Written By:
Natwatch - Date published:
7:35 am, November 13th, 2015 - 87 comments
Categories: journalism -
Tags: fran o'sullivan, homophobia, used to be a journalist
Really Fran? What with the week we’ve just had, you felt it necessary to…
Andrew Little’s grab for territory limp-wristed
So we’re in for hilarious homophobia then. Righto.
If Andrew Little was hoping to craft a new Labour playbook, last weekend’s sop to the party faithful at their annual conference was remarkably effete.
Yup.
Labour activists have also allowed themselves to be seduced if they believe …
Uh huh.
But in truth all he has done is produce a blank canvas that on current performance Key will write on before he gets his pen out.
Stop. Just stop.
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this too merits a polite
Yes Dear. đ
My first thought was – Fran is showing her true colours.
My second thought was – is someone else (from ShonKey’s office maybe) impersonating Fran.
It is a very odd story .
Hey … Go look at the article again. The headline has been changed from:
Andrew Littleâs grab for territory limp-wristed
to
Andrew Littleâs grab for territory is weak.
As a gay, I personally don’t associate the phrase “limp-wristed” by itself to be homophobic. But in conjunction with “effete” it clearly is.
Pretty lame by Fran.
Do you often refer to yourself as “a gay”. Honest question as I can never tell if this is considered a slur any more. I suppose context has a lot to do with it?
When I refer to myself as gay, I use it as a noun not an adjective. When people use it as an adjective it is a pejorative, synonymous with “bad”, “sick” etc
Only speaking for myself but referring to someone as Gay is no big deal, Saying “that’s so Gay” is unfortunately used ignorantly as an insult. Personally I think John Key is effete and limp wristed sometimes and I’m not questioning his sexuality.
as our Prime Minister did when referring to a shirt…
Yes and his mincing down the catwalk. Such a dick !!
That was entirely tongue-in-cheek, which I guess doesn’t really work over the internet.
When anyone refers to someone as “a gay” or “the gays” I think they’re a dim-witted moron.
Gay is an adjective, lesbian is a noun. They’re used differently.
Gay is also a noun surely? I am Gay.
1. I am cold -> adjective.
2. I am gay -> adjective.
3. I am a man-> noun
4. I am a gay -> noun
5. I am a gay man -> adjective + noun
#4 is unacceptable and I consider anyone who says that a dim-witted moron. Nothing wrong with the other examples I’ve given.
Fair enough. You can consider anyone a dim-witted moron if you want. But your opinion that gay is not acceptable as a noun is a personal interpretation and is actually wrong, even though you might like it to be correct. Check a few dictionaries.
A quick google dictionary check produces:
gay
/gei/
adjective
1. (of a person, especially a man) homosexual.
2. dated. light-hearted and carefree.
noun
1. a homosexual, especially a man.
2. Gay – a female or male given name.
That’s my understanding Grindlebottom…. but maybe it is generational… and Lanth is, I think, much younger than me.
Can’t be bothered reading our political Pravda/Fox news, “The Granddaddy Herald” and their commentators adoration of John Key. Ra Ra. Is it real or just to keep their job? Who Knows?
I would not even bother to click a link on the Herald these days as you are just supporting their revenue.
This is what Key’s ouburst this week promotes. It gives people comfort that their wrongheaded thinking is actually OK even when they are derogatory and demeaning to others. This is the environment he is intentionally creating and has been for 7 years.
He pushes Hot Buttons, and clearly pushed Fran’s, or gave her the security to post her outdated and disrespectful views.
I just read a Chris Trotter piece, in which he claims that Labour wants to concentrate on bread-and-butter issues, and avoid the trap of overemphasis on “identity” politics.
http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/2015/11/of-dreams-and-nightmares.html
While it is true that you can chew gum and walk at the same time you have to watch out for wedge potential – the right says, “They don’t give a stuff about ordinary people, they are only there for minorities”, then when they try to defend themselves there is a good chance they will end up ruffling feathers, and having to defend themselves again, and so on. Fran is probably doing her bit to tempt Labour into a trap of that kind. At the moment there seems to be an all out rush to gain or retain control the narrative – even Dunne was on RNZ this morning, forcefully asserting the good old golden mean that served him so well in the nineties.
Chris also needs to read the counter to the wedge strategy. It isn’t as easy as some think
“you can chew gum and walk at the same time”
if you are even half smart ..
The references to Little being ‘limp-wristed’ and ‘effete’ were just silly and unnecessary but she’s right when she said “all he has done is produce a blank canvas that on current performance Key will write on before he gets his pen out.” Little said at the conference “And where people canât work, the government should support them because we donât believe in throwing Kiwis on the scrap heap.” There was a lot of talk about “detail coming later”, but Labour’s never released a detailed social welfare policy since before the 2008 election, that’s nothing at all before at least the last three elections. Why should we think anything’s going to change just because he spouted some rhetoric even Bennett, Tolley et al wouldn’t disagree with? I’ll wait, yet again, to see what comes. But I learned a while back now not to be disappointed.
