Open mike 29/04/2025

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, April 29th, 2025 - 79 comments
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Open mike is your post.

For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.

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Step up to the mike …

79 comments on “Open mike 29/04/2025 ”

      • Ad 1.1.1
        29 April 2025 at 10:03 am

        Weka

        maybe shift this commentary over to your post.

        Reply
        • weka 1.1.1.1
          29 April 2025 at 10:25 am

          I wish I could. Not technically possible, but I have been thinking about asking Lprent if he can make that tool available. It happens a fair bit that conversations on a topic start on OM before a post goes up for the day.

          Reply
    • Tiger Mountain 1.2
      29 April 2025 at 7:26 am

      Agree, she made a good decision here and hopefully will win the position she is now going for.

      I would add that younger brown women particularly–let alone a Green!– face a hard road in politics.

      Reply
    • Ad 1.3
      29 April 2025 at 8:29 am

      Mayor Whanau and Mayor Hawkins of Dunedin have not been easy experiments for NZs only two liberal urban centres.

      Surviving for a term is a start. But survival isn't enough. Hawkins IMHO delivered a lot quickly and its lasted. But in 1 term it's then the conservative that got the credit.

      Tory Whanau however has been nothing but an embarrassment for the Green Party as a whole let alone Wellington.

      Reply
      • Res Publica 1.3.1
        29 April 2025 at 8:39 am

        I'd be inclined to agree. The Green Party has a real problem with how it selects, shapes, and supports candidates.

        I wrote a submission about it based on my experiences back when I was a member but then was too chicken to publish it.

        Felt too much like a middle-aged Pakeha guy mansplaining politics.

        Reply
        • arkie 1.3.1.1
          29 April 2025 at 8:43 am

          Whanau ran and was elected as an independent. She was not selected by the Green Party before the 2022 race.

          But we never let the opportunity to put the boot in slip by do we chaps

          Reply
          • Res Publica 1.3.1.1.1
            29 April 2025 at 9:00 am

            Be that as it may, but voters don’t read the fine print.

            If you’re publicly a Green, walk like a Green, and quack like a Green, you’re a Green candidate: no matter how many footnotes you (or the party) hastily tack on.

            That said, Tory Whanau’s decision is a sign of her intelligence, integrity, and ability to do basic political math. It reflects her commitment to doing the mahi rather than boosting her ego — and that’s something rare in a politician of any stripe.

            She should be immensely proud of what she’s achieved despite the resistance. And I suspect a pakeha, male mayor would have been given a far easier ride.

            Still, the controversy surrounding her has inevitably damaged the Green brand. And made life a little bit harder for progressives everywhere.

            Reply
            • arkie 1.3.1.1.1.1
              29 April 2025 at 9:19 am

              the controversy surrounding her has inevitably damaged the Green brand.

              Especially if we keep insisting that this is the case. Repeat it over and over and over.

              Reply
              • weka …
                29 April 2025 at 9:57 am

                Whanau aside, the Green Party itself is at a crossroads. Either it pursues growing the party and gaining major influence in government, or it holds to its current principles on social issues: prioritising identity politics, the degree to which they allow personal autonomy in the party over the party's interests, the kinds of MPs it is looking for in selection.

                The latter is a valid position. They can make all sorts of gains as a 10 – 12% party, as history has shown. Even the mistakes they made with the fallout over Turei's speech in 2017 worked, because it shifted the public perception of and narrative about poverty, including in the MSM.

                But they can't do both. The latter precludes them becoming a major force and it also precludes substantial changes in climate action in NZ (we can't rely on Labour for that, so it's really on the Greens).

                To be clear, I'm not saying they should abandon social issues, nor change their fundamental position around relationship and care for people. But the way they are doing it currently isn't the only way, and unfortunately, too many of the hard core greenies are blind to this including in caucus and I expect the exec and very active membership.

                Reply
                • Ad …
                  29 April 2025 at 10:02 am

                  Yes.

                  Similar to the Jim Anderton Progressives in the 1990s. They took massive portfolios, re-built a big chunk of the public service into the MED which then morphed into MBIE, and their delivery institutions like Kiwibank are still going well 20+ years on.

                  My pen has hovered to vote for them before especially with Rod and Shaw, but not currently.

                  Reply
                • SPC …
                  29 April 2025 at 10:26 am

                  First it was no (social democratic/social justice) economic policy – only environmental policy, so they could work with National or Labour (as if National would place the environment before business/capitalism).

                  Now, we have here, a call to have no progressive social policy, identity politics, because DEI culture wars are back again. What then the party policy on Maori issues … .

                  Some white men, those who don't vote Greens will approve.

                  Reply
                  • weka …
                    29 April 2025 at 10:33 am

                    fuck off. I explicitly this because I believe it's possible to do both much better than the Greens are currently.

                    To be clear, I'm not saying they should abandon social issues, nor change their fundamental position around relationship and care for people. But the way they are doing it currently isn't the only way, and unfortunately, too many of the hard core greenies are blind to this including in caucus and I expect the exec and very active membership.

                    Reply
                    • SPC …
                      29 April 2025 at 10:48 am

                      Not moderator language, especially when it could infer a threat.

                      Care to explain about what you mean by this then, as per DEI and social policy.

                      or it holds to its current principles on social issues: prioritising identity politics, the degree to which they allow personal autonomy in the party over the party's interests, the kinds of MPs it is looking for in selection.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 11:37 am

                      moderators and commenters can both say fuck off to other commenters on TS, always have been able to. My comment wasn’t as a moderator, there was no threat implied. If I wanted to make a point as a moderator, I would have.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 11:39 am

                      Care to explain about what you mean by this then, as per DEI and social policy.

                      or it holds to its current principles on social issues: prioritising identity politics, the degree to which they allow personal autonomy in the party over the party’s interests, the kinds of MPs it is looking for in selection.

