Williams’ new show canceled and 7 Days cut to bone, writes Duncan Greive.A trio of shows which have been amongst Three’s most important local productions are either being canceled or severely cut back, as the channel’s agonising ...
'Joker' expects viewers not only to understand its cruelty, but to understand the justified violence of a white man when the protests of black men and women in the US are regularly met with condemnation, vilification and exclusion. ...
She runs the women's Aussie Rules and netball programmes at one of Australia's oldest sports clubs, so why is Jane Woodlands-Thompson sitting on the Silver Ferns bench? ...
As someone with a severe chronic illness, Hannah McGowan has a vested interest in getting to the bottom of what cannabis can and can’t do for her health. The reality, she discovers, is complicated.Woo [colloq.]: Mystical, supernatural or pseudo-scientific beliefs not backed up by evidence. I crave a well informed, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The last PM shock jock Alan Jones slapped down was Jacinda Ardern. His language was particularly offensive, advertisers deserted his program and he apologised to New Zealand’s leader. But at least Ardern didn’t have to ...
By Michael Andrew and Sri Krishnamurthi The true story of one of the Pacific’s great waka builders and sailor has been captured in a stirring and visually gripping documentary. Loimata: The Sweetest Tears follows the final years of Ema Siope, a Samoan born kiwi who endured a tumultuous past ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Benjamin Cowie, Director, WHO Collaborating Centre for Viral Hepatitis, The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity Around one-third of Australians living with hepatitis C have been cured in the last four years. Hepatitis means inflammation of the liver. Hepatitis C is ...
New Zealand Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern. Image AsiaPacificReport.nz/RNZ.Commentators across the political spectrum seem to agree – the Labour-led Government’s popularity is being damaged by its failure to deliver in Jacinda Ardern’s self-proclaimed “Year of Delivery”. Instead, the delivery of bad news to Labour and the Government has come in ...
Internet Service Providers have cautiously greeted the news that the Government is exploring an internet filter for violent extremist and terrorist content. ...
Editor’s Note: Here below is a list of the main issues currently under discussion in New Zealand and links to media coverage.New Zealand Parliament Buildings, Wellington, New Zealand.Today’s content by Dr Bryce Edwards.Polls Richard Harman (Politik): Ardern now dependent on Peters Sam Sachdeva (Newsroom): Ardern still standing, but ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Greg Austin, Professor UNSW Canberra Cyber, UNSW This is part of a new series looking at the national security challenges facing Australia, how our leaders are responding to them and how these measures are impacting society. Read other stories in the series ...
Researchers from Lincoln University are investigating how to use nanotechnology in agriculture to increase productivity and reduce environmental impact. ...
The increased presence of anti-trans and white supremacist stickers around the University of Auckland campus is proof that inaction is enabling hate groups, write Anisha Sankar and Max Whitehurst.Anisha Sankar is a Chennai-born, Te Awakairangi-raised, South Indian Tamil studying at the University of Auckland. Max Whitehurst is a transgender Pākehā ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Gillespie, Professor of Law, University of Waikato Following the Christchurch mosque shootings, the New Zealand government’s first response was to ban the firearms the alleged gunman had used to murder 51 people. Seven months later, the second tranche of this process ...
The nine members for the next three year term of the Independent Māori Statutory Board (IMSB) for Auckland have been appointed by the statutory Selection Body. Their appointments begin on 1 November 2019 and continue to 31 October 2022. Mana Whenua ...
“If we are truly to solve the challenge of poverty within the Te Ao Maori world we must lift our people from the low wage and low skills growth side of the economy. At the same time we must continue to ensure our people, no matter where they are, ...
Alex Casey asks Rose Stewart from Family Planning every single question she can think of about New Zealand’s new free IUDs. Listen up, womb-owners who love free shit and long-term contraceptive options: Pharmac announced that they will be fully funding two new long-lasting, reversible contraceptives in New Zealand from November 1, ...
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Sunshine capital? Check. Rich artisan tradition? Check. Incredible sausages? That’s a big check. We’ve put together a list of all you need to know before you explore the truly gorgeous Nelson region this summer. If you’ve got friends or relatives visiting Aotearoa, top of their list should be sorting out their ...
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Open mike 25/03/2019 
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Thanks to a report from the Acting Inspector General of Intelligence and Security following a complaint by Nicky Hager, we have come to find out that the SIS illegally spied on Mr. Hager on behalf of the NZDF after publication of Hager’s 2011 book, Other People’s Wars. The NZDF justified ...23 hours ago
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Fisk …: “So I have a prediction. If the Trump regime collapses – for regime it is – I suspect it will not be his frolics with the Russians which destroy it. Nor his corruption, nor his domestic lies. Nor his misogyny. Nor his anti-immigrant racism. Nor his obvious mental instability, though this clearly connects him to his friends in the Arab world. The Middle East has already got its coils into the White House. Trump is a friend of a highly dangerous state called Saudi Arabia.
He has adopted Israeli foreign policy as his own, including the ownership of Jerusalem and wholehearted support for Israel’s illegal colonisation of Palestinian Arab land.
He has torn up a solemn treaty with Iran. He has joined the Sunni side in its sectarian war with the Shias of the Middle East, in Iran, in Lebanon, in Syria, in Bahrain and, of course, in Saudi Arabia itself.
Many countries have gone to war on behalf of other nations. Britain drew the sword for Poland in 1939, albeit a little late in the day. But to actively seek participation in someone else’s sectarian war for no other reason than to continue to sell weapons to a wealthy and unstable autocracy, to amalgamate your own country’s foreign policy with that of the most militarily powerful state in the Middle East — to the point of depriving an entire people of a share in its capital city –
– and to wilfully ignore the long and lucrative support that our Gulf “allies” have given to the most frightful of our cult enemies – those who have indeed struck in the streets of London and New York – is beyond the usual lexicon. It is beyond shameful. Beyond wicked. Were it not for the insanity of the man responsible, the word “depravity” comes to mind.”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/12/04/how-middle-east-
dictators-bring-their-western-allies-down/
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/05/israel-is-playing-a-big-role-in-indias-escalating-conflict-with-pakistan/
It seems most of the farming community, such as this useless one, can’t think for themselves and have to follow the thought patterns of their messiahs, here Bill English in calling the less fortunate “useless” https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/111458974/federated-farmers-marlborough-president-slams-tax-reform-as-funds-for-the-useless
The funny thing about this cry is two-fold;
One; the generation that Philip Neal here complains about has been raised by his own generation, being the parents.
Two; the generation that Philip Neal here complains about has been raised under his own politics – voting as they did the for the Nats and Bill English through the nineties which this generation was born into and raised under.
If there is a “useless” generation (and I no way accept there is), then it is the result of Philip Neal and his own generation… what a frikkin’ dipstick.
It’s the sort of ingrained ignorance I would expect from a group of people who, for the most part, live in isolation.
That isolation is the urban / rural divide in a nutshell.
there is no urban/rural divide.
Frankly that is made up bullshit to ‘create a divide’ that can be used by the likes of useless double dipping welfare benefit abusing men like bill english.
NZ is a very small country with a really small population. Literally everyone other then a really new migrant is related to someone somewhere by marriage etc.
Rural useless children end up going to Uni in the big urban centers and some might even end up in towns, like useless Bill English whose only link to rural existence is his father who was a farmer.
Urban useless children end up working on farms or moving rural and create businesses there.
These guys don’t live in isolation, they live for divide and conquer and they do a real good job there.
+100
Great response Sabine.
Mr Neal got a serve from Jill Hawkey, Methodist Missin director, in the same article. She said that the comments were “really, really unhelpful” because they fed stigma around people receiving social supports. “The majority are only on there for a short period of time and the benefit just helps them through a difficult period.”
“The sign of a healthy society is how we treat our most vulnerable,” she said.
Jill Hawkey has a better handle on the situation, She runs Blenheim’s only emergency housing provider.
Mr Neal said, “we do need benefits but there’s lots of people who abuse the system”.
Well, he’s right there. In all the tax debate I’ve not heard much from the wealthy about tax evasion necessitating tax reform, in other words about “lots of people who abuse the system.”
benefits are prepaid services
we pay for superannuation
we pay for unemployment benefits
we pay for ACC
we pay for social welfare for those who can’t finance their own lifes fully
we pay for the accommodation benefit
we pay for the state houses
we pay for the roads
we pay for the hospitals
we pay for the schools
we pay for street lightning, for parks, for public buildings
we pay for the infrastructure that is used by the public, businesses and farmers
we pay for all of it via our income taxes, GST, business taxes.
Non of the things we pay for is ‘welfare’, it is a prepaid service.
Maybe its time to list up again on our pay slips just what hte percentage of each of hte tickets on our wage is .
Superannuation 5 %, Unemployment 5 % , ACC 5% …..until we understand that we don’t get Hand Outs from government (which is also financed by us – urban and rural useless people) we get to claim back a service we paid for.
And then maybe men like the useless pencil pusher from the federated farmers would learn to think before sprouting hate.
Farmers need workers, but workers get paid better in oz, why. Well farmers here have a extra incentive to push down wages, capital gains. Nz has a skill shortage, as it’s obvious easier to get ahead in oz when the owners aren’t farming the capital gains at 0% tax. So farmer whinning about the need for those lazy bennies to get a job, turns out its just greed as they have a worker shortage.
Mr Neal is simplistic in his statements and very generalising. He says that some government members “would like to see farming put down altogether.” Such a view is very exaggerated.
He talks about sponging beneficiaries.
Here is a question for him. What is the amount stolen by beneficiaries convicted of beneficiary fraud as opposed to the amount stolen by tax evasion?
“New research reveals tax dodgers are ripping off the country at up to 150 times the rate of welfare fraudsters, but are being jailed much less often. Last year, tax evaders cheated the country of between $1 and $6 billion, while welfare fraud cost $39 million.” Excerpted from a post on The Standard July 18 2017 titled “Benefit fraud vs white collar crime.”
In 2018 IRD reported that it was owed $3 billion in unpaid taxes, with $1.7 billion owed for more than three years.
Note that Neal’s “opinion” gets front page treatment on the Marlborough Express. Be interesting to see what his farm is like. Clean and green?
The letters to the Editor might get a tad more interesting, too, ianmac.
“so the Government can then redistribute money to those they perceive as the helpless and needy, but in my opinion, useless.”
That will be a statement that will return to haunt Mr Neal. He mentions recent events in Christchurch as having distracted him from his opining on taxation.
What he doesn’t seem to get is the distance between what that man did in ChCh and where most Kiwis are. He uses the same language of divisiveness, of ‘the other” by calling our people on benefits ‘useless’. I should hope that most Kiwis will also regard his opining as a form of hate speech. To call someone useless is to deny their humanity. Every human being has value.
“Beneficiaries are us”, as Sabine argues above.
I wonder how much direct and indirect, taxpayer or ratepayer funded support Mr Neal, his family and his business receive. He might go strangely quiet at the answer.
Two bail outs for the farming (mostly) sector in recent years come to mind.
Mycoplasma bovis
South Canty Finance
AND
What about the agricultural worker being ripped off by the sector as well.
Maybe if a living wage was paid, then there would be fewer seeing benefits.
irrigation, without it many farms would literally not be farming where they are.
The South Canterbury Farms are not viable without taxpayers funded Irrigation Schemes and Free Water.
The Salmon and Trout fisheries have been wrecked in South Canterbury.
I would actually go far to say that beneficiaries and working people have been used as ATMs for the countries landlords, banks and power companies for a very long time.
Exactly. Has always been the case that the capitalists withdraw to max-OD on the workers of any nation. This is the history, and the evidence.
Further current evidence – migrant workers keeping wages down to below-sustenance level.
It is cheaper to pay minimum wage than it is to keep a slave today.
He probably means useless to him personally. Tax money not spent on him is wasted obv.