Little said before the conference that he would not have a lot to say about policy – his speech was intended to be direction-setting. And we will all have to wait and see how these things play out. He may not be able to do all he hopes to do, but from what I have seen of Andrew Little, he is not a dissembler like Bennett and Tolley are.
I hope you are right. It’s just that Labour has done nothing since well before 2008 to suggest it will provide the detail it has again said it would provide. When it comes to things welfare Labour simply says nothing and hopes nobody will notice. And most people don’t notice most of the time and it’s likely many people don’t care which is why Labour gets away with what it does but as I say I hope you are right but I’ll still bet my house that when it comes to welfare and benefits Labour will continue to sidestep the issue.
O’Sullivan making Little out to be “un-manly” or weak of conviction doesn’t necessarily make any comment or inference on his sexuality.
Think you’re drawing a very long bow here, and the inference probably says more about you than it does about O’Sullivan.
Well I bet Little could hammer a nail!
Limp wristed and efete dont mean less manly in your world? Fascinating. What country do you live in?
There is a ( claimed left wing) poster here that refers to the “Ponce Key” quite regularly. not a murmur from anyone that I recall.
“There is a ( claimed left wing) poster here that refers to the âPonce Keyâ quite regularly. not a murmur from anyone that I recall.”
Ponce is an old fashioned word for a Pimp (sort of, more like a tout )
pick up a dictionary FFS
ponce
Term originated in the UK and came to prominence in the 1960’s, initially to describe a pimp. In Spanish it means “prince” and could have either been referring to the fancy, over-the-top clothing and jewelry popular with pimps, or because he was surrounded by a harem of women, involved in the underworld, but usually not the actual “king” of the area (he had to pay tribute to use the block or neighborhood).
Now it is generally used to refer to someone (usually a male) who dresses in nicer clothing and acts in a polished fashion; often interchangable with fag or pussy, but not necessarily as derogatory: a ponce is not necessarily homosexual, nor are they necessarily passive or weak, but they would tend to be thought of as metrosexual or gay in their manner of dress.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ponce
Try again…
Noun
ponce â(plural ponces)
(Britain, slang) A man employed by a prostitute to find clients, and who may also act as a bodyguard and driver. A ponce is different from a pimp in being the prostitute’s employee, not the employer.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ponce
where as you my good man are probably more of a Nonce…
It’s been tried once or twice. Trouble is that the person responsible just doubles down and plays the old “unfamiliar with that broadly-known use of the word” trick that bigots like to pull.
I’m not sure most people are comfortable with it, I just can’t see a way of the behaviour being changed.
Of course it’s unlikely that my “behaviour”……viz. the use of “The Ponce Key”……will change. The subject reflects it more and more demonstrably as the kaupapa advances.
I believe you go too far with mention of “bigot” though McFlock. That’s OK…..your view and not even a burdensome one, to me at least…..
Suspect that the burden would lessen were you to know a bit about me. We’d probably share a chuckle. Sorry, secret squirrel stuff. A la the styles of The Rt. Hon. John Phillip Key, Our Sovereign Lady’s Chief Minister And Gushing Highlands Guest…..I must not elaborate.
Wow ! Was that an epiphany just happened ???
McFlock !!!
Save NZ LOL!
This is obviously spin from Fran.
I was at the conference. I heard his spin. It was inspiring. It was brilliant. It was strong and confident. It was passionate. Even my friend who was very doubtful about Little was completely won over.
It was definitely an odd piece of work from Francis. But the more you look at it, it’s obvious that it is a “dead cat” strategy . Trying to create a diversion from the real news around the Guantanamo Christmas Island saga and Her heroe’s outburst in Parliament the other day. Here is a quote from Wiki on Lynton Crosby’s bio, describing the strategy.
“In a 2013 article for the Daily Telegraph written by former client Boris Johnson, the current London mayor said one of Crosby’s tactics when losing an argument and having the facts against you was to do the equivalent of “throwing a dead cat on the table”: bring up an issue you want to talk about that draws widespread attention from the populace, forcing opponents to also talk about your new issue instead of the previous issue.[24]”
Watch for more of these strategies as the Natz become increasingly desperate. More important that the opposition and Bloggers don’t buy into it.
Her full first name’s probably Frances (or Franceska or Francine), G.
In English, Frances is the usual spelling for a female: Francis is for a male.
was the talking mule male or female?
Male.
Fran O’Sullivan is dire, never more so than when she’s dumbing it down for the troglodytes at NewstalkZB…..
http://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-29072015/#comment-1051571
So the argument from this piece seems to be:
Gays are often demeaned as unmanly.