                      Sure. I named three things:

                      1. prioritising identity politics
                      2. a cultural values position in the party around personal autonomy
                      3. their selection process

                      I will make three comments on those.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 11:50 am

                      Prioritising identity politics.

                      Firstly, DEI is US term, and it’s attached specifically to US politics. I’m talking about identity politics in the NZ political context.

                      I also said that prioritising IP (and the other points) is a valid position, and that many gains can be made as a 10 – 12% party. I’m not arguing against solidarity politics, I firmly believe that it’s necessary in civil society. I also believe that green politics has to include social aspects, because without attending to justice, human societies will be unable to change to protect the environment. And humans are part of nature.

                      I think solidarity politics is the antidote to IP excess, because it centres individuals within a class context, and it allows for a greater variety of human expression than the dictatorial aspects of ultra IP. Again, this is core to green politics, diversity is essential to stability and here I don’t mean ‘DEI’, I mean the ability to work with people we think differently from. That’s the bit about doing it differently in my original comment.

                      Identitarianism is very libertarian, and in its excess it prioritises individuals over the collective, and that’s anti-leftist.

                      IMO the Greens are going down a cul de sac that will keep them in 10/12%. Admittedly partly this is because some of their MPs have gone off on one at the expense of the party, but it’s also because of how the GP handle these issues. I will address that in the next comment.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:02 pm

                      actually I will deal with the next two points in once comment because of how they interrelate.

                      “a cultural values position in the party around personal autonomy
                      their selection process”, and “their selection process”.

                      there’s a long list now of problems with MPs. If we look at the last one as an example, here’s what I understand. It was suggested to Benjamin Doyle by the party that he remove his social media from public. He chose not to. The posts that were used to attack him were obviously going to be a problem for the party, and either the Greens didn’t see it coming, or they decided it was worth it.

                      Doyle has said that he chose to keep them because he won’t hide who he is. Again, valid position, although personally I think any MP who chooses their personal expression over the wellbeing of the party is probably going to end up a liability at some point. But if the Greens want to champion the rights of queer men to have queer culture, they can do that. But it won’t grow the party or enable them in the fight against climate denial.

                      That they allow an MP to make that choice, rather than expecting candidates at selection to tidy up their SM, is what I meant about personal autonomy. The problem is that it sends further messages to the electorate (not the small part of it that that is already on board), around competency. There will be more people than just the FR that are uncomfortable with the idea of Doyle holding portfolios about children when he lacks some basic boundary judgement. His personal expression comes across as more important.

                      I’ve heard a rumour that the Greens are tightening up on their selection process and I really hope it includes not just preventing another Tana, but that they understand the need to stop handing their political opponents ammunition.

                    • gsays []
                      29 April 2025 at 11:48 am

                      I thought weka's language was fairly plain and easy to understand.

                      What I took it to mean was less emphasis on identity politics. Not barking at every car with a culture war bumper sticker on it. Winston's recent interview on rnz for example.

                      There are plenty of other social justice issues to campaign on. Poverty, growing inequality, erosion of workers rights, wages and conditions, meaningful housing reform.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:06 pm

                      tbf, the Greens do good work on those things as well, but unfortunately they don’t get the same kind of publicity as a scandal. My point is more that IP is getting excessive and there is backlash against that (worldwide), and that they could be preventing some of the backlash and getting the MSM in particular interested in the actual work they are doing.

                      But it would be interesting to do an analysis of their MPs, particular the new ones, in light of where their expertise is. My sense at the last election was that environmentalism was a big priority in candidate selection (thankfully). But they’ve lost a lot of MPs, including tragically like with Efeso Collins. I think they are constantly on the backfoot for a number of years, and it will take a lot of work to remedy that (which I think they are doing).

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 12:02 pm

                      You make the assertion that identity politics are prioritised but you have not provided the evidence that this is the case.

                      The Greens are widely ignored and it goes unreported when they discuss other social justice issues.

                      For example:

                      • Govt’s austerity Budget to cause real harm in communities – Chlöe Swarbrick April 29, 2025 9:14 AM
                      • Ban on engineered stone essential to protect workers – Teanau Tuiono MP April 28, 2025 10:54 AM
                      • Greens continue to call for Pacific Visa Waiver -Teanau Tuiono April 11, 2025 11:35 AM
                      • More children going hungry under Coalition govt – Ricardo Menéndez March April 11, 2025 9:55 AM
                      • Ka mate te Pire, ka ora Te Tiriti o Waitangi – Treaty Principles Bill dead, Te Tiriti o Waitangi movement lives on – Marama Davidson April 10, 2025 5:02 PM
                      • Member’s Bill an opportunity for climate action – Julie Anne Genter April 10, 2025 12:53 PM
                      • Greens call for Govt to scrap proposed ECE changes – Benjamin Doyle March 27, 2025 11:07 AM
                      • Greens question Govt commitment to environmental protection with RMA reform – Lan Pham March 24, 2025 5:07 PM
                      • Greens call for compassionate release of Dean Wickliffe – Tamatha Paul March 19, 2025 12:50 PM
                      • Another failed ETS auction, another indictment on the Govt’s climate credibility – Chlöe Swarbrick March 19, 2025 12:19 PM

                      https://www.greens.org.nz/media

                      This list is the latest page of their media releases, which of these do you remember being covered by commentariat or media? Which one of these demonstrates their prioritisation of identity politics?

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:10 pm

                      I think you are missing my point. I’m not making the common argument from non-greenies that the Greens should prioritise other things over IP. I’m saying how they manage IP is a problem.

