Some lighthearted banter

Written By: - Date published: 11:03 am, January 5th, 2017 - 155 comments
Categories: the praiseworthy and the pitiful, you couldn't make this shit up - Tags: ,

Peter Leitch, aka Mad Butcher has been in the news lately.

A passing comment to a young Maori Woman Lara Bridger has made the news and after two days the story is still going strong.  She was upset that he told her that Waikeke Island is a “white man’s island”.  The context of the surrounding words is somewhat although not very important.  She says it was in response to a claim that she was Tangata Whenua and had been born on Waiheke Island and that he should acknowledge this.  He says that it was in response to a claim by her that she was Tangata Whenua and could do what she liked and that he said it was a “white man’s island too”.

Bridger was that upset she posted a video on Facebook.  After the video started to go viral she took it down.

Leitch apologised for the distress caused by the statement, not the statement itself.

Since then the incident has spiralled out of control.  In these news empty days has dominated the media.

Leitch hired Michelle Boag to sort out the media shitstorm that had developed.  She has set out to douse the fire by pouring huge amounts of petrol on it and then using a flamethrower. She claimed that Bridger only did this for publicity which is rather belied by the fact she took the video down. She also said that Bridger was “barely coffee coloured”. Can you imagine a better way to insult a young Maori Woman clearly proud of her heritage?

Leitch should just apologise for the hurt he clearly caused and work on the way he expresses himself and thinks about current issues.  I am sure he did not mean it and that he is not a racist.  But modes of expression and ways of thinking that may have been acceptable in the 1960s are no longer acceptable.

Update: As pointed out by Siobhan in comments Boag just keeps digging and has said “[Lara Bridger’s] a very attractive colour – and I aspire to a tan like that every year. So there was no offence [intended].”

155 comments on “Some lighthearted banter ”

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  1. Sacha 1
    5 January 2017 at 11:14 am

    Leitch’s behaviour came as less of a surprise to Leilani Tamu who grew up in Auckland rugby league circles: https://leilanitamu.com/2017/01/04/my-beef-with-the-mad-butcher/

  2. Sacha 2
    5 January 2017 at 11:17 am

    Lest anyone get sucked into believing Boag’s ‘coffee-coloured’ comment was a one-off or an accident, RNZ’s Michael Cropp tweeted:

    “She’s barely even got a tan” was what Michelle Boag told me last night as she tried to discredit Lara and control RNZ’s coverage.

    Filth.

  3. Keith 3
    5 January 2017 at 11:20 am

    How did this shit make a story let alone so called newspaper?

    Who cares about this extremely dull wealthy man and his what he thinks apart from ZB listeners and their dickhead hosts.

    That he has hired the awful Michelle Boag says more about Leitch’s connections to the National Party more than anything. He did fancy John Key ever so much which says a lot about his judgement.

    And as for the New Zealand Herald, please go out of business, bankrupt, liquidate, be bought off by those Aussie wide-boys who bought and flogged off Dick Smith, anything please but just cease to exist, you are a bad joke!

    • mickysavage 3.1
      5 January 2017 at 11:30 am

      I was going to leave it but Boag’s comments were just to appalling to ignore. It has become an interesting story about how the media narrative is formed and attempts made to control it.

      • Keith 3.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 11:44 am

        Not you, it is interesting he hired Boag. Rather its just our god awful media.

        • mary_a 3.1.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 12:55 pm

          @ Keith … (3.1.1) As far as I know Michelle Boag still lives on Waiheke Island, so was on tap to rush to Peter Leitch’s side, as a fellow Natz supporter, volunteering her services to act as his spokesperson. I’ve seen her in all her glory over there and if there is a celebrity involved, international or local, she will be there.

          In one instance my husband, was approached (not by Boag) to work with a very well known celebrity for the day of his visit to Waiheke some years ago. Boag took it upon herself to “instruct” my husband how to act in front of this person! She then had the audacity to tell hubby to only speak when the celebrity speaks to him! How or why she was on the scene is anyone’s guess. But word obviously got out that a well known person was visiting and so Boag had to crawl out of the woodwork, to get in on the act!

          You certainly wouldn’t want to tangle with her. I’ve seen her in action. A combination of the devil spitting, hell, fire and brimstone, along with a constrictor crushing its prey! Not nice at all!

      • greywarshark 3.1.2
        5 January 2017 at 1:11 pm

        Keith, Keith
        Why don’t you go to kiwiblog or anywhere, where your aimless ponderings unconnected with the world we are discussing in an attempt to make us a great little country again, against the downward pull of your cohort.

        • mickysavage 3.1.2.1
          5 January 2017 at 1:47 pm

          I think you should reread his comment GWS.

          • greywarshark 3.1.2.1.1
            5 January 2017 at 7:51 pm

            Okay ms
            I think I had just read something about a silly little girl in one comment and my stomach was turning my head. Keith I take it back.

  4. esoteric pineapples 4
    5 January 2017 at 11:33 am

    I would say Waiheke Island is more a “white bread” island. Kind of bland and unnutritious

  5. Ad 5
    5 January 2017 at 11:36 am

    I’ve been to the Vodafone Warriors members stand multiple times and his ethnic and gay joked get huge laughs. I recall thinking at the time even Billy T was edgy with similar material. And Billy was two decades ago.

    Leitch is not Waiheke culture.

