After his infamous train wreck of an interview (followed by an equally appalling attempt by the Prime Minister) Faafoi is now officially in hiding in the hope of avoiding any more attention to an issue that is internally polling 80% in the negative.
The fact that neither the Minister nor Prime Minister can credibly stand 5minutes questioning over what will and won’t criminalize speech is a testament to how poorly they have thought this through.
The criticism of why the Government believed they could simply waltz into a free speech fight with nothing more than ‘feelings’ as an argument honestly asks hard questions of their strategic team.
Everything the Government has attempted to put up as an argument justifying the criminalization of speech is intellectually bankrupt and appallingly stupid.
But for real gasp inducing arrogance are the tribal Labour and Green apologists desperately trying to justify this fucking nonsense.
If National was attempting to ram through hate speech laws allowing the Police to define hate and imprison people based on that definition, the collective Left would be on the streets rioting, but because it’s our team in power (and we are so fucking noble), we are defending state tyranny!
That’s why the woke cult are such hypocrites!
There are better ways to protect minorities in a liberal progressive democracy and I outline these in my submission to the Ministry of Justice, but the naked desire by so many on the Left to gain legislative weapons to attack those whose opinions they dislike is just another shocking insight into how fascist your average middle class identity politics acolyte really is.
These people want a woke caliphate so their revenge fantasies against everyone they dislike can be actualized in the present.
Their daily to do list would look like this:
-meditation
-yoga
-self actualize while taking selfie for Instagram
-correct others on their te Reo pronunciation
-cycle to drop off recycling
-call police and report a misuse of pronouns as a hate crime
-get into Twitter argument about Meghan Markle living her best life, report to Police as hate crime and try to get the person sacked
-juice cleanse
-bake bread & be present with gratitude
Throwing someone in jail for 3years using a law defined by the police is not a liberal progressive democracy no matter how noble the life goals!
I can’t tell the difference between a woke lynch mob and a sensible sentencing lynch mob any more!
This is why the Left needs Winston!
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Did you have to mention Markle ? A (passive -aggressive) offspring bought me her crappy kids’ book and I put it in the recycling. Please don’t tell anybody. I don’t fancy arguing her with a copper. It’s not like I’m a graduate in public relations like the PM, or an ex-television presenter accustomed to the public eye – or that anybody’s paying me big bucks to do a job.
PS. Mentioning Winston is just fine. His mother was a Scot, and that has to count for something. He wears a suit as well as any Italian, is almost Churchillian in Parliament, and is no big a fabricator than certain USA presidents. I’ll go Winston – if not TOP.
Still a toss up for me between Winston and TOP.
The scary thing is on TDB community that the ones who seem to advocate for the hate speech rules also seem to think physical violence is ok/less of a crime than an idea like religion!
So put 2+2 together and you see that the ‘hate speech’ which is better named ‘anti freedom of speech’ laws as a catalyst for many who want to control others and think in some circumstances violence is ok. Law is only as good as the lawmakers and the police, and in the ChCH terror attack, what went wrong is enforcement and proper care from police/SIS and visa/border controls as people can come to NZ and live here without any real checks or monitoring over time which is why NZ was targeted for the terror ‘training’.
The root causes of CHCH have not been addressed and many of the risks are still there, but instead like the UK they pretend that these new laws are doing something. The poor results of the UK hate speech laws is their sad history to encourage more terror attacks and violence (aka bombs, acid attacks, knives, vehicles) as various enabled groups, try to destroy each other.
Already woke mobs are going around threatening others in nz too, and believe they are enabled to do violence against others because the ‘others’ beliefs are wrong and they must be punished. AKA death threats from the transgender community and slurs to the lesbian community (TERF) or vice versa, but the police and society seem to be more interesting in supporting that type of behaviour than prosecuting it, (which they can do under current laws as you are not allowed to threaten others already). So called hate speech laws are lighting a match and enflaming situations – which until they become about violence should be a police free zone.
We see from the pride parade that somehow these mobs are able to destroy goodwill and harmony, desperate to take control.