“USELESS” beneficiaries how very Hitleresque of Mr. Neal someone should educate him on the Nazis extermination of the mentally ill and disabled described by Hitler as “USELESS MOUTHS”
Bit of a joke from the most featherbedded, by tax dollars, community in New Zealand.
Not to mention the almost total destruction of non commodity manufacturing and service sector of our economy, and the resultant billions in costs, unemployment and poverty, to obtain “free trade” agreements to benefit farmers.
I am not necessarily against State subsidies, but some acknowledgement of the real “hard working Kiwi’s” who pay the taxes, instead of moaning about the little they, farmers, pay, would be nice.
Fortunately, There are a lot of farmers who don’t think like that clown.
A lot don’t like fed farmers because of that sort of BS.
Muslims do not hate us for our freedoms and values …. its our actions and history in the middle east that creates extremist ‘blowback’. …. and refugees fleeing violence and extremism
“From Washington’s perspective, peace in Syria is the horror scenario. Peace would mean what the United States sees as a ‘win’ for our enemies: Russia, Iran, and the Assad government. We are determined to prevent that, regardless of the human cost.”
“Just consider for a moment the UK’s support for, and involvement in, the horrifying Saudi war against Yemen, or US politicians’ blanket silence on Israel’s massacre of unarmed demonstrators in Gaza. Our leaders have no moral high ground to stand on. Their foreign policy decisions are about oil, defence contracts and geo-strategic interests, not about protecting civilians or fighting just wars.
However bad Assad is, and he is a dictator, he is responsible for far fewer deaths and much less suffering in the Middle East than either George W Bush or Tony Blair.
Former New York Times correspondent Stephen Kinzer sets out a very plausible reason why the US, UK and France keep intervening in Syria. It is not about children or chemical weapons. It is to prevent the Syrian government and Russia triumphing over the jihadists, as they have been close to doing for some time.
These western states are adamantly opposed to allowing a peaceful resolution in Syria, Kinzer observes, because it:
“might allow stability to spread to nearby countries. Today, for the first time in modern history, the governments of Syria, Iraq, Iran and Lebanon are on good terms. A partnership among them could lay the foundation for a new Middle East.”
“That new Middle East, however, would not be submissive to the United States-Israel-Saudi Arabia coalition. For that reason, we are determined to prevent it from emerging. Better to keep these countries in misery and conflict, some reason, than to allow them to thrive while they defy the United States. “…
“From Washington’s perspective, peace in Syria is the horror scenario. Peace would mean what the United States sees as a ‘win’ for our enemies: Russia, Iran, and the Assad government. We are determined to prevent that, regardless of the human cost.”
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/04/18/robert-fisks-douma-report-rips-away-excuses-for-air-strike-on-syria/
“However bad Assad is, and he is a dictator, ”
That’s not correct. Elections were held in Syria in 2014 attended by numerous UN observers. Bashar al Assad won by a considerable majority.
The UN observers report is here:
FYI
The Syrian Arab Republic Constitution
https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Syria_2012.pdf
To true Brigid ….. I didn’t want to edit what I had quoted. ..I did quote the main point twice though ….
Elections were indeed held and for more info on the western supported extremist and proxy overthrow of Syria …
https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-revolutionary-distemper-in-syria-that-wasnt-us-nato-sponsored-al-qaeda-insurgency-since-the-outset-in-march-2011/5552358
“reporters representing Time magazine and the New York Times referred to the government as having broad support, of critics conceding that Assad was popular, and of Syrians exhibiting little interest in protest. At the same time, they described the unrest as a series of riots involving hundreds, and not thousands or tens of thousands of people, guided by a largely Islamist agenda and exhibiting a violent character.”
“Bashar al-Assad’s refusal to renounce Arab nationalist ideology dismayed Washington, which complained about his socialism,”
“Time’s correspondent Rania Abouzeid attributed the failure of the protest organizers to draw significant support to the fact that most Syrians were not opposed to their government. Assad had a favorable reputation, especially among the two-thirds of the population under 30 years of age, and his government’s policies were widely supported. “Even critics concede that Assad is popular and considered close to the country’s huge youth cohort, both emotionally, ideologically and, of course, chronologically,”
“That the government commanded popular support was affirmed when the British survey firm YouGov published a poll in late 2011 showing that 55 percent of Syrians wanted Assad to stay. The poll received almost no mention in the Western media, prompting the British journalist Jonathan Steele to ask: “Suppose a respectable opinion poll found that most Syrians are in favor of Bashar al-Assad remaining as president, would that not be major news?”
Steele described the poll findings as “inconvenient facts” which were” suppressed “because Western media coverage of the events in Syria had ceased “to be fair” and had turned into “a propaganda weapon.”[66
https://www.globalresearch.ca/trump-regime-continues-supporting-isis/5651020?utm_campaign=magnet&utm_source=article_page&utm_medium=related_articles
Well, I watched the chief censor on the AM show rationalising his decision to ban the shooter’s manifesto & agreed that propaganda from violent groups ought not to be given a platform in the msm.
Then I saw the rep from the FSM explaining that we need to understand what motivates such groups and suppressing the manifesto stops folks learning, and agreed with that.
So there’s merit on both sides of this divide. I suspect a medial line will have to be taken, in which people are free to selectively examine the group’s advocacy on a point-by-point basis. Why bother? Consider the weakness of the censor’s position: public policy ought to be evidence-based, and he failed to cite a single piece of evidence to validate his stance.
I’ve noticed the same failing in those here who stridently demonise the alt-right. None have provided a single example of incitement to violence in the manifesto. I’m not saying none exists – just that laziness isn’t good enough.
The censor’s stance is to treat the public with contempt by assuming they don’t need to know. Maybe tacit rather than conscious (like Trump) but still evident. Paternalism. Unlikely to fly well in the new millennium.
For those of us who have been fighting racism and injustice, bigotry and hate over the years we don’t have to read the specific cut and paste jobbie from this murderer because we already know what they think – it’s all over the internet, it’s all over their low impact support sites from those with like mind. It is good others want to join the fight – may I suggest – read and follow those fighting these people and you will learn a lot. Reading their rambling tomes you’ll learn not so much just how to hate more.
If it’s ‘all over the internet’, why are we banning only this one particular example?
Shradrach is all over the internet …. spreading victim blaming shit like this ….
Special Report: The Ladder Down to Hell : “The ( NZ ) killings also coincided with a surge of anti-Muslim hate crimes in other regions of the world, including the United Kingdom and Canada, while in the U.S., such crimes have spiked to all-time highs. ”
Shradrach s response : “If that is true, it is hardly surprising given the hatred being preached across the US by Islamic leaders, particularly anti-Semitic diatribes.”
This is the truth versus Shradrachs angry fear-mongering arguments.
These Muslim New Zealanders …. and the restraint and love shown by the bereaved …… show Shadgag to be a very very ugly member … of us
https://twitter.com/hashtag/50lives?src=hash
I often find that when someone quotes another without providing links, they are being dishonest. Like you were here /open-mike-21-03-2019/#comment-1600348.
Yes your deliberately shortened the quote from’ the ladder to hell “….to leave out christchurch …. we can all see that.
Why did you shorten it ????
So you could push your “: “If that is true, it is hardly surprising given the hatred being preached across the US by Islamic leaders, particularly anti-Semitic diatribes.” ….. without making us all vomit at your sentiments.
How about your bullshit statement when you conflate extremist fundamentalist Muslims …… with normal peaceful Muslims ….
“Islam as an ideology, as practised in Islamic nations and as taught in many western countries, is fundamentally incompatible with a modern liberal democracy. There are many Muslims who are calling for an Islamic reformation, unfortunately their voices are, as yet, not being heard.”
So according to Shradich a good portion of our Muslims murdered in Christchurch were incompatible with New Zealand life.
Could you identify the ones we are better off without shradarch
Here they are ….. strangely they seem like better New Zealanders than you
https://twitter.com/hashtag/50lives?src=hash
“So according to Shradich a good portion of our Muslims murdered in Christchurch were incompatible with New Zealand life.”
No, never said that.
Take a deep breath and contemplate for a moment the notion that it is possible to critique an ideology (in this case Islam) without wishing it’s followers ill. Are you suggesting that criticising Nazi ideology should not be allowed because it is attacking German people?
Never mind the Nazis
Instead ….
Nice sentiments, but critiquing an ideology is not ‘violence’. Nor is it ‘racism’, ‘bigotry’, ‘islamophobia’ or any other word you may choose to try to shut down debate.
No different from the OIA. Openness, transparency, and trust are just buzzwords to pacify the great unwashed. They know best, Dennis, and they don’t even have to justify it because it is their job and it comes with fancy titles (and pay packages) that tells them they’re above us. This is the natural order and the so-called chain of command. No respect for the underlings.
This is the problem I have with hierarchical structures and institutions; it breeds a climate of non-communicative so-called managers and leaders who can’t (be bothered) to properly explain anything. And no, appearing on a morning show is not the same as actually properly communicating and explaining.
This is even more of a problem with complex sensitive and controversial matter. The harder it gets, the less communication and explanation will be forthcoming. IMO, it should be the exact opposite.
“Openness, transparency, and trust are just buzzwords to pacify the great unwashed.”
the great unwashed – wonderful imagery and telling comment.
Good we have the sorting hat on in this country at the moment – and people are sorting themselves nicely.
Marty. Would you have wanted the Urewera raids, censored by the Government?
Incognito is right about the authoritarian arrogance.
I admit to struggling with this. For example I want child porn, and other similarly objectionable stuff on the internet, totally gone.
Political speech. Where do you draw the line? To me Bennett’s welfare bashing is “Hate speech” which is used to justify the level of cruelty inflicted on people by the right wing, and WINZ. Violence which hurts 100,s of thousands of people. Refusing her a platform however, will not stop the hate.
To a large extent if you give these people enough rope, they eventually discredit themselves, to all but a few.
Brash, for example is unelectable, as is Seymour anywhere but a National electorate, which will vote for a blue gumboot, if they are told to.
I admire incognito’s writing and sentiment. I cannot stand authoritarian arrogance either and middle manager incompetence or idiocy.
I don’t agree with the enough rope strategy on this stuff. The Chief Censor has made a call and it will be assessed. I’m cool with that.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018688
I read about half of the terrorist’s wee missive and did not see it as instructional….a ‘how to’ manual. He assumed he would be killed or caught and anticipated being isolated. The manifesto…or the first 40 pages or so consists of this arsehole interviewing himself. Asking himself the questions he thinks he should be asked so he can explain/justify the horror he has wrought.
Most of it was copy and paste. I doubt an original thought or idea has ever escaped from his brain. The couple of references to his own personal experience give insight into just how faulty his thinking is.
The bulk of the content is ubiquitous…banning this particular manifestation of this ideology serves only to raise what is in actuality crap to mythical heights. Create a legend Censor. Good work. /sarc, btw
Child pornography…most definitely ban…and ffs increase the penalties for making and disseminating 100 fold, as at the moment the courts are being too soft.
I too have real issues with being told by my ‘betters’ what is appropriate for me to know/see/read/hear. All government business should be totally open and transparent, and so far this lot have fallen way short on that.
A subject dear to my heart Incognito but I won’t start on it because I would still be going this time tomorrow. Suffice to say, times are a’changing and these upstarts who have goose-stepped around the corridors of the Public Service and other halls of power for the past umpteen decades are gradually becoming extinct.
Long may it continue.
That’s my impression too @Anne. I’d go a little further in one or two cases – and that is that a couple who’ve ‘goose-stepped around the corridors’ (anxious to preserve their status, career options and perceptions of their own might), and who’ve been pushing back since the change in government might well be shitting themselves about now. (And if they aren’t, they’re a little bit ficker than I originally thought they were)
“Well, I watched the chief censor on the AM show….”
Well that’s your problem right there Dennis.
