'After three years of leave supporters being dismissed as racist and stupid, and seeing Labour eventually get off the fence and back the People’s Vote campaign, how on earth did the party expect its leave supporters to react?'
The reason Corbyn was for leaving the EU was because he wanted to re-nationalise the railways, energy, water, etc., which was against EU rules, but the Blairites in the party would not allow this and insisted on siding with the LibDems (some of them getting right behind the reprehensible ant-semitism smear campaign run by all the media outlets except the mirror and the morning star that is now being used on Sanders in the US to silence him too). The inquest that the Labour Party are currently running is being controlled by the same people that wanted a second vote, so don’t expect much clarity from that either.
….but those on the right are simply allowed to fling whatever they like at the left..
By the way, Col Wilson is NOT working class. He owns a bricklaying company. He is pretty bourgeois. He would quite happily vote those in retail and hospitality lower wages and shitty conditions if it meant he got a tax cut. The so called white working class ie tradies dont give a shit about solidarity anymore. They want the Bach, boat and BMW, and are willing to screw over their brothers an sisters to get it.
Agree Millsy. I think our Col is the typical impotent grumpy old Tory pakeha male who knows the world has passed him by. Vilifying younger women, especially those in power, is the only thing that makes him feel powerful again.
Ani O'Brien is a kid who doesn't know what she is talking about.
Her presumption that those who are "turning" on this dinosaur from the South are bona-fida "lefties" from Labour or the Green parties (which is what she is inferring) is likely to be nonsense born out of her own ignorance and feverish imagination.
Assuming she is a journo, it was her own profession that caused the song and dance about a piddling gotcha-type story and alerted the international press in the first place. The culprits are more likely ne'er do wells who don't belong to either parties and are taking an opportunity to create a bigger stir.
Good way to smear and down-grade the centre-left during the barbie season though isn't it.
Pfft to her. Wonder if her National Party controllers wrote the piece?
There. You are not providing room in the tent for Labour supporters with different views. Some are probably even more liberal in many ways than you, too.
Are you on twitter Anne? Because this played out there quite distinctly before the media picked it up. Imo she's not referring to Green or Labour party people, but the left generally.
Suggesting she has National handlers because she critiques the left is pretty much the problem she is pointing to.
weka. You're too intelligent to have to spell it out to you. I was referring to the "Nat controller" comment. It was not a genuine question but a tongue in cheek bit of sarcasm.
She has been banging this particular drum for some time. Loves to throw around terms like "woke", "SJW" and "working class" but never really eleborates on what policies she wants the Labour party to have.
It only leads me to suspect further that the general idea among the establishment is that the 'working class family' should be the one depicted in Loretta Lynn's song "Coal Miner's Daughter". Nothing about unions, class conciousness, mutual banking and insurance services, soildarity (ie not selling out those in retail and hospitality). Even religion was at least questioned.
The people who have attacked the silly old git turning the magazines over look like identity politics devotees who are over-invested in the personality and gender of Jacinda. Their over-reaction to the silly old git has opened us all up to this bogus concern-trolling by yet another right-wing 'journalist' pretending to be of the left.
Joe – of course TurnArdern is saturated with misogyny. Calling it out is fine. But making threats against the guy or publishing details about him is beyond stupid.
I haven't seen anyone clearly from "the left"attacking "the silly old git"- when I first heard of the campaign (through social media) it was from apparent supporters of the campaign joking about it, then it was predictably picked up by the media, then the backlash. Has it been talked about on The Standard?
I am surprised there have not been reports of threats of violence (unidentified) from the left, and calls for calm from some clearly left person. Did the campaign get things a little out of order, or is it working exactly as planned? Can anyone identify any evidence of anything that fits the description "the characteristically hysterical response of the increasingly militant and intolerant section of the Left who are determined to attribute the most horrendous of social crimes to anyone who holds opinions contrary to theirs."? Is it conceivable that someone somewhere may have pretended to be from the left and mischievously posted and extremist view? Surely not!
There was talk in the article of "threats" – which can be anywhere from boycotting his company to police-actionable threats againstl ife and limb, yet no further information beyond "threats" is available, it seems.
I would suggest that serious threats run contrary to the vibe our current PM inspires, but who knows – there can be tossers anywhere, so actual threats are theoretically possible, I guess.
I don't think that the people calling the boomer manbaby "racist" are doing so basd on his latest activities. I gather (including from comments here) it has to do with some now-deleted tweets from March or thereabouts.
But the basic idea "turning books gets called racism" is consistent for Speak Up for Bigots. Didn't know why the name was familiar until I saw the line at the bottom.
How about if those of us who conclusively aren't women avoid posting comments like this, as a flame retardant measure? I don't think female readers of this blog really want to see two men arguing about who's an acceptable feminist and what a woman is.
Regardless of the trans argument, it seems that they are quite literally speaking up for a bigot who has a problem (among other problems) with a woman in a position of power.
In her role as chair of Speak Up For Women, Ani O'Brien has gained a lot of experience of pile-ons by irate postmodernists offended that someone should hold opinions they don't agree with, so I'm willing to cut her some slack in this instance. I think the OP was wrong, in that the potential loss of the South Island racist vote isn't something that should keep Labour strategists awake at night, but I can also see her point: a lot of people aren't going to trouble themselves to delve into it far enough to find out why this prick is being called a racist, but they might well pay enough attention to decide they're seeing a working class guy being dipped in shit by smart-arse middle-class liberals. Identity politics is a bitch.
After looking at joe90s tweet link . Na shes fucked up . If you going to go to print calling out people for attacking someone you need to show all the reason why the one being attacked is coping it. Makes one wonder if she isnt a dishonest cur
Lord save me from conservative reactionaries and their concern for the left's share of the votes. It always ends up with the proposition that the only way the left can win an election is by actively courting bigots (of whatever flavour).
Which is like curing thirst by drinking petrol. Rather than providing relief, it's incompatible with the basic functioning of the organism.
Take for example the following excerpts from the link provided:
Now, I do not know the people involved with the protest, but as far as I can tell turning books around is about as benign as political objection can get.
She calls that benign? Removing magazines from supermarket shelves as we saw in one TV video clip and chucking them in a corner as if Ardern is some tart not worthy of display. Call that benign?
People should be free to protest Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern without being subjected to threats, writes Ani O'Brien.
No they're not when they make protests intended to smear and demean.
It is also reminiscent of those who hid books about John Key when he was Prime Minister and if I recall they were not labelled anything other than 'petty' by their political opponents.
I don't recall that but if it happened my guess it was an isolated incident or two. This chump set up an online site asking for people throughout the country to join him in his puerile protest – a protest which is based on a lie in the first place.
In context, yes. For example, the context in which Don Brash gets mud thrown on his clothes and Stephen Joyce gets smacked in the face with a dildo – turning book displays around is benign by comparison.
People should be free to protest Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern without being subjected to threats, writes Ani O'Brien.
Seriously, you're disputing that statement? Wtf?
This chump set up an online site asking for people throughout the country to join him in his puerile protest…
You do get that people are allowed to do that in this country, right?
… turning book displays around is benign by comparison.
In the physical sense yes, but in a psychological sense? No.
It is all part of a campaign to deride Jacinda Ardern, to create a false sense of her supposed lack of capabilities and to fool people into believing the lies and innuendo and the fake stories that inevitably follow.
It is "Dirty Politics II" and we've seen the terrible toll that took on people in the firing line.
Stop it in its tracks I say. Hopefully, the hostility the chump in question has apparently been subjected to, might make all the other chumps think twice before indulging in similar acts.
"Regardless of the trans argument, it seems that they are quite literally speaking up for a bigot who has a problem (among other problems) with a woman in a position of power."
Someone on twitter was saying this too. Can you please point to the bit you think is her defending or speaking up for Col? Because I saw her critiquing the left and not being particularly supportive of him (or them).
The bit where she conflated calling him racist with his book-turning campaign. Two different issues, but putting them together supports her argument that his critics are practising hyperbole, rather than responding rationally to each of his multiple stupidities. Thereby defending him from his critics.
I thought that bit was off too. My own position is that I'm concerned about strategy. Many on the left seem to think that doing the hard man stuff will help. I'm not saying this out of sympathy for Col (bar the doxxing and threats), but rather it's the many invisible people on twitter, FB, and now reading the papers who were undecided and are now shifting towards the right, not because Col is right and the left are wrong, but because of how the left are approaching the issue. This is my understanding of what OBrien is saying too. If it had just been about Col, then maybe the response was useful. But it wasn't just about him.
FWIW, having seen Col around, but not followed closey what he does, I just assumed he was part of the twitter RWers who are there to shit stir for National.
The opinion piece was a run of the mill tone argument, from my perspective. Unless they can provide decent metrics, 99% of the time "if you keep doing this you lose votes" translate to "if you keep doing this, my personal vote will go to someone else, but in all probability I would have voted for them anyway but felt a little bit bad about it".
But even if it were true and the left needs to tolerate social conservatism to the point of bigotry in order to win an election, that strikes me as being a suicidal "victory". I'm all for incrementalism, but pandering to the mythical Waitakere Man is active regression. How far should it go? Failing to punish racism in meetings? Sexual harrassment? Homophobic bullying? Sitting there and smiling through gritted teeth when epithets are flung around, making people visibly uncomfortable?
Because the yanks and the blowback into NZ have taught me that the social conservatives won't compromise. So if one group in society has to smile through gritted teeth, I'd rather it be them.
I don't think that was her argument though. If I get the time I'll ask her, Leaving aside our respective interpretations of her piece, the issue for me isn't about tolerating racists, it's about how we respond. I'm not arguing for incrementalism (I think the centre left has that covered), I'm saying that like others I'm watching lefties/progressive shift away from the left and the left saying things like 'don't let the door hit you on the way out'. At another time that might be funny, but not in a world of Trumpian politics. The solution isn't to be incremental, it's to be respectful and where possible kind. Not to Col, but to the people who are on the verge of being influenced.
Because NZ conservatives are less well funded than the US – we have fewer belts of fundies and fewer corporate evangelicals.
But they learn from the US, and it could easily go the other way, because we also have cols in NZ. And SST, and density church, and the nats have signalled they will embrace that lot like the repugs embraced the US equivalents.
The downside of there being no permanent defeat is that there's no permanent victory, either.
Ani O'Brien is the chair of Speak up for Women. Their very existence is to oppose Greens policy.
Seems to me they speak up for women not to protect against dominant patriarchy but to protect against transgender rights, progressive politics and specifically the Greens.
What confuses me about people like Ani O'Brien and Ryan Bridge is that they fight against the very type of activism which enabled they themselves to freely identify and enjoy equal rights as gay people in modern society.
Sure, your claim that these feminists aren't opposing patriarchal oppression but are instead doing some other shit you made up is totally, totally just about the politics. /sarc
Her opinion piece in Stuff was purely political. Her organisation defines itself as opposing particular political legislation.
I loved the threat she made about being 'reluctantly left'. Sounds like she wants to leave because the left is too progressive and not traditional enough. Amazing that a militant gay feminist would come down on the side of tradition when it suits her! She's on the same side of the argument as Bob McCoskie, ffs.
Don't let the door hit your arse on the way out, Ani.
"Don't let the door hit your arse on the way out, Ani."
Wow. You really think it's not a problem that people are radicalising away from the left? Because from where I'm standing, we're approaching a point of crisis and the left seems to think it is assured of winning. Remember what happened in the 2016 US election?
I just don't think it was a big deal. One person tweeted publicly available information and that seems to be the basis of ongoing article about the treatment of poor old Colin Wilson.
Ani O'Brien tried to paint all lefties as hysterical when everyone had forgotten about it.
what wasn't a big deal? This isn't about a single tweet, it's an evolving dynamic over a number of weeks, largely based around leftie twitter (and in the context of a much longer dynamic of how the left are responding to the right there) that has now spilled over into the MSM.
