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| Once Again With Feeling: What the parties on both sides of the aisle need to understand, however, is that New Zealanders are not passionless, and they are certainly not zombies. They are voters – and they want change. Now. |
I NEVER BOUGHT Gordon McLauchlan’s Passionless People argument. The book was published in 1976 – barely a year since Rob Muldoon ran over Bill Rowling’s Labour Government in his big blue bus. Liberal-Left intellectuals like McLauchlan were appalled. It had never occurred to them that Labour – sitting on a 23-seat majority – could possibly lose the 1975 election. But, lose it did, and McLauchlan’s response was to do what all democratic politicians tell us we must never do – blame the people. New Zealanders, he said, were without passion – “smiling zombies”. As if a country filled with such people could ever have produced a song like Nature Enter Me!
The decisive argument against McLauchlan’s thesis came five years after the book’s publication, in 1981. No one could honestly accuse a nation that had just spent 56 days convulsing itself over Apartheid and Rugby of lacking passion. McLauchlan quickly found other things to write about.
Imagine my consternation, then, upon discovering that Karl du Fresne, hardly an ideological soulmate of McLauchlan’s, had nevertheless appropriated his “smiling zombies” description of New Zealanders and used it to diss them in the pages of the Australian Spectator.
Entirely unsurprisingly, given his right-wing predilections, the target of du Fresne’s wrath is the Labour Government of Jacinda Ardern. She stands accused of rushing through “an agenda of radical transformation quite unlike any the country has experienced.” (Given that this is the same country that went through the ‘Rogernomics Revolution’, that’s a pretty bold claim!) At the core of this “hostile takeover” is what du Fresne calls “Maorification”. Pursued “aggressively” by “activists of mixed Māori and European descent”, Maorification is, according to du Fresne, all about allowing these activists to “exercise power and influence that would otherwise not be available to them.”
It’s about here, I suspect, that we arrive at the nub of the issue. Du Fresne is by no means alone among Pakeha males of a certain age in sensing that the power they have carried in their hands for so long is beginning to slip through their fingers. While they have dozed in their comfortable armchairs, new social, economic and political forces have not only made it past the “Establishment’s” front gate, they’re through the front door! To say that du Fresne and his ilk are not happy, is to seriously understate matters. Just listen to this!
“So far, the smiling zombies – five million of them – have tacitly encouraged all this radical transformation through their silence.”
Whoa! Let’s just take a few seconds to parse that sentence. When du Fresne talks about five million New Zealanders, he’s talking about all of them – Jacinda’s whole “team”. This is, of course, hogwash. It is a matter of public record that in the 2020 General Election Labour attracted an astonishing 50.01 percent of the Party Vote, and the Greens 7.86 percent. A resounding vote of confidence in the parties of the Left. The Right, however, still managed to attract 33.4 percent of the Party Vote. Of the 2,919,086 votes cast, 957,306 went to National and Act. So, not quite five million, then. In fact, not even close!
Rather strangely, du Fresne also omits from his commentary any reference to the impressive demonstration mounted by New Zealanders living in rural and provincial New Zealand. The convoys of tractors and utes prompted much spontaneous applause from the “townies” who encountered them. Not everybody in New Zealand is silent.
Also missing from du Fresne’s analysis is any reference to the findings of the Aussie-based Roy Morgan polling agency. The last two of its polls have registered a fairly substantial decline in the Labour Party’s popularity – from 50 percent to less than 40 percent. In the latest Roy Morgan, the two major blocs, Labour-Green and National-Act are separated by just 7.5 percentage points. And there are still two years to go until the next election.
So, what is it, really, that’s eating Karl du Fresne? He’s been practicing the craft of journalism long enough to know that this government’s grasp on power is very far from being unassailable. Indeed, should the Delta variant of Covid-19 make it past New Zealand’s border and start spreading at speed among this country’s still largely unvaccinated population, then, for Labour, the political weather could turn very nasty, very quickly.