    • JanM 5.1
      5 January 2017 at 12:26 pm

      Of course they get huge laughs – those stands will be full of his sycophants, in many cases no more informed than he is

      • Ad 5.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 12:36 pm

        It’s where you meet all the current and retired players after the game – he’s the MC and has been doing it for quite a while. It may not be Waiheke Island, but they’re certainly informed about League.

        • JanM 5.1.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 1:19 pm

          yes, well – and that is relevant for the purposes of this discussion because —?

          • Ad 5.1.1.1.1
            5 January 2017 at 3:37 pm

            It’s relevant because Leitch’s humor and views fit less on Waiheke and more in his usual ground of the Mt Smart Warriors stadium post-match events – where I have seen them work fine. He’s at fault as much as anything for not understanding context.

    • Anno1701 5.2
      5 January 2017 at 2:01 pm

      “Leitch is not Waiheke culture.’

      any “culture” Waiheke had got washed away a LLLOOOONNNGGG time ago

      • Ad 5.2.1
        5 January 2017 at 3:38 pm

        It’s a new, intensely hierarchicalised strata of cultures.
        Very much New Zealand in microcosm.

        • Anno1701 5.2.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 3:44 pm

          “It’s a new, intensely hierarchicalised strata of cultures’

          its hole in the ground mostly filled with bougi scumbags

          the place needs a ICBM injection IMO…..

  6. JanM 6
    5 January 2017 at 11:46 am

    ” I am sure he did not mean it and that he is not a racist.”
    Micky Savage – it would be a help if you defined ‘racist’ as you understand it.
    This is Te Ururoa Flavell’s response and I think he has it right.
    “The lesson here is no matter how you dress it up, making comments directed at someone else because of their ethnicity is racist and you’ll be called on it.”
    He also said he didn’t think Peter Leitch meant to cause offence. There is a difference.

    • Nick 6.1
      5 January 2017 at 12:03 pm

      I think PL meant to intimidate and cause offence to the young woman because she challenged him and his world….and its backfired and exposed his well hidden racist side…as witnesses are now confirming.

      • Naki man 6.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 12:37 pm

        Well Nick it appears that you also have a very large chip on your shoulder
        just like the silly young women with the mouth like a blocked drain.

        • greywarshark 6.1.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 1:17 pm

          Hello Naki man
          I remember you from your past utterances. So bad they don’t – can’t be put out of mind. Block your own drain, but first pour in some organic cleansing – a teaspoon of baking soda and a cup of vinegar. Make you fizz and suits you, you like action doesn’t matter what sort. Insensitive, thick, undiscerning etc. that’s you.

        • Banjo 6.1.1.2
          5 January 2017 at 3:34 pm

          “just like the silly young women with the mouth like a blocked drain.”

          Sad how many rw commenters have used the same key words to try and diminish this woman and her account of what she experienced – reducing her to a “little” “silly” “hammered” “girl”.

          And its just weird how they seem offended by her use of swear words.
          The comments about her “potty mouth” “mouth like a blocked drain” as if it is the 19th century and they have never heard a woman use the word fuck before.

          Peter Leitch is well known for swearing but it’s laughed off as colourful language. Phil Gifford spoke at the launch of PL’s biography and said the book “would have been much longer if he had left the swear words in”. When the mad butcher uses profanity he is applauded for his “honesty”, for calling a spade a spade, he’s called a straight talker, no bullshit kind of guy. The double standard is ridiculous.

      • Anne 6.1.2
        5 January 2017 at 3:59 pm

        I agree Nick. These jumped up johhny-come-latelies who often come from the same humble beginnings as the rest of us are by far the worst. Their insecurity is such they can’t bear to be either proven wrong or challenged.

        A big-ups to Lara Bridger.

      • HDCAFriendlyTroll 6.1.3
        5 January 2017 at 5:02 pm

        So you’ve never said things like:

        “White guys look stupid dancing” (admittedly we do but I digress).

        “Stop doing such a Maori job and do it probably.”

        “Stop whinging” (to a Pom, naturally).

        “He’d pay for it but the Scottish in him won’t let him”?

        I bow to your superior ethics and morality.

  7. Morrissey 7
    5 January 2017 at 12:13 pm

    I am sure he did not mean it and that he is not a racist.

    Who wrote that sentence for you, Mickey? Michelle Boag?

    • mickysavage 7.1
      5 January 2017 at 12:52 pm

      I’m careful with the allegation. I agree he says racist things but that does not necessarily make him a racist. That phrase I personally reserve for more extreme sorts.

    • HDCAFriendlyTroll 7.2
      5 January 2017 at 5:19 pm

      But everyone’s racist to you, Mo*.

      *Except Noam Chomksy. Noam’s not racist. Or wrong. Like ever.

      • Morrissey 7.2.1
        5 January 2017 at 6:39 pm

        But everyone’s racist to you, Mo*.

        Why would you say that? I don’t think everyone is racist at all. I don’t bandy the term around irresponsibly, because it’s too easy to besmirch someone. Some years ago, one marty mars tried to imply I was racist because I had had the temerity to criticise Sir Mark Solomon, the leader of Ngai Tahu. Recently he did the same thing after I posted up a transcript showing up that supreme waste of space Tau Henare as a fool.