OBrien didn't paint all lefties as hysterical, she pointed to a problem that increasing numbers of people are concerned about, intolerance on the left. I'm seeing it in the leftie responses to her article many of which start with undermining her rather than addressing her points.
a. entice the people to vote who don't vote at all
b. stop running after the conservative vote as if it were better then the votes of the people who have stopped voting
c. grow some spine and actually stand for something more then a 50$ heating aid for some in winter that will be cut of the programm next time the no mates party wins.
d. understand and acknowledge that allies don't have to be on the left.
Heck i don't consider myself the 'left' no more then i consider myself ' right'. I consider myself without representation by all the parties.
Too rich to profit of labours welfare hand outs, to poor for the no mates parties tax cut hand outs, but rich enough to be fleeced to death by both parties. As for the Greens, NZFirst …..just nothing for no one other then job creation for themselves.
As for the 2016 election, i remember the shit i got from many here that were only concerend with the economic anxiety of the 'white male working class' as being the underdog. Cause the women workers – of color or white – fuck em, the kids? fuck em, the mexicans and brown people running away from their fucked up countries? fuck em. And so on and so on.
and now we are to be scared into voting for the Left cause 2016? Good grief, we are so fucked if that is why we are to vote for 'the left'.
if you believe there are enough votes on the left and in the non-vote to shift the Overton Window, and prevent rising fascism, then all power to you in getting more people voting for progressive parties. I’d love to see the non-voters enfranchised.
However I’m not convinced that this is sufficient, although it’s obviously necessary. I’m not arguing for the left to go after conservative voters by compromising something. I’m not even really talking about voting here. I’m saying that we need to address the things that are polarising NZ, and where people are radicalising away from liberal values or left wing politics, and where people who have no political home end up feeling valued and welcomed by the right.
I remember the shit storm of 2016 on TS too, and have paid a price for trying to shift the culture here. Ironically, it’s that experience as much as anything that informs my current view. It’s not one group that is polarising or radicalising, there are really complex dynamics shifting in the culture, and the old left/right paradigm doesn’t have dominance. The left still seems to be largely operating as if it does and that the left can somehow win if we just push virtue hard enough. Meanwhile, the people that are telling us there is something wrong are being shown the door.
Her opinion piece in Stuff was purely political. Her organisation defines itself as opposing particular political legislation.
That's the way it came across to me too Muttonbird and I had never heard of her nor had any knowledge of her background. But the fact it was a political piece masquerading as something else seemed clear to me.
It's not that it's too progressive. You don't get it, do you? It's because it is too authoritarian. That's how you can alienate both social conservatives and social liberals – dare I say, the "libertine left" – at the same time!
Identity politics has destroyed contemporary labour the world over. The party born of solidarity between disparate groups living and sometimes suffering under the same circumstances cannot bring itself to allow scriptural divergence from Gender Trouble circa 1990, University of Berkeley California, etc, but tolerates class humiliation every day in the form of disgust ridden car window media lectures from former pop stars and models etc.
I was not aware that Ani O'Brien was denying people their chosen identity.
If you want to talk about this in terms of rights, Ani O'Brien is a woman who does not want to share intimate spaces with people she considers biologically male. That’s been the practical, real world example through all of this, has it not?
Is there not an awkward but practical solution to this? Why not build four sets of changing rooms from now on: for men, for women, and for women who desire greater privacy than many other women expect? The need for the latter may increase as the population shifts to include a more diverse group of cultural backgrounds with their own ideas of culture, sex, the body, and so forth. We didn't always have disabled toilets. From now on we might need two sets of changing rooms for women. Shouldn’t the debate for a progressive be able accommodating as many people as possible, or are you some sort of cultural supremacist, blinded by an arguably time-limited ideology?
More widely, I don't see how O'Brien is oppressing transgender people by refusing to recognize that gender isn't tied to sex. Not practically, as in the previous example, in respect of Ani's rights against what is a fairly recent cultural change in attitude (you'd think it was written on stone tablets).
I meant: Shouldn’t the debate for a progressive be about accommodating as many people as possible, or are you some sort of cultural supremacist…
btw Would be quite amusing to have multiple women’s changing rooms labelled “progressive women” and “social libertarian and social conservative women”.
"I was not aware that Ani O'Brien was denying people their chosen identity."
I don't think she does. SUFW's opposition is to putting self-ID into law. Afaik they're not opposing official ID via state sanctioned assessment (which doesn't require medical transition anyway). Nor are they saying that trans ppl can't identify socially how they choose, although obviously there is a conflict between their view on sex/gender and that of trans activists.
"Basically if you can't afford the treatment and surgery you are not allowed to identify as the gender you identify with."
Are you saying that OBrien's political position is that trans ppl without medical transition shouldn't be allowed to present as the gender they identify as? If that is what you are saying, you'll need to back that up now, or withdraw the comment. I don't want to get into moderator mode, but this is such a contentious issue that care is needed when presenting facts, especially about public figures. Afaik this is not AB's position, so you'll need to provide some evidence.
This stance has been criticised by transgender advocacy groups as discriminating against low income transgender people who cannot afford to provide the required medical evidence.
The required medical evidence and Family Court process can be difficult, and expensive. It is out of line with the current policy on passports and drivers licenses, which require a simple statutory declaration to change the gender marker on them. It is also out of step with international best practice for human rights.
This impacts most heavily on those who:
do not undertake medical steps as part of their transition (for financial, medical, religious, or other reasons)
do not know how to make a formal legal application to the Family Court and/or
cannot afford to pay a lawyer to apply on their behalf, which can be expensive, costing up to $3,000.
The current process can be lengthy, particularly for those takatāpui, trans and non-binary people waiting for medical evidence to be supplied from a GP, hormone specialist or surgeon. They may also not want a particular medical treatment, and may be pressured toward medical intervention in order to obtain accurate identification
I had a quick read of the SUFW website and it seems to be populated mainly by articles about how they and their speakers have been banned from events rather than offering alternative solutions to the BDMRR bill to which they are so opposed.
I'm happy to read further into this if that is what you require for me to keep my commenting privileges.
you need to quote (and link) evidence to back up your assertion that AB wants to deny non-medically transitioned trans ppl the right to identify as they want. The onus is on you to spell it out, not expect me to read a link and parse what you are referring to.l
I'm putting myself in the position of a transgender person who, as per the Gender Minorities Aotearoa website, wants to be able to identify with, in law, their chosen gender without intrusion or major cost. The amendments seek to:
replace a Family Court application with a statutory declaration process that enables takatāpui, trans or non-binary people to affirm and legally document their correct gender
remove any other eligibility requirements, such as the need for medical evidence
enable gender markers to be recognised as male, female, or as a third, non-binary gender, ensuring trans and non-binary people have the same right to legal recognition, and the legal protection that provides, as all non-trans people in New Zealand.
I think the Gender Minorities Aotearoa website is very thorough on why this is important to low income transgender people.
SUFW opposes the bill to make it easier for transgender people to change the marker on their birth certificate because:
If a person is “female” or a “woman” just because they say so, then “female” and “woman” become meaningless concepts.
and:
Biology is a material reality, etc.
To me, and this is just my opinion, this is straight out of the Family First handbook.
As other have pointed out, were not these very same oppositions presented by traditionalists when the argument of gay rights arose?
Many people no longer feel compelled to smile politely and make small talk over dinner with someone who would happily see them or their loved ones dead in a ditch.
I am not saying it is authoritarian to grant transgender people rights.
I am saying it is authoritarian to demand that people all adopt the same beliefs and speech according to some existing doctrine, or ideological view.
This troubling and humouless ideological rigidity is bad news for the Labour party as it doesn’t just alienate conservatives with departing views but many social liberals also.
In the transactivist/gender critical feminist war, the authoritarianism comes in the form of things* like suppression of debate. It's brutal and whatever else is going on in the rights and wrongs of that war, that suppression of debate should be a big concern to the left.
*to make that a bigger list, left wing GCFs (i.e. politicised, progressive women) get rape and death threats, people pissing on their doors at work, fired or threats to their careers, visits from the police for tweets that are not illegal but they are told to rethink their thoughts and actions, physically and verbally attacked, deplatformed, deboosted on twitter, subjected to violent memes involving guns or graphic depictions of violence against a woman and so on. And all of that is being silently sanctioned by other parts of the left, liberals/progressives. The upshot of that is that many women are afraid to express political opinions. Authoritarianism.
I didn't say she wasn't a real feminist. I said she was a bigot. If I have confused her with a transphobic person and she is is in fact a support of trans rights and equality, I apologise.
As for her current article, her description of the reaction to "coltheman" is exagerrated and conflates numerous issues.
We recognise and respect the right of transgender people to live their lives in their chosen identity, and we understand why having a birth certificate consistent with that identity is important to them.
They also have some feminist concerns about the consequences for women if society were to accept that men can simply declare themselves women, but that's something neither of us is really qualified to comment on.
…her description of the reaction to "coltheman" is exagerrated and conflates numerous issues.
Kind of ironic, given the way many on the left describe Speak Up For Women.
Maybe your reduction of feminists' concerns about what sex self-identification means for women to a line about toilets is what's actually full of shit?
In that case I'd better rephrase this, because it seriously doesn't seem to be getting through to you even slightly: what we as men think of feminist concerns about the consequences for women of societal acceptance of sex self-identification is worth two-fifths of fuck-all. If you genuinely have something against bigotry, stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject.
The men letting their instinctive dislike of these women out through their keyboards like to frame it in terms of protecting trans people from being belittled and marginalised, sure. Bigotry never looks like bigotry to the bigot, which is one reason dismissing them as bigots doesn't have any effect on them. In this case, the "shut up" message is being delivered to women, by men, so if you genuinely have a problem with people like Col, start with your own mind and stop demonising the women you don't like.
One of the Herald articles showed the inconsistencies between col's criticisms of Ardern and his responses when it was pointed out that John Key had done similar things.
If I've been inconsistent depending on who's been arguing against self-id, feel free to point it out.
Col isn't a bigot because he's inconsistent, he's a bigot because he dislikes women who go public with views he opposes. That should ring a bell.
Inconsistency isn't the issue here. The issue is a man dismissing women's concerns about sex self-id as irrelevant (because they are irrelevant – to men) and then adding insult to injury by calling them bigots. Mansplaining is trivial by comparison.
Guess I'm not done – people may still be reading this, after all.
I don't care what your opinions are, let alone want you to make an argument for them. I'm arguing against supposedly progressive men telling feminists they're doing feminism wrong (which, despite your disclaimer to weka, was exactly what your "Speak up for bigots" comment consisted of).
Whatever your opinions are that lead you to dismiss out of hand feminists' concerns about something that affects only women and declare those feminists bigots, those opinions are irrelevant – at issue is the fact that you're doing it, not the "why."
Not so from the TERF perspective. They hold that trans women are not women. Trans women are those most affected as they face high risk of violence from men in men's spaces as well as huge risk of depression and suicide through alienation.
Who is or isn't a woman is not the subject here. The subject is men: supposedly progressive men dismissing feminists' concerns and declaring them bigots. Did you have any actually-relevant contribution to make about that?
I think it is idiotic to say that a man cannot hold a woman accountable for their bigotry because the woman identifies as a feminist. I have found the opinion in the TERF stuff that i have read to be bigoted. The feminists i know find it bigoted also.
The article was speaking up for a bigot, written by someone who felt their association with SUFW was relevant to that article, so it was a pretty literal description.
Solkta: yes, there are lots of men who see nothing wrong with giving the world their considered opinions on what feminists should or shouldn't think. That's exactly the problem.
McFlock: that disingenuous portrayal would carry a bit more weight if you hadn't gone on to directly call her a bigot and imply she's someone who belittles and marginalises trans-gender people.