In worse cases we get the Cultural Revolution and may aspects of that are already happening in NZ, such as the destruction and cancel culture of artefacts, language, peoples right to speak and rally if they are deemed the ‘wrong’ types. AKA Mayor of Wellington telling the lesbian community to have their meetings in a waste bin and the media company refusing to put a billboard with a dictionary definition of a woman. They are not censored for their actions. I think Bomber’s daughter was also targeted with death threats in the past but don’t believe the police have found the person or even investigated but I am sure they will be hot on his heels to prosecute him over the hate speech laws and close down this and other blogs aka Nicky Hager style.
saveNZ It was a Hutt Valley Mayor, not the Mayor of Wellington, who made the comment about women in waste bins. The truly ghastly thing is that such a silly man – or whatever he is – could get elected Mayor anywhere in 21stC New Zealand. In a normal workplace, his comment would constitute a code of conduct offence, but politics attracts some strange bedfellows.
What he said wasn’t hate speech, just puerile and creepy, and it’s a bit depressing knowing there are males
like that in public office, but when they do shoot their mouths off, then we see them for what they are.
Machiavelli would be rolling in fits of laughter in his grave!
Don’t worry about this time bomb, easy to sit on woke arses and debate woke law, than do the hard yards and work out that your woke committees have been 100%, wrong just like the hate speech laws.
Housing crisis: Children in emergency housing rises 34pc in a year
“Holding pens” and residents treated “almost like cattle” is how one social service provider is describing how children are living in emergency housing in Tauranga.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/housing-crisis-children-in-emergency-housing-rises-34pc-in-a-year/JHMO72QI434IYLRLCPQ4TK3KTY/
I guess when some woke/right winger persuaded the politicians to demolish all the affordable housing as they were not good enough as they didn’t have twitter woke bells and whistles, import in tens of thousands of construction workers with no NZ trade certificates working for cash on visa scams and unqualified, and waste time and resources on rezoning farmland ready in 2050 or not at all, while importing in hundreds of thousands of temporary visa workers who needed housing, they could never have envisioned what would happen next to our existing children….
I always thought Faafoi was one of the smartest in this government (although it’s a low bar) and pursuing this legislation is a collective cabinet decision. He’s just got the short straw as minister. So he’s right to avoid the media because he knows he cannot really justify it.
‘I always thought Faafoi was one of the smartest in this government (although it’s a low bar’ ????
An example please of Faafoi being “smart” . I am at a loss to think of any.
And anyway one looks at it ,making a journo Minister of Justice is just plain dumb.
Shona, I meant he was smart in relation to the rest of the cabinet. That doesn’t mean *actually* smart LOL
Bear in mind that in terms of intellectual horsepower, this government is the most lightweight in the history of the country.
Great list Martyn, but that to-do list looks a bit light. I’m not sure you realize quite how busy and conscientious these people are. A few of the activities you overlooked:
– Write to Kaye’s Bakery to demand they follow the moral example set by Griffins and rename their racist “Afghan” biscuits
– Picket the local bookstore for continuing to sell JK Rowling’s books
– Organize a neighbourhood hui to lobby for rainbow pedestrian crossings in your suburb
– Strain the kombucha
Pope P 11…..lol! You seem to know them really well
“The woke caliphate”
Lol.
I suggest the name Aotearoistan.
No need to officially change the name, we can just tell the media if they don’t run with it they don’t get funding.
The settler guilt PC clergy will purge all other names from Twitter, the public service will climb all over each other to prove their righteousness for promotion.
Democracy in action.
The major reason we have come to the point of having to consider a free speech law, is the internet. I don’t know how you do it, but perhaps if it were concentrated on it, we could get somewhere.
I read on RNZ that Faafoi wanted to quit following the last term but was talked into staying. And worse and despite his loss of commitment and interest in general, was loaded up with some important portfolios.
Talking people who have clocked out into remaining never works.
After reading that i can’t see why he’s faded so badly.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/on-the-inside/448551/what-s-eating-kris-faafoi
I think this proposed legislation is idiotic also, but it highlights a continuing pattern on the left. As was the case with the Cannabis and CGT policy, if you don’t get off the stool, start swinging and get into the fight, your opponents will control the narrative and easily defeat you. If you truly believe in the policy, bloody well fight for it!
Absolutely agree Martyn.