For goodness’ sake, watching telly is hazardous at any time….first thing in the morning though? The producers rightly assume the audience is barely awake so they don’t have to bother with quality content.
Give it up…take your coffee outside and watch the sunrise.
It’s not a woolly line at all if a speech act directly incites violence. I am happy for the citations provided by the Chief Censor to be enough evidence for me.
So no, there is no merit in continuing then able that kind of speech.
I have no problem at all censoring death threats, and as far as I can tell I’m one of the most permissive free speech advocates here.
Right kind of paternalism.
So where’s your proof, Ad? Where did you see him provide a citation? If you refuse to front up with evidence, you can’t complain if folks remain unconvinced.
“Right kind of paternalism.”
Rightio, Dad.
You want the incitements to violence quoted do you franky?
You mean that’s not obvious? Normal in a court of law, just as normal in the court of public opinion… 🙄
No incorrect. We put people into roles and we entrust them to do the role. It is peculiar that you think you need to know the detail.
We? Some of us believe officials are accountable to the public. Not just in theory, but in practice too. Shifting democracy in the direction of accountability is wise. That’s why many people are helping to do it…
Yes we. I thought youd been involved in politics – this line you’re pushing seems very juvenile to me. Note I am not saying YOU are juvenile just what you are SAYING is imo. What accountability are you actually talking about. He went on the idiotbox didn’t he? He answered the inane questions didn’t he? Do you want to interview him yourself? Trust Dennis is actually what makes democracy work. Distrust destroys it.
Evasion of accountability by mainstream politicians and public servant was one of the concerns that motivated my joining the Greens 29 years ago. Similar evasion by capitalists motivated me even more.
Dunno why you regard such widespread concerns as juvenile. Zillions of adults share them. Many contributors here keep proving that.
I agree that trust is crucial. I’m actually reading a very good about it at the moment: Who Can You Trust? I bought Fukuyama’s book Trust in the nineties and one with the same title by a different author a couple of years later.
Re the current book, this is what the publisher’s section About the Author says: “Rachel Botsman is a world renowned expert on trust, whose three TED talks on the topic have been viewed over 3.5 million times.” Named “a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. She writes for the Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Harvard Review, Wired, and more.”
Her chapter on how the dark web operates to build trust on a verified and validated basis is fascinating (she gives examples to illuminate that). She’s an academic with the University of Oxford’s business school.
Interesting book. Trust is an interesting topic to discuss but i’ll leave it for another day for me
So true. And in my view, accountability is a necessary ingredient to build trust. Accountability is more than telling you do your job well and follow instructions nicely. It is about providing some (…) justification and explanation as to why you doing things and with what intentions and outcomes.
It’s a grey area but instead of a whiter shade of pale they choose a blacker shade of beige 😉
yay we agree. Trust is built on accountability. No accountability no trust. In regards to the mechanisms of government I am okay with the level of accountability – to a point – I’d certainly like heads to resign after mistakes that hurt people or break the law or are racist or sexist or ageist or ableist and so on. I haven’t seen anything like that or even remotely like that. I’ve seen a banned manifesto after the darkest day of murder against innocent Kiwis this country has seen. White supremacist garbage should be consigned to the rubbish bin. There are ZERO redeeming qualities for it to be available imo.
“We put people into roles and we entrust them to do the role.”
Hmm…considering the huge number of examples of government appointees getting it horribly wrong, methinks your faith is misplaced. Just a bit.
Sure they get it wrong – if anyone thinks someone should be perfect well sadly people aren’t like that because that’s impossible. There are checks and balances as there should be. They seem to work mostly and the alternative is not a society that cares for the vulnerable imo.
You want to taste the meat that’s been condemned as not fit for human consumption franky?
Gabby
What does that mean? Anything of value?
If the text is poisonous, reading it (to decide for ourselves whether it is poisonous) involves poisoning ourselves with it.
Seems pretty obvious to me.
Well the obvious would also suggest that the censor,who spends his days watching,(at the taxpayers expense )reading and listening to porn and violent games should be required to undertake psychological evaluation.
I suspect it’s an essential part of the job.
It is an essential part of the job. From what I understand, the stuff that team sees can be pretty harrowing.
Yeah, some of the police forensic IT guys can have a hard time of it, too, ISTR hearing.
Always the trouble. Accepting enforced ignorance.
Pornography is outlawed.
So obtaining some to view what is being talked about makes you an
outlaw.
If a teacher has it then that is the finish to their good reputation, no matter if it is just a small amount – not tons of files.
But police will have evenings when they watch it, so they know about it,
can recognise it when they see it. Yet teachers have not the standing to also be shown it. (This is what I understand has been the case and probably still is.)
Therefore if their students have it and watch it, then they know more about this important mind and attitude-bender than the teacher and might feel rather superior. It puts teachers at a disadvantage.
Do you really want teachers to be able to download child porn?
I suspect the viewings to which you refer aren’t self-directed downloads, either.
I raise some points. It isn’t an all-encompassing idea. Just a pint that some people who are supposed to be knowledgable and capable of moral behaviour know some things and other, similarly important people, are prevented from even viewing them.
I can see why cops might need to know precisely what sort of things might be deemed objectionable in practise. It goes to grounds for making an arrest or giving the censors appropriate items to rule on.
Teachers probably don’t need to know that much. How does a teacher discovering a kid is watching r18 differ from discovering the kid is watching something a bit closer to R20 or even objectionable? Surely it goes to parents and maybe school counsellor. They might call in the cops depending on age and content. But is there any functional difference at the teacher end?
Can’t you work it out grazy?
You can fill me with your meat.
You understate your massiveness sambarse.
Based on the evidence, your staments are questionable.
Wonderful, Gabby! I understand what you are saying even if some others don’t. Always appreciate your ability to get right to the crux of the issue in a very few words. It’s a skill many of us don’t have.
+1 it really is the essence of DF’s demand.
Recall that I made the same point myself re not wanting to have the manifesto on my computer. I mentioned that there is a contaminating effect on the psyche.
Today I’m making a different point. Public policy must be evidence-based nowadays, to seem credible, lot’s of folk are claiming. I agree that is desirable. Citation of evidence has been missing in the hate-speech debate. I’ve pointed that out several times. This morning I caught Ad pretending that the censor cited evidence – did you notice how he ducked for cover when I called his bluff?
Now you may wish to claim that nobody comes here to make a positive contribution to public policy. I’m inclined to disagree. I know I do. Why would anyone seek to participate in politics from an impotent position?
Sorry, just to clarify, theoretically-like, you want evidence that the 74-page manifesto released by a mass-murderer immediately prior to his rampage contains objectionable material?
I think most people would safely assume it’s not a recipe for cinnamon swirls.
To see if it is a feasible candidate for prosecution under our hate-speech law. Proof of incitement to commit violence. I note how many folk are happy to assume it does without proof. I just think it unwise to form public policy on the basis of unvalidated assumptions.
Like the unvalidated assumption that a document written in relation to committing 50 murders might contain some nasty-ass shit?
Do you need to see every image someone downloaded to agree whether they were watching child porn, or are you happy with the existence of a conviction on the basis that the defendant was found to be in possession of images classified as objectionable?
You could try applying to the censors for permission to read the manifesto on the grounds that you wish to verify for yourself that it does indeed contain objectionable content that justifies its banning.
Let us know how you get on.
Or if you’re sufficiently distrustful of the quality of the censors’ decisions, I’m sure you could find it online, read and print it before the cops got to your door. The absence of truly objectionable material should then be a pretty good defence at trial.
Go on, set yourself up to be a free-speech martyr. If teenage me could play my illegal copy of Marianne Faithfull’s Why’d Ya Do It, you can strike a blow for free speech today.
i don’t want to see the manifesto discussed to see evidence for mass murder – the evidence of mass murder was provided before the manifesto. So that point is moot.
i would like to see the manifest discussed to learn where we – our spy agencies, our police services, our gun shop owner, us the community, and all other that interacted with this fellow- have missed that he is so incited to hate the other that he would become a mass murderer.
And as state before, i don’t forcibly want to read it, but i would like to see certain people read it, Hoskins, Richardson, Bill English, the federated farmer dude, and all those that regularly diminish people as useless, as others, as undeserving, as not fit, as bludgers, etc etc etc.
And i would like them to be asked, publicly is there anything in your rhetoric over the past few years that you would take back.
As i firmly believe that the incitement to hate not only comes from radicalized people, but more importantly comes from our so called polite society that shapes the daily discourse of our public.
i.e. Donald Trump : all mexican are rapists and murderers. All muslims must be banned. All african nations are shit holes.
Is this any less hate speech? And should we ban Donald Trump?
Should we ban that federated farmer dude that declares that some people are ‘useless’? And if they are useless, what should then be done about them?
And again, i understand that to look at us and our own discourse – and i include myself – might not be fun, might not be easy, might actually be hurtful. But we can not ever change hate, and hateful behavior by banning manifestos and screeds and pretend it did not happen here and it was not one of us – one of us fellow white people. Because we would not have any gumption of demanding accountability from every Muslim we see if the perpetrator of the crime were a Muslim.
The thing is that we know that for at least the next while not only will it not be easy, we know that other fuckwits will draw solace and encouragement from that document. Because that’s what they do: cut and paste from previous fuckwits.
If you can demonstrate a genuine need and ability to process that material, apply for an exemption.
McFlock 1.55
again, you try hard to not understand what i say.
i don’t need to read it. I just want to see where we as a society failed.
So i list up whom i think needs to read it.
The man from the federated farmers who a week after a mass murder sprouts nonsense about ‘useless people’. He needs to read it.
Mike Hoskins who has been on record now for years sprouting nonsense about dole bludgers, people who have children who can’t afford it, and generally ‘useless people’.
Bill English who has been on record calling our young people ‘useless and pretty damned hopeless.
Sky News that showed the video.
The police that surveilled others and not white supremasits.
Our polititians that have hyped in one way or another our fear of the Muslim while the terror came from a non muslim.
And they should answer to us the public, as many of htese guys are paid for by us. And they should tell us if they think that they too might be part of the problem.
And unless you have read the thing you would not know what they copy and pasted or wrote themselves. Don’t you want to know : WHY and HOW did this happen. and WHY and HOW did we miss it? and WHAT can we do to prevent it from happening again.
As for the fuckwits drawing solace, they already have the video and the manifesto downloaded and your little attempt at censor ship is something that they are laughing about.
@McFlock – “we know that other fuckwits will draw solace and encouragement from that document. Because that’s what they do: cut and paste from previous fuckwits.”
We also know that they will find opportunities for recruitment and ‘righteous’ outrage from the restriction or deletion of said document.
So, either way, the hard part is dealing with the recognition of the presence of a supportive community and individuals with this mindset and perspective, and then, making efforts to counteract or engage with them so that they are not destructive.
Sabine’s comments so far have been straightforward and well reasoned, and despite the harm caused, what little I have seen of the manifesto shows it to be an embarrassment to the author. I think her reasons are more convincing so far, than any others put forward regarding the classification of the material.
What makes you think Hosking or whomever won’t agree with it?
In ten years, I might read a book by a forensic psychologist or someone else who talks about why this specific insecure little fucker did what he did. It might have some revelation (e.g. apparently Whitman had a brain tumour that might have accounted for his actions to some degree). Most likely it will be a similar story to most of the other sad, pathetic, weak, insecure, scared little fuckers who do shit like this.
The how is being rapidly addressed.
The why is something we will never truly going to understand. We missed it because we thought we were better, we thought we had gun control, we thought the problem came from people we didn’t realise we thought of as “other”.
But why he did it? How does any normal person comprehend why some insecure little fuck needs to murder defenceless people to feel good about himself?
@molly and Sabine
Fair call, there are good arguments both ways, I should be clear. But the other key thing about banning it is that anyone who gets caught possessing it immediately brings themselves to the close and public attention of the courts. So people have to be keen to read it, and it becomes a self-outing mechanism. And in the search for answers, most of the reviews indicate there is nothing particularly interesting compared to other right-wing terrorists.