Men's casual dismissal of feminist concerns about a women's issue and assertion that they're doing feminism wrong is what's under discussion. Your views on transgender politics never were and still aren't relevant. Your views on "TERFs", to use your derogatory term, are relevant only to the extent that they illustrate the behaviour under discussion – they aren't the subject matter.
I thought the problem was bigotry towards trans people.
I can't speak for McFlock but i can assure you that my conclusion is not a casual one. You keep saying feminist concerns but what you really mean is concerns of some feminists. And as i have already pointed this is not a women's issue as defined by SUFW – it is a 'men who think they are women''s issue. Trans people are the ones most affected. It is primarily their issue. You don't seem to have any consideration for them.
I can't see that "feminist" should be a get out of jail free card and that any idea expressed by a feminist is beyond criticism from anyone with a penis.
I thought the problem was bigotry towards trans people.
It's "a" problem sure – but not the one under discussion here.
…i can assure you that my conclusion is not a casual one.
Big whoop. We're anonymous blog commenters, our authoritative declarations count for shit.
You keep saying feminist concerns but what you really mean is concerns of some feminists.
Well, I've yet to hear of some official Head Office of Global Feminism that might issue proclamations on what's an official feminist issue, so yeah, I'm talking about the concerns of some feminists. So are you, only you're dismissing those concerns out of hand despite not being qualified to judge the merits of those concerns.
I can't see that "feminist" should be a get out of jail free card and that any idea expressed by a feminist is beyond criticism from anyone with a penis.
Well, yeah, that much is obvious. What's not obvious is why feminists should give a shit what a man thinks about whether they're doing feminism right or not. Can you provide a reason why they should give a shit?
Then what is the meaning of all your words? You have been, i think, trying to tell me that i have no right to tell a feminist that i think they are being bigoted when i think they are being bigoted. Not what they might think of my opinion. Bigots are very hard to sway, that is a big part of being a bigot.
The opinion of people matters generally as we have legislation to come before Parliament.
And i haven't made any statement about doing feminism right or not.
If all our opinions here count for shit (or two fifths of fuck all), then there's no particular reason anyone should care.
But then that would logically lead you to follow your own instruction to "stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject". And if everyone did that, there would be few if any comments on this site.
So maybe telling me to shut up because my opinion is worthless is a tad intrinsically inconsistent.
Bigots are very hard to sway, that is a big part of being a bigot.
You bet – I'm finding it fucking difficult to sway them on this thread, that's for sure.
And i haven't made any statement about doing feminism right or not.
You don't believe that's what you're doing, sure. Col doesn't believe he's being a misogynist either. To you, telling feminists with concerns about the implications of sex self-id that you as a man dismiss their concerns and consider them bigots, surely can't be characterised as telling feminists they're doing feminism wrong. But it can be, because that's what it is. Discussion of the subject would be improved if more men could recognise that reality.
So maybe telling me to shut up because my opinion is worthless is a tad intrinsically inconsistent.
Disingenuous, or deliberately obtuse? No-one's telling you to shut up because you're opinion's worthless (after all, any opinion is worthless outside the head of the person holding the opinion). But I am suggesting that maybe men should have a think about whether it's really a good idea for a man to just dismiss out-of-hand feminist concerns about a woman's issue and declare the feminists' bigots, before they open their big gobs.
what we as men think of feminist concerns about the consequences for women of societal acceptance of sex self-identification is worth two-fifths of fuck-all. If you genuinely have something against bigotry, stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject.
I took "two-fifths of fuck-all" to mean "worthless", and "stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject" as a lot of words for "shut up".
That was just one of a number of ways I've phrased the message "maybe men should have a think about whether it's really a good idea for a man to just dismiss out-of-hand feminist concerns about a woman's issue and declare the feminists' bigots, before they open their big gobs." You haven't actually responded to that message, just reframed it as you being told to remain silent in the face of bigotry, which is a disingenuous and self-serving misinterpretation.
Ani O'Brien is the chair of Speak up for Women. Their very existence is to oppose Greens policy.
Seems to me they speak up for women not to protect against dominant patriarchy but to protect against transgender rights, progressive politics and specifically the Greens.
This doesn't make sense. Gender critical feminists are by and large left wing, and progressive. SUFW have specific issues with the GP position on gender and sex. They don't oppose the GP generally.
GCF politics are based in an analysis of the patriarchy and oppose it eg the patriarchal imposition of gender roles is central to that analysis.
What's interesting and important here is that Obrien is pointing to intolerance on the left, including the inability of the left to handle criticism well, and lots of lefties are now proving her right by trying to undermine her instead of addressing the points she raises.
I feel for a lot of people who were angry with Colin Wilson's antics.
Anger is a legitimate emotion – it's normal. The danger with browbeating people into suppressing their emotion, their anger, is you will have no activism left at all.
I agree, and that works for others too, which is part of OBrien's point I think. The degree of intolerance and social media battering of people in political circles is understandable but not necessarily a winning strategy. If Col disappears from twitter, who thinks this has changed him for the better? Maybe it's made him much worse.
But all that aside, this wasn't just about him. It was about a group of people who did a political action, and what happened when their political opponents responded. To me it looks like practice for election year and I remain unconvinced that some of what has gone down will be good for the left.
Not sure you could make Col worse and I have zero empathy for him if he gets hounded off social media. Calling the Prime Minister a bitch in a private conversation as my 'friend' did the other day is one thing, but spraying it all over Twitter is another.
This is a shut down and if Col disappears then all the better – it serves to prove you cannot liken the Prime Minister to a horse and expect no fallout. It's not for the left to roll over and say, oh, that's ok.
A few people seem to be worried that any response to RW hatred is going to sink the government. If that's the case then the government is already sunk.
Perhaps they should have tried a little harder with Kiwibuild, with the CGT, and with rail in Auckland.
The issue with Col isn't sympathy. Him not being on twitter is a good thing. The problem is that the very public way that happened will have been seen and experience by a large number of people. That's where there might be a problem.
If you can't imagine someone like becoming worse you are fortunate.
…lots of lefties are now proving her right by trying to undermine her instead of addressing the points she raises.
That's not true weka. I addressed three quotes from her article further up the thread and would have liked to quote from more that I don’t agree with but three was enough.
I wasn't just referring to you Anne 🙂 (it's others here and on twitter). I read the undermining of OBrien before I read the analysis of what she said, but appreciate you coming back with the later thoughts.
Your quotes from Ani's piece weren't responded to with anything other than a statement that didn't address her points.
Weka's point stands – people on the "left" are too busy trying to dissemble every statement and turn it into an argument as to why it's "wrong" rather than adopt a holistic viewpoint and accept that the sometimes sanctimonious, holier than thou attitude, is a massive turn off for those who are not tribal and are "leftist"
It's terrifying how many people I've seen on twitter who formerly voted Labour or Green, and are now considering ACT, because they feel Green and Labour want to restrict what people can say, how they say it, what should be said. ACT is seen as supporting “free speech” which believe it or not, is attractive to people in allowing them to explore their thoughts and ideas, and not be told they can’t have such thoughts or ideas which are anathema to accepted diktats.
It might not be true, but it's the perception. And in politics, perception is everything.
So Anne, while I know you've got years of experience of Labour background, perhaps instead of arguing the toss, the conversation that the "left" needs to have should be focused on "how can we respond to people's concerns and educate them on what we're going to do about it, instead of telling them why they're wrong and leaving it at that"
… the conversation that the "left" needs to have should be focused on "how can we respond to people's concerns and educate them on what we're going to do about it, instead of telling them why they're wrong and leaving it at that"
And its my considered opinion that is exactly what the Labour-led Govt. is trying to do.
I may be a Labour supporter but I do not represent them in any shape or form. The opinions I express here are mine and mine alone.
My beef with this article by Ani O'Brien is that she is being very disingenuous. I don't care whether she's gay or straight or a bit of both, but I do care that she is not being honest about this matter. This dinosaur from ChCh is getting away with garbage. He is making wrong assertions (deliberately imo) about the Prime Minister – demeaning her as a woman as well as PM. He claims she spends all her time having photo shoots for PR purposes which is patently untrue and shouldn't be allowed to stand without strong criticism.
Yes, she's been in a few magazines but no more than any other prime minister. Most of the photos come from official occasions and interviews which she has no control over. Yes, she's hot property internationally but that is because she has garnered much genuine admiration from around the world.
This fellow Wilson, is obviously a Nat who is trying to generate ill-will towards Jacinda Ardern on misogynistic as well as political grounds. He’s not the first and he won’t be the last.
Labour may well be trying to say "here's what we're doing to address your issues" but in the wider world, Labour is associated with the "left". The actions of the likes of PaPa and their antics around Pride Parade, "TWAW" being repeated as a truism, and ignorant of the fears of a large number of women (and no, the few women that say "they're silly fears" completely discounts the fears women do have), "let's have open borders and do away with immigration controls" are the sort of issues that are seen as coming from the "left" and woe betide anyone that also identifies as "left" and says
– wait a minute, how can men change sex?
– wait a minute, why is immigration a good thing when we don't have the infrastructure, or resources, to deal with what we have right now?
Or other such valid questions… Instead of answers, they get called "Terf" and "racist" instead of engagement.
*That* is the type of leftist tribalistic issue that Ani is trying to address. The vocal minority on the left that want to have peace and utopia on earth yesterday, aren't very good at educating others as to why that vision of theirs is the *best* vision, and instead stoop to ad hominem attacks. And then wonder why people don't like them. Or their vision for society.
You only get so far when you argue at people, rather than over positions.
Don't agree with everything Ani O'Brien says or writes. For instance, I will happily address transgender women with she and her if they demand it, including under the threat of real or theatrically posed punishments.
If Labour keeps plowing the woke identity politics road it runs the risk of losing its social liberals; people, ironically, who have no issue with whatever coupling or self description you might imagine but who hate being told how to act or speak, especially by brain dead entertainer-influencers with the PM on speed dial. Some of whom who have received, frightfully, government funding; or, worse, have been put on a panel around mooted legislative, even constitutional, changes!
But not being a traditional values person by any stretch of the imagination or anything else I would like propose another category in direct opposition to the scalds and wowsers of the woke left: the libertine left.
Who’s with me? You have nothing to lose but your chains (or a lot of lawyerish small talk before Lola applies your chains).
fwiw, I thought you comment at 2 was coherent political analysis. Not sure which of it I agree with, but disappointed that so many here are still either missing the point of what Obrien was saying, or simply don't care.
I think there's background confusion about what rights are. Confusion around negative and positive rights and so forth. There's a lot of incoherence among these doctrinaire types. For instance, they are likely dismissing the rights / beliefs of a lot of Muslim women, too.
Half a century ago, it was 1969, man walked on Moon, hippie did Woodstock, I first used a computer. It belonged to the University of Auckland, filled a room so big you couldn't even eyeball the whole thing. Six years on, I had my second computer experience.
1975 Vid-Com trained me as a videotape editor, and I became the second-equal kiwi to make colour television – the year before it got transmission. Our system was powered by a PDP-11, small enough to sit in a rack and about the size of the average large chillybin.
In "October 2019, a Sycamore processor created in conjunction with Google AI Quantum was reported to have achieved quantum supremacy, with calculations more than 3,000,000 times as fast as those of Summit, generally considered the world's fastest computer."
Just a couple of months back. So we await further confirmation. Remember how the initial reports of cold fusion failed confirmation testing? Sometimes scientists & engineers misinterpret results. Replication is essential in scientific learning. A reminder that our social reality is constructed via consensus. Truth, in science, can't be merely asserted, even if scientists often demonstrate their humanity by trying to get away with unvalidated assertions…
Russian singer Mary Marisol has released a rap song in solidarity with people of Idlib province who are under a major offensive by the Syrian regime and key ally Russia.