        So I’m aware all too well of the incendiary potential of the term “racist” if it is applied maliciously and inaccurately.

        But I do think it’s the right word to describe Murray Deaker’s repeated ranting about “dumb” Polynesian footballers and “lazy” Maoris. It’s the right word to describe Leighton Smith’s labeling of Muhammad Ali as a “n**ger”.[1] It’s the right word to describe Tony Veitch’s labeling of Serena Williams as an “ape”. [2]

        [1] https://bsa.govt.nz/decisions/show/3842

        [2] http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10344087

        I do think Leitch’s comments were racist, just like this seven minute spiel by one of his close friends…..

        Clearly you have not read anything by Chomsky, which will explain your sarcasm.

  8. Ad 8
    5 January 2017 at 12:44 pm

    Waiheke is a really compressed form of what New Zealand is becoming;

    – ever closer to the wealth-dominance of Auckland
    – full of the most expensive blocks and wealthiest people in the southern hemisphere
    – where the top level don’t come by ferry; it’s seaplane, helicopter, or yacht
    – with vineyards and grounds and sculpture parks that need tending by labourers
    – sprawling largely unplanned suburbs with middling houses and poor island public transport
    – reactionary local board that delivers very little
    – living within a fiction of beaches, high-end restaurants, palm beach purity, and breezy joi-de-vivre
    – a really crap place to be poor

    • Anne 8.1
      5 January 2017 at 4:30 pm

      Spent all my childhood summer holidays at Onetangi, Waiheke Island. Wonderful place then with loads of interesting people… some permanent dwellers, others holiday residents only. We swam, hiked, fished, walked freely all over the island. I remember the first hint that times were a-changing… some wealthy sod (turned out to be Spencer of toilet roll fame) bought a beautiful little secluded beach called Piemelon Bay and the public was banned from going there. Barricades and manned turnstiles (from ragged memory) were erected. Everybody was as mad as hell. Spencer built a flash house and, as far as I know, members of the public have never been able to enjoy this truly gorgeous beach and its equally beautiful surrounding peninsulas ever since.

      Waiheke was a Garden of Eden once. Now its the riff-raff nouveau riche who dominate the place.

  9. Skinny 9
    5 January 2017 at 1:09 pm

    Fry the fucking red neck Leitch for carrying on his position of continued insulting racial slurs. I will call him out if I see him anyway in future. He has courted controversy before standing up for that old goat sports commentator mate Murray Deka and his “works like a N (word) ” brushing it off as political correctness gone mad. He got tuned up back then and hasn’t changed one bit.

    As for Leitch calling in his National mates PR spin doctor Michelle Boag that is just flame baiting. Boag is pushing the PC gone mad narrative by her own deliberate delivery of a racist ranting. Drag that old redneck Leitch into mediation and make the prick sit there all day and listen to the local Maori’s hurt.

  10. Siobhan 10
    5 January 2017 at 1:32 pm

    “[Lara Bridger’s] a very attractive colour – and I aspire to a tan like that every year. So there was no offence [intended].”…..go Michelle! Good thing the young lady wasn’t, you know, a bit too tanned.

    http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11777074

  11. The Real Matthew 11
    5 January 2017 at 1:54 pm

    This shows everything that’s wrong with New Zealand.

    A part-Maori woman makes a blatantly racist comment and the media response is to persecute a white man.

    I couldn’t sum up the current state of New Zealand race relations any better.

    • weka 11.1
      5 January 2017 at 3:11 pm

      Yeah, because racism is only what one person does to another and nothing to do with power relations 🙄

    • Anno1701 11.2
      5 January 2017 at 4:13 pm

      “A part-Maori woman makes a blatantly racist comment and the media response is to persecute a white man.’

      that was just feeble

      are you even really trying or just treading water ?

  12. Sacha 12
    5 January 2017 at 2:07 pm

    Her Boagness now claims to have had an epiphany: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11777242

    This afternoon, Boag told the Herald: “I’ve since read Dame Susan’s comments about casual racism and I found them quite instructive, in the sense that I had no idea what casual racism was – like most New Zealanders, I suspect.

    “But I think what she’s talking about is exactly what I’ve done; which is didn’t intend to offend anyone, didn’t think there was anything wrong with it, but clearly some people take offence at it.

    “And that’s probably a good description of what casual racism is. Dame Susan’s comments have helped me to understand.”

    • Rosemary McDonald 12.1
      5 January 2017 at 2:49 pm

      Brilliant. And she gets paid for this???

      You couldn’t make this shit up.

      ‘Bout time the lady retired.

    • weka 12.2
      5 January 2017 at 3:07 pm

      *headdesk*

    • Dialey 12.3
      5 January 2017 at 3:28 pm

      Folk like Boag and Leitch are just following John Key’s example over the ponytail: “I didn’t mean to offend, therefore because there was offence taken, it’s their fault, not mine.”
      If the Key-Boag-Leaches of the world cannot understand or realize that what they are saying is offensive, then what are they doing in positions of power/authority/respect?

      • weka 12.3.1
        5 January 2017 at 3:38 pm

        In the case of Key and Boag, they just don’t care. For them power goes hand in hand with manipulation and doing what one can get away with.

      • Anno1701 12.3.2
        5 January 2017 at 3:46 pm

        “I didn’t mean to offend, therefore because there was offence taken, it’s their fault, not mine.”’

        doublespeak/think really….