Some great ironic comments here, and what is left to thinking, practical citizens when well-paid leaders at the top of the chain turn out this sort of dangerous policy and push it through, all the while claiming that is for our collective good. Our ideas of what is good in this culture are skewed. The general public would be more concerned about their politicians antics if they were said to be well-laid. Will no-one rid us of this turbulent clique? (paraphrasing King Henry II).
It seems to me that PM Jacinda is unconsciously acting out the part of Princess Elsa in Disney’s Frozen.
Elsa, princess of Arendelle and heiress to the throne, is born with the ability to create and control ice and snow. As a child, she uses her abilities to create a winter wonderland to play in with her younger sister and best friend, Princess Anna. One night, Elsa accidentally harms Anna with her powers. Elsa (Frozen) – Wikipedia
This is the message that comes out of the ‘Frozen’ production and I think it would apply to PM Jacinda as well.
Perhaps the most obvious message in Frozen is that it’s good to be courageous. Elsa fleeing her home to live on her own was bold; Anna following her was even more so. Having a feisty streak can be a very good thing!2/01/2020 10 Life lessons we learnt from Frozen – Asda.com
As for Faafoi, if the above comment is right – that he decided to step down earlier on – then I think he is going through a Todd Muller moment that stretches out unbearably. ‘It was never like this when I was a TV journalist!’ I know, contract Mike Hosking for the job, he knows everything, and half of NZ seems to listen to him, and he has the hide of a bison or even a ‘wilder-beast’.
Is the law going to be retroactive?
It’s right out of the Saul Alinsky playbook – Labour are using divide and conquer tactics.
Labour will continue throwing out pipedream backed announcements, pushing harmful ‘woke’ policies AND THEN claim to have the solutions for the problems they (Labour) create.
Whether it be free-speech, housing, infrastructure, or race relations – Labour seem to want the public divided – then feign the unity of 5 million.
Even the reimagining of police values is a straight up Saul Alinsky tactic. People involved with the Labour party have definitely read his playbook, I guarantee they have!!
Good idea Greywarbler let’s get Mike Hosking.
Zack Brando you are correct they divide on purpose then pretend to fix the very things they broke.
Very Alinsky.
Very cold calculated strategy. But to give them credit their followers swallow it.
I’m not so sure the Greens are actually worse. Woke maybe but which is worse? Wokiewoke or just outright crassness.
I’ve come to think that JA has a real stubborn control freak streak (needed for things like getting us through the pandemic, but at odds when ACTUALLY being kind and compassionate); Sepoloni has a bit of a mean streak, and Robertson really just a bit of a scrooge.
We all know that in the scheme of things when it comes to budget allocations – it’s all about priorities. But one would have thought that with the mandate Labour has, they’d return to the values of its founders. albeit recognising we’re in a different era.
Instead, we now have a party that’s obviously ‘comfortable’ with inequity, double standards, a pecking order, and which doesn’t seem all that bothered handing their opposition ammunition. They seem to think all that’s required is to try and manage the message through spin and bullshit ($300m worth of it).
They now LITERALLY have blood on their hands and are proving themselves to be hypocrites. Many of the ills could be solved with the stroke of a Ministerial pen as we’ve already seen with various exemptions given at the border.
They’re complicit with the likes of many senior / muddle managers in our public service who seem to have the skills, budget and resource to develop demographic spreadsheets, yet unable to develop an equitable MIQ booking system – which shouldn’t actually be that hard.
The bullshit and spin is beginning to show (actually it has for a while) and they’ll have done brung it on thereselves.
R.I.P Davender Singh and FUCK YOU Faafoi
Very well put OnceWasTim.
Hypocrites I think is generous devious I think more accurate.
They are pathetic this whole Labour/Greens Caucus. They lack the knowledge and expertise in law and legislation, that they hand the buck over to the New Zealand Police to be Community Babysitters on behalf of the Government. Why pass Bills to become Law and Legislate it if you have no understanding of what is already implied in the very Legislation you are trying to impose, enhance, re-create, delete, revoke, or amend. It is just uneconomical fundamentally speaking. They are still in Early Childhood Care this unethical government. They need to grow up.
This entire thing is a joke. Surely it has to be
There’s a Tiktok video clip on Newshub of street preachers in Auckland’s K’Rd being moved along recently by a police officer whose initial justification was that they were getting very close to hate speech.