Marisol's song, titled “From Russia with Love and Bombs”, portrays scenes of war and destruction in Idlib, its suffering civilians, and the Russian invasion of Syria….
She said that her song, written by her and composed by Dela Music, came as a response to the song by Amir Al Maarawi, with the purpose to confirm that there are Russian citizens who do not support the military incursion into Syria. She is hoping that the Russians will recognize the propaganda that the government is disseminating and realize what the Russian army is actually doing in their name and with their taxes.
The artist explained that she is facing strong opposition and hatred from supporters of the current Russian regime, who are accusing her of being “an enemy of the people”, but she also insists that there is a large number of rational people who want peace.
More than 235,000 people have fled the Idlib region over the past two weeks, the UN said Friday, amid heightened regime and Russian attacks on Syria's last major opposition bastion.
The mass displacement between 12 and 25 December has left the violence-plagued Maaret al-Numan region in southern Idlib "almost empty," the UN said in a statement.
"The militants controlling the Syrian city of Maarat al-Numan in the Idlib province have refused to give it up peacefully during negotiations with the Syrian government, Omar Rahmon, a member of the National Reconciliation Committee, said on Wednesday.
"The terrorist groups that are active in Maarat al-Numan have refused to initiate any reconciliation [process], despite the civilians' strong desire to rejoin the government", Rahmon said in an interview with the newspaper.
On Monday, Rahmon told the Syrian al-Watan newspaper that the Syrian authorities were negotiating the city's surrender, but the chances of that were slim. He accused the militants that run the city of acting on the orders of Turkey.
Idlib remains a major terrorist stronghold, being home to an estimated 10,000 jihadists from various factions, according to the UN Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team."
…..Idlib remains a major terrorist stronghold, being home to an estimated 10,000 jihadists from various factions, according to the UN Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team.”
In a Fight Over Syria, Echoes of Spain’s Civil War and the Battle for Truth in Guernica
…..In the days after the firebombing of the undefended Basque town of Guernica, on April 26, 1937, Spain’s embattled government drew attention to what was then an unprecedented atrocity, the result of more than three hours of airstrikes carried out by a fleet of bombers dispatched by Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini in support of their fascist ally, Gen. Francisco Franco.
Within 24 hours, as the blogger Joey Ayoub noted in a discussion of Syria last week, spokespersons for Franco’s rebel junta offered an alternative explanation. Guernica, the fascists said, had not been bombed at all, but set on fire by their retreating enemies as part of a plot to garner international sympathy…..
…..Although Steer’s report, which inspired Pablo Picasso to begin work on his painting about the massacre, was entirely accurate, Franco’s press office immediately offered a counternarrative, claiming in a statement headlined “Lies, Lies, Lies,” that the Basque president, José Antonio Aguirre, was attempting to blame the fascist air force for fires set by his own troops.
Pure lies, Says Berlin
Wireless to The New York Times.
Berlin,April 29. – The Diplomatische Korrespondenz, semi-official organ of the Foreign Office, after characterizing as pure lies reports that German planes participated in the bombing of Guernica, reminds the world and particularly Britain, that aerial bombing has been freely resorted to in Northwestern India and Aden.
The communique says that this evidently was overlooked by the Opposition in the Brtitsh Parliament. No country deplores more than Germany that methods of warfare are still employed that result in the suffering for cicilian populations, the paper continues.
Attention is drawn to Chancellor Adolf Hitler’s appeal of May 21, 1935, when he proposed an international agreement to stigmatize all air bombings as barbarism and forbid them absolutely. But this proposal, says the communique, “was unfortunately ignored by powers that at that time felt they possessed far superior air forces.”
German newsreels and propaganda of the time gave huge coverage of the crimes of the British Empire, and it was all true. The crimes of British Imperialism are some of the bloodiest in human history, resulting in over 40,000,000 dead. As well as death by fire and sword, carried out in countless wars of invasion, occupation and suppression, millions more died by disease and neglect resulting from imperial policies of economic dislocation and appropriation, theft and slavery.
Exposed to this twisted one-sided propaganda, millions of German Socialists and Leftists became committed National Socialists.
Thats not how it works unfortunately, for some reason lefties look down on certain occupations (armed forces, police, corrections) so arn't inclined to offer decent pay rises to corrections (2.5% pay rise is what was offered and accepted)
I can't explain it better then anyone else can because I simply can't understand it. I mean if I was a mum and had a 15 year old daughter and 12 year old sons the last thing I'd do is invite a junkie ex-con gang member into my home.
New Zealand is again having to reconcile conflicting pressures from its military and its trade interests. Should we join Pillar Two of AUKUS and risk compromising our markets in China? For a century after New Zealand was founded in 1840, its external security arrangements and external economics arrangements were aligned. ...
The ‘50 Shades of Green’ farmers’ protest in 2019 was heavy on climate change denial, but five years on, scepticism and criticism about the idea that pine forests can save us is growing across the board. File photo: Lynn GrievesonTL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate ...
This morning the sky was bright.The birds, in their usual joyous bliss. Nature doesn’t seem to feel the heat of what might angst humans.Their calls are clear and beautiful.Just some random thoughts:MāoriPaul Goldsmith has announced his government will roll back the judiciary’s rulings on Māori Customary Marine Title, which recognises ...
In 2003, the Court of Appeal delivered its decision in Ngati Apa v Attorney-General, ruling that Māori customary title over the foreshore and seabed had not been universally extinguished, and that the Māori Land Court could determine claims and confirm title if the facts supported it. This kicked off the ...
Earlier this week at Parliament, Labour leader Chris Hipkins was applauded for saying that the response to the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care had to be “bigger than politics.” True, but the fine words, apologies and “we hear you” messages will soon ring ...
TL;DR: In news breaking this morning:The Ministry of Education is cutting $2 billion from its school building programme so the National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government has enough money to deliver tax cuts; The Government has quietly lowered its child poverty reduction targets to make them easier to achieve;Te Whatu Ora-Health NZ’s ...
Kia ora. These are some stories that caught our eye this week – as always, feel free to share yours in the comments. Our header image this week (via Eke Panuku) shows the planned upgrade for the Karanga Plaza Tidal Swimming Steps. The week in Greater Auckland On ...
1. What's not to love about the way the Harris campaign is turning things around?a. Nothingb. Love all of itc. God what a reliefd. Not that it will be by any means easye. All of the above 2. Documents released by the Ministry of Health show Associate Health Minister Casey ...
Trust in me in all you doHave the faith I have in youLove will see us through, if only you trust in meWhy don't you, you trust me?In a week that saw the release of the 3,000 page Abuse in Care report Christopher Luxon was being asked about Boot Camps. ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking about the Royal Commission Inquiry into Abuse in Carereport released this week, and with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent on a UN push to not recognise carbon offset markets and ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 26, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Transport: Simeon Brown announced$802.9 million in funding for 18 new trains on the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines, which ...
The northern expressway extension from Warkworth to Whangarei is likely to require radical changes to legislation if it is going to be built within the foreseeable future. The Government’s powers to purchase land, the planning process and current restrictions on road tolling are all going to need to be changed ...
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedFirst they came for the doctors But I was confused by the numbers and costs So I didn't speak up Then they came for our police and nurses And I didn't think we could afford those costs anyway So I ...
Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on UnsplashWe’re back again after our mid-winter break. We’re still with the ‘new’ day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when we have our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm.Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream ...
Notes: This is a free article. Abuse in Care themes are mentioned. Video is at the bottom.BackgroundYesterday’s report into Abuse in Care revealed that at least 1 in 3 of all who went through state and faith based care were abused - often horrifically. At least, because not all survivors ...
Luxon speaks in Parliament yesterday about the Abuse in Care report. Photo: Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:PM Christopher Luxon said yesterday in tabling the Abuse in Carereport in Parliament he wanted to ‘do the ...
About a decade ago I worked with a bloke called Steve. He was the grizzled veteran coder, a few years older than me, who knew where the bodies were buried - code wise. Despite his best efforts to be approachable and friendly he could be kind of gruff, through to ...
Some of the recent announcements from the government have reminded us of posts we’ve written in the past. Here’s one from early 2020. There were plenty of reactions to the government’s infrastructure announcement a few weeks ago which saw them fund a bunch of big roading projects. One of ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Thursday, July 25 are:News: Why Electric Kiwi is closing to new customers - and why it matters RNZ’s Susan EdmundsScoop: Government drops ...
Hi,I felt a small wet tongue snaking through one of the holes in my Crocs. It explored my big toe, darting down one side, then the other. “He’s looking for some toe cheese,” said the woman next to me, words that still haunt me to this day.Growing up in New ...
Yesterday I happily quoted the Prime Minister without fact-checking him and sure enough, it turns out his numbers were all to hell. It’s not four kg of Royal Commission report, it’s fourteen.My friend and one-time colleague-in-comms Hazel Phillips gently alerted me to my error almost as soon as I’d hit ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Thursday, July 25, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day were:The Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquirypublished its final report yesterday.PM Christopher Luxon and The Minister responsible for ...
The Official Information Act has always been a battle between requesters seeking information, and governments seeking to control it. Information is power, so Ministers and government agencies want to manage what is released and when, for their own convenience, and legality and democracy be damned. Their most recent tactic for ...
TL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown is accelerating plans to spend at least $10 billion through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) to extend State Highway One as a four-lane ‘Expressway’ from Warkworth to Whangarei ...
I live my life (woo-ooh-ooh)With no control in my destinyYea-yeah, yea-yeah (woo-ooh-ooh)I can bleed when I want to bleedSo come on, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)You can bleed when you want to bleedYea-yeah, come on (woo-ooh-ooh)Everybody bleed when they want to bleedCome on and bleedGovernments face tough challenges. Selling unpopular decisions to ...
Please note:To skip directly to the- parliamentary footage in the video, scroll to 1:21 To skip to audio please click on the headphone iconon the left hand side of the screenThis video / audio section is under development. ...
Given the crackdown on wasteful government spending, it behooves me to point to a high profile example of spending by the Luxon government that looks like a big, fat waste of time and money. I’m talking about the deployment of NZDF personnel to support the US-led coalition in the Red ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:40 am on Wednesday, July 24 are:Deep Dive: Chipping away at the housing crisis, including my comments RNZ/Newsroom’s The DetailNews: Government softens on asset sales, ...
As I reported about the city centre, Auckland’s rail network is also going through a difficult and disruptive period which is rapidly approaching a culmination, this will result in a significant upgrade to the whole network. Hallelujah. Also like the city centre this is an upgrade predicated on the City ...
Today, a 4 kilogram report will be delivered to Parliament. We know this is what the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care weighs, because our Prime Minister told us so.Some reporter had blindsided him by asking a question about something done by ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Wednesday, July 24, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Beehive:Transport Minister Simeon Brownannounced plans to use PPPs to fund, build and run a four-lane expressway between Auckland ...
NewstalkZB host Mike Hosking, who can usually be relied on to give Prime Minister Christopher Luxon an easy run, did not do so yesterday when he interviewed him about the HealthNZ deficit. Luxon is trying to use a deficit reported last year by HealthNZ as yet another example of the ...
Back in January a StatsNZ employee gave a speech at Rātana on behalf of tangata whenua in which he insulted and criticised the government. The speech clearly violated the principle of a neutral public service, and StatsNZ started an investigation. Part of that was getting an external consultant to examine ...
Renting for life: Shared ownership initiatives are unlikely to slow the slide in home ownership by much. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy today are:A Deloittereport for Westpac has projected Aotearoa’s home-ownership rate will ...
You're broken down and tiredOf living life on a merry go roundAnd you can't find the fighterBut I see it in you so we gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsWe gonna walk it outAnd move mountainsAnd I'll rise upI'll rise like the dayI'll rise upI'll rise unafraidI'll rise upAnd I'll ...