    • Rae 12.4
      6 January 2017 at 4:59 pm

      Cough, splutter

  13. The PInk Postman 13
    5 January 2017 at 2:53 pm

    I went off Leitch when he smooched up Helen Clark until she made it clear she did not believe in knighthoods ,then he smooched up to Key and of course received his Knighthood .

  14. HDCAFriendlyTroll 14
    5 January 2017 at 4:28 pm

    “Leitch should just apologise for the hurt he clearly caused and work on the way he expresses himself and thinks about current issues. I am sure he did not mean it and that he is not a racist …”

    Heh, that’s not what the majority of commentators here reckon.

    “But modes of expression and ways of thinking that may have been acceptable in the 1960s are no longer acceptable.”

    Better watch yourself too Greg. You never know when you’ll say something that someone will take the wrong way and the SJWs will be on you like bees to honey.

  15. The PInk Postman 15
    5 January 2017 at 4:31 pm

    Sacha .I don’t know about a epiphany, I thought it was an expensive facelift . She’s that dolled up that if she laughed her face would split.

  16. Guerilla Surgeon 16
    5 January 2017 at 5:10 pm

    She may not have helped, but she didn’t really need to. If you read the comments in some of the dailies, they are heavily in favour of the Mad Butcher, and often outright racist.

  17. weka 17
    5 January 2017 at 6:27 pm

    Leitch chose to say he is not a racist. Pākehā reflexively needing to state they are not racist when confronted by someone who has been experiencing racism their whole life is actually a form of racism. How about instead we reflect on what racisms are, all of them, across the board, and look at how we can do better? “I’m not racist” just shuts down the conversation (or blows it up), and prevents anything progressive happening. Maybe that’s the point.

    • BM 17.1
      5 January 2017 at 6:41 pm

      Peter Leitch is refreshingly old school, he dosesn’t see races he just sees people.

      Personally, I find the left wing construct of having to carefully weigh each word uttered and prostrating yourself when talking to another race/culture just painful and annoying.

      • Sacha 17.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 6:49 pm

        Why would someone who doesn’t see race use a phrase like “white man’s island”?

        Not being a dick is pretty basic stuff.

        • BM 17.1.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 6:57 pm

          He said “white man’s island also”

          It was the young girl being a dick with her special people bull shit.

          • Sacha 17.1.1.1.1
            5 January 2017 at 7:01 pm

            His supporters claim he added the “also”, yes. Along with claiming the young woman is just an attention seeker. Funnily enough that’s the same line we heard about the cafe worker with the ponytail and the stripper with the Chiefs.

            • BM 17.1.1.1.1.1
              5 January 2017 at 7:21 pm

              He was also sober, she was pissed.

              I take the word of a sober person over a drunk person any day.

              For fucks sake this guy has done so much for South Auckland yet you leftwingers want to hang him because of some drunken facebook accusation.

              What’s the real problem?, his support of National and saying positive things about Jon Key?.

              • Sacha …
                5 January 2017 at 7:28 pm

                I’m more concerned about Boag’s behaviour than his, any day. I can imagine a plausible conversation where both Leitch and Wharepapa-Bridger made some assumptions about what the other meant by the words they chose to use.

                However, the context for that is our ongoing national discourse about power structures, race relations, immigration and the Treaty relationship – which will continue for many years. Let’s hope we get better at that conversation because ignoring or suppressing it will not end well for anybody.

                • BM …
                  5 January 2017 at 7:35 pm

                  Maybe for you.
                  Personally, I don’t have a problem, the secret is just to treat a person as just another person, don’t get so hung up with culture and worrying about causing offence.

                  • Sacha …
                    5 January 2017 at 7:40 pm

                    I see it as a huge opportunity for this nation, not a problem. And I certainly don’t go around worrying about causing offence.

                  • One Anonymous Bloke …
                    5 January 2017 at 7:40 pm

                    …treat a person as just another white person. FIFY

                    • BM …
                      5 January 2017 at 7:54 pm

                      Christ, What is it with you leftwingers and this inability to just see someone as just another person.

                      I know it’s hard, but try and look past the colour of the skin.

                    • weka …
                      5 January 2017 at 8:03 pm

                      “What is it with you leftwingers and this inability to just see someone as just another person.”

                      Lol at that piece of framing (some of my best friends are lefties though).

                      “I know it’s hard, but try and look past the colour of the skin.”

                      How do you know when you are being racist then, if you don’t have an analysis of ethnicity?

                    • BM …
                      5 January 2017 at 8:28 pm

                      How do you know when you are being racist then, if you don’t have an analysis of ethnicity?

                      You poor thing, you must be so riddled with white guilt, I take it you’ve never had much contact with people outside of white rural NZ?

                      People are people with lots and lots of similarities, don’t over think things, just be yourself and go with the flow.

                    • weka …
                      5 January 2017 at 8:53 pm

                      in other words you can’t answer the question and so have to try an belittle me.

                      It’s ok, I get it. You support progressive politics so long as it doesn’t require you to change, which means you don’t support fairness or equity. You like to think of yourself as a decent bloke, but you’re racist and you refuse to look at how the people in NZ worst affected by racism might see it. As far as I can tell, you are in this thread to defend your own privilege and when it comes down to it you don’t give a shit about people in general.