Little has been described as unmanly.
Therefore Little is being disparaged as gay.
Complete and utter failure of logic.
Key has been described as effete. And indeed i would describe him as such, with no question mark on his sexuality.
… and a golliwog is just a doll, and minstrel shows are just plain old fun…
Gratuitous and a quantum leap into a gaping canyon of illogic McFlock. Immaculateness. An exquisite badge. Not available to many, many mortals. Vaunt it !
whatever, dude
i tend to describe Key as a wanker, in very manly way of course. So you see, no harm done there too. đ
Just horsing around, cause girls will be girls n stuff.
chuckle
Key has been described as effete. And indeed i would describe him as such, with no question mark on his sexuality.
Effete:
adjective
– affected, over-refined, and ineffectual.
“effete trendies from art college”
synonyms: affected, over-refined, ineffectual, artificial, studied, pretentious, precious, chichi, flowery, mannered; More…
– no longer capable of effective action.
“the authority of an effete aristocracy began to dwindle”
synonyms: weakened, enfeebled, enervated, worn out, exhausted, finished, burnt out, played out, drained, spent, powerless
“the whole fabric of society is becoming effete”
– (of a man) weak or effeminate.
“he chatted away, exercising his rather effete charm”
synonyms: effeminate, unmasculine, unmanly; More
Et tu Brute. Your failure to consult a dictionary leads you to the wrong conclusion.
Haven’t you just exactly proved my point? Where are the allusions to homosexuality in those definitions?
And I ask you McFlock, who would describe Little as homosexual?
If O’Sullivan has described his actions as unmanly, and you’ve brought his sexuality into the equation, isn’t it you then who are drawing the link between “unmanliness” and homosexuality?
A very common belief about men who are perceived as “limp-wristed” and “effeminate” is that they are camp gays. A typical example is Julian Clary. Fran is using dog-whistle language that conveys that picture. She is not a fool & she chooses her words carefully.
I have no idea who would describe Little as a homosexual, including whether he himself does so.
However, we do know who repeatedly refers to Little or describe him with terms that have a long and strong history of being used perjoratively against gay men in particular. That person is Fran O’Sullivan.
Your insistenence that you don’t understand the subtleties of the lingua franca is ever so butch, but she’s not exactly using palare palaver.
I understand perfectly how those words can be used, and against whom.
But against Little, they have none of that undertone, and it doesn’t take a genius to work that out. Little is just a joe average, your typical NZ straight white male with no particularly notable features in any direction.
As i said, if anything, Key is effete and limp-wristed, and he is a heterosexual male with a penchant for ponytails.
You might have a slightly stronger argument when Fran describes Key in her next article as effete, limp-wristed and with a penchant for pulling women’s pony tails.
She’d still deserve the same criticism but at least she could claim to be even-handed in her dog whistling.
Oh, you claim perfect understanding despite all evidence to the contrary? I stand corrected, then. And Mickey Rooney’s role in Breakfast at Tiffany’s is solid and unremarkable in every way, even by today’s standards… /sarc
but Fran didn’t describe Key that way, she chose those words and phrases to describe Little.
I’d like to read the journo who called Key effete. Can you link please to the major daily so I can read it.
Not only that, but no-one described Little as either limp wristed or effete. O’Sullivan described Little’s speech as ‘effete’, and his grab for territory ‘limp wristed’. These are descriptions of Little’s policy, not his personality. More faux offence from the left.
More faux intelligence from Daniel
Daniel Cale is becoming a most tiresome troll.
Faux offence? So why has Fran’s headline been changed from:
“Andrew Littleâs grab for territory limp-wristed”
to now read:
“Andrew Littleâs grab for territory is weak”?
Really?????
Yep.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=11543877
Media gutlessness.
Yes, you’re quite right. Fran is happy to pay lip service to her ill-formed false beliefs, and when they’re challenged she launches cowardly ad hominem attacks from her bully pulpit.
She’s as gutless as you are.
What ‘ill-informed false beliefs’? That Little’s policy outline at the Labour Conference was limp wristed (meaning weak) and effete (also meaning weak, ineffectual). Seem’s like a valid criticism.
Geez Daniel. Can’t they send better wing nuts over? You come up with these insulting phrases which have no relationship to reality and you never back your phrases up.
Oh, they’re certainly ill-informed too; reading is a skill.
Media wakes up after dose of smelling salts and decides it made a big boo boo with inappropriate headline.
Well it’s what she wrote, so I’m sticking with gutlessness.
But she withdrew it. So the writer agrees it was wrong and you still claim it was right? Can’t you do better than reflexive left bad right good stuff? It makes it really boring to parse your comments.
If you readmy post from yesterday yu can see why we behave as Daniel has in the face of being wrong. And yeah by “we” I am including me.