There’s been a change in Myers Park. Down the steps from St. Kevin’s Arcade, past the grassy slopes, the children’s playground, the benches and that goat statue, there has been a transformation. The underpass for Mayoral Drive has gone from a barren, grey, concrete tunnel, to a place that thrums ...
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections Global society may have finally slammed on the brakes for climate-warming pollution released by human fossil fuel combustion. According to the Carbon Monitor Project, the total global climate pollution released between February and May 2024 declined slightly from the amount released during the same ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Tuesday, July 23 are:Deep Dive: Penlink: where tolling rhetoric meets reality BusinessDesk-$$$’sOliver LewisScoop:Te Pūkenga plans for regional polytechs leak out ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Tuesday, July 23, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:Health: Shane Reti announcedthe Board of Te Whatu Ora-Health New Zealand was being replaced with Commissioner Lester Levy ...
Health NZ warned the Government at the end of March that it was running over Budget. But the reasons it gave were very different to those offered by the Prime Minister yesterday. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon blamed the “botched merger” of the 20 District Health Boards (DHBs) to create Health ...
Long ReadKey Summary: Although National increased the health budget by $1.4 billion in May, they used an old funding model to project health system costs, and never bothered to update their pre-election numbers. They were told during the Health Select Committees earlier in the year their budget amount was deficient, ...
As a momentous, historic weekend in US politics unfolded, analysts and commentators grasped for precedents and comparisons to help explain the significance and power of the choice Joe Biden had made. The 46th president had swept the Democratic party’s primaries but just over 100 days from the election had chosen ...
TL;DR: I’m casting around for new ideas and ways of thinking about Aotearoa’s political economy to find a few solutions to our cascading and self-reinforcing housing, poverty and climate crises.Associate Professor runs an online masters degree in the economics of sustainability at Torrens University in Australia and is organising ...
The Finance and Expenditure Committee has reported back on National's Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill. The bill sets up water for privatisation, and was introduced under urgency, then rammed through select committee with no time even for local councils to make a proper submission. Naturally, national's select committee ...
Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
Despite having no bars or other designated spaces for lesbians, Auckland boasts a small but mighty lesbian museum. So how did it get here? The past 18 months has brought increasing hostility towards the queer community across Aotearoa. Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s anti-trans rally in Tamaki Makaurau last March led to a ...
Poneke Antifascist Coalition has invited Wellingtonians to stand in solidarity with the Kanak people at 12pm today outside the French Embassy in Wellington. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Layton, Visiting Fellow, Strategic Studies, Griffith University Drones are the signature technology of the Ukraine war. A few miniature aircraft designs were used in the war’s early days, but an incredible array of drones have now evolved. There are different types, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Slee, Associate Professor, Clinical Academic Neurologist, Flinders University Francisco Gonzelez/Unsplash Migraine is many things, but one thing it’s not is “just a headache”. “Migraine” comes from the Greek word “hemicrania”, referring to the common experience of migraine being predominantly ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lee White, Senior Lecturer and Horizon Fellow, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney Australia was slow to introduce minimum building standards for energy efficiency. The Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS) only came into force in 2003. Older homes ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steven Sherwood, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, Climate Change Research Centre, UNSW Sydney The past century of human-induced warming has increased rainfall variability over 75% of the Earth’s land area – particularly over Australia, Europe and eastern North America, new research shows. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Heynen, Program Coordinator, Sustainable Energy, The University of Queensland A temporary stadium in the Champ-de-Mars, ParisEkaterina Pokrovsky/Shutterstock As Paris prepares to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the sustainability of the event is coming under scrutiny. The organisers have promoted ...
A night of karaoke and community in a pub that feels like a memory. You’d barely even notice it, unless you knew to look. Tucked away behind a liquor store on busy Constable Street is the capital’s last great pub. Newtown Sports Bar is an emblem of the pub culture ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Wright, Professor in Marine Geology, University of Canterbury Louise Corcoran/Getty Images The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy. Aotearoa New Zealand’s ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurie Berg, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney defotoberg/Shutterstock Migrant worker exploitation is entrenched in workplaces across Australia. Tragically, a deep fear of immigration consequences means most unlawful employer conduct goes unreported. On Wednesday, however, the government officially launched a ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vaughan Cruickshank, Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education, University of Tasmania Paris is about to host its third summer Olympics. While we don’t yet know what the legacy of this year’s games will be, let’s take the opportunity to reflect on ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hugh Breakey, Deputy Director, Institute for Ethics, Governance & Law, Griffith University In the wake of the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, there were calls from bothsides of US politics, as well as internationally, to reduce the brutal, ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Keith Rathbone, Senior Lecturer, Modern European History and Sports History, Macquarie University Two high-profile assaults on Australians in Paris have raised concerns about security ahead of the Olympic Games. On Saturday evening, a young woman was allegedly sexually assaulted by a ...
Dying is inevitable and, so it seems, is it costing a lot, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund in today’s extract from The Bulletin. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here.The cost of dying ...
The government took Joyce Harris's first baby and sent her off to a girls' home. Half a century on - and out of oceans of hurt - it asked her to be a mother figure. ...
It’s the deadliest fictional town in the country, but which death has been the most bonkers? Alex Casey looks back at 10 seasons of The Brokenwood Mysteries to find out. Warning: The following ranking story contains famous New Zealand actors appearing to be dead (not alive). The Spinoff has been ...
Water cremation is the biggest thing to happen to the death industry in the last 100 years. Alex Casey meets the people trying to bring it to Aotearoa. Through a set of mirrored doors down the industrial end of Christchurch’s St Asaph Street, death is getting a new lease on ...
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/118491108/turn-down-the-hysterics-on-turnardern-or-risk-alienating-many-on-the-left
Are the more rabid lefties turning people off?
Bullying a silly git who turned a few books over is going to far.
Indeed, there are lessons from overseas about this:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/19/labour-working-class-voters-brexit
'After three years of leave supporters being dismissed as racist and stupid, and seeing Labour eventually get off the fence and back the People’s Vote campaign, how on earth did the party expect its leave supporters to react?'
The reason Corbyn was for leaving the EU was because he wanted to re-nationalise the railways, energy, water, etc., which was against EU rules, but the Blairites in the party would not allow this and insisted on siding with the LibDems (some of them getting right behind the reprehensible ant-semitism smear campaign run by all the media outlets except the mirror and the morning star that is now being used on Sanders in the US to silence him too). The inquest that the Labour Party are currently running is being controlled by the same people that wanted a second vote, so don’t expect much clarity from that either.
….but those on the right are simply allowed to fling whatever they like at the left..
By the way, Col Wilson is NOT working class. He owns a bricklaying company. He is pretty bourgeois. He would quite happily vote those in retail and hospitality lower wages and shitty conditions if it meant he got a tax cut. The so called white working class ie tradies dont give a shit about solidarity anymore. They want the Bach, boat and BMW, and are willing to screw over their brothers an sisters to get it.
Agree Millsy. I think our Col is the typical impotent grumpy old Tory pakeha male who knows the world has passed him by. Vilifying younger women, especially those in power, is the only thing that makes him feel powerful again.
Ani O'Brien is a kid who doesn't know what she is talking about.
Her presumption that those who are "turning" on this dinosaur from the South are bona-fida "lefties" from Labour or the Green parties (which is what she is inferring) is likely to be nonsense born out of her own ignorance and feverish imagination.
Assuming she is a journo, it was her own profession that caused the song and dance about a piddling gotcha-type story and alerted the international press in the first place. The culprits are more likely ne'er do wells who don't belong to either parties and are taking an opportunity to create a bigger stir.
Good way to smear and down-grade the centre-left during the barbie season though isn't it.
Pfft to her. Wonder if her National Party controllers wrote the piece?
There. You are not providing room in the tent for Labour supporters with different views. Some are probably even more liberal in many ways than you, too.
You're crazy. Stop it.
I guessed someone would not compute the inherent sarcasm. It was silly little billy. 🙄
Are you on twitter Anne? Because this played out there quite distinctly before the media picked it up. Imo she's not referring to Green or Labour party people, but the left generally.
Suggesting she has National handlers because she critiques the left is pretty much the problem she is pointing to.
That was a spot of sarcasm weka. I thought it would be obvious so didn't bother with the sarc tab.
And no, I’m not on twitter or facebook. Have no desire to be.
Check out my 1.5.1.1.2.1.
Funny way to point to such a problem.
your whole comment was sarcasm? Or just the bit about the handlers? What's the point, that she is right wing? It's still a smear /irony.
weka. You're too intelligent to have to spell it out to you. I was referring to the "Nat controller" comment. It was not a genuine question but a tongue in cheek bit of sarcasm.
I have checked out Ani's twitter feed.
She has been banging this particular drum for some time. Loves to throw around terms like "woke", "SJW" and "working class" but never really eleborates on what policies she wants the Labour party to have.
It only leads me to suspect further that the general idea among the establishment is that the 'working class family' should be the one depicted in Loretta Lynn's song "Coal Miner's Daughter". Nothing about unions, class conciousness, mutual banking and insurance services, soildarity (ie not selling out those in retail and hospitality). Even religion was at least questioned.
The people who have attacked the silly old git turning the magazines over look like identity politics devotees who are over-invested in the personality and gender of Jacinda. Their over-reaction to the silly old git has opened us all up to this bogus concern-trolling by yet another right-wing 'journalist' pretending to be of the left.
Yeah, let's not overreact.
/
https://twitter.com/GregReardon76/status/1211049996667125760
Joe – of course TurnArdern is saturated with misogyny. Calling it out is fine. But making threats against the guy or publishing details about him is beyond stupid.
I haven't seen anyone clearly from "the left"attacking "the silly old git"- when I first heard of the campaign (through social media) it was from apparent supporters of the campaign joking about it, then it was predictably picked up by the media, then the backlash. Has it been talked about on The Standard?
I am surprised there have not been reports of threats of violence (unidentified) from the left, and calls for calm from some clearly left person. Did the campaign get things a little out of order, or is it working exactly as planned? Can anyone identify any evidence of anything that fits the description "the characteristically hysterical response of the increasingly militant and intolerant section of the Left who are determined to attribute the most horrendous of social crimes to anyone who holds opinions contrary to theirs."? Is it conceivable that someone somewhere may have pretended to be from the left and mischievously posted and extremist view? Surely not!
There was talk in the article of "threats" – which can be anywhere from boycotting his company to police-actionable threats againstl ife and limb, yet no further information beyond "threats" is available, it seems.
I would suggest that serious threats run contrary to the vibe our current PM inspires, but who knows – there can be tossers anywhere, so actual threats are theoretically possible, I guess.
I don't think that the people calling the boomer manbaby "racist" are doing so basd on his latest activities. I gather (including from comments here) it has to do with some now-deleted tweets from March or thereabouts.
But the basic idea "turning books gets called racism" is consistent for Speak Up for Bigots. Didn't know why the name was familiar until I saw the line at the bottom.
…Speak Up for Bigots…
How about if those of us who conclusively aren't women avoid posting comments like this, as a flame retardant measure? I don't think female readers of this blog really want to see two men arguing about who's an acceptable feminist and what a woman is.
Regardless of the trans argument, it seems that they are quite literally speaking up for a bigot who has a problem (among other problems) with a woman in a position of power.
In her role as chair of Speak Up For Women, Ani O'Brien has gained a lot of experience of pile-ons by irate postmodernists offended that someone should hold opinions they don't agree with, so I'm willing to cut her some slack in this instance. I think the OP was wrong, in that the potential loss of the South Island racist vote isn't something that should keep Labour strategists awake at night, but I can also see her point: a lot of people aren't going to trouble themselves to delve into it far enough to find out why this prick is being called a racist, but they might well pay enough attention to decide they're seeing a working class guy being dipped in shit by smart-arse middle-class liberals. Identity politics is a bitch.