I’ve seen other videos of the incident and its clear that they only spoke about God’s love (albeit loudly) but it’s pretty extraordinary a police officer would try that on even before a law is passed.
No matter how high the bar to prosecution, it gives a good idea of how the law will be abused by police on the street if it’s passed. I wrote about it here:
https://democracyproject.nz/2021/08/05/graham-adams-the-thorny-hate-speech-debate-sorts-sheep-from-goats/
Lessons here about how totalitarianism starts, also by letting your own sovereignty go, countries thinking that other countries will help end all your economic problems by assigning all your eggs in one basket to them, stopping education, critical thinking, freedom of speech, removing guns from farmers but then encouraging others to take them up, making kids be raised by the state rather than parents, and gradually your culture is gone, your economy is gone … and you might be pushed into positions that you don’t want to be in….
She survived Hitler and wants to warn America……
“I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history.
If you remember the plot of the Sound of Music, the Von Trapp family escaped over the Alps rather than submit to the Nazis. Kitty wasn’t so lucky. Her family chose to stay in her native Austria. She was 10 years old, but bright and aware. And she was watching.
“We elected him by a landslide – 98 percent of the vote,” she recalls.
She wasn’t old enough to vote in 1938 – approaching her 11th birthday. But she remembers.
“Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force.”
No so.
Hitler is welcomed to Austria
“In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression. Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed. We had 25 percent inflation and 25 percent bank loan interest rates.
Farmers and business people were declaring bankruptcy daily. Young people were going from house to house begging for food. Not that they didn’t want to work; there simply weren’t any jobs.
“My mother was a Christian woman and believed in helping people in need. Every day we cooked a big kettle of soup and baked bread to feed those poor, hungry people – about 30 daily.’
“We looked to our neighbor on the north, Germany, where Hitler had been in power since 1933.” she recalls. “We had been told that they didn’t have unemployment or crime, and they had a high standard of living.
“Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group – Jewish or otherwise. We were led to believe that everyone in Germany was happy. We wanted the same way of life in Austria. We were promised that a vote for Hitler would mean the end of unemployment and help for the family. Hitler also said that businesses would be assisted, and farmers would get their farms back.
“Ninety-eight percent of the population voted to annex Austria to Germany and have Hitler for our ruler.
“We were overjoyed,” remembers Kitty, “and for three days we danced in the streets and had candlelight parades. The new government opened up big field kitchens and
everyone was fed.
“After the election, German officials were appointed, and, like a miracle, we suddenly had law and order. Three or four weeks later, everyone was employed. The government made sure that a lot of work was created through the Public Work Service.
“Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women. Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home. An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn’t support his family. Many women in the teaching profession were elated that they could retain the jobs they previously had been required to give up for marriage.
“Then we lost religious education for kids
“Our education was nationalized. I attended a very good public school.. The population was predominantly Catholic, so we had religion in our schools. The day we elected Hitler (March 13, 1938), I walked into my schoolroom to find the crucifix replaced by Hitler’s picture hanging next to a Nazi flag. Our teacher, a very devout woman, stood up and told the class we wouldn’t pray or have religion anymore. Instead, we sang ‘Deutschland, Deutschland, Uber Alles,’ and had physical education.
“Sunday became National Youth Day with compulsory attendance. Parents were not pleased about the sudden change in curriculum. They were told that if they did not send us, they would receive a stiff letter of warning the first time. The second time they would be fined the equivalent of $300, and the third time they would be subject to jail.”
And then things got worse.
“The first two hours consisted of political indoctrination. The rest of the day we had sports. As time went along, we loved it. Oh, we had so much fun and got our sports equipment free.
“We would go home and gleefully tell our parents about the wonderful time we had.
“My mother was very unhappy,” remembers Kitty. “When the next term started, she took me out of public school and put me in a convent. I told her she couldn’t do that and she told me that someday when I grew up, I would be grateful. There was a very good curriculum, but hardly any fun – no sports, and no political indoctrination.
“I hated it at first but felt I could tolerate it. Every once in a while, on holidays, I went home. I would go back to my old friends and ask what was going on and what they were doing.
“Their loose lifestyle was very alarming to me. They lived without religion. By that time, unwed mothers were glorified for having a baby for Hitler.