                      I totally agree that it’s hard for the Greens to get coverage of the work they do, but I think a big part of that is because their time/energy has been taken up with the MP dramas of recent years, as well as things completely out of their control like the death of Collins, and Davidson needing time out for cancer treatment.

                      I made another comment in reply to SPC about IP. A better phrasing might have been ‘how they prioritise IP’.

                    • gsays []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:41 pm

                      Good point.

                      I can only comment on what permeates through to me.

                      Basically that is here (TS), RNZ and Stuff.

                      The last time the Greens popped up on my radar was when Doyle came into the public eye. Which at the heart of it was more an issue of competency. (weka summed it up well).

                      You make a good point about cut through. If only more of the noise, enthusiasm and colour, the Greens can generate were to be visited on other causes…

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 12:24 pm

                      @weka did you read my comment? I asked you to demonstrate how they prioritise identity politics.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:39 pm

                      I gave an example here of how they handled the Doyle selection and later the attack on him

                      https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-29-04-2025/#comment-2032473

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 12:50 pm

                      @gsays

                      If only more of the noise, enthusiasm and colour, the Greens can generate were to be visited on other causes…

                      It is is here that the problem lies, a misattribution of agency.

                      The Greens try to discuss the issues but the noise/enthusiasm/colour is not generated by the party or MPs by choice or planning, but by the media/commentariat. These are often those who are very keen to reinforce the meme that the Greens are captured by identity politics. It's easy to get coverage by focusing on differences in approach or style rather than around the real issues that the Party regularly releases statements and policies.

                      It is my opinion that NZ politics is widely anti-Green as it doesn't want voters to realise the extent to which climate change is already locked in and unavoidable.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 1:08 pm

                      that last point is probably true, don’t know how conscious it is, but I can see that the Greens being a constant reminder of the crisis would be a challenge for many. I think the anti-Green vibe on the left is bigger than that though, some of the working class lefties have long seen the Greens as being agin them. Trotter, Bradbury etc have written a lot of anti-Green rhetoric. This was before the climate crisis was so widely acknowledged.

                      As to the Greens getting good media coverage, I remember a time during the Key government when the MSM gave the Greens a lot of press, as if they were the Opposition. Because the Greens functioned like the Opposition, constantly. The MSM in NZ aren’t so much biased against the left or green, as they are against whoever they perceive as being ripe for pointing the finger at. Can’t really blame the MSM for going after the stories on Gharahman, Tana etc. I think the MSM generally did well on the Doyle story, essentially establishing that the media aren’t illiberal.

                      The question for me then is why are the current Greens not getting cut through? I think there are a number of reasons. The leadership is not as mainstream strong as it was with Norman, Turei, Shaw. The party has lost a lot of time/energy dealing with multiple crises, that must be sucking up their capacity. I really hope an additional reason is that they’re working on the background on big plans like for the green budget announcement next month.

                      But what if the attacks on Doyle had been timed to coincide with that? Doyle can choose to keep his SM as a way of upholding the expression of queer men in society. But Green supporters can’t then complain when the shit hits the fan and that gets more attention than other, arguably more important policy.

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 1:10 pm

                      @weka

                      There will be more people than just the FR that are uncomfortable with the idea of Doyle holding portfolios about children when he lacks some basic boundary judgement. His personal expression comes across as more important.

                      What do you mean here? Because it certainly reads like someone inferring that someone else is a danger to children purely because of their identity, a very dangerous and bigoted thing to infer.

                      You are reacting, without critique, to a dirty politics campaign on a MPs private life that requires not understanding how a multi-photo instagram post works.

                      No party can appeal to everyone so it is unreasonable to expect the Greens to lead on bringing everyone along. We can't even get the coverage of where we are all currently going!

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 3:05 pm

                      I will explain what I mean in a moment, but I’ll start by pointing out that you could have just asked what I meant. Instead you asked and then jumped straight to pointing at me and calling me a bigot. This is exactly what I am talking about when I say that IP ultra is a problem. Pointing out bigotry is useful, assuming bigotry because you haven’t bothered to make sense of someone’s argument or position is a fail, and one that is harming the left massively.

                      I understand now how IG works, I didn’t when the images first surfaced. Like lots of other people. And the lefties were all up on SM mocking people for not understanding. Second example of how the IP approach is a fail. Do you think mocking helps people get on board?

                      I also had a pretty good understanding right from the start (I saw it unfold on twitter in real time) precisely because I’ve been following both the right and the left on these issues. My critiques aren’t hard to find and none of them include calling Doyle a paedophile.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 3:14 pm

                      re this,

                      There will be more people than just the FR that are uncomfortable with the idea of Doyle holding portfolios about children when he lacks some basic boundary judgement. His personal expression comes across as more important.

                      What I saw was Doyle placing his desire to protect queer identity over any child safeguarding issues. Correct me if I’m am wrong, but I didn’t see anyone from the Greens even mention child safeguarding. My reading of that is because it’s now taboo on the left to talk about child abuse from gay or queer men. Which means paedophiles who are part of those communities get a free pass.

                      That you assumed when I used the term child safeguarding I meant something about gays are child abusers, is a consequence of that taboo. Maybe you can’t conceive of any other reasoning in my comment.

                      I don’t believe BD is a paedophile, and the attack on him was one of the worst I’ve seen on SM from the FR. It was a frenzy that conflated hatred of gays with hatred of the Greens. I think it was a mistake for those IG posts to have been visible once BD put his hand up to be a GP candidate. Because anyone who’s been paying attention to what the FR are doing could see this one coming a mile off.

                      That he thinks those posts are ok, never mind the damage to his party is a problem with his judgement. There’s a huge difference between being a private person and an MP. If he doesn’t understand those boundaries, then I question his judgement around boundaries generally.