After looking at joe90s tweet link . Na shes fucked up . If you going to go to print calling out people for attacking someone you need to show all the reason why the one being attacked is coping it. Makes one wonder if she isnt a dishonest cur
Lord save me from conservative reactionaries and their concern for the left's share of the votes. It always ends up with the proposition that the only way the left can win an election is by actively courting bigots (of whatever flavour).
Which is like curing thirst by drinking petrol. Rather than providing relief, it's incompatible with the basic functioning of the organism.
Not just speaking up for a bigot but effectively agreeing with him.
Take for example the following excerpts from the link provided:
She calls that benign? Removing magazines from supermarket shelves as we saw in one TV video clip and chucking them in a corner as if Ardern is some tart not worthy of display. Call that benign?
No they're not when they make protests intended to smear and demean.
I don't recall that but if it happened my guess it was an isolated incident or two. This chump set up an online site asking for people throughout the country to join him in his puerile protest – a protest which is based on a lie in the first place.
Call that benign?
In context, yes. For example, the context in which Don Brash gets mud thrown on his clothes and Stephen Joyce gets smacked in the face with a dildo – turning book displays around is benign by comparison.
People should be free to protest Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern without being subjected to threats, writes Ani O'Brien.
Seriously, you're disputing that statement? Wtf?
This chump set up an online site asking for people throughout the country to join him in his puerile protest…
You do get that people are allowed to do that in this country, right?
… turning book displays around is benign by comparison.
In the physical sense yes, but in a psychological sense? No.
It is all part of a campaign to deride Jacinda Ardern, to create a false sense of her supposed lack of capabilities and to fool people into believing the lies and innuendo and the fake stories that inevitably follow.
It is "Dirty Politics II" and we've seen the terrible toll that took on people in the firing line.
Stop it in its tracks I say. Hopefully, the hostility the chump in question has apparently been subjected to, might make all the other chumps think twice before indulging in similar acts.
"Regardless of the trans argument, it seems that they are quite literally speaking up for a bigot who has a problem (among other problems) with a woman in a position of power."
Someone on twitter was saying this too. Can you please point to the bit you think is her defending or speaking up for Col? Because I saw her critiquing the left and not being particularly supportive of him (or them).
The bit where she conflated calling him racist with his book-turning campaign. Two different issues, but putting them together supports her argument that his critics are practising hyperbole, rather than responding rationally to each of his multiple stupidities. Thereby defending him from his critics.
I thought that bit was off too. My own position is that I'm concerned about strategy. Many on the left seem to think that doing the hard man stuff will help. I'm not saying this out of sympathy for Col (bar the doxxing and threats), but rather it's the many invisible people on twitter, FB, and now reading the papers who were undecided and are now shifting towards the right, not because Col is right and the left are wrong, but because of how the left are approaching the issue. This is my understanding of what OBrien is saying too. If it had just been about Col, then maybe the response was useful. But it wasn't just about him.
FWIW, having seen Col around, but not followed closey what he does, I just assumed he was part of the twitter RWers who are there to shit stir for National.
The opinion piece was a run of the mill tone argument, from my perspective. Unless they can provide decent metrics, 99% of the time "if you keep doing this you lose votes" translate to "if you keep doing this, my personal vote will go to someone else, but in all probability I would have voted for them anyway but felt a little bit bad about it".
But even if it were true and the left needs to tolerate social conservatism to the point of bigotry in order to win an election, that strikes me as being a suicidal "victory". I'm all for incrementalism, but pandering to the mythical Waitakere Man is active regression. How far should it go? Failing to punish racism in meetings? Sexual harrassment? Homophobic bullying? Sitting there and smiling through gritted teeth when epithets are flung around, making people visibly uncomfortable?
Because the yanks and the blowback into NZ have taught me that the social conservatives won't compromise. So if one group in society has to smile through gritted teeth, I'd rather it be them.
I don't think that was her argument though. If I get the time I'll ask her, Leaving aside our respective interpretations of her piece, the issue for me isn't about tolerating racists, it's about how we respond. I'm not arguing for incrementalism (I think the centre left has that covered), I'm saying that like others I'm watching lefties/progressive shift away from the left and the left saying things like 'don't let the door hit you on the way out'. At another time that might be funny, but not in a world of Trumpian politics. The solution isn't to be incremental, it's to be respectful and where possible kind. Not to Col, but to the people who are on the verge of being influenced.
I'm not opposed to kindness, until kindness to one person is cruelty to another.
The same organisation can't be a welcoming space for vulnerable groups if it's also a welcoming space for bigots against those groups.
So we have to have a line. And it has to be clear. "Don't let the door hit you on the way out" is as clear as it gets.
"Because the yanks and the blowback into NZ have taught me that the social conservatives won't compromise."
How has NZ become more liberal then? That's happening faster than natural attrition via death.
Because NZ conservatives are less well funded than the US – we have fewer belts of fundies and fewer corporate evangelicals.
But they learn from the US, and it could easily go the other way, because we also have cols in NZ. And SST, and density church, and the nats have signalled they will embrace that lot like the repugs embraced the US equivalents.
The downside of there being no permanent defeat is that there's no permanent victory, either.
oab's on form
https://twitter.com/1anonymousbloke/status/1211023048083525632
Ani O'Brien is the chair of Speak up for Women. Their very existence is to oppose Greens policy.
Seems to me they speak up for women not to protect against dominant patriarchy but to protect against transgender rights, progressive politics and specifically the Greens.
What confuses me about people like Ani O'Brien and Ryan Bridge is that they fight against the very type of activism which enabled they themselves to freely identify and enjoy equal rights as gay people in modern society.
Ladder-kickers much?
Oh great, another man wants to tell women how feminists are wrong. Please just stop.
Well, in fact, it’s about the politics.
But continue being the hall monitor. It suits you.
Sure, your claim that these feminists aren't opposing patriarchal oppression but are instead doing some other shit you made up is totally, totally just about the politics. /sarc
Her opinion piece in Stuff was purely political. Her organisation defines itself as opposing particular political legislation.
I loved the threat she made about being 'reluctantly left'. Sounds like she wants to leave because the left is too progressive and not traditional enough. Amazing that a militant gay feminist would come down on the side of tradition when it suits her! She's on the same side of the argument as Bob McCoskie, ffs.
Don't let the door hit your arse on the way out, Ani.
"Don't let the door hit your arse on the way out, Ani."
Wow. You really think it's not a problem that people are radicalising away from the left? Because from where I'm standing, we're approaching a point of crisis and the left seems to think it is assured of winning. Remember what happened in the 2016 US election?
I just don't think it was a big deal. One person tweeted publicly available information and that seems to be the basis of ongoing article about the treatment of poor old Colin Wilson.
Ani O'Brien tried to paint all lefties as hysterical when everyone had forgotten about it.
That's political.
what wasn't a big deal? This isn't about a single tweet, it's an evolving dynamic over a number of weeks, largely based around leftie twitter (and in the context of a much longer dynamic of how the left are responding to the right there) that has now spilled over into the MSM.
OBrien didn't paint all lefties as hysterical, she pointed to a problem that increasing numbers of people are concerned about, intolerance on the left. I'm seeing it in the leftie responses to her article many of which start with undermining her rather than addressing her points.
maybe the 'left' needs to
a. entice the people to vote who don't vote at all
b. stop running after the conservative vote as if it were better then the votes of the people who have stopped voting
c. grow some spine and actually stand for something more then a 50$ heating aid for some in winter that will be cut of the programm next time the no mates party wins.
d. understand and acknowledge that allies don't have to be on the left.
Heck i don't consider myself the 'left' no more then i consider myself ' right'. I consider myself without representation by all the parties.
Too rich to profit of labours welfare hand outs, to poor for the no mates parties tax cut hand outs, but rich enough to be fleeced to death by both parties. As for the Greens, NZFirst …..just nothing for no one other then job creation for themselves.
As for the 2016 election, i remember the shit i got from many here that were only concerend with the economic anxiety of the 'white male working class' as being the underdog. Cause the women workers – of color or white – fuck em, the kids? fuck em, the mexicans and brown people running away from their fucked up countries? fuck em. And so on and so on.
and now we are to be scared into voting for the Left cause 2016? Good grief, we are so fucked if that is why we are to vote for 'the left'.
if you believe there are enough votes on the left and in the non-vote to shift the Overton Window, and prevent rising fascism, then all power to you in getting more people voting for progressive parties. I’d love to see the non-voters enfranchised.
However I’m not convinced that this is sufficient, although it’s obviously necessary. I’m not arguing for the left to go after conservative voters by compromising something. I’m not even really talking about voting here. I’m saying that we need to address the things that are polarising NZ, and where people are radicalising away from liberal values or left wing politics, and where people who have no political home end up feeling valued and welcomed by the right.
I remember the shit storm of 2016 on TS too, and have paid a price for trying to shift the culture here. Ironically, it’s that experience as much as anything that informs my current view. It’s not one group that is polarising or radicalising, there are really complex dynamics shifting in the culture, and the old left/right paradigm doesn’t have dominance. The left still seems to be largely operating as if it does and that the left can somehow win if we just push virtue hard enough. Meanwhile, the people that are telling us there is something wrong are being shown the door.
That's the way it came across to me too Muttonbird and I had never heard of her nor had any knowledge of her background. But the fact it was a political piece masquerading as something else seemed clear to me.
It's not that it's too progressive. You don't get it, do you? It's because it is too authoritarian. That's how you can alienate both social conservatives and social liberals – dare I say, the "libertine left" – at the same time!
Identity politics has destroyed contemporary labour the world over. The party born of solidarity between disparate groups living and sometimes suffering under the same circumstances cannot bring itself to allow scriptural divergence from Gender Trouble circa 1990, University of Berkeley California, etc, but tolerates class humiliation every day in the form of disgust ridden car window media lectures from former pop stars and models etc.
I'd say that denying transgender people their chosen identity is the authoritarian position.
Basically if you can't afford the treatment and surgery you are not allowed to identify as the gender you identify with.
It's actually a double war on a particular maginalised population.
But then war on the marginalised is a specialty of the right wing isn't it Billy?
I was not aware that Ani O'Brien was denying people their chosen identity.
If you want to talk about this in terms of rights, Ani O'Brien is a woman who does not want to share intimate spaces with people she considers biologically male. That’s been the practical, real world example through all of this, has it not?
Is there not an awkward but practical solution to this? Why not build four sets of changing rooms from now on: for men, for women, and for women who desire greater privacy than many other women expect? The need for the latter may increase as the population shifts to include a more diverse group of cultural backgrounds with their own ideas of culture, sex, the body, and so forth. We didn't always have disabled toilets. From now on we might need two sets of changing rooms for women. Shouldn’t the debate for a progressive be able accommodating as many people as possible, or are you some sort of cultural supremacist, blinded by an arguably time-limited ideology?
More widely, I don't see how O'Brien is oppressing transgender people by refusing to recognize that gender isn't tied to sex. Not practically, as in the previous example, in respect of Ani's rights against what is a fairly recent cultural change in attitude (you'd think it was written on stone tablets).
I meant: Shouldn’t the debate for a progressive be about accommodating as many people as possible, or are you some sort of cultural supremacist…
btw Would be quite amusing to have multiple women’s changing rooms labelled “progressive women” and “social libertarian and social conservative women”.
"I was not aware that Ani O'Brien was denying people their chosen identity."
I don't think she does. SUFW's opposition is to putting self-ID into law. Afaik they're not opposing official ID via state sanctioned assessment (which doesn't require medical transition anyway). Nor are they saying that trans ppl can't identify socially how they choose, although obviously there is a conflict between their view on sex/gender and that of trans activists.
Why not build four sets of changing rooms from now on
Why not build eight and have people of colour separated as well, keep the racists happy too.