What do you expect from the dead cat choir once the song sheet is released from dirty politics HQ.
As at now the bulk of the comments on Fran’s article are critical of it for its bias, only one for its homophobic headline. Will be interesting to see if that changes over the next few hours.
Franâs headline has been changed from:
âAndrew Littleâs grab for territory limp-wristedâ
to now read:
âAndrew Littleâs grab for territory is weakâ.
Limp wristed means weak. Lacking strength. Obviously it’s a term the left don’t understand.
Obviously its a dog whistle term the Herald does understand.
She did an article a year or so back writing about John Keys ‘big swinging dick’.
To be fair, he has fucked the nation so thoroughly it’s walking funny…
It certainly gives us an insight into Ms O’Sullivans mind.
For a bit of levity in this nothing debate – The Perfects (The Prefects?) v. The Non-Immaculates (The Bigots?) – that reference to “big swinging dick” was surely satirical……how would Fran know anyway ? Oh Jeezuz……it’s come to that has it ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QT3JgcwojY
Here is Key being “effete” if you want an example.
a link to a Major daily please, so we can see the true comparisson of your view. You said Key had been described as effette.
Confession is the strongest of evidence Tracey. I know that’s in your learning……be a bugger if nothing were ‘real’ unless published in a major daily. Oh God……there I go again.
This is a fucked debate anyway. I can look after myself. I don’t need ‘Carping Immaculates’ to drive ‘my’ car around/through such obstacles as I encounter on the highway of ‘my’ life. I don’t need their vaunted yet essentially tepid concern. ‘Outrageously’ I extend ‘me’ to include ‘many’. I do that on empirical authority.
Please note…..I don’t perceive you as CI. Hope you’ll take me at my word.
PS – in that clip The Ponce Key was effete principally on the score that he was prepared to ‘act out’ at the suggestion of a bunch of guffawing fools.
PLease note, this should be directed to Brutus Escariot who stated John Key has been called effette
Yeah well perhaps I went off at a bit of a tangent there Tracey but if there’s one thing that really pisses me off it’s people who guess at and then presumptuously, imperiously, ‘colonise’ the life experience of others to demonstrate firstly to themselves and secondly to the world how ‘immaculate’ they are.
Knowing fuck all about the life experience of those others. Telling those others what they can and can’t say. ‘Punishing’ with Hosking-like throwaway lines accusing of bigotry and so on. Fuck off, traveller on your imperfect personal journey !
It’s not their right unasked to polish the shoes that others wear, especially when the essential motive is to see their own ‘perfect’ faces brilliantly reflected. That applies even if they are as me. Fuck them ! In my reading, Brutus Iscariot has accurately identified the fragile, intrusive snottiness of the ‘Immaculates’ contributing to this thread. Good on him/her ! With respect demanding links to MSM is somewhat nitpicking. Yeah I know I do it too but I’m not at my best when I do it……
Your first 2 paragraphs describe your attitude in lecturing me.
So in your world a defence of something not being homophobic can be that Key has been called a poof too (by the meda) but we just take brutus word for it cos you agree with him?
I genuinely want to know which MSM journos have called him effete other than to describe his affected catwalk prank. To my knowledge Little was not trying to be effete or limp wristed so a different example is required to make brutus’point which you so passionately support
So you can fuck off too, with your pseudo philisophical self righteousness and I will stand by request of Brutus cos when he posts it I can concede he is right that a widely read MSM journo has invoked homophobic imagery toward Key.
How passive aggressive of you North
Your first 2 paragraphs describe your attitude in lecturing me.
So in your world a defence of something not being homophobic can be that Key has been called a poof too (by the meda) but we just take brutus word for it cos you agree with him?
I genuinely want to know which MSM journos have called him effete other than to describe his affected catwalk prank. To my knowledge Little was not trying to be effete or limp wristed so a different example is required to make brutus’point which you so passionately support
So you can fuck off too, with your pseudo philisophical self righteousness and I will stand by request of Brutus cos when he posts it I can concede he is right that a journo in the MSM has been homophobic toward Key too.
they really really must not have liked the feel of the labour Conference last weekend.
Effete, limp wristed, supporters of “rapists, murderers, and child molesteres”, uppity women walking out of parliament being all hysterical n stuff.
Wonder what they did not like about it? That Labour seems to be doing well, that there is co-operation between the Labour Party and The Greens, that no one gave them policies that they could ridicule or steal?
Really it seems to me that the right at the moment is shitting themselves. So much bile, and hate in such a short time. Bucket loads of bile and hate and all coming from the National Party. I wonder why? But maybe that’s just how they are made.
Why did she write it? It is so so late 20th century.
Maybe she is of a certain age. Sigh , are’nt we all?
Its sexism anyway