                      I also think that his child’s picture shouldn’t have been in an album called Bussy Galore, from an account named BibleBeltBussy. Again, this isn’t him being a paedophile, it’s him blurring the lines around child safeguarding. Which may or may not be a problem in his community, but it is in the wider community for someone who is an MP with children related portfolios.

                      We don’t talk about child safeguarding in NZ much, and liberals tend to react in this situation as if it’s a RW bigotry. But most people understand why children need to be safeguarded when it comes down to it. That the liberal left has created a taboo on talking about it is unconscionable.

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 5:13 pm

                      For someone to think this is a child safeguarding issue, one would first have to think that this child is at risk of abuse, by their parent, because of this parent being part of a particular community. Of this particular community you so generously say:

                      this isn’t him being a paedophile, it’s him blurring the lines around child safeguarding. Which may or may not be a problem in his community

                      This is a baseless association with an convenient equivocation, but the inference is that there is something specific about this community that is a danger to children. It's a widely used but tired tactic.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 5:23 pm

                      you are still completely missing the point.

                      The child safeguarding issues are nothigg to do with BD’s child (I see no reason to suspect there are any issues there). Maybe it’s you that’s reacting without thought to FR bullshit, and ignoring what feminists have been saying about child safeguarding for years now. You can only hear this as an attack on BD because of his queerness, despite me saying that’s not what I mean.

                      The issues are around blurring cultural boundaries and protective norms between children, and adult sexuality, and his position as a spokesperson on children’s issues in a political party. ie Associate Education (Māori and Early Childhood). That is an issue for queer culture, but not in the way you are implying. I already named part of it, that the liberal left has made it almost impossible to have a conversation about boundaries in those communities and generally when it comes to anyone outside of hetnormative sexuality.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 5:41 pm

                      because I’m sick of the wilfull ignorance, here’s some extreme examples from the UK and the US.

                      Family friendly Pride events where men in their pup fetish gear interact with children. That’s not ok. Do I need to explain why?

                      https://x.com/againstgrmrs/status/1662086212088131585

                      Another example was rainbow dildo butt monkey,

                      https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/07/13/the-rainbow-dildo-butt-monkey-is-no-laughing-matter/

                      Another example is gender diverse kids performing at adult drag events (ie sexualised shows). eg Desmond is Amazing, child drag star, posing with naked men.

                      https://x.com/fem_mb/status/1631074151413735428

                    • arkie …
                      29 April 2025 at 6:17 pm

                      No I have not, the association you are making is that there may or may not be more danger to children posed by a particular group because of their sexual identity. You have then furnished us with some shock articles but this doesn't show a representative slice of the amount of inappropriate sexual material children are exposed to across society, and by these fringe examples you associate this egregious behaviour with all members of the LGBT community. Inappropriate heterosexual material is a much bigger threat to the safeguarding of children but this doesn't mean that members of the heterosexual community shouldn't have portfolios involving children does it? So why LGBT?

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 10:41 pm

                      the association you are making is that there may or may not be more danger to children posed by a particular group because of their sexual identity

                      No, I’m really not. I’m saying that eroding social norms around child safeguarding is an issue when any group does it. Doesn’t matter if they’re queer or priests, child safeguaring centres children not the groups of adults.

                      You still appear to not understand the concepts. Child safeguarding doesn’t say this group (hets) is more of a risk so let’s not talk about that group (queers). Sexual abuse of children is sexual abuse, no matter how the adult doing it identifies or the cultural context it happens in.

                      The area I’m pointing to here is where adults blur lines between adult sexuality and children. That’s what those links give examples of. They’re not saying that queer people are inherently paedophilic. They are saying that some adults in queer culture are blurring the lines, and this is becoming more socially acceptable. The blurring of the lines lessens the safeguarding, in part because it opens up opportunities for the sexual abuse of children.

                      I don’t know why I have to explain this, but if you have adult men behaving sexually around children, and there being increasing degrees of social acceptance around that, then paedophiles are going to look at that and see it as an opportunity. This is why we don’t do that.

                      regarding portfolios, my comment has absolutely nothing to do with Doyle being part of the LGBT+ community. The problem is his judgement around boundaries. There are plenty of LGBT+ people who don’t have poor boundaries who would be perfectly suited for that for portfolio. This is why I think you don’t understand the argument. I say the problem is around judgement and boundaries, and you think that I am saying that the problem is with somebody being gay or queer.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 10:47 pm

                      the association you are making is that there may or may not be more danger to children posed by a particular group because of their sexual identity

                      Here’s another way to understand it. It’s not queerness as identity that’s the problem, it’s queer theory and philosophy which values transgression above safety. Pushing the boundaries around adult sexuality and children is dangerous. By all means push against norms that create harm, but we absolutely have to be able to talk about that as a society, and especially when it affects children. The taboo on talking about child safeguarding in relation to queer culture is a serious problem. Everyone has an obligation towards the safety of children, and queer people aren’t exempt from that.

                    • Muttonbird …
                      29 April 2025 at 8:45 pm

                      Family friendly events are family friendly as far as they go but should not impinge on people expressing themselves in their own environment.

                      We've been to four or five AFC games this season which are certainly marketed as family friendly. There's a Ferris wheel and big sand pit for kids at the bank end.

                      Twice we've seen people with kids uncomfortable. One time a family with a toddler about three years and a baby under 12 months found themselves in the official AFC supporters area and wanted those around them to be less vocal and boisterous. The other time a mother didn't like the language and behaviour around young Johnny and had some fans thrown out.

                      It's a football match. Young people go along to be passionate and express themselves about something which is a meaningful part of their life experience.