McFlock 2:57 pm
What makes you think Hosking or whomever won’t agree with it?
i actually believe that he does agree with some of the shit the white supremacists peddle – oh surely not openly, cleverly disguised as ‘opinion’, a bit of not political correct fun you see, wink wink, nudge nudge.
But so long as they don’t have to affront their own biases and the results of their words they will not change.
Currently the main danger that i see is that the white supremacists laugh at us and our hurt feelings. Going to prison? Heck why not. They be heroes for their fellow white supremacists. Or do we believe we don’t have the Aryan Nation, Identity Europe and the likes here in NZ and in our prisons? so unless the guy is send to a prison full of maori he will have white supremacists in the public population with him and support. think of it.
That is why i think we need to have a open public discussion about what happened. So that people that would not think twice about dehumanizing someone for being brown, poor, unemployed, pregnant, handicapped, or of a different religion think twice about some political incorrect commentary and ‘wink wink nudge nudge’
. Lest they be held accountable if some fuckwit takes their words and goes on a killing spree.
cause at the end of the day, teh question really is: Why is a average white guy, average everything, good finances, good family support going to a different country to buy guns and slaughter people? Why? And how come our vast surveillance state that knows every pot smoker and grower, could not see this guy and realize that he is up to something. And What should we do different from now onward.
so to do nothing and just simply ‘who could imagine that this happens, well we don’t have to imagine it, in certain parts of the world this shit happens every day. do we want this to happen here every day and offer thoughts and prayers and nothing can be done, next?
I think the main danger is that we don’t know who they are.
I’m not saying that we should do nothing. This little fucker should be a lab rat for the rest of his life. But that’s different from distributing his rants.
Interesting analogy but flawed IMO. The defendant knows the images, the prosecution knows it too, as do the jury and the judge. In fact, the defense team can provide a counter-argument regarding the images if they choose to.
None of that applies to the Chief Censor and his office’s decision to declare something objectionable and unfit for public consumption, meat or vegetable. It is an asymmetric or unilateral decision rather based on authority.
My understanding is that the jury etc don’t actually judge the images. The censor classifies the images, and if they’re objectionable then the legal question is possession, not the nature of the images themselves.
But more to the point, everyone whose role in the trial requires it might see the images, but the public does not. And nor should we. It would defeat the purpose.
I think the criteria in the act itself are a bit prescriptive in places – most of them are clearly consent and public welfare issues (e.g. minors and animals), but damned if I can see that justification for urine. It’s not my scene, but crazier stuff has been done consensually.
I suspect the evaluation itself errs on the side of conservative when it comes to judging the public standard, but I’m hard-pressed to think of a better system to judge all publications etc. Because if we don’t have such a system, it all goes to the lowest denominator.
Yep and he still doesn’t get it I think.
Good to see you back veutoviper.
+ 1 yep been missed
Hello veutoviper, so pleased to see your post.!! Yes Gabby can be concise. That is why his name is a laugh.
Yep good one gabby
I find this discussion bizarre. Librarians and other groups have been disputing unhelpful OFLC decisions for a long time, eg this egregious example, but for some people it’s apparently all good until the OFLC bans a fucking white supremacist manifesto advocating the murder of their fellow citizens. Seriously, what the fuck? That’s the point at which the OFLC’s gone too far? Maybe the people whinging about the Chief Censor’s decision should take a break and think about their priorities.
Ok, but many of us are not librarians and would never have heard of this particular case and the reason being it did not attract as much attention. Duh! I find this bordering on false equivalence.
It would be interesting to think what the reaction would be if Key were PM.
Why?
Looms like the Victoria University Council is going to go to the high court to try and get the name change it wants – see the post “A LETTER FROM HUGH RENNIE QC TO FRIENDS OF VUW” on this FB page:
https://www.facebook.com/stickwithvic/?__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARDj6osCKzXHGaREDMzpSCHnU0_9EqtYadx0i__21GYkVXc63KL2aFYcWK0jSNYgFmnSf4k0xlGFKEsRPk2fAb6ZS5BbbtF69WVtazmOt7xQt4t0q19p6B0mCtZ4twngc5WhJCdpQS6gItj4KL1j8tKNE9iDutk5qAaaT4T2WyA8vSp9C-n-OMNzwkJSwVlxyNH7Hb5ZWz806tCKoKxA6uAohw
This is an utterly reckless waste of money by an arrogant VC and council.
Now on Scoop:
http://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=117277&fbclid=IwAR1L0tflkX1ktEB-6GTFo5SM5rwpl8Dr4mCcr8UrI0aTRiBGuZKnI4SJsPg
Bugger That!
All power to Hugh, and hope that the VUW council take on board the huge opposition to this stupid proposed name change which will, actually harm, not enhance my alma mater
Auckland University
Canterbury University
Otago University
Eastern Institute of Technology is in the east, Hawkes Bay.
Victoria University. Where is Victoria in NZ?
(Perhaps it should establish itself as a separate entity from
Wellington, or get the area named a suburb so it has
connection with its place.)
VUW stands for Victoria University Wellington
and it’s actually not about where it’s physically located. It’s far more nuanced than that – but you need to read the scoop article to understand why.
I may think the name is a colonial hangover, but the majority of the people involved, such as alumni, staff and students appear to want to keep the name.
Democracy!
The mania for management driven, re-naming every thing, for no good reason is a characteristic of Neo- liberal managerialism. They like to call it “Re branding”.
Something new broom managers like to do, to give the appearance of doing something.
Now. If the impetus for change had come from the grass roots, gaining everyone’s support, that would be a different story.
KJT
The reason for changing the name is good, or so it seems. The argument is that Wellington as the university’s name will stand out and its mana and that of the research that comes from it will be noticed and not just disappear in the mix of Victoria Universities around the world.
If past students and others look at things in an academic manner with a statistical bent about whether being connected with other Wellingtons is going to give them a leg-up compared to being swamped by other Victorias then there might be light on this.
It is a bit like the Christchurch Cathedral, apparently we are clinging on to the 1800s, and while we aren’t looking the powers that be are taking away the chunks of the 2000s till we have a few sun-bleached rocks.
BTW GWT are you related to John Key just wondering ?
If I was there I may have argued for changing the name. Trying for consensus on the change. . For post colonial reasons.
I don’t know how many Wellingtons and Victoria’s there are around the world, but a cursory google finds rather a lot.
However it doesn’t seem to be what the VUW community want.
The reasoning appears to me more from the “marketing” angle.
Driven by the “bums on seats” crowd.
GWT = Goat
FFS it’s always been Victoria University, this is another stunt like Pony Boy’s Flag Change which cost the taxpayer $23 million ?
Key would pretend empathy …. be comfortable with nationals watered down inaction over the firearms review under his watch …..
And like Wayne Mapp pretend we should stick with Israel as they are the source of civilization and share our values in the middle east
Well that’s more disturbing that the fake “live video” of the NZ attack that I saw. It will be an awkward moment if they are allowed to show it in the trial.
[Corodale. This is your third comment in recent hours hinting at a false flag event in Christchurch. It’s also going to be your last word on the matter. This site is not infowars and you are not Alex Jones. Show some respect or you’ll be moved on. TRP]
“the fake “live video” of the NZ attack”
Couldn’t we just ban this piece of shit for life. Do we need to have a conversation on the veracity of the video.
I posit: this line is positioning fools to watch the video in detail.
This is hate speech, in case you were wondering. It minimises all the hurt and harm to relay some whackjob trolls opinion.
If you can’t get rid of this shit, I can’t be part of this place.
There’s a mod note on Corodale’s comment already WTB and any further attempts to go down this path will be dealt with in the usual manner. Generally speaking, false flag claims are fodder for the intellectually weak; people who can’t deal with the world as it is. Pity is probably the correct response.
Thanks TRP.
False narratives are the life-blood of terrorism. 1 part truth, 10 parts hysteria. This particular narrative is just trolling. Not feeble minded, deliberate provocation.
And then the feeble echo it.
well the ‘fake attack’ line is out there and will not be put to rest.
As i said before, i am happy to repeat it again.
We can set the tone of the discussion, or we can ban everything related to the mass murder in christchurch and pretend -it did not happen- once the guy is locked up in Prison.
in the meant time others will not have such qualms.
This country needs to discuss these events. Publicly, openly, ideally televised (as that is the means of information for most), PM, Police, First Emergency Responders, clerics etc etc etc so that people like Corodale are literally just laughed out of the room as the cowards that don’t want to acknowledge the truth.
But here we are discussing how we applaud the banning of the manifest (cause it does not teach us anything !), we don’t publicly discuss the failings of our security apparatus (cause Spies!), we don’t discuss how we are incited to hate and dislike of others – muslims, single mothers, disabled people, useless people (Bill English), old people, young people, brown people, white people, urban people, rural people – by those who make a pay cheque out of ‘talk back shock radio and politics (Hoskins, Bill English, Paula Bennet etc) and the dividing of our country in to ‘us’ vs ‘them’.
So either we want to and realise even we MUST freely discuss the events of March 15th, or we are bound to repeat them again and again until we find the courage to look at us and our society openly and freely.
Transparency beings with us.
Alex jones …..
Such a good song too.
More Alex Jones in his own words
1 minute in and it’s just a lot of loud mouths talking over each other. Is this supposed to be something worthwhile? Do you have to be smoking something to appreciate it?
Almost certainly. But I really only wanted to post it for the first 25 seconds.
@ Corodale.
I love a good conspiracy theory as much as anyone, but this is a bad one. Dumping it here is deeply unwelcome.
Hate speech should be banned. You are a hate speaker.
Agree Corriedale’s should not be allowed near computers.
‘Islamist Attack Plot’ Foiled By German Police; 11 Arrested For Planning “To Kill As Many Infidels As Possible” https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-23/islamist-attack-plot-foiled-german-police-11-arrested-planning-kill-many-infidels As nice as my Muslim friends are, its still easy from me to see where Islamophobia comes from. They aren’t all nice, for example: Muhammad of Mecca was a war-lord who took slave-wives from the Jewish/Pagan tribes he _______. And Allah is historically the god of the Moon, as opposed to Christ, which is historically a god of the Sun. Sorry, just trying to keep things balanced and honest here in this little echo chamber. Yeah, truth. It hurts, I know.
This is what happens when you teach a Corriedale how to use the internet.
A) They can’t spell ” Corriedale” and
B) They are, at the end of the day, easily scared sheep.
Just say no when you flock asks for a laptop.
So instead of making weak sheep jokes (the average Aussie is much funnier, don’t try to compete) I went and checked out the German source above:
https://www.thelocal.de/
A brief scan reveals an interesting lead article:
https://www.thelocal.de/20190322/how-the-enabling-act-paved-the-way-for-nazi-dictatorship
So although I’m unfamiliar with the site it’s fair to assume this isn’t some bunch of nasty neo-nazis. Then we get to the details:
https://www.thelocal.de/20190322/police-arrest-11-over-terror-attack-plan
Are you alleging this story is a complete fabrication on the part of the news site or the German police? Or alternatively that we discount the plot because the target was just presumably white ‘infidels’? No need to waste any good outrage?
You might reasonably argue that a foiled plot in Europe has little relevance to NZ, and some decades ago this would have been reasonable. But given the ChCh terrorist was clearly radicalised in Europe, and given that many have pointed to the internet as having eliminated distance when it comes to psychological connections and threat … then evidence pointing out that the radical Islamic threat is as alive as ever is pertinent.