                      FWIW, I don’t feel guilt as a white person in the way you infer. I do however feel bad about the fact that some people are worse off because of my white privilege and I’m willing to work to redress that. That’s not the same thing as the guilt you are talking about, and I get why some people are so averse to feeling that guilt or looking at their own racism, because it’s hard work. Work you are obviously not willing to do.

                      By all means carry on with the belittling, because that looks like all you’ve got in lieu of some actual politics (although I can see why you wouldn’t want to state baldly that you support a racist state).

                    • Robert Guyton …
                      5 January 2017 at 8:57 pm

                      “white rural NZ”

                      What???

                    • Sacha …
                      5 January 2017 at 9:07 pm

                      The world is a far simpler and easier place for individualists who are fortunate enough to belong to the right social groups so they do not have to take social groupings into consideration.

                      Society is so tiring. Why bother?

                    • weka …
                      5 January 2017 at 9:14 pm

                      Lol RG. I just rolled my eyes at that one. But I can see that if someone was colourblind like BM he might actually not see the non-white people in the country. Some of them are too pale for a start 😉

              • One Anonymous Bloke …
                5 January 2017 at 7:33 pm

                So Leitch is lying when he says “I responded with a joke about it being a white man’s island”.

                You are incapable of understanding what the problem is. If you could understand it you could articulate it and explain why you disagree.

              • Banjo …
                5 January 2017 at 7:42 pm

                He was also sober, she was pissed” – says who? in all the media coverage there has been no suggestion Lara was drunk. can you provide a link to back up that allegation up or are you just making shit up because your real problem is that she said something negative about a National party supporter?

                • weka …
                  5 January 2017 at 8:54 pm

                  It’s all about the slur. BM takes his cues from Boag.

                • Sacha …
                  5 January 2017 at 9:13 pm

                  Lara was apparently inebriated in the clip she posted. Therefore some people are assuming she was drunk earlier. I do not know how long elapsed between the confrontation and the recording of said clip.

                  Apparently drinking is quite common behaviour when people are upset. And at vineyards, to be fair. Who knows?

              • mauī …
                5 January 2017 at 8:13 pm

                The only person pissed at this point seems to be you. Either drunk pissed or pissed for some other reason.

            • Anne 17.1.1.1.1.2
              5 January 2017 at 8:01 pm

              Funnily enough that’s the same line we heard about the cafe worker with the ponytail and the stripper with the Chiefs.

              And we have another one that has just come to light. A young woman tells us she has been harassed and intimidated and (rightly or wrongly) is seeking temporary asylum in Russia where she happened to be when her situation felt untenable. Yet another young woman charged with attention seeking mental disorders.

              How come when a woman is the victim – and they are the vast majority of victims – then the ‘white’ men of means claim mental disorders?

      • weka 17.1.2
        5 January 2017 at 7:52 pm

        “Peter Leitch is refreshingly old school, he dosesn’t see races he just sees people.”

        Colourblind people are often racist. Not sure what your point is except that you like Leitch and his style.

        “Personally, I find the left wing construct of having to carefully weigh each word uttered and prostrating yourself when talking to another race/culture just painful and annoying.”

        I don’t have to weigh each word uttered, and I don’t have to prostrate myself. So if you do, you certainly have a problem.

      • Muttonbird 17.1.3
        5 January 2017 at 10:08 pm

        Peter Leitch is refreshingly old school, he dosesn’t see races he just sees people.

        That’s easy to say when you are a member of the empowered rather than the disempowered.

        • Clump_AKA Sam 17.1.3.1
          5 January 2017 at 10:11 pm

          It’s just code for can’t see maori, nope, nope, nope. Can see fuck all

          • Muttonbird 17.1.3.1.1
            5 January 2017 at 10:27 pm

            It’s a lie for people to claim they don’t see races they just see people because that would mean culture is irrelevant to them. I find this hard to believe in Peter Leitch’s case as someone who has apparently done a lot of work with Pacific peoples.

      • Sacha 17.1.4
        5 January 2017 at 10:44 pm

        Nothing much “refreshing” about the 1950s, either. Unless you were a well-off pale bloke.

      • Dialey 17.1.5
        6 January 2017 at 9:47 am

        “Your kind could never understand” perfect example of ‘Othering”
        The othering process is the human tendency to believe that the group (race, religion, ethnicity, culture, gender, country, sexual orientation, species etc.) that they are a part of is inherently the ‘right’ way to be human. “This often results in hostility towards those not part of a group, as they can be seen as a threat or liability that is detrimental to the group’s existence, creating an ‘us vs. them’
        mentalityhttp://sc2218.wikifoundry.com/page/The+Process+of+’Othering’

      • Anno1701 17.1.6
        6 January 2017 at 1:28 pm

        “Peter Leitch is refreshingly old school”

        FFS…….

        yep just like smallpox

    • JanM 17.2
      5 January 2017 at 7:30 pm

      Yes, it can be pretty wearisome coping with closed-minded attitudes like that. They see no need to change because they have a ‘born to rule’ mentality, which means that anyone who is not a pakeha male is bound to cop it sooner or later, and all their little friends will come out in support of him, and an ugly situation has the potential to become even uglier (like this will potentially) until the confronted one just withdraws, hurt and exhausted and said male carries on regardless 🙁

      • weka 17.2.1
        5 January 2017 at 7:55 pm

        Yep, and it’s the bizarreness of Pākehā thinking they get to decide what is racist.