                      The point is, it's the suppression and hiding of young adults' expression of themselves in an environment which they should feel is theirs and which they pay for which is not right.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 10:26 pm

                      sure, and my point isn’t that Pride should tone itself down. There’s a pretty big difference between being exposed to rugby fans saying fuck, and men expressing their sexuality in public with children. Pride needs to decide if it’s kid suitable or not. Or run two events or whatever, lots of ways to resolve this that maintain child safeguarding.

                  • Drowsy M. Kram …
                    29 April 2025 at 12:04 pm

                    Are the Green party's progressive policies relating to social justice and respect for diversity limiting their electoral prospects. As the overshoot emergency erodes 'our' environment and standard of living, social justice and diversity policies could well take a hammering.

                    Money ? Happiness. QED. [2007]
                    The formula for human well-being used to be simple: Make money, get happy. So why is the old axiom suddenly turning on us?
                    …
                    Trying to meet that kind of demand will stress the earth past its breaking point in an almost endless number of ways, but let’s take just one. When Thomas Newcomen fired up his pump on that morning in 1712, the atmosphere contained 275 parts per million of carbon dioxide. We’re now up to 380 parts per million, a level higher than the earth has seen for many millions of years, and climate change has only just begun. The median predictions of the world’s climatologists—by no means the worst-case scenario—show that unless we take truly enormous steps to rein in our use of fossil fuels, we can expect average temperatures to rise another four or five degrees [Fahrenheit] before the century is out, making the globe warmer than it’s been since long before primates appeared. We might as well stop calling it earth and have a contest to pick some new name, because it will be a different planet. Humans have never done anything more profound, not even when we invented nuclear weapons.

                    CO2 at 380 parts per million is so naughties – try 428 ppm and rising.

                    https://climateanalytics.org/publications/cat-global-update-as-the-climate-crisis-worsens-the-warming-outlook-stagnates

                    Reply
                    • weka …
                      29 April 2025 at 12:14 pm

                      Some worry that the Green party's progressive policies relating to social justice and respect for diversity are limiting their electoral prospects.

                      I'm sure some people are worrying about that, but just to clarify, I said it's how they're doing identity politics that is part of the problem.

                      I agree that as the relatively well off mainstream are forced to give up standards of living, that maintaining social progress will be more difficult. Even more important then to shift from an individualist IP excess position to a position of valuing people that reaches across the whole of society, is class based, and focuses on bringing people along.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      29 April 2025 at 12:33 pm

                      Even more important then to shift from an individualist IP excess position to a position of valuing people that reaches across the whole of society, is class based, and focuses on bringing people along.

                      yes Imho, many ‘first worlders’ won't shift voluntarily – people will be forced to react to ‘events’, and the devil take diversity / the hindmost.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 12:48 pm

                      and in this context ‘many first worlders’ includes GP MPs who have the chance to change voluntarily on IP excess, but probably won’t until they are forced to (as has happened in the UK, although the Green Parties there are batshit crazy and seem intent on electoral suicide, which thankfully teh NZ Greens don’t)

                      What we need in order to subvert the ‘won’t act on climate/ecology until forced to’ dynamic are political parties that lead on bringing everyone along. That would be a game changer imo. The Greens should and could be leading on this, but they’re not, at least not yet.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      29 April 2025 at 1:20 pm

                      and in this context ‘many first worlders’ includes GP MPs who have the chance to change voluntarily on IP excess…

                      Don't know about "IP excess", but I favour pollies who understand and respect diversity – Lord save us from monocultures!

                      What we need in order to subvert the ‘won’t act on climate/ecology until forced to’ dynamic are political parties that lead on bringing everyone along.

                      yes Yes, we need "political parties that lead on bringing everyone along", but where are the exemplars? Imho, the 6th Labour-led govt came close with it's early response to the pandemic, and Labour became the only MMP-era party to win a parliamentary majority – it was all downhill from there.

                      In some parts of the world, hard-right political parties seem to be popular, but even they aren't able to bring the majority, let alone everyone along – yet.

                      Hard-right parties are now Europe’s most popular
                      [28 Feb 2025, paywalled]
                      But our number crunching shows that they have mostly been kept out of power

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 2:03 pm

                      I think the Labour government during the pandemic did as you say, bring everyone along initially. But then they engaged actively indirectly and dividing the country, hence not just the mandates, but the ostracising of those that didn’t agree. That’s not bringing everybody along. That’s actually rejecting a whole bunch of people.

                      Of course, in my opinion, the mandates were a necessary evil. But it’s in the how again. What might have softens the blow, as if people badly affected by the mandates have been looked after particularly by the labour party.

                      For all that the Labour Party do that helps, they are still fundamentally a party that believes daddy knows best. They favour centralisation over local democracy and seem to think that they can dictate policy against the wishes of the people. Which is why there was the backlash against them later in the pandemic, and then in the election last year, there was the movement against three waters and co-governance, which succeeded, not just because the right were organised but because a whole lot of swing voters actually felt similarly.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      29 April 2025 at 4:11 pm

                      That’s not bringing everybody along.

                      Chastising political parties for "not bringing everybody along" is easy, and it may be more useful to critique policies (cost-benefit analyses). It's a rare party that can capture more than half the NZ party vote.

                      Imho it's impossible for any political party to bring everybody along, on anything. People are diverse – ostracisation can only be minimised.

                      Some parties appeal more to me, and they're the ones I will consider voting for, but she's a hard road finding the perfect party.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 5:00 pm

                      Chastising rather than cogent political analysis? 😬 😉

                      Bringing everyone along isn’t about having policy that everyone likes, or getting everyone to vote for you. It’s about having a position that everyone deserves respect and support and a voice in democracy, even the ones who don’t vote for you. This is a large step away from where we are now of course.