Of course this would be nothing more than a tiresome ‘whattaboutism’ if I was attempting to justify ChCh because say Bali. Quite the contrary, all extremists start as a tiny pathological minority, their core strategy, their only hope for victory entirely rests on escalating the atrocities, forcing more and more people to ‘choose sides’ and participate in the conflagration they so deeply desire … and that I openly condemn.
i would not consider theLocal.de a right wing publication rather a ‘european one’ with a focus on news form germany in english..
this is good reading and i suggest to others as it is a timely reminder that what happened in the past was ‘legal’ and that it can happen again. https://www.thelocal.de/20190322/how-the-enabling-act-paved-the-way-for-nazi-dictatorship
I am very happy that the police did manage to take this group out before they could do any harm.
and did you see, names were named, locations were named, and everyone gets to read about it. Transparency is needed if we want to prevent this from happening. The public is needed to help prevent these types of terrorist attacks.
the only difference between this plot and the attack on March 15th is that we in NZ we kind of expected an attack by Muslims, or basically had been conditioned to expect a terror attack by Muslims, and much to our surprise it was a white average guy with average looks, average heights, average intelligence and a bit more then average access to funds.
Who said they were all nice corodale ???
Which ones out of the 100 odd killed and injured in christchurch had it coming … just for balance ??
Here’s the truth of the matter …. or to some a echo chamber
https://twitter.com/hashtag/50lives?src=hash
You sure that’s not fake corodazed?
“Allah is historically the god of the Moon, as opposed to Christ, which is historically a god of the Sun”
Now I understand why Jesus wants me for a sunbeam. Thank you for your enlightening discourse.
Is the moon evil, do you think?
Cold-hearted orb that rules the night
Removes the colours from our sight
Red is grey and yellow, white
But we decide which is right
And which is an illusion
Graeme Edge
FO Corodale
If there could ever be a time to put that up, this isn’t it. It isn’t help to us – go and roll in something you dirty dog.
Is it ironic …. that in the usa it takes a black Somali refugee to stick up for the people of Venezuela … and call out the death squad activity s of the people Trump has appointed to ‘deal with’ Venezuela ???
Is it coincidence … when she talks of the biggest buyers of influence over us democracy …. and their Govts foreign policy …. she gets attacked as anti-Semite ???
“Congressional Democrats are attempting to discipline Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar for speaking critically about the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — and more generally in defense of Palestinian rights — after smearing her as “anti-Semitic.” This comes at the same time that Omar, one of the only Muslim representatives in Congress, has been targeted for death threats and Islamophobic propaganda likening her to those who carried out the 9/11 attacks.”
https://socialistworker.org/2019/03/06/jews-stand-against-the-smearing-of-ilhan-omar
“Bad-faith smears of Omar and many others are being used to crush Palestinian rights, undermine social movements and divert attention from real anti-Semitism. http://inthesetimes.com/article/21778/false-accusations-antisemitism-ilhan-omar-israel-palestine-democrats
“An Islamophobic sign made by the Republican Party of West Virginia and falsely linking the congresswoman to the 9/11 attacks was posted at the Capitol. The same party accusing Omar of perpetuating anti-Semitic myths felt it was completely appropriate to do the same to Muslims.”
See the usa heartland hate directed against her on twitter
Tweets by Ilhan
Sorry heres the hate thread against Ilhan Omar … on the subject of climate change
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/we-already-know-ilhan-omar-is-an-anti-semite-the-question-is-do-democrats-care
Are you blaming Ilhan Omar for the christchurch mass murders now Shradcock ??
Or just spreading anti semite smears ,,,, against a Muslim woman …. ?
https://lobelog.com/ilhan-omar-anatomy-of-a-smear/
https://mondoweiss.net/2019/02/ilhan-semitic-canard/
http://inthesetimes.com/article/21778/false-accusations-antisemitism-ilhan-omar-israel-palestine-democrats
https://newrepublic.com/article/153228/shameful-campaign-silence-ilhan-omar
https://www.rollcall.com/news/congress/ilhan-omar-called-anti-semitic-for-tweet-criticizing-pro-israel-lobby
“BDS is a non-violent movement calling on governments and corporations to exert financial pressure on Israel in an effort to recognize the rights of Palestinians. The campaign draws parallels to the South African anti-apartheid movement.
McCarthy has decried Omar and Tlaib’s support for BDS as anti-Semitic, attributing their opposition to the nation-state of Israel to anti-Jewish bigotry.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is Jewish, has defended BDS as constitutionally protected free speech. ”
Ilhan Omar seems like a a nice human …..the same as those murdered in christchurch ….. who you smear and fear-monger against.
People can read Ilhan Omars words …. and compare them to yours shradlophobe …. once more you will look very very ugly.
Your argument appears to be dishonest hate …. do you have a gun license ?
Your usa comrades of dishonest Islamophobia hate speach pollute her twitter .
“We all know what your doing. The same thing that has been done in NZ, UK, SWITZERLAND, BRUSSELS and Germany. Remember this: Land of the Free and Home of the Brave Sharia Law will NOT happen in the USA! ”
https://twitter.com/ilhan?lang=en
“Are you blaming Ilhan Omar for the christchurch mass murders now Shradcock ??”
If you need to ask that question you clearly haven’t been keeping up.
Ilhan Omar is an anti-Semite, who is increasingly offside with even her own fellow democrats.
Anti semitic to oppose Israel murdering Semites in Gaza?
That is screwed up even for you, Shadrack..
If she was simply expressing a concern about Israel responding to Palestinian terrorism, I wouldn’t call her on it. But ‘Benjamins Baby’ type comments are a different league.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/we-already-know-ilhan-omar-is-an-anti-semite-the-question-is-do-democrats-care
You do know that Israel has been terrorizing Palestinians, since Israel’s beginnings.
Which Palestinians? Jewish Palestinians? Samaritan Palestinians? Arab Palestinians? And since when? Since the Arab invasion of modern Israel hours after it was formed? Or for the thousands of years of Jewish rule back to the twin kingdoms?
You mean when the Israeli’s drove out the Palestinian inhabitants at gun point. Those they didn’t bomb or shoot, around the formation of Israel.
Then got all precious, and poor me, when they fought back.
Oh so you’re talking about the legal establishment of modern Israel in 1948? The one immediately followed by an invasion by Israel’s Arab neighbours?
When the Haganah and Stern gang and later the Israeli army engaged in terrorism. Yes.
You must be reading your history back to front.
So. If in New Zealand we drove Maori into Northland, walled them off, and bombed them at intervals, that would be fine.
Because “God told us we owned the land”. FFS.
In the aftermath of a world incident massacre in New Zealand, the shill media is peddling some good ole eugenics connotative ”news”, isn’t that strange.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/111458974/federated-farmers-marlborough-president-slams-tax-reform-as-funds-for-the-useless
Corporate socialism will have you off your farm in due time too, old boy.
Yeah, it is amusing how upset they still seem to be at not being held in higher regard than other forms of life…
… they seem to have not noticed that the agricultural revolution ended some ten thousand years ago….
talk about not moving with the times
Hey, are you still supporting NZF? I noticed Garner & Richardson this morning opining that Winston was past it & ought to retire due to wimping out of presenting our nation strongly to the Turkish leader & people. What do you think of that?
What was Drunken Garner’s reasoning franky?
I googled to discover that. You can too. Found a media report to that effect. Presumed they were bouncing off it.
No citations franky?
It seems that Winston should have said something like at the bilateral.
We were unhappy with the original use of the live stream video, but would like to ask that you not us it again.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/christchurch-shooting/111512016/while-winston-was-sleeping-jacinda-delivers-a-masterclass
Horeskin stirring up shit again in the MSM Fish & Chup Wrapper NZ Herald again this morning ?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12215871
When are we going to see the end of this irritating little piece of shite ?
When we demand accountability from shit stirrers like him.
Hey are you still coming here and starting fights Frank?
“HE said this about YOU, what do YOU think about THAT?”
Then, challenged, a diatribe about seeking the truth, being the mediative aspect, and then the victim card. Starting with smilies.
I am obviously picking on you for no reason. Aye.
Now that the Mueller report has found not enough evidence for a conspiracy between Donald Trump and the Russian government, we can get on with sifting through the best candidate to beat him on his performance, and on Democratic policies.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/24/breaking-news-barr-to-release-summary-of-mueller-report-1233771
“The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities,” the special counsel wrote in his findings.
As expected by me. Leftist hallucinations will need to focus on the Maduro justification program now. Falsifications of history just don’t seem to be working.
Plenty of investigating to come franky. Your boy’s not in the clear yet.
Disingenuous, Gabby. I lost count of my criticisms of Trump here long ago. Honesty is the best policy. Give it a go!
If you really believe honesty is the best policy, how can you have any time for Trump?
Was that a two for one post dennis ? …. you should have stuck to just Trump …. then you wouldn’t be bullshitting with your left stereotypes.
So Ilhan Omar was spouting ” Leftist hallucinations ” about war criminal Eliot Abrams ….. who while in the Reagan Govt played a crucial role in propping up murderous south American dictators …. as well as the Contra death squads in Nicaragua…..
Abrams also helped perpetrate the cover up of the El Mozote massacre … where even the children were killed and raped
Evil History you dennis never refer to …. when spouting Trump /Abrams made in the usa bullshit about ” Leftist ” Venezuela ………
Tell us all Dennis …… is Maduro as evil as Trump /Abrams…….. and past usa south American policy ….since forever
Or is that fantasy crap … spouted by a anti Semite back Muslim Somalian refugee woman not fit to live in the usa.
Your always rooting for the good guys …. eh dennis ??????
“USAID had trained over 100,000 of Brazil’s police in the dark arts of rule-by-terror; another 600 Brazilian police were brought to the US for special USAID training in explosives and interrogation techniques.
Brazil’s military dictatorship murdered or disappeared hundreds of dissidents, and tortured and jailed thousands more. Among those tortured: a Marxist student named Dilma Rousseff, arrested in 1970 and subjected to beatings to her face that distorted her dental ridge, and electrical shocks from car batteries, resulting in the hemorrhaging of her uterus. Today, Rousseff is Brazil’s president — and she’s not too happy about the NSA tapping her phones.”
Mitrione taught local police specialized forms of electroshock torture, introducing wires so thin they could fit between the teeth and gums. He also demonstrated drugs that induced violent vomiting fits, and advised on psychological tortures, such as playing tapes of a woman and child screaming in a room next to the interrogation room, and telling the detainee those are his wife and child. And it was all done under the aegis of USAID.”
“According to Victoria Sanford’s “Buried Secrets: Truth and Human Rights in Guatemala,” USAID programs supported the death squads as they carried out the genocide:”
etc etc
See if you can be more honest than Gosman Dennis …..
What would happen to the NZ economy if we were labeled a hostile state to the usa …and received the sanctions / cut of from international finance treatment …. that the usa has been giving Venezuela …. since Chavez kept winning all those elections …. after the failed usa backed coup to remove him.
Are you denying such actions against us ……would 100% make our economy shit itself and die ???
Try and be more honest than Gosman or wayne mapp now ……………….
Is whataboutism really such a thrilling experience? You think blog commentators don’t routinely ignore straw men? Wise up. Some of us were alienated from supporting US foreign policy long before you were in nappies – exactly for those reasons you listed.
If nobody was warning us about the stuff you compiled, I’d be doing it. I’ve moved on. Now I prefer to focus on leftist evil-doers because many leftists are in denial of that. Someone has to blow the whistle. I agree the Trump regime is bad news. Hilary would have been worse – most politically aware commentators know that now.
My personal stance on the prospect of yank invasion of Venezuela is that it has no moral basis, therefore I oppose it. However, there’s a tipping point that applies: if the other countries in the region agree to support it, the notion acquires some validity. Not enough for me to support it, but enough to get me neutral. If the targeted killing of the Venezuelan people by the Maduro regime escalates to the tipping point, I will join others in support of the victims.