        The whole framing around ‘offence’ is problematic too.

  18. Sacha 18
    5 January 2017 at 6:42 pm

    The Boagan hasn’t really grasped the concept:
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/88152409/michelle-boag-says-racism-debates-been-instructive

    Boag said she “looked after” a Samoan family and there was no way they’d call her racist.

    After having the “benefit” of reading Devoy’s comments about casual racism, she’d come to understand that even if you did not intend to offend anyone or be racist, casual racism could occur when someone else regarded the remarks as racist.
    …

    Boag is also sticking by her plan of learning Te Reo in 2017.

    • weka 18.1
      5 January 2017 at 7:50 pm

      It’s been a while since I’ve cringed this much as a NZer.

      • Sacha 18.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 7:54 pm

        It shows how far we have to go.

        • weka 18.1.1.1
          5 January 2017 at 8:01 pm

          Yes, and possibly that we are losing ground. It’s like the people who really don’t give a shit about others are emboldened in their self-centredness and now have more licence to be racist. Am thinking Boag here, and Bradbury’s recent posts. I don’t know enough about Leitch to tell if he is just old school racist having to catch up, or if he is actively wanting to turn the tide against progression.

          • Morrissey 18.1.1.1.1
            5 January 2017 at 8:58 pm

            Am thinking Boag here, and Bradbury’s recent posts.

            You’re equating Boag and Bradbury? Do please explain….

            • weka 18.1.1.1.1.1
              5 January 2017 at 9:12 pm

              I wouldn’t equate them (although since you ask, they’re probably both authoritarian, and have sufficiently large egos to cause problems for society to the extent that they gain power). What I meant was that in the post-2016 US election world, there is a tide turning against progressives, and there are people on all facets of politics who are coming out of the woodwork with their nasty now that they feel some legitimacy to do so. Bradbury’s poor white boy me thing strikes me as an example of what is happening on the left whereby those who don’t in fact support equality can start to say so. People like Boag, being on the right, have had that freedom for much longer, and neoliberalism has given them far greater power, but even there it seems to me that they are taking new liberties with their proto-fascism.

              (no, I didn’t just call Bomber proto-fascist, so have a care with how you read what I wrote, and ask for clarification if you need it. I’m just sharing some evolving thoughts on what’s happening with quite a big shift in the culture).

              • Morrissey …
                5 January 2017 at 9:21 pm

                That’s a pretty good attempt at an explanation, weka.

                Actually, the two of them have a long and fraught history. Bomber once drove Boag into a paroxysm of inarticulate fury on Jim Mora’s Panel, when he kept asking her to explain her contention that the super-rich in this country contribute more than working people. Luckily for her, Jim Mora intervened and shifted on to the next topic, while she lapsed into sullen near-silence for the rest of the programme.

              • greywarshark …
                5 January 2017 at 9:32 pm

                Morrissey
                I have heard Boag’s name come up in connection with background maneouvring about people’s employment, position etc.
                Maybe she made a complaint and that is why Bomber was off Mora’s program. I also heard that she damned Simon Mercep on Radionz – now unheard.

                And that she was a scout for National to get Jonkey back to NZ in the first place. Has she form like this?

          • Sacha 18.1.1.1.2
            5 January 2017 at 9:01 pm

            I’m inclined to agree with others that Leitch is a high-profile example of an old-timer who has got away with this stuff for years and knows no better, not a person of intent like her Boagosity.

            • weka 18.1.1.1.2.1
              5 January 2017 at 9:04 pm

              that makes sense.

            • Morrissey 18.1.1.1.2.2
              5 January 2017 at 9:26 pm

              I know lots of “old-timers”; they all know better than to spew racist filth. And so does Peter Leitch. He chose to make that offensive remark, it wasn’t something beyond his control.

              • Clump_AKA Sam …
                5 January 2017 at 9:29 pm

                the irony is enough to fuel south aucklands protein intake for a year

              • Sacha …
                5 January 2017 at 9:30 pm

                He is used to getting away with it (as Leilani Tamu’s story reinforces). Doesn’t mean it’s OK.

                • Clump_AKA Sam …
                  5 January 2017 at 9:32 pm

                  In other news KFC revised there quarterly profits upwards.

                  You can tell me when it isn’t funny any more.

          • Muttonbird 18.1.1.1.3
            5 January 2017 at 10:14 pm

            I think we are losing ground, after eight years of this ‘MoreFM’ government.

            English ‘doesn’t know (or care)’ what feminism is.

            Boag ‘doesn’t know (or care)’ what casual racism is.

            These are giant backward steps.

            • Clump_AKA Sam 18.1.1.1.3.1
              5 January 2017 at 10:23 pm

              I think Amore accurate discretion is.

              English cares that you don’t care.

              And Mud knows you care about casual racism.

              They know. It’s probably written on a white board from last week.

            • weka 18.1.1.1.3.2
              5 January 2017 at 11:46 pm

              I know, it’s weird isn’t it. I keep thinking about Key’s behaviour to Amanda Bailey and how that whole thing was handled. And he did that several years before Trump and it’s now normalised in NZ culture. This is different than something like Roastbusters which has always been latent in the culture. This is something new. And we have apparently left wing people defending it.