                      Ostracisation is an intentional strategy now in ways that it wasn’t in the past. Here I am speaking of SM as much as anything, and specifically around identity politics. It’s a hard line to judge sometimes between making a strong political argument and pushing people away, but when it’s an intentional strategy applied liberally (lol), it has a consequence of, well, ostracising people. I’d like to know how people see that working out socially and politically.

                      I don’t know if this is your kind of thing, but I’m listening to this podcast, and interview with a woman who experienced an climate driven extreme weather event (flood) and how the local community responded. My emphasis,

                      But yeah, I remember like on that first morning, someone asked me how I was going, and I was like, I’ve been through worse. I think that I was kind of maybe in shock.

                      There was also just this incredible sense of feeling, feeling caught by that community. The Lismore community is an incredible community in that they, in the Northern Rivers, they managed to successfully kick out and keep out coal seam gas through community campaigns that came together, bringing together so many different parts of that community from farmers and hippies and greenies and mob and all different kinds of people to advocate to keep fossil fuels and fracking out of that region. So, there’s very strong community networks.

                      And what I witnessed in the aftermath was those networks pulling together again. And how that kind of formed a net that caught so many people and how quickly people could respond. And that was exhilarating to be a part of.

                      It was the, you know, formed a trauma bond with Lismore, honestly. Like it was the fastest kind of community making that I’d ever done.

                      .

                      From Reskillience: Loving What’s Left with Tessa Campisi, 28 Apr 2025

                      https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/reskillience/id1723090226?i=1000705164557

                      What she is describing cannot be done if you have ostracised people, or at least, it’s much harder.

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 5:04 pm

                      it’s not just SM, that’s where I see it in action the most. It’s also in communities and families/friends/work places. The only thing I can see that is similar was the Tour. I was staunchly anti-tour and my father and brother were pro-Tour, but we all kind of ignored each other as much as possible. Other families and communities it was harder on. But it still was quite different to what happens today with cancel culture, and that is driven by SM imo even in real life.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      29 April 2025 at 7:55 pm

                      Bringing everyone along isn’t about having policy that everyone likes, or getting everyone to vote for you. It’s about having a position that everyone deserves respect and support and a voice in democracy, even the ones who don’t vote for you.

                      An admirable aspiration that some Kiwis would support, but would "having a position that everyone deserves respect and support and a voice in democracy" really bring everyone along? Objectively ranking NZ's political parties and pollies according to this ideal would be interesting – are they all as bad as each other?

                      Tbh, I had not considered the possiblity that our CoC pollies deserve my "respect and support", but I will try to separate the effects of their policies and initiatives (most of which I cannot respect or support) from the pollies themselves, and give it a one-week trial.

                      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_National_Government_of_New_Zealand#Significant_policies_and_initiatives

                      And thanks for that link to the Campisi podcast – no time to listen at the moment but will file it away for later.

                    • Incognito []
                      29 April 2025 at 8:09 pm

                      There’s consensus, majority consensus, and unanimity as opposed to simple majority-based decision-making where might is right, until and unless it goes against the views of the Right and all Hell breaks loose with accusations of being anti-democratic and other such nonsense. Ironically, neo-authoritarians happily override any of the above approaches to decision-making and this morphs into templates for proto-fascism and full-blown fascism. In other words, it’s a spectrum and where a Party or Nation sit differs and changes over time, for better or for worse …

                    • weka []
                      29 April 2025 at 10:36 pm

                      Tbh, I had not considered the possiblity that our CoC pollies deserve my “respect and support”, but I will try to separate the effects of their policies and initiatives (most of which I cannot respect or support) from the pollies themselves, and give it a one-week trial.

                      You’re not the government though. Would you want a RW government to respect and support you and make sure you have a voice in democracy?

                      An admirable aspiration that some Kiwis would support, but would “having a position that everyone deserves respect and support and a voice in democracy” really bring everyone along?

                      You can’t force everyone to come along, people are still allowed to refuse. But I think this is a bit abstract, let’s talk some examples. One of my critiques of Labour’s handling of both three waters and co-governance, was that it was dictating to the electorate what should happen, even if the electorate didn’t want this. That’s bad governance for two such important issues, one a matter of critical infrastructure and the other a constitutional matter.

                      Bringing everyone along isn’t a literality, it’s a shorthanding for governing the country for all of us. Why not spend the time explaining the issues with three waters, making a propose solution, and then taking it to the country, engaging citizens, getting them involved in decision making and so on. Might have to change plans, which is anathema to top down governance.

                      Citizens Assemblies are one good way of understanding ‘bringing everyone along’.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      30 April 2025 at 11:43 am

                      Would you want a RW government to respect and support you and make sure you have a voice in democracy?

                      Govt respect and support doesn't matter, personally. It would be nice if our self-serving CoC govt MPs respected and supported so-called bottom-feeding Kiwis, and the natural environment, rather than accelerating environmental degradation and ACTing on behalf of the rich – ‘trickle down’ my arse, and don't get me started on health.

                      https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-07-04-2025/#comment-2031025

                      Bringing everyone along isn’t a literality, it’s a shorthanding for governing the country for all of us.

                      It isn't that much of a 'shorthanding', but "governing[…] for all of us" does make more sense, and is (again) admirably aspirational. "All of us", however, is a very diverse group, and time grows short. I prefer a progressive "for the many, not the few" – also aspirational, if less fashionable than 45 or 90 years ago, when our long-term problems were young(er) and more tractable.

                    • weka []
                      30 April 2025 at 12:02 pm

                      Govt respect and support doesn’t matter, personally.

                      This makes it sound like you are ok with the government removing rights and privileges you have. That’s extraordinary. Respect and support of citizens is fundamental, and picking and choosing which citizens is exactly why NACTF are able to target the underclass currently.

                      “All of us”, however, is a very diverse group, and time grows short. I prefer a progressive “for the many, not the few” – also aspirational, if less fashionable than 45 or 90 years ago, when our long-term problems were young(er) and more tractable.