My personal stance on the prospect of yank invasion of Venezuela is that it has no moral basis, therefore I oppose it. However, there’s a tipping point that applies:
“However”… is a fancy way of saying ….’ but’ … dennis
But is the word you use when you are being insincere
I apologize BUT
I didn’t mean to hit you honey … But
And from me …. I would believe you dennis … But you keep repeating usa propaganda….. ie” the victims of Maduro”
Instead of talking about coup justifying tipping points …. why didn’t you just admit you thought Abrams may not be as evil as Maduro.
As part of your ongoing coup justification and leftist slandering program.
No ifs or buts about it … imo your a bullshitting weasel dennis ….no better than gosman or wayne mapp.
whatabout that dennis gosman 🙂
Sticks & stones… Abrams=evil. An equation big in my mind mid-’80s. No you won’t be getting any US propaganda from me, twerp. Make your own.
who believes this apart from you dennis gosman
“If nobody was warning us about the stuff you compiled, I’d be doing it. I’ve moved on. Now I prefer to focus on leftist evil-doers”
The first bits bullshit ….” I’d be doing it” ….
And you admit to being one eyed in your ” focus on leftist evil-doers”
To which I’d add unbalanced, biased, spreader of Trump / Abrams dishonest rhetoric …. have you ever mentioned the Venezuelan victims of the usa actions in Venezuela ??? … or just those of Maduro.
I seem to recall you as an Islamophobe in the Wayne mapp mold …. could you direct me to anything positive you have ever said about Muslims / Afghanistan people / Libya etc.
I’ll apologize if I am wrong …..
otherwise your just a fancy dennis gosman
Who is Maduro killing?
No one.
If he was really a ruthless dictator, do you think Guido, and the right wing thugs behind him, who have already attempted an armed coup, would still be alive.
Hell, most of them haven’t even been arrested.
Even the accusation of blowing up food trucks turned out to be fake news. Though I wouldn’t have blamed his supporters, given the US history of aid, with guns in it.
I like Mayor Pete. I like him a lot. But it seems every democrat and their dog wants to be king. Still, the field will narrow.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/why-some-democrats-say-don-t-sleep-mayor-pete-buttigieg-n985906
frankly i prefer a range of people running – knowing that many will peter out soon enough, compared to the RNC who literally is advocating for no one to run but the orange colored vulgarian.
Mr. Pete Buttigieg is a long shot, but if he can change the discourse – as a vet, a mid westerner, white working class male, as a man living in a same sex marriage etc then i can’t see the issue with that.
The more people – all of us – see men like Pete Buttigieg, the more it becomes normal. The same can be said of women running for president. Or men and women of color.
i think it is good, and i can’t see how a dog can do more damage then the orange colored vulgarian. I mean some carpets might suffer, some furniture might suffer, but people?
My preference is premature to be honest there’s a lot of people I’ve only looked at a few and even then I don’t really know anything. but I got a feeling about Pete, he seems like the real deal.
they have a few running that i ‘like’, but it is way to early to say too much.
personally i am in the camp of ‘there will be no 2020 election’, but that is just my pessimistic inner german.
“there will be no 2020 election”
Yeah I’ve smelt that foul wind too.
we can get on with sifting through the best candidate to beat him on his performance, and on Democratic policies.
That would be nice but what do you reckon are the chances?
Trump’s chances are still not too bad.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/trump-approval-ratings/
Beating Trump is going to take a white guy with a name starting with B.
Beto? But strictly speaking, that name starts with an R.
Buttigieg? 😀
Nah, not his time yet. Bullock or Bennet or de Blasio? Or maybe Bloomberg or Brown will have a change of heart and jump back in it.
The establishment won’t let a guy like B be the Democratic Candidate ?
Well that’s good, only two years wasted on 2016 was all Russia’s fault lol
Good article
“We will continue to fight for this, for the safety of our children, for the safety of our lands, for the safety of our Muslim whānau, and all communities of colour.”
https://thenonplasticmaori.wordpress.com/2019/03/19/what-does-a-just-safe-aotearoa-look-like/
One of the things that can help bring us all together is appreciating each others’ culture and that may start with the music – perhaps Womad is a good example.
Here is a link from a Japanese man brought up in NZ and he learned the Maori song E Papa which he finds soothing for his baby. His wife asked him to write down the words and he has in Japanese Katakana. Singing E Papa has made him think of certain similarities in the languages.
http://www.hikosaemon.com/2010/02/new-zealand-maori-folk-songs-as.html
Here is a link about E Papa and shows how it would be performed for a public display, clever and everyone enjoying themselves.
http://folksong.org.nz/epapa/
Thanks grey was lovely to listen to that waiata again, been ages since I heard or sang it. Womad is awesome and yes a great model. Haven’t been myself but lots of friends go.
I’m pleased that you like it. Now I have had another thought. I have just seen Alan Duff’s book 50 Maori Heroes. Have you seen this? It was one of Duffs Books in Homes series. Would it be helpful for work you are doing to have this to show young people but particularly Maori, what others have done with their natural talents and skills as a reminder that they have their own abilities?
Shame MSM consistently trash Maori’s ?
Shame that you had to tack that on to my comment which was meant to be in the positive patch. We don’t need to have something negative tacked on to everything we discuss. There are more negative things in the present than positive. Let’s try to build on positive steps to a better
future.
LOL
Reading this, I wondered why I had never heard of Rangiaowhia – then thought, maybe I have, and dismissed it as not true as it destroys the illusion of our ‘civil society.’
The bubble is convenient to live in, it has moonbeams and lambs (for export).
“Rangiaowhia for example, where u the crown attacked an unarmed village full of women, children & elderly – the men were away (& the crown knew this)… you burned their homes so they fled to shelter in Saint Paul’s, a church of a religion u taught us. As we/they huddled in the church – no doubt praying, u the crown nailed the door shut and set the building on fire. While it burned full of people, u the crown stood outside & shot any1 who tried to evacuate, some of them were on fire – don’t fucking say “it’s unprecedented”. For our combined benefit please learn our/your history so we feel included.”
…..and don’t even discuss what the Crown troops did to Tuhoe, Whitmore and Co were barbaric.
To expand on vto’s comment @2 about this prat:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/111458974/federated-farmers-marlborough-president-slams-tax-reform-as-funds-for-the-useless
For obvious reasons the discourse around hate in NZ society is focused on racism, and to a degree religion. But let’s also not forget about the other forms of hate that have been actively encouraged in our country over the last 30 years (note the timing) as part of the great divide and conquer campaign mostly by political interests, and with the full support of mainstream media.
*Beneficiary bashing. Especially popular with right ring politicians when they need to distract the populus from some scandal. The rest of the time, any means possible to turn anyone working against anyone who needs benefit assistance for whatever reason. Thankfully we haven’t quite reached the extreme situation as in the UK where the tabloid press created an atmosphere of disability related hate crimes based on the idea that “all disabled are bludgers”. Readesr here are well aware of the consequences of bashing in the NZ context, and it has contributed to suicides.
* Hate landlords/hate tenants. This has been one the medias been having fun with for the last few years since the housing crisis really took hold. Lets keep finding examples of extreme situations and publishing them, then open the comments sections. Improve standards for rentals? Play the property investors off against struggling tenants. Play the struggling tenants off against the slumlords. be unable to report the actual situation without resorting to hyperbole. Scare a lot of people in the meantime.
*Class warfare. Encourage each tax/wage bracket to resent the next one either above or below them because they either get more money that they do, or pay less tax. And in the case of minimum wage workers, get them to hate beneficiaries for getting well paid to live a cushy life while you’re slugging your guts out and still can’t pay the bills.
All of the above is hate. We’re probably all guilty of one of these at some point, and probably because of a reaction to something we read online, or heard in the media. Are people likely to get physically hurt over it? Well they have, as I’ve said in example one. Words can be lethal when you’re exposed to them often enough.
We’ve let ourselves become victims of this political divide and rule game, probably without realising. So now that at least some of us have clicked on, while we can do our best not to participate in the game, how do we stop it altogether? Politicians here are going to be bloody careful from now on talking about topics like immigration. But it’s only a matter of time before they start reverting to type with encouraging this type of hate.
+1000
and we need to start talking about us and how we get manipulated in ‘hating’ the other.
I am less worried abut the politicians (we view them through the lens of Party Manifesto which generally are public) then i am about talk radio, certain opinion writers that seem to be given a rather large mega phone when bashing certain groups and then go silent when shit hits the fan (how many editorial did Hoskins write last week?) , and the training of our police and security forces that seem also to be a one way street only myopic look upon the world.
thank you for saying so much better what i would like to say.
‘Manipulated’- that’s the word I was after, thank you Sabine 🙂 And I totally agree about the media opinion- or should that be ‘clickbait’- writers. It may have been politicians who initially lit the flame but the media can take the blame for the spreading.
I’ve just noticed something interesting on Stuff on my laptop- the up/down votes have been removed in the comments section. Cant see on my phone because an update won’t let me open comments at all (probably not a bad thing!). Anyone else notice this? If so, maybe this is a very small silver lining from recent events, Stuff finally getting the message on that particular issue.
Excellent post and observations Kat
Most NZers do not bear witness to what is happening to our society…. and our media generally misinforms us.
Bearing pressure to reverse the wrongs and injustices is the next challenge.
It would be a great tribute to those murdered in christchurch if they were the lightning rod for a surge of inspiration …. giving traction and momentum …. in our quest to regain our humanity ….
A kind of reverse shock doctrine …. where our terrorist mass murders disaster, is used for good……
Putting us firmly on the path to roll back the wrongs legislated for by our bad politicians. …. who pandered to and encouraged hate, racism, greed, war, exploitation and other injustices in our society.
The alternative is we continue our race to the bottom.
Sorry I didn’t pick up on my typo of your name Kay …. my apologies.
I’ve had posting overload today … hopefully my links say things better than me … are half on topic ….. and helpful to some.
Kay
Your comment has a lot of stuff in to deeply think about. Really good points. Has anyone noticed that the negativism/divide between different POV has deepened in the last week or so? I am feeling sad about that, as well as the shooting tragedy.
It’s a double tragedy when people start carping at each other and reaching for the sneering and deriding lever as an automatic reaction.
Grey, can’t say I’ve noticed that sort of thing, but very sad if you’ve experienced it. If anything, in my area I’ve noticed more people smiling at strangers in the street and in the supermarkets than usual. What have you noticed in particular?
I’m referring to what I have noticed on this blog and on another as well.
In the street I think people generally are wanting to create a friendly and connected-community approach.
Me using bad language and having zero tolerance for proliferation of terrorist materials and ideas.
Also, me using bad language after politely asking people not to micromanage me and others.
Also. Me.
I am proud to have stood up to these mealy mouthed types, (GWS is not a creep is a good person who only means well). I hate fighting but I will not lie down and play doormat. I am also quite open to apologizing for MY part.
I feel I owe you an apology as your intentions are good, despite your annoying the hell out of me constantly picking at my and others language. This detracts from their messages and makes it about your feelings. That’s what angers me, trying to discuss terrorism and you are upset I said f***.
Recall that I also asked politely before that for you to leave me alone. I am not the names you’ve called me.
GWS I’m sorry I cussed you out. If you can refrain from being pedantic about my language I will refrain from directing it at you.
Sorry WtB I wasn’t even thinking of you. You try to think your way through the problems as so many do here.
There are many though with nothing but short, nasty little jabs to the body and mind and who seem to have nothing but negativity and hostility whatever is suggested towards finding an answer. The suggestion of a better approach, reaching for a positive path even if it involves seeing some fault that then needs thought-work. Instead they would have us wallow in unhappiness and fix blame on somebody, and focus on that. Positivity as to ways we can do better is needed, the trolls way means we won’t find a way out to higher ground.
It’s hard to take other’s aggressive jabs without feeling insulted when you’ve campaigned for calm, reason and peace this whole time huh. I hear you, I’m sorry you’ve been exposed to too much crap, and my part must be owned if I am to improve.
There are certainly many trolls and I struggle not to rise to them. It is my estimate, judging by how most of them argue online (regurgitate foul memes and exit) that most are kids directed by nasty adults.