"Basically if you can't afford the treatment and surgery you are not allowed to identify as the gender you identify with."
Are you saying that OBrien's political position is that trans ppl without medical transition shouldn't be allowed to present as the gender they identify as? If that is what you are saying, you'll need to back that up now, or withdraw the comment. I don't want to get into moderator mode, but this is such a contentious issue that care is needed when presenting facts, especially about public figures. Afaik this is not AB's position, so you'll need to provide some evidence.
O'Brien is being willfully misrepresented, I agree.
The evidence is their campaign against the sex self-ID amendment being pushed through as part of the BDMRR Bill.
This stance has been criticised by transgender advocacy groups as discriminating against low income transgender people who cannot afford to provide the required medical evidence.
I had a quick read of the SUFW website and it seems to be populated mainly by articles about how they and their speakers have been banned from events rather than offering alternative solutions to the BDMRR bill to which they are so opposed.
I'm happy to read further into this if that is what you require for me to keep my commenting privileges.
you need to quote (and link) evidence to back up your assertion that AB wants to deny non-medically transitioned trans ppl the right to identify as they want. The onus is on you to spell it out, not expect me to read a link and parse what you are referring to.l
and your link doesn’t support your assertion. l
I'm putting myself in the position of a transgender person who, as per the Gender Minorities Aotearoa website, wants to be able to identify with, in law, their chosen gender without intrusion or major cost. The amendments seek to:
I think the Gender Minorities Aotearoa website is very thorough on why this is important to low income transgender people.
SUFW opposes the bill to make it easier for transgender people to change the marker on their birth certificate because:
and:
To me, and this is just my opinion, this is straight out of the Family First handbook.
As other have pointed out, were not these very same oppositions presented by traditionalists when the argument of gay rights arose?
It's not authoritarianism, it's freedom.
Many people no longer feel compelled to smile politely and make small talk over dinner with someone who would happily see them or their loved ones dead in a ditch.
What is authoritarian about giving rights to trans people? Was it also too authoritarian when lesbians were given rights?
I am not saying it is authoritarian to grant transgender people rights.
I am saying it is authoritarian to demand that people all adopt the same beliefs and speech according to some existing doctrine, or ideological view.
This troubling and humouless ideological rigidity is bad news for the Labour party as it doesn’t just alienate conservatives with departing views but many social liberals also.
so what you saying there then billy boy? Muttonbird was talking about SUFW opposing rights for trans people.
In the transactivist/gender critical feminist war, the authoritarianism comes in the form of things* like suppression of debate. It's brutal and whatever else is going on in the rights and wrongs of that war, that suppression of debate should be a big concern to the left.
*to make that a bigger list, left wing GCFs (i.e. politicised, progressive women) get rape and death threats, people pissing on their doors at work, fired or threats to their careers, visits from the police for tweets that are not illegal but they are told to rethink their thoughts and actions, physically and verbally attacked, deplatformed, deboosted on twitter, subjected to violent memes involving guns or graphic depictions of violence against a woman and so on. And all of that is being silently sanctioned by other parts of the left, liberals/progressives. The upshot of that is that many women are afraid to express political opinions. Authoritarianism.
thanks PM. Men feeling enabled to tell women who are and aren't the real feminists should be raising alarm bells in progressive circles. But it's not.
I didn't say she wasn't a real feminist. I said she was a bigot. If I have confused her with a transphobic person and she is is in fact a support of trans rights and equality, I apologise.
As for her current article, her description of the reaction to "coltheman" is exagerrated and conflates numerous issues.
+1. It was a political opinion piece designed to advance her opposition to progressive legislation but several lefties claim it wasn't.
If I have confused her with a transphobic person and she is is in fact a support of trans rights and equality, I apologise.
Well, the group she chairs that you called "Speak Up For Bigots" has this on its web site:
We support the rights of transgender people to live their lives free from violence and discrimination.
Also this:
We recognise and respect the right of transgender people to live their lives in their chosen identity, and we understand why having a birth certificate consistent with that identity is important to them.
They also have some feminist concerns about the consequences for women if society were to accept that men can simply declare themselves women, but that's something neither of us is really qualified to comment on.
…her description of the reaction to "coltheman" is exagerrated and conflates numerous issues.
Kind of ironic, given the way many on the left describe Speak Up For Women.
We support the rights of transgender people to live their lives free from violence and discrimination.
so what is it that they argue for to enable this? Are there to be four sets of toilets everywhere? No? They are just full of shit?
Maybe your reduction of feminists' concerns about what sex self-identification means for women to a line about toilets is what's actually full of shit?
lol
And all of those finance companies in the late oughts talked about how they were solid and reliable and had good credit ratings.
Doesn't follow though in their actions – or at least didn't when the topic of SUFW was thoroughly hashed out in february.
In that case I'd better rephrase this, because it seriously doesn't seem to be getting through to you even slightly: what we as men think of feminist concerns about the consequences for women of societal acceptance of sex self-identification is worth two-fifths of fuck-all. If you genuinely have something against bigotry, stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject.
In other words: shut up while trans people are belittled and further marginalised.
The men letting their instinctive dislike of these women out through their keyboards like to frame it in terms of protecting trans people from being belittled and marginalised, sure. Bigotry never looks like bigotry to the bigot, which is one reason dismissing them as bigots doesn't have any effect on them. In this case, the "shut up" message is being delivered to women, by men, so if you genuinely have a problem with people like Col, start with your own mind and stop demonising the women you don't like.
On the other hand, maybe it's a considered dislike for these individuals because they are bigots.
I'm sure Col the Man tells himself something similar re the women he disparages.
One of the Herald articles showed the inconsistencies between col's criticisms of Ardern and his responses when it was pointed out that John Key had done similar things.
If I've been inconsistent depending on who's been arguing against self-id, feel free to point it out.
Col isn't a bigot because he's inconsistent, he's a bigot because he dislikes women who go public with views he opposes. That should ring a bell.
Inconsistency isn't the issue here. The issue is a man dismissing women's concerns about sex self-id as irrelevant (because they are irrelevant – to men) and then adding insult to injury by calling them bigots. Mansplaining is trivial by comparison.
Inconsistency would at least indicate you had a point about my statements being made because of the nature of the group rather than its conduct.
Rather than "shut up and tolerate bigotry".
I'm done. The approach of simply repeating that the people you disagree with are bigots is impervious to argument, as this thread demonstrates.
Thank god for that. Your weak false equivalencies were getting tiresome.
Why would I develop an argument to justify an opinion on a matter when your position is that my opinion on that matter should be left unsaid?
Guess I'm not done – people may still be reading this, after all.
I don't care what your opinions are, let alone want you to make an argument for them. I'm arguing against supposedly progressive men telling feminists they're doing feminism wrong (which, despite your disclaimer to weka, was exactly what your "Speak up for bigots" comment consisted of).
Whatever your opinions are that lead you to dismiss out of hand feminists' concerns about something that affects only women and declare those feminists bigots, those opinions are irrelevant – at issue is the fact that you're doing it, not the "why."
about something that affects only women
Not so from the TERF perspective. They hold that trans women are not women. Trans women are those most affected as they face high risk of violence from men in men's spaces as well as huge risk of depression and suicide through alienation.
Who is or isn't a woman is not the subject here. The subject is men: supposedly progressive men dismissing feminists' concerns and declaring them bigots. Did you have any actually-relevant contribution to make about that?
I think it is idiotic to say that a man cannot hold a woman accountable for their bigotry because the woman identifies as a feminist. I have found the opinion in the TERF stuff that i have read to be bigoted. The feminists i know find it bigoted also.
The article was speaking up for a bigot, written by someone who felt their association with SUFW was relevant to that article, so it was a pretty literal description.
Solkta: yes, there are lots of men who see nothing wrong with giving the world their considered opinions on what feminists should or shouldn't think. That's exactly the problem.
McFlock: that disingenuous portrayal would carry a bit more weight if you hadn't gone on to directly call her a bigot and imply she's someone who belittles and marginalises trans-gender people.
So now my opinion on TERFs is relevant to the discussion again? Make up your mind.
Men's casual dismissal of feminist concerns about a women's issue and assertion that they're doing feminism wrong is what's under discussion. Your views on transgender politics never were and still aren't relevant. Your views on "TERFs", to use your derogatory term, are relevant only to the extent that they illustrate the behaviour under discussion – they aren't the subject matter.
I thought the problem was bigotry towards trans people.
I can't speak for McFlock but i can assure you that my conclusion is not a casual one. You keep saying feminist concerns but what you really mean is concerns of some feminists. And as i have already pointed this is not a women's issue as defined by SUFW – it is a 'men who think they are women''s issue. Trans people are the ones most affected. It is primarily their issue. You don't seem to have any consideration for them.
I can't see that "feminist" should be a get out of jail free card and that any idea expressed by a feminist is beyond criticism from anyone with a penis.
I thought the problem was bigotry towards trans people.
It's "a" problem sure – but not the one under discussion here.
…i can assure you that my conclusion is not a casual one.
Big whoop. We're anonymous blog commenters, our authoritative declarations count for shit.
You keep saying feminist concerns but what you really mean is concerns of some feminists.
Well, I've yet to hear of some official Head Office of Global Feminism that might issue proclamations on what's an official feminist issue, so yeah, I'm talking about the concerns of some feminists. So are you, only you're dismissing those concerns out of hand despite not being qualified to judge the merits of those concerns.
I can't see that "feminist" should be a get out of jail free card and that any idea expressed by a feminist is beyond criticism from anyone with a penis.
Well, yeah, that much is obvious. What's not obvious is why feminists should give a shit what a man thinks about whether they're doing feminism right or not. Can you provide a reason why they should give a shit?
Well, yeah, that much is obvious.
Then what is the meaning of all your words? You have been, i think, trying to tell me that i have no right to tell a feminist that i think they are being bigoted when i think they are being bigoted. Not what they might think of my opinion. Bigots are very hard to sway, that is a big part of being a bigot.
The opinion of people matters generally as we have legislation to come before Parliament.
And i haven't made any statement about doing feminism right or not.
If all our opinions here count for shit (or two fifths of fuck all), then there's no particular reason anyone should care.
But then that would logically lead you to follow your own instruction to "stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject". And if everyone did that, there would be few if any comments on this site.
So maybe telling me to shut up because my opinion is worthless is a tad intrinsically inconsistent.
Bigots are very hard to sway, that is a big part of being a bigot.
You bet – I'm finding it fucking difficult to sway them on this thread, that's for sure.
And i haven't made any statement about doing feminism right or not.
You don't believe that's what you're doing, sure. Col doesn't believe he's being a misogynist either. To you, telling feminists with concerns about the implications of sex self-id that you as a man dismiss their concerns and consider them bigots, surely can't be characterised as telling feminists they're doing feminism wrong. But it can be, because that's what it is. Discussion of the subject would be improved if more men could recognise that reality.
So maybe telling me to shut up because my opinion is worthless is a tad intrinsically inconsistent.
Disingenuous, or deliberately obtuse? No-one's telling you to shut up because you're opinion's worthless (after all, any opinion is worthless outside the head of the person holding the opinion). But I am suggesting that maybe men should have a think about whether it's really a good idea for a man to just dismiss out-of-hand feminist concerns about a woman's issue and declare the feminists' bigots, before they open their big gobs.
I took "two-fifths of fuck-all" to mean "worthless", and "stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject" as a lot of words for "shut up".
That was just one of a number of ways I've phrased the message "maybe men should have a think about whether it's really a good idea for a man to just dismiss out-of-hand feminist concerns about a woman's issue and declare the feminists' bigots, before they open their big gobs." You haven't actually responded to that message, just reframed it as you being told to remain silent in the face of bigotry, which is a disingenuous and self-serving misinterpretation.
Yeah, you've used most of the continuum from passive-aggressive to explicit in telling people to shut up when they perceive bigotry.