                      Sure, but all of us doesn’t mean every single person all the time, which I’ve already said. All of us means the country as a whole. It’s the core different between neoliberal and leftist. Leftist favours the collective. That’s what I am talking about. If we don’t have a politics of the good of the commons, then various governments will pick and choose who in society they value, and they will trade that back and forth every 2 or 3 terms (the situation we are in now).

                      You can call it aspirational, I call it fundamental.

                      To bring this back into the climate context, if we’re not holding a position of bringing everyone along, then how do climate progressives see things working? You’ve already said that you think thing won’t work, and that people will only change when circumstances force them to. This is both defeatist and problematic where it closes doors to change.

                      I’m saying that people generally want to do the right thing where it means that they and their people are ok. If we can offer pathways of change that both maintain material wellbeing in the present and create a low carbon future where their kids and grandkids will be ok, I think people will increasingly choose that over head in the climate sand.

                      But the point I am making is that in order to offer that pathway, it has to be a pathway that brings people along, not dictates that they should accept what some bods in Wellington say. If we don’t engage with people where they are at and with their needs and desires, then why should those people trust us? All the semantics about my shorthanding aside, this is the central point and it’s incredibly important if we want an alternative to ‘people will only act when forced’.

                    • Drowsy M. Kram …
                      30 April 2025 at 3:00 pm

                      This makes it sound like you are ok with the government removing rights and privileges you have.

                      Nope – I replied truthfully on the matter(s) of govt "respect and support" for me, personally – I (deliberately) left out "make sure you have a voice in democracy", and oppose our CoC govt's plan to remove voting rights for prisoners. If you had asked 'Would you want a RW government to remove the rights you have?', then that would (have) be(en) a firm NO.

                      All of us means the country as a whole.

                      Yes, I hope we're on the same page here – imho, "for all of us" and "for the many, not the few" are not so different. All political parties try to convince us that they will do what's best for "the country as a whole" – that's democracy; a contest of money and ideas.

                      If we don’t have a politics of the good of the commons…

                      Which democracies are closest to "a politics of the good of the commons", and is that different to a politics of "for the many, not the few", or “for all of us”?

                      You can call it aspirational, I call it fundamental.

                      I’ll see you, and raise you 'aspirational and fundamental' smiley

                      To bring this back into the climate context, if we’re not holding a position of bringing everyone along, then how do climate progressives see things working?

                      Shaw made a good faith effort to work "for all of us" when he negotiated a bipartisan consensus for NZ's Zero Carbon Act, but he couldn't "bring everyone along" – ACT wants to repeal the Act, although it has survived, so far.

                      The climate wins that will outlast James Shaw – and his regrets [6 Feb 2024]
                      Despite what’s stuck, Shaw said the Government’s repeal of carbon-cutting policies had been hard to watch.

                      I’m saying that people generally want to do the right thing where it means that they and their people are ok.

                      I'm saying that "generally", and agreeing on what "the right thing" and "ok" mean, are significant barriers to crafting a pathway that will bring everyone along. I agree with the principle that (law-abiding?) citizens shouldn't be coerced to do what some bods in Wellington or anyone else believes is "the right thing", national/global emergencies excepted, and hope NZ as a whole will adhere to that principle for as long as possible – we don't know how lucky we are, or were.

                      If we don’t engage with people where they are at and with their needs and desires, then why should those people trust us?

                      Yes, politics is all about trust, but the inevitable mismatch of (some) people's needs and desires/wants is problematic – c'est la vie.

                • Res Publica …
                  29 April 2025 at 12:15 pm

                  Exactly!

                  My thesis is that while the Green Party’s commitment to building a representative caucus is deeply important, the way it’s currently being executed risks undermining the very goals it seeks to achieve.

                  At present, candidates are not always vetted rigorously enough, nor are they given the infrastructure and political apprenticeship necessary to survive, let alone thrive, in the realities of public life.

                  When mistakes inevitably happen, the party is often caught flat-footed, with no plan to manage or contain the fallout.

                  By contrast, both Labour and National are deliberate in building pipelines of political talent: future MPs typically spend time working in an MP’s office, learning how Parliament actually works, and getting real-world exposure to the demands of the role.

                  The leap from activist to MP is enormous. Not everyone can bridge it with the chutzpah and resilience that someone like Chlöe Swarbrick or James Shaw brings.

                  If the Greens are serious about growing their influence — especially on climate action, where leadership is desperately needed — they have to think longer-term: not just about who is elected, but about how they are prepared, supported, and stewarded once they get there.

                  It's highly likely the Greens will have a relatively small caucus for the near future. That means there is very limited room for error., and no capacity to carry deadweight.

                  Every MP has to be a net contributor, politically and operationally, from day one.

                  Reply
      • Bearded Git 1.3.2
        29 April 2025 at 9:03 am

        Not sure about that Ad. How about these achievements (from the Herald article)?

        "Looking back, Whanau is proud to have lifted the city’s water investment to $1.8 billion in the 2024-34 Long-Term Plan. The council’s district plan will enable thousands of new homes. The council has also planned to upgrade over 800 social housing units. It has built 27km of new cycleways and bus priority lanes have doubled from 4km to 8km.“I’m really proud of that … that is exactly what I was elected to deliver and now with the Golden Mile project starting officially I feel very proud. We’re, we’re in the middle of transformation,” Whanau said."

        Reply
  2. Ad 2
    29 April 2025 at 7:28 am

    Well day of Canadian elections. Sure sick to be cheering for Mark Carney, ex Goldman Sachs, ex Governor of Canadian Reserve Bank, ex head of Bank of England, ex head of Brookfield Investments.