Kids sense of humor can be largely ‘unrefined’, to put it mildly. But do they learn it from their elders? It carries on to adulthood e.g.
When you go to raw (wannabe comics) nights in comedy clubs there’s lots of really dumb stuff adult people (on stage, and a small part of adult audiences) think is funny. Racism, sexism, etc. The new comic often thinks a joke is a punching down as practised at school. Some people come out of the gates ready for stardom (nuanced idiocy), but that is rare – See Rhys Matthewson.
The comedian trolls their audience, but (one would hope) not with spite.
Internet trolling is schoolyard level wit with evil adult supervision. Those who know what they’re doing, and their gullible cling-ons.
There’s also a lot of pain that has simmered beneath the surface for a long time for a lot of people. And it is coming out sideways. I’ve barely kept it together. The voluntary work and assistance of others the past few days has brought me back to Earth – that place I love. It is difficult to describe how being minimised or the brunt of ‘jokes’ your whole life feels, much easier to throw a finger in the air, and stamp feet loudly.
Absolutely justified and understood. Uncomfortable, yes.
I’m very relieved we’re able to extend olive branches here, it weighed heavily on me that we’d fallen out.
Peace and love.
Return – Love and Peace.
Excellent post thanks.
I would add to the list of person’s who are consistently minimized or denigrated:
Those with any form of disability be it physical, developmental, neurological or other.
With you there WTB. This one still amazes me, given the well known statistic of 1 in 5 (or is it 4) NZers live with some type of disability. Everyone in this country knows someone with something and they’d be lying if they said otherwise. One would think on this occasion our village size would offer more compassion- it’s not like the bad old days where anyone with an obvious disability was locked away out of sight; mainstreaming is commonplace at most schools so children now grow up knowing that there is variety to the human spectrum, although their parents didn’t so much- there was a tiny bit of mainstreaming just starting at my high school mid-1980s.
Yet, there are those in our society who for whatever warped ideological idea think that we’re a drain on society (sound familiar?) just because a little extra help/adjustment is needed to participate in society, or a benefit is needed because working is impossible. And they’ve somehow learned to ‘hate’ the fact their hard earned taxes are propping up non-economic units. Not that those words will ever be used specifically, but they’re there when you read between the lines.
Governments fall over themselves to say there will always be some people who do need benefits (ie severely ill/disabled) and they they have no problem with that, so their supporters think they’re only going to attack solo mums and those feckless unemployed, not realising welfare ‘reforms’ have made life even worse for disabled. But the supporters have been so well trained to hate on beneficiaries it makes no difference to them. As I mentioned in my original post, I’m just extremely relieved that disabled here haven’t been experiencing the vicious physical and other abuse (now classed as hate crimes) as is happening in the UK. One hopes we are better than that, but also have to call out anyone on this .
You missed the hate towards all farmers from vegans and segments of the left.
Go back to the standard archives for 6 months leading up to the last election if you doubt me.
Valid point. I prefer to attack their (destructive) methods unless they arrive here and get personal then I’ll have at em. Sometimes I go over the top and say stuff that isn’t fair.
I’m also an avid cheerleader when they get it right. I want to help Farmers in the inevitable transition coming.
Some do love to hate em for the sole reason they’re ‘Dairy’ though. 😀
A world without cheese, would it be worth living in?
a world without cheese?….no
If it’s a choice between frying the planet and me giving up cheese, well, sorry planet. It’s not even close.
But I’d be quite happy for the cheese to be made from from an engineered mix of proteins, fats, sugars etc produced in vats by engineered microbes, rather than what’s squeezed from cows immediately downhill from their sewage outfalls.
well youre in luck…you dont need to choose….cheese is not the leading cause of CC
bwaghorn
Do you think that farmers are that vulnerable that they feel they are helpless and disabled? It doesn’t seem an equivalence comparing farmers problems, most brought about by themselves, to those who have congenital problems, or drug problems – there could be some farmers disabled from alcohol I suppose.
I know it causes deterioration and booze and rural males have gone together for a long while.
You been down south ? They pretty inbred down there. !!!
But seriously you seem to be fine with hating on people as long as they are fortunate enough to be wealthy . ?
Even Paula Benefit got on the benefit bashing band wagon ?
It took about 5 minutes, before unthinking stereotyping of the mentally Ill started.
With those doing it seemingly blissfully unaware of their repetition of bias.
“Othering” is used to hide or justify cruelty all the time. It is habitual with Politicians, and their useful idiot mouthpieces, normalising policies which harm many people.
The repeated falsehoods about those on welfare, for one.
Reading the room 😀
Hold my grenade, I’m goin’ in…
I think Catherine Tate is masterful at taking the mickey out of racism
I bet this guy would the first to complain about not getting a handout when something goes wrong within his industry aka M Boivs or a outbreak of foot and mouth when farmers haven’t or couldn’t comply with the law or complain about reduced public funding services like education, health, MPI, Trade or the lack of Police action over cattle/ sheep rustling etc.
Horeskin stirring up shit again in the MSM Fish & Chup Wrapper NZ Herald again this morning ?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12215871
When are we going to see the end of this irritating little piece of shite ?
when we admit that he is a shit stirrer that should be removed from his bullhorn and actually demand it, rather then fight among us.
until then, the divide and conquer strategies works as intended.
I’m waiting for him to walk too close to a naked flame with all that hair product in.
A product of Linwood High School and Christchurch explains it all, no questions asked ?
How much profit does NZ actually get from tourism, when we have so many tourists that actually spoil the attractive aspects of the country, damage it and move on while we have to restore it, cause congestion and difficulties in remote parts of the country (man died after vehicle fell to the left while trying to make way for a large van on narrow rough road). Now quad bike riders needing aid. People have to turn their lives inside out to rescue these people.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/385481/quad-bike-deaths-tour-group-did-not-have-permission-to-be-on-land-owner
And this is on top of a heavy cost rescuing sports and outdoor enthusiasts who fail
to cope with the conditions; have accidents in remote places and find that they aren’t the all purpose supermen they thought they were. And then they need medical care.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nelson-mail/news/111503965/nelson-marlborough-rescue-helicopter-crew-has-busy-morning
(Four callouts kept the Nelson Marlborough Rescue Helicopter in the air on Saturday. A 45 year old man on a motorbike, another up a mountain had a
medical event, two more motorbike riders from the same area as the first.)
Perhaps user pays needs to be brought in for such situations. Those that can afford to bikes and play in the backblocks can pay for the facilities from the Nanny State, when it shows how necessary it is for them to have a Nanny State that cares and serves the people. New slogan for tax – Play and pay. Then we might have more money for providing better standards for the low income, and maintain the services we need for all such as hospitals.
And we need to respond with intelligence to the obvious – we have too many tourists. The people of this country need to take it back into their own hands again and not keep voting in a government that doesn’t care about anything except high house prices. No wonder Labour Coalition is struggling to get stuff done.
For so long previous governments have bent over backwards to advance some, and diminish others, and the people who convince themselves we are doing well haven’t looked at the immoral way that appearance has been achieved , and the economically dangerous cost yet to present its final bill. But blame Labour, don’t think about details. Easy-peasy go-for of the fashionable scapegoat from people who believe in magic, with the mindset of Carroll’s mad White Queen who could believe in six impossible things before breakfast and who also is in a time-warp – ‘The White Queen lives backwards in time’.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Queen_(Through_the_Looking-Glass)
I guess it would another impossible thing for responsible people around government to understand arithmetic when it comes to tax and our complete economy; The different branches of Arithmetic — Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision. Alice in Wonderland.
and in other sad news, two kids that survived the Parkland School shootings last year
have committed suicide in the last few days.
just sad. so fucking sad.
https://splinternews.com/another-parkland-survivor-takes-his-own-life-1833526348
“911 happened, and overnight, everything changed. I went from being friends with almost everybody, to friends with almost no one”
Local comedian Pax Assadi, NZ Comedy Gala 2016.
911 served it’s purpose for US & Isreali intentions in the Middle East it was well choreographed ?
This is a nice bright song – Love Will Keep Us Together. Feels positive.
Captain and Tennille
Sickens me where our society has gone here in NZ, we have no empathy for our own people as we are all chasing the almighty $.
Trashing the environment our harbours, our beaches etc
Wellington Bus services – oh dear. Rates City and Regional – oh dear, dearer, dearest?
Scoop – http://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=117243
It’s been a bad week for the Regional Council. (The one that refers to itself as “Greater Wellington.”) It had to deal with scores of unplanned bus cancellations, and there was derision at its request to be told what’s wrong with its bus services. Then came its announcement that it was increasing the rates by 6.5 per cent, which was quickly followed by the discovery of something it had chosen not to mention: for Wellington city the increase was to be much more than that.
Much much more. If you had the time and the patience to read the 144 page agenda for this week’s meeting, you discovered a table which revealed that the rates increases in Wellington were planned to be more than 16 per cent.
Hard to reconcile that proposal with the later statement from chair Chris Laidlaw who said “It’s been our consistent position that we must minimise the impact of rates on regional ratepayers.” Perhaps he overlooked the 16 per cent in the 144 pages of information.
Got to cover the CEO’s wages somehow ratepayers are just like cows ready to be milked IMHO ?
From the people who brought you the Wgtn bus fiasco… we have the latest Wellington thrill ride! Bus routes 31 and 36.
Personally I can’t wait to shit myself as we hurtle through the Haitaitai tunnel in a Double Decker within centimeters of the tunnel wall. We can amuse ourselves further by making bets about whether or not we come out the other end unscathed.
Testing had been going on since before Christmas. He confirmed a double-decker “grazed” the tunnel side in testing.
A range of safety features such as red cat’s eye and bollards had been installed to help the drivers stay on the correct line through the tunnel.
“There’s definitely margin for error. We wouldn’t be employing buses that weren’t safe,” he said.
That margin of error was 37cm at the tightest point but it opened out to 41cm he said.
But Tramways Union secretary Kevin O’Sullivan said that, from the top corners of the bus to the edge of the tunnel, there was just 30cm of clearance.
Nick Focas, who lives in Pirie St, near the Mount Victoria end of the tunnel, had seen one of the trial double-deckers going through.
“It looked really tight,” he said.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/111509819/wellington-doubledeckers-to-start-using-hataitai-bus-tunnel
Good News Time
Feasibility Study concludes Sustainable Agriculture can feed Europe.
Why is this good news – climate change. We don’t want to stop the planet overheating us just to starve… Diets will move to more plant based consumption, but not wholly vegetarian.
It’s a large document so here’s a few sound bites.
“The idea of an entirely agroecological Europe is often considered unrealistic in terms of food security because agroecology sometimes means lower yields. But this new research shows that by refocusing diets around plant-based proteins and pasture-fed livestock, a fully agroecological Europe is possible.”
“Pesticide-hungry intensive production is not the only way to feed a growing population. This study shows that agroecological and organic farming can feed Europe a healthy diet, while responding to climate change, phasing out pesticides, and maintaining vital biodiversity.”
“This is the first component of a foresight exercise that will successively deal with the socioeconomic challenges and the policy levers for an agro-ecological transition.”
Europe is around 500 million people, so this is a big deal. Here’s hoping they take notice.
Here’s the report.
https://www.iddri.org/sites/default/files/PDF/Publications/Catalogue%20Iddri/Etude/201809-ST0918EN-tyfa.pdf
Great.
Assuming Europe feels no moral obligation to be producing a surplus for the benefit of food poor regions, I guess it is good news.
I’m getting this strong feeling that you are trying your hardest to duck that debate I challenge you to the other day, was looking forward to it. Any time you want to get off these low tier assumptions and challenge your self I would be more than willing to accomodate your needs. Just say my name and I’ll sharpen my pencil while you chit chat.