              • Clump_AKA Sam …
                6 January 2017 at 12:19 am

                In corporate culture you’re conditioned not to blow whistles because bad business practices is profitable (tax evasion, price fixing ect) so if you question billions in unearned income you’re meet with silence and then confusion that reinforces the ubusers.

                When your selling dog shit to stupid people, every one knows

        • Skinny 18.1.1.2
          5 January 2017 at 9:42 pm

          Oh come on you lot are killing me with laughter. Toxic Boag deliberately jumps in attempting to run the PC gone mad line. Focus on what is going on in the big picture. PM 21% needs all the skulduggery Boag and others will give.

          Stop engaging in the small stuff and do some real work like us others do. Get on top of the narrative and control it just like Boag.

      • JanM 18.1.2
        5 January 2017 at 9:17 pm

        Me too 🙁

    • Morrissey 18.2
      5 January 2017 at 9:10 pm

      Boag’s not the only one claiming immunity due to close association with someone of what she would call “the darker persuasion.”

      Cameron Slater claims he can’t be a racist because he was born in Fiji and his father is dating a woman from the Philippines. Don Brash is not a racist because his ex-wife was Chinese. Richard Prebble is not a racist because he had not one but TWO Pasifika wives. Jamie “Lock Up His Sisters” Whyte can’t be racist, despite his expressions of sneering contempt for Māori during his braindead 2014 campaign, because his wife is African. Andy Haden claims there’s no way he was a racist, in spite of all appearances, because he played rugby with a lot of Polynesian and Māori players. And of course THIS bloke can’t have been racist because his wife was Māori….

  19. greywarshark 19
    5 January 2017 at 8:48 pm

    Just marvelling at that marvellous photo of Boag, I noticed that her pink suit has a design that looks like scales. You couldn’t make this sort of thing up!

  20. Robert Guyton 20
    5 January 2017 at 9:09 pm

    I stayed on Waiheke last year, in a small handmade cob hut. Breakfast was guavas from the bushes outside of the door and coffee ground by our host. We fed a dead rat to a huge female eel in the creek and visited a little rice paddy to see how the first grains had formed. Didn’t see no “butcher” 🙂

  21. RedBaronCV 21
    5 January 2017 at 10:32 pm

    Okay can somebody clear something up for me. Why did he approach her in the first place? Does he approach all sorts of people to give unsolicited advice (young/old/male/female?) Would he have approached say a 30 something male to give unsolicited advice?
    Or does he simply approach young women so that he can give his completely unasked for view on her affairs which then deteriorated. Does he – putting aside the comments made – think he is entitled to make comments as of right to women in this age group because of course they always need old white guy input (not)!

  22. Muttonbird 22
    5 January 2017 at 10:41 pm

    It has made me very happy to see Farrar is all pissy about the existence of social media as a more powerful vehicle for forming public opinion that his own staid polling and trolling method.

    He’s actually having a cry that Bridger posted a clip on Facebook! Get with the program, David.

    • Clump_AKA Sam 22.1
      5 January 2017 at 10:45 pm

      Same reaction to Trump using Twitter. I mean why listen to some one else’s interpretation of US forign policy when it’s all on trumps Twitter feed in the simplest language that any 8 year old understands.

      • Nick 22.1.1
        5 January 2017 at 11:53 pm

        Haha…thats so true Sam…..Massive US/World changing stuff delivered in 140 letters or less….Wow, blows your mind…..just like that republican watchdog backdown yesterday……boom , done.

        • Clump_AKA Sam 22.1.1.1
          6 January 2017 at 12:09 am

          Online profits is a myth anyway. As far as I can tell no less than 60% of online profit is generated from Facebook/Google/YouTube so mainstream media is trying to breath life into a dead corps.

  23. North 23
    6 January 2017 at 7:54 am

    The Unstudied Boag (doesn’t even know what “casual racism” is) and The Studied Bogan (“Hey I’m a straight-up joker…….y’all’d love a beer with me”).

    What a hoot. Both pissed off when anyone has the temerity to challenge their individual and joint machinations. The Boag as the ‘go-to’ person for the National Party and The Bogan as the ‘come-to’ person for the National Party. Deservedly, they’re both getting it. Good job !

    How I fear for poor New Zealand. So many emperors with no clothes !

  24. JanM 24
    6 January 2017 at 8:26 am

    I think this is pretty sound. Predictably it’s getting a lot of flack from the unevolved:

    OPINION: What does a “white man’s island” look like? Is it the sort of place fair-minded New Zealanders would want to inhabit in the 21st century?

    The questions arise because of a controversial encounter between Sir Peter Leitch and a young Maori woman on Waiheke Island during a wine-tasting event.

    In Lara Bridger’s account, Leitch, the benighted Mad Butcher and Rugby League patron, approached her family, advised them against drink-driving and commented that they were not local. Bridger responded that, in fact, she was born on the island and was tangata whenua.

    According to her, Leitch said, “Well, you need to acknowledge that this is a white man’s island now”, a comment which left her deeply upset. As is the modern way, Bridger reported the exchange on social media, but felt she had to remove the post when Leitch became the target of nasty and threatening comments.

    Leitch said he was disappointed that his “light-hearted banter” had been misinterpreted as racist. His spokeswoman, Michelle Boag, unhelpfully added that Bridger was “barely coffee-coloured”; despite all her years in public relations, Boag still seems to have lessons to learn about holes and digging.