And don’t pretend the passive-aggressive version isn’t just a long-winded way of saying “shut up”.
Still no response, just the same self-serving reframing. This time I really am done.
It's not "reframing" when you literally said "stop handing everyone your gut-feeling reckons on that subject" as a way of rephrasing the same message.
"I didn't say she wasn't a real feminist."
I wasn't referring to you.
fair call, sorry
all good, long thread confusion.
This doesn't make sense. Gender critical feminists are by and large left wing, and progressive. SUFW have specific issues with the GP position on gender and sex. They don't oppose the GP generally.
GCF politics are based in an analysis of the patriarchy and oppose it eg the patriarchal imposition of gender roles is central to that analysis.
What's interesting and important here is that Obrien is pointing to intolerance on the left, including the inability of the left to handle criticism well, and lots of lefties are now proving her right by trying to undermine her instead of addressing the points she raises.
I feel for a lot of people who were angry with Colin Wilson's antics.
Anger is a legitimate emotion – it's normal. The danger with browbeating people into suppressing their emotion, their anger, is you will have no activism left at all.
I agree, and that works for others too, which is part of OBrien's point I think. The degree of intolerance and social media battering of people in political circles is understandable but not necessarily a winning strategy. If Col disappears from twitter, who thinks this has changed him for the better? Maybe it's made him much worse.
But all that aside, this wasn't just about him. It was about a group of people who did a political action, and what happened when their political opponents responded. To me it looks like practice for election year and I remain unconvinced that some of what has gone down will be good for the left.
Not sure you could make Col worse and I have zero empathy for him if he gets hounded off social media. Calling the Prime Minister a bitch in a private conversation as my 'friend' did the other day is one thing, but spraying it all over Twitter is another.
This is a shut down and if Col disappears then all the better – it serves to prove you cannot liken the Prime Minister to a horse and expect no fallout. It's not for the left to roll over and say, oh, that's ok.
A few people seem to be worried that any response to RW hatred is going to sink the government. If that's the case then the government is already sunk.
Perhaps they should have tried a little harder with Kiwibuild, with the CGT, and with rail in Auckland.
lol, with you on that re Labour.
The issue with Col isn't sympathy. Him not being on twitter is a good thing. The problem is that the very public way that happened will have been seen and experience by a large number of people. That's where there might be a problem.
If you can't imagine someone like becoming worse you are fortunate.
That's not true weka. I addressed three quotes from her article further up the thread and would have liked to quote from more that I don’t agree with but three was enough.
I wasn't just referring to you Anne 🙂 (it's others here and on twitter). I read the undermining of OBrien before I read the analysis of what she said, but appreciate you coming back with the later thoughts.
Anne,
Your quotes from Ani's piece weren't responded to with anything other than a statement that didn't address her points.
Weka's point stands – people on the "left" are too busy trying to dissemble every statement and turn it into an argument as to why it's "wrong" rather than adopt a holistic viewpoint and accept that the sometimes sanctimonious, holier than thou attitude, is a massive turn off for those who are not tribal and are "leftist"
It's terrifying how many people I've seen on twitter who formerly voted Labour or Green, and are now considering ACT, because they feel Green and Labour want to restrict what people can say, how they say it, what should be said. ACT is seen as supporting “free speech” which believe it or not, is attractive to people in allowing them to explore their thoughts and ideas, and not be told they can’t have such thoughts or ideas which are anathema to accepted diktats.
It might not be true, but it's the perception. And in politics, perception is everything.
So Anne, while I know you've got years of experience of Labour background, perhaps instead of arguing the toss, the conversation that the "left" needs to have should be focused on "how can we respond to people's concerns and educate them on what we're going to do about it, instead of telling them why they're wrong and leaving it at that"
And its my considered opinion that is exactly what the Labour-led Govt. is trying to do.
I may be a Labour supporter but I do not represent them in any shape or form. The opinions I express here are mine and mine alone.
My beef with this article by Ani O'Brien is that she is being very disingenuous. I don't care whether she's gay or straight or a bit of both, but I do care that she is not being honest about this matter. This dinosaur from ChCh is getting away with garbage. He is making wrong assertions (deliberately imo) about the Prime Minister – demeaning her as a woman as well as PM. He claims she spends all her time having photo shoots for PR purposes which is patently untrue and shouldn't be allowed to stand without strong criticism.
Yes, she's been in a few magazines but no more than any other prime minister. Most of the photos come from official occasions and interviews which she has no control over. Yes, she's hot property internationally but that is because she has garnered much genuine admiration from around the world.
This fellow Wilson, is obviously a Nat who is trying to generate ill-will towards Jacinda Ardern on misogynistic as well as political grounds. He’s not the first and he won’t be the last.
Therein lies the issue Anne.
Labour may well be trying to say "here's what we're doing to address your issues" but in the wider world, Labour is associated with the "left". The actions of the likes of PaPa and their antics around Pride Parade, "TWAW" being repeated as a truism, and ignorant of the fears of a large number of women (and no, the few women that say "they're silly fears" completely discounts the fears women do have), "let's have open borders and do away with immigration controls" are the sort of issues that are seen as coming from the "left" and woe betide anyone that also identifies as "left" and says
– wait a minute, how can men change sex?
– wait a minute, why is immigration a good thing when we don't have the infrastructure, or resources, to deal with what we have right now?
Or other such valid questions… Instead of answers, they get called "Terf" and "racist" instead of engagement.
*That* is the type of leftist tribalistic issue that Ani is trying to address. The vocal minority on the left that want to have peace and utopia on earth yesterday, aren't very good at educating others as to why that vision of theirs is the *best* vision, and instead stoop to ad hominem attacks. And then wonder why people don't like them. Or their vision for society.
You only get so far when you argue at people, rather than over positions.
You're confusing Col the Anthropoid with a good faith commenter. His twitter history shows that he's anything but.
The Left cannot win by trying to accommodate the septic right, any more than the Right can win be designing their policy to persuade Standardistas.
Wouldn't know "good faith" if it was in the tyext of an employment court judgement.
Don't agree with everything Ani O'Brien says or writes. For instance, I will happily address transgender women with she and her if they demand it, including under the threat of real or theatrically posed punishments.
Well worth a read:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/118491108/turn-down-the-hysterics-on-turnardern-or-risk-alienating-many-on-the-left
If Labour keeps plowing the woke identity politics road it runs the risk of losing its social liberals; people, ironically, who have no issue with whatever coupling or self description you might imagine but who hate being told how to act or speak, especially by brain dead entertainer-influencers with the PM on speed dial. Some of whom who have received, frightfully, government funding; or, worse, have been put on a panel around mooted legislative, even constitutional, changes!
But not being a traditional values person by any stretch of the imagination or anything else I would like propose another category in direct opposition to the scalds and wowsers of the woke left: the libertine left.
Who’s with me? You have nothing to lose but your chains (or a lot of lawyerish small talk before Lola applies your chains).
This topic was discussed further up the thread. Check before you meander off on some incomprehensible mish-mash of a diatribe.
Yes maam! I will pull up the illegal corn I attempted to grow behind the sleeping quarters and return to the collective farm immediately.
[Bored much, Billy? Do you want to play outside the tent? Stop stirring – Incognito]
See my Moderation note @ 12:28 PM.
Coming in very late, Silly Billy, I see 'libertine left' as neither witty nor relevant.
I think you would be better outside the tent.
Okay! Bye. I'll give my vote to another party.
fwiw, I thought you comment at 2 was coherent political analysis. Not sure which of it I agree with, but disappointed that so many here are still either missing the point of what Obrien was saying, or simply don't care.
I think there's background confusion about what rights are. Confusion around negative and positive rights and so forth. There's a lot of incoherence among these doctrinaire types. For instance, they are likely dismissing the rights / beliefs of a lot of Muslim women, too.
Give your vote, Billy, to another party – we'll be knocked for a six! ( Why, oh why didn't we treat Billy with respect???)
The outrage
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/406337/uk-new-year-honours-1-000-addresses-published-in-error
The irony
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/19/opinion/location-tracking-cell-phone.html
Spot where gallery journos have focused their attention during the year.. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/118416407/stuffs-political-awards-for-2019-the-best-and-the-rest
The bloody Russians, no wait it was…
Half a century ago, it was 1969, man walked on Moon, hippie did Woodstock, I first used a computer. It belonged to the University of Auckland, filled a room so big you couldn't even eyeball the whole thing. Six years on, I had my second computer experience.
1975 Vid-Com trained me as a videotape editor, and I became the second-equal kiwi to make colour television – the year before it got transmission. Our system was powered by a PDP-11, small enough to sit in a rack and about the size of the average large chillybin.
Now we have quantum computing, supposedly on the verge of transition between experiment and practical application: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_computing
In "October 2019, a Sycamore processor created in conjunction with Google AI Quantum was reported to have achieved quantum supremacy, with calculations more than 3,000,000 times as fast as those of Summit, generally considered the world's fastest computer."
Just a couple of months back. So we await further confirmation. Remember how the initial reports of cold fusion failed confirmation testing? Sometimes scientists & engineers misinterpret results. Replication is essential in scientific learning. A reminder that our social reality is constructed via consensus. Truth, in science, can't be merely asserted, even if scientists often demonstrate their humanity by trying to get away with unvalidated assertions…
The cold fusion announcement also came out of left field, whereas quantum computing has been steadily developed. So, likely.
But the next step is translating it into mass production.
As expected, the smearing of Bernie Sanders as anti-Semitic begins. Laughable given that Sanders is a Jew, if it wasn’t so disgusting and dangerous.
"The militants controlling the Syrian city of Maarat al-Numan in the Idlib province have refused to give it up peacefully during negotiations with the Syrian government, Omar Rahmon, a member of the National Reconciliation Committee, said on Wednesday.
"The terrorist groups that are active in Maarat al-Numan have refused to initiate any reconciliation [process], despite the civilians' strong desire to rejoin the government", Rahmon said in an interview with the newspaper.
On Monday, Rahmon told the Syrian al-Watan newspaper that the Syrian authorities were negotiating the city's surrender, but the chances of that were slim. He accused the militants that run the city of acting on the orders of Turkey.
Idlib remains a major terrorist stronghold, being home to an estimated 10,000 jihadists from various factions, according to the UN Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team."
https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/201912251077831256-syrian-militants-refuse-to-peacefully-surrender-city-in-idlib-province—official/
Funny how people don't like to surrender their homes.
If only people would stop whining and be reasonable about things…..humph !.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/israel-evicting-palestinian-family-replace-settlers-190115061242614.htmlhttps://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/israel-evicting-palestinian-family-replace-settlers-
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/love-sex/118502305/prison-romance-the-wellington-couple-who-fell-in-love-behind-bars
Oh dear lord why, why would you do this?
yes what is the motorvation for inviting this sort of publicity!…$ or probation points?
Older woman meets stud 10 years younger…hope it doesn't end in..tears.
Considering she has a 15 year old daughter I also hope it doesn't end in tears
I see the cost of housing your clients has risen. That must meant you got a big pay rise!
You know if you vote National they will freeze your pay for many many years to come.
Thats not how it works unfortunately, for some reason lefties look down on certain occupations (armed forces, police, corrections) so arn't inclined to offer decent pay rises to corrections (2.5% pay rise is what was offered and accepted)
It's OK PR – your infatuation with Judith will protect you from such vagaries…
In the meantime it is now you who are in a position to eventually explain how such things come about, rather than any of us…
Kia Kaha, PR
I can't explain it better then anyone else can because I simply can't understand it. I mean if I was a mum and had a 15 year old daughter and 12 year old sons the last thing I'd do is invite a junkie ex-con gang member into my home.
Oh dear lord why, why would you do this?
Pheromones. Evolution lacks any interest in your happiness.
I sincerely hope this turns out all right