“It seemed strange to me that our society changed so suddenly. As time went along, I realized what a great deed my mother did so that I wasn’t exposed to that kind of humanistic philosophy.
“In 1939, the war started, and a food bank was established. All food was rationed and could only be purchased using food stamps. At the same time, a full-employment law was passed which meant if you didn’t work, you didn’t get a ration card, and, if you didn’t have a card, you starved to death.
“Women who stayed home to raise their families didn’t have any marketable skills and often had to take jobs more suited for men.
“Soon after this, the draft was implemented.
“It was compulsory for young people, male and female, to give one year to the labor corps,” remembers Kitty. “During the day, the girls worked on the farms, and at night they returned to their barracks for military training just like the boys.
“They were trained to be anti-aircraft gunners and participated in the signal corps. After the labor corps, they were not discharged but were used in the front lines.
“When I go back to Austria to visit my family and friends, most of these women are emotional cripples because they just were not equipped to handle the horrors of combat.
“Three months before I turned 18, I was severely injured in an air raid attack. I nearly had a leg amputated, so I was spared having to go into the labor corps and into military service.
“When the mothers had to go out into the work force, the government immediately established child care centers.
“You could take your children ages four weeks old to school age and leave them there around-the-clock, seven days a week, under the total care of the government.
“The state raised a whole generation of children. There were no motherly women to take care of the children, just people highly trained in child psychology. By this time, no one talked about equal rights. We knew we had been had.
“Before Hitler, we had very good medical care. Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna..
“After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone. Doctors were salaried by the government. The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything.
“When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a.m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full.
“If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn. There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine. Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and emigrated to other countries.
“As for healthcare, our tax rates went up to 80 percent of our income. Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household. We had big programs for families.
“All day care and education were free. High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized. Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing.
“We had another agency designed to monitor business. My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables.
“Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners. Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities. It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar. He couldn’t meet all the demands.
“Soon, he went out of business. If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control.
“We had consumer protection, too
“We were told how to shop and what to buy. Free enterprise was essentially abolished. We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers. The agents would go to the farms, count the livestock, and then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it.
“In 1944, I was a student teacher in a small village in the Alps. The villagers were surrounded by mountain passes which, in the winter, were closed off with snow, causing people to be isolated.
“So people intermarried and offspring were sometimes retarded. When I arrived, I was told there were 15 mentally retarded adults, but they were all useful and did good manual work.
“I knew one, named Vincent, very well. He was a janitor of the school. One day I looked out the window and saw Vincent and others getting into a van.
“I asked my superior where they were going. She said to an institution where the State Health Department would teach them a trade, and to read and write. The families were required to sign papers with a little clause that they could not visit for 6 months.
“They were told visits would interfere with the program and might cause homesickness.
“As time passed, letters started to dribble back saying these people died a natural, merciful death. The villagers were not fooled. We suspected what was happening. Those people left in excellent physical health and all died within 6 months. We called this euthanasia.
“Next came gun registration. People were getting injured by guns. Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns. Most citizens were law-abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms. Not long afterwards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns. The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily.
“No more freedom of speech. Anyone who said something against the government was taken away. We knew many people who were arrested, not only Jews, but also priests and ministers who spoke up.
“Totalitarianism didn’t come quickly, it took 5 years from 1938 until 1943, to realize full dictatorship in Austria. Had it happened overnight, my countrymen would have fought to the last breath. Instead, we had creeping gradualism. Now, our only weapons were broom handles. The whole idea sounds almost unbelievable that the state, little by little eroded our freedom.”
“This is my eyewitness account.
“It’s true. Those of us who sailed past the Statue of Liberty came to a country of unbelievable freedom and opportunity.
“America is truly is the greatest country in the world. “Don’t let freedom slip away.
“After America, there is no place to go.”
Kitty Werthmann
Thanks for putting that up savenz. A gripping history.
Thanks for posting that. It is an important story to remember.
Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.
We remember.
Once we celebrated our democracy, then neo-liberalism quietly slipped liberal in and now TDB is equally slipery with the addition of progressive: when did we all agree to either?
We can’t work out what hate speech is, and free speech? Take any judgement out of the equation. Don’t make the difficult decision, let people say what they like. There you go, I sorted it out for Mr Faafoi.
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