    The Race Relations Commissioner, Dame Susan Devoy, seemed to be having a bob each way, first describing Leitch as the “least racist person” she knows (which is unlikely), but later decrying his comments as “casual racism”.

    Leitch was born in 1944, so grew up in a time and a place when such attitudes were commonplace and unremarkable, unless you happened to be on the receiving end of them.

    When protests were raised, the words could be easily dismissed as a joke, or even as banter.

    It is not that time and New Zealand is not that place any more, and there is no part of it that could be described in any context as a “white man’s island” (a place, incidentally, where presumably the female 52 per cent of the population are also welcome only on men’s terms).

    At the last census, 74 per cent of New Zealanders identified as having at least one European ethnicity; that means that more than a quarter of us no longer consider ourselves to be European in any way.

    Fifteen per cent had Maori heritage, 12 per cent were Asian and 7 per cent Pasifika. The population of people with Asian heritage expanded by a third between 2006 and 2013.

    New Zealand is a progressive country which is becoming more pluralistic and diverse as time goes on. And in this more complex and dynamic environment, a person does not have to have coffee-coloured skin to identify as Maori.

    This is the reality, and for some people it takes some getting used to. They are the people who see the words “I am tangata whenua” as a challenge, rather than a statement of fact.

    To give Leitch the benefit of the doubt, from his generational viewpoint he may have intended to be more casual than racist but, if reported correctly, his words were inappropriate in this day and age, and they caused offence.

    But the people who responded with hate and threats, forcing Bridger to take down her post, were also in the wrong.

    If New Zealand is to move forward as a harmonious bicultural and multi-cultural society, we need to treat each other with more respect.

    This editorial ran in The Press.

  25. North 25
    6 January 2017 at 10:26 am

    Agree that editorial is reasonably comprehensive JanM.

    Worried however about its last paragraph. Seems emblematic of an MSM given to simpering/whining that thoroughgoing (and out of its control) response by the ordinary person to wilfully or clumsily offered offensiveness is non-legitimate. For the disrespect such response connotes, allegedly – gimme a break. At best that invokes a double standard in favour of the initial gratuitous offensiveness and at worst it blames the impliedly flawed victim.

    Why doesn’t the editorial unflinchingly canvass that Boag (authorised by Leitch obviously) deliberately set about an indisputably disrespectful hatchet job on the woman the victim of Leitch’s ‘Keeper of the WaiheKey Gate’ fantasy ? And that it paused only when they were called out on it ? An intended hatchet job no different from that mounted against Amanda Bailey.

    Instead we see the weasel words “complex” and “dynamic” and in respect of Boag, “unhelpfully”. Words which essentially counsel the direction of the narrative away from the now Establishment ‘personage’ who kicked it all off in the first place.

  26. Rae 26
    6 January 2017 at 5:01 pm

    If you got Boag in damage control, you are screwed.

    • North 26.1
      6 January 2017 at 9:44 pm

      “If you got Boag in damage control, you are screwed”.

      What exactly do you mean Rae ? If it’s meant to convey that PR guru Boag is superbly effective when in damage control……..really ? Leitch’ll be asking for his dough back I’m guessing. On the score that not only has she not repaired his PR she’s screwed it up more, made him look like a dick for having hired her in the first place, and confirmed his status as a National Party lickspittle still in debt to those who ‘elevated’ him.

  27. Anne 27
    6 January 2017 at 7:32 pm

    A nice summing up of Leitchgate (sorry) by Pablo of Kiwipolitico fame.

    http://www.kiwipolitico.com/2017/01/darkness-at-heart/

    Enjoy. 😀

  29. Morrissey 29
    6 January 2017 at 8:36 pm

    Michelle Boag looks and acts like one of the rich, corrupt women that are preyed on by con-man Michael Caine in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

  30. Sacha 30
    8 January 2017 at 1:58 pm

    Bevan Hurley adds a sharp piece in the Sunday Star-Times:
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/88176010/opinion-no-matter-which-way-you-tie-it-racisms-dresscode-is-neither-smart-nor-casual

    All of this reminds us we live in a country where countervailing racial winds are constantly buffeting each other, occasionally drawn into plain sight via social media.

  31. Sacha 31
    8 January 2017 at 4:12 pm

    And http://www.stuff.co.nz/good-reads/88191397/oscar-kightley-when-light-banter-becomes-offensive

    The late, great Manu Samoa legend Papali’itele Peter “Fats” Fatialofa had a great way of explaining an acceptable context for light-hearted racial banter.

    He said: “You can call me a coconut to my face but you had better be a really good friend first.”

    …

    The thing is that unless you’re a comedian talking to your audience and being really funny and clever about it, there aren’t many situations in life where you could include jokes about race in polite small talk with people you’ve just met. Even if you’re an awesome human who has done loads for the community.

    Whoever you are, stick to Fats’ rule and you will at least avoid hurting people, or getting hurt yourself, feeling that you’ve been misunderstood.

  32. North 32
    8 January 2017 at 5:07 pm

    Oskar Kightley calling for social sanity. In the first place social sanity is not coming on uninvited at strangers. Being all sort of recently appointed ‘Prefect’ of the self-perceived ‘Perfecture of WaiheKey’.

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