I don’t see the purpose of this blog as a playground for the bored or hungry intellect…As times get harder and quality input becomes more valuable the jaunty jester will be a disadvantage,
Well I think gobbys attitude is questionable and your one word answer is laughable. Do you even realize European farmers receive 40c-60c in the dollar from the government, mess with that and European agriculture stops being a thing. I’d love to see you try and get that past Brussels mr funny man.
Hi Sam. Just browsing. Are you challenging someone to a debate and prefacing that by renaming them in a demeaning manner?
Just askin’.
Funny you’d ask. I’d assumed the more hetro normative guys would have turned and run at the thought of packing me with all the meat, nice of you to inquire though. You’d be surprised how much meat I can handle, more than willing to come back for more.
Really? You were surprised to be asked? It was a pretty obvious question, begging to be asked, I thought. And it remains unanswered, at least so far as I can discern. Why the demeaning name-calling, I ask a second time?
Yeah well, no homo of course. Gobby interested me when she started leaving these strange comments underneath mine so I inquired a bit to see if there was some logic or reason behind her little quibbles and she didn’t want to give it up so I challenged her to a debate and she hasn’t replied back since. Been ducking me ever since and Iv lost all respect for the thing and I’m not about to second guess myself.
Handle all the meat you like sambimbo and if you do it in private nobody will bother. But if you go round in public waving your floppy meat in people’s faces I’m saying OI! SAMBIMBO! NAO! That might pass muster in the gents at the young nats xmas disco, but it won’t fly around here.
I’m more of a pay a teppanyaki chef to cook it up for me kind of guy. What I was implying is that I’m unafraid to debate controversial topics. That you could make that about young nays and Christmas disco proves how ideologically driven you are.
I can say more with one word than you can with lots of puff. If you have a point about European farmers and subsidies or whatever say so.
Instead you have to wrap it up in a mud pie to throw at someone. Kids have kinder toys that they break open to get at the contents. We grown ups shouldn’t have to search yours to get the gist, not your attempt at tantalisation. That’s your weakness. Mine is fitting the situation to a song which you can listen to if you choose.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WO23WBji_Z0
Apparently people like you and gobby misunderstand what I say or mean and here you are again advancing more retarded arguments after getting stomped last time.
So you want to @me about a topic you feel strong on, pfft, that’s fine, nig I was born hungry. I’ll come to your place, I’ll slap you, it ain’t nothing.
So I’m going to start at just after WW1 so 1919-1939 the price of food droped to all most nothing, because during the war farmers, farmed as much land as possable.
This made the price of food go down to nothing, force the farmers to farm even more land, starting a vitious cycle. Many farms could not keep up and went under, this contined until they’d farmed the land so completly that not even grass would grow. So eventally their were great areas of Europe covered with dead dirt fields.
So now the European Union has to burn approx. 25 – 40% of its surplus agricultural produce a year (differing between different areas). That is because they have nothing to do it with. The burning of surplus is part of the plan to keep the prices high as to prevent another Dust Bowl cyle of price fall, heavy farming and then great amounts of dead over farmed land, wich would fuel another Dust Bowl.
So, would you like another slap or are you fine with this one. I have to do it like this by putting the nuts and bolts in the middle because the regulars around here and especially authors and super moderators are especially insecure and emotional when ever I point out well hey look, this this and this is wrong for this this and this reason, perhaps you might want to correct yourself and then it all comes out, it’s all but what about muh feelings and reasons. So if you want another slap then @me I’d be happy to explain more to you.
I’d be too embarrassed/cowardly to simply demand/suggest that another commenter here “concede” – not on a blog. And certainly not in real life. But I concede that might just be me.
So you’d like to start a little deviation to prove how virtuous and reserved you are. I mean fine, what ever floats your boat. That you start out by repeating what I said before and listed it nicely and all is really nice, I guess. All though deviating from my point that Brussels is so large and slow to react is like death to utopian dreamers imagining some European permaculture utopia. I mean no one has to try that hard to show how stupid that is so I guess it’s understandable why you’re starting out the way you did.
Being ‘nice’, or losing an argument, can indeed be quite rewarding, but I concede it’s not everyone’s cup of tea.
Yeah, I take conssesions. Normies who can’t handle an argument directly is no way to objectively access whether one argument is stronger than another. That’s why I take conssesions when people try and weasel there way out of making false claims or statements or are just being ideologicalay driven. If you want to lose to that well that’s just a stupid strategy. The sign of a true master is when the student surpasses the master, that’s not losing at all, being magnanimous in defeat is great mentoring, not losing. If you want a right of reply to promote the virtues of losing by all means, fill ya boats.
Quit stalling sambimbo, jus debate me, watchoo scared of?
Been waiting for you to pick a topic and starting point for days but you keep on acting dumb about it. I just want to take you on at your overwhelming best but you seem to be a bit shy it. Like I said. So choose your strongest subject. I don’t want any excuses like oh, I didn’t research enough. I just want to debate really strong talkers.
Why you being so evasive sambimbo? Come ON. Research is for high school babies. You forgotten that explaining is losing? Put your money where your meat is.
Fine. So you want to replace the language of explaining with the language of training for different principles and for different goals and you began that by asking me to acknowledge your presence and you’d talk about a kind of soft vigilance that’s conducive to a particular insight that you discuss. This kind of involvement is indicative to and being deeply interested in the structural functional organisation of something and not that that’s taking you into paying attention. And all the while remembering to get the correct tuning and optimization, for awhile now I’v been talking about attention and my argument is attention is not very well served by your spotlight metaphors. While attention to your spotlight metaphors does give attention to alternate salience your metaphors misses a lot of what attention is doing.
So I began by investigating what attentions you are missing with the idea that attention isn’t a direct action you do to being physically alert to threats, it’s something you do to modify something else. That’s why you can successfully pay attention to something else by saying many desperate and different kinds of things, you can pay attention by optimising words into different meanings, and by optimising your hearing into listening, and by optimising your seeing and listening into a coordinated tracking of what some one is saying like what you are doing right now.
All those are different ways of paying attention so what is needed is a different understanding of paying attention that can captures an optimisation strategy and aligns and tunes your ideas about how something might be linked to a response to existential model confusion and the elevation of the suffering there in.
So now that I’v put what in think you’re doing into words I’ll predict that you’re about to restart your premiss, do you agree?
honestly if Europe could produce organically, humanly all the food to feed its own population it would be great.
and in saying that, it would probably help food poor regions as they rather then export what little they grow for cash can actually keep their food for themselves.
a bit like here in NZ where many people actually can’t afford milk, butter, cream, cheese and yet we are a high yield producing dairy country with all the mess that comes with industrial dairy production.
We would need to preserve a trade in food though if only so that poor countries could sell so they could buy needed goods from more developed countries.
this would come naturally i would guess.
i.e. south of europe has a different growing season then mainland Europe and northern Europe.
so the exchange of goods or the trade of goods would manifest naturally as it did all throughout history.
surplus would always get either stored or traded. And if one is clever enough to change raw materials in a finished product……there is ample opportunity for trade.
Gabby. You can’t make that comment without reading the report. And if you read the report you would not be making that comment.
On the whole we’ve produced excess all through my lifetime. It’s not production that’s the problem, it’s (fair) distribution. Many countries grow lots of food while their people go hungry. The food goes on a world cruise, then winds up in a skip bin.
Excess?
What’s the true cost though?
Should Europe be fed?
http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2019/03/germany-must-investigate-us-drone.html
Yemenis in Germany have forced their hand about supporting the USA through intelligence posts? in drone strikes by the USA on their country.
this is excellent.
And i hope that there are enough people in Germany to assure that this comes to light.
i for one would be happy to see the US move out of Germany, they should have left completely in 91.
I asked the other day about DTB but didn’t see if anyone could tell me if he is okay, still around, where?
Still active on twitter so guessing all’s well.
Thanks. I miss his thundering comments full of explanations of capitalistic faults. Which I have thought about and agree with but can’t see how it would be changed. It seemed that some of the peeps here might have been ambushing him.
but then, do we really want to have this conversation?
is it going to be the banned Mueller manifesto ; )
https://www.nowtolove.co.nz/parenting/family/how-to-talk-to-your-children-about-christchurch-mosque-terror-attacks-40823
Dear Folk, my apologies for challenging ye all in these challenging times, may I express my respect and empathy for your perspectives.
Here is my concrete point: What the fake video means, is that this wasn’t a lone-wolf attack. That is all I’m saying.
Officially its a “terror attack”, so guess the police etc are obliged to conceal facts in the name of national security. Like, don’t alarm the people by saying, “attackers where networked with who-knows-what…” Or have I got that wrong?
What I find concerning is global media coverage that has nothing to go on other than that fake video eg. NYTimes. Which all dribbles into either blind assumptions, or at best that BS manifesto.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/world/asia/christchurch-shooting-new-zealand.html
Guess we will never know the truth regarding who did it and why, I’m sure the censorship etc has been world-class. But the public will be happy to hear that that patsy with the buzz-word manifesto was alone responsable, and most of us will get back to our busy lives, full of austerity, in a highly destabilised world, well over-due for a complete financial collapse.
(Hey, the Allah moon-god isn’t bad, but can be a bit “tricky” as they say themselves, from the Quran. Note that the Hindu worship the moon god too, but just as one of many gods. Muhammad didn’t much like the Pagan hindu-type (or Jews, same-stuff). Ya see the moon goes in cycles, more of a passive-creative governance, which does have limits regarding access to spiritual freedoms and full comprehension of spritial-beauty. The Christian sun-god is more of a constant alignment, connecting purely and positively to The Way, The Light and The Truth. Naturally the Christian churches are far from pure, and not automatically more positively creative than the Islamic groups, but that’s the game we live in. Hey, I welcome folk to correct me on detail here, I’m a farmer not a scholar, but the truth is approximately as above (so-below) 🙂
Blessings to All
One of the themes that runs through all fascist ideologies is one of ‘victimhood’.
Sometimes this ‘victimhood’ is based on some real perceived grievance. Sometimes it is based on pure myth. Most times it is a mix of both.
The German nazis played up on the so called ‘Stab in the back’ – the allies taking advantage of the mass democratic anti-war revolt that overthrew the Kaiser, and ended the First World War, to take advantage of the weakened German state to extract crippling reparations, while painting Germany as the main aggressor in that international imperial conflict. Mixed with mythology of a so called suppressed Aryan culture and race.
The same with today’s fascists
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/christchurch-shooting/111415544/the-growing-white-nationalist-group-with-a-harmful-and-violent-ideology
When those with privilege and power start posing themselves as the ‘The Victim’, it is time to worry.
And it is not just New Zealand fascists who play up this theme of ‘victimhoo. It is a notable signature of the Donald Trump political brand.
Not since the nazi era has a more privileged and powerful figure cast himself and his supporters as ‘The Victim’
Some real go-no-where half-truths there Jenny. It would be not less true for me to say “Rhodes and King George where instrumental in getting WW1 rolling”, “WW1 never ended, it just deadlocked and took a 20year timeout for another generation of children to reach fighting age.” I’ve also no real message to my story above, expect perhaps to hint that the only real truth is empathy. Empathy is the Truth.
Indeed.
Not just the German nazis were unhappy with the Armistice, the ruling elites of the other warring powers were also unhappy with Armistice, and would have preferred to continue the slaughter to achieve a definitive victory. What stopped the other warring powers continuing the slaughter, and which forced them to the negotiating table, were the mass mutinies and fraternisation among front line troops, admittedly beginning on the German side, but not exclusively. The greatest fear of the allied powers was that if they continued to prosecute the war, the mass soldier and sailor revolts could spread to the allied forces.
What was needed to continue the war, was an ultra-nationalist movement, that could engender and then exploit a feeling of victimhood.
Which takes me back to my original point; that what is common to all fascists is their exaggerated and mostly false claims of victimhood, by some hated minority, who usually have nothing at all to do with the claimed victimhood of the fascists.