    That he looks now like a bulwark of sanity and nobility is both surreal and aggravating.

    Reply
    • Tiger Mountain 2.1
      29 April 2025 at 7:42 am

      Well, at least Mr Carney does not appear to be a Trump suck up, despite having been in the belly of the beast–international Finance Capital. There are more than a few MAGA types in Canada as trucking protests illustrated so best to keep the likes of Poilievre well away from leadership.

      Reply
    • Res Publica 2.2
      29 April 2025 at 8:44 am

      shrug

      If we judged people solely by their CV, we’d have to dismiss every soul who ever wandered into a corrupt institution and tried to do some good.

      Being a banker doesn’t make you a villain by default; any more than being a Data and AI Engineer makes me a disciple of Bezos, Musk, or every other scummy tech-bro poisoning the public square one ill thought-out deregulatory policy at a time.

      Character is revealed in what you do within the machine, not the titles you collect on the way through it.

      Reply
    • Obtrectator 2.3
      29 April 2025 at 5:34 pm

      Well, as BoJo might have chosen to put it: fas est et ab hoste doceri. Which can be translated very loosely as: "it's OK to cheer the enemy if he's doing the right thing".

      Reply
  3. Kay 3
    29 April 2025 at 9:49 am

    Anyone shocked and surprised?

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/559338/1b-cut-to-operating-allowance-coming-in-budget-nicola-willis-says

    Once again, I don't blame the government, this is how they operate and they love austerity ie punishing the plebs. I completely blame those who voted them in- or didn't vote- thus giving this mob the means to destroy the country.

    I really, really hope that those out there who couldn't get past the words 'tax cuts' yet alone the implications, will be suffering themselves.

    Reply
  5. SPC 5
    29 April 2025 at 3:25 pm

    A few days before the election in Australia – solar Labour elbows power vs nuclear dutton fingers power.

    Meanwhile here, solar farms go up in scale.

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/companies/energy/nzs-biggest-solar-farm-opens-boosts-renewable-energy-in-canterbury/KTUKJTRPBVAWNOUIEZZKXVN5RA/

    Reply
    • weka 5.1
      29 April 2025 at 3:38 pm

      It's another form of extraction economy.

      The solar farm has produced an estimated 200 tonnes of mainly green waste, which has been delivered to the Ashburton Resource Recovery Park. The park sorts Ashburton's rubbish, recycling and green waste.

      There was a 43 percent increase in waste received at the Ashburton Resource Recovery Park in September, according to a recent Ashburton District Council activity briefing meeting.

      Operations and projects manager Hernando Marilla said it was partly due to the volume of waste received from the solar farm project.

      The recovery park had received more than 100 tonnes – the equivalent weight of a blue whale – from the solar farm in August and another 117 tonnes in September, he said.

      "They have been bringing in green waste and some two tonnes of general waste."

      https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/533147/country-s-largest-solar-farm-prepares-to-power-up-as-green-waste-piles-up

      I'd like to see the ecological audit of the land owner farming under the panels as well.

      Build it and they will come. This isn't going to make NZ more sustainable, it's going to fuel unsustainable growth. The reason for that is virtually no-one is operating within the limits of nature.

      Reply
      • SPC 5.1.1
        29 April 2025 at 4:13 pm

        It's one off construction waste.

        Contrary to common solar myths about harmful chemicals, the materials used to make solar panels are sealed and contained so they do not negatively affect the surrounding area.

        https://cleangridalliance.org/faqs/?1

        AI

        Grazing sheep on land with solar panels, a practice known as agrivoltaics, offers several benefits. Sheep can help maintain pastures, reduce the need for mowing, and even improve wool quality, while the solar panels provide shade and can protect the sheep from harsh weather conditions. Studies have shown that sheep grazing under solar panels spend more time grazing and resting, and may be happier and healthier than those grazing on open fields

        https://lightsourcebp.com/nz/news/six-reasons-why-solar-farms-make-great-grazing/

        Reply
        • weka 5.1.1.1
          29 April 2025 at 4:33 pm

          it's not a one off cost, it's an ongoing cost in perpetuity everytime a component needs to be replaced, in addition to the disposal of the old component. You can look up lifetime estimates of solar farms, but let's say the farm has to be replaced every 30 years.

          That's great there are benefits for the sheep, but solar panel shade ain't like a tree. And that's not an audit. I want to see how much power is used as well as the other impacts, inputs and pollution. My standard is comparing it to a reforestation or regenag conversion.

          Reply
          • SPC 5.1.1.1.1
            29 April 2025 at 5:48 pm

            Here it is one off green waste resulting from the construction.

            Replacement is most likely new panels in place of old.

            The farm audit is fine.

            Covering the country in trees does not supply the power for EV's etc.

            If the global warming threat is existential, then non carbon based energy is required.

            Once there is enough clean energy, then the power is used in the making of new tech.

            Then the issue is how long there are mineral resources for the new tech, so onto CERN and fusion.

            Reply
  6. gsays 6
    29 April 2025 at 5:05 pm

    That's a bit stink.

    https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2025/04/29/comrades-it-is-with-deep-sadness-that-i-announce-the-working-group-has-been-cancelled-by-the-political-right/

    The Working Group will not be continuing. For those of us that can handle politics that isn't an echo chamber this is grim news.

    Apparently there was tension brewing between Bomber and Damien Grant throughout the year. Came to a head with some of Bomber's blog posts on Palestine and links between Stuff's political editor and The New Zealand Initiative and Nicky No Boats.

    I know Hooten isn't everyones cup of tea but I found his analysis interesting and he absolutely eviscerated Brash and crticized Luxon in a way I haven't heard anyone else do.

    Maybe another sponsor will step up. Who could replace Grant? (Who could put up with Bomber?)

    Reply

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