I suspect that the following sentence from du Fresne’s Spectator piece holds the key to his all-too-evident alienation:
“In mainstream media, Maori place names, most previously unheard of by most New Zealanders and unused even by people of Maori descent, have displaced official names bestowed by British colonists — ignoring the inconvenient fact that New Zealand cities and towns are British, not Maori, creations.”
Du Fresne is very far from being alone in finding this development extremely hard to swallow. Quite literally, it is hitting people where they live. As any Māori New Zealander will attest, it is no small thing to have the names you grew up with – and all that they signify in the history of your life – unceremoniously shoved aside by those speaking an unfamiliar tongue. Simply re-iterating that Māori is an official language of New Zealand is too cute by half for a lot of Kiwis. The arbitrary re-naming of their home towns is felt by many as an almost physical blow, and those responsible are considered guilty of attacking something fundamentally important to their sense of national – and personal – identity.
Du Fresne articulates their acute sense of alienation with considerable eloquence:
“New Zealanders returning after a few years abroad might wonder whether they’ve blundered into a parallel universe. A government that is pitifully thin on ministerial ability and experience is busy re-inventing the wheel, and doing it at such speed that the public has barely had time to catch its breath. To quote one seasoned political observer: ‘It seems like a hostile takeover of our country is underway and most people feel powerless to do anything about it’.”
Except, as Gordon McLauchlan discovered all those years ago, there is something people who feel themselves to be the target of a hostile political takeover can do about it. They can vote the politicians responsible out of office.
As a young man preparing to cast his first vote in 1975, I did not share McLachlan’s (and so many others’) carefree confidence that the Third Labour Government was unbeatable. I used to hitch-hike my way across the country in those days, and dutifully listening to my vehicular benefactors, I had heard the anger and alienation building slowly in their voices. When Rob’s big bus rolled over Bill Rowling I was not surprised. Too many Kiwis had lost faith in “Big Norm’s” dream.
What du Fresne, and all those who cling to the Right’s discredited neoliberal dream, need to grasp is that a very similar loss of faith has taken place in the hearts and minds of Māori, Pasifika, women and young New Zealanders. Jacinda Ardern’s “politics of kindness”, and her handling of the Christchurch massacres and Covid-19, continue to hold them – for the moment. They’re not irretrievably alienated – yet.
What the parties on both sides of the aisle need to understand, however, is that these people are not passionless, and they are certainly not zombies. They are voters – and they want change. Now.
This essay was originally posted on the Interest.co.nz website on Monday, 2nd August 2021.
44 comments:
du Fresne's job is not to provide political analysis, but to garner clicks. So the more outrageous he is the better his employment prospects. Met him once, he tried to persuade me that being made redundant was a good thing. Man's an eejit.
Incidentally, if McLachlan had hung around here, he would have called his book "The Humourless People".
If one read McLauchlan’s book carefully enough, it was pretty clear at the time that his real (and probably unconscious) argument wasn't that NZers were passionless. It was actually that they were passionate about the wrong things - and that this passion sat quietly and immovable and deadly under a hard shell of seeming impassivity. But at least McLauchlan was a good writer - far better than Du Fresne who is a moderately talented blatherer with a totally undeserved platform. I grew up in a town that had a Maori name already - and any backlash has been against trying to pronounce it properly. When you see that level of gracelessness, it's pretty clear one is not dealing with some legitimate feeling of having familar names removed - but with something else entirely.
Hey Chris Karl not Justin was what I think you meant to write. Obviously you were feeling a passionate response to Mr Karl Du Fresne's diatribe, not a tribe that the left or real progressives are likely to belong to. He is always the same. I admit that I have called NZs in general 'sheeples' as we have allowed so much to escape our control that we now realise we should have valued and fought to retain. We did try though, with protests and marches, but the forces of capitalism can go to war, or wrap the helpless or naive in dazzling words or the latest designs and fashion and we are drawn as to magnets, which is a design of a different sort.
Reading about Justin, he too sounds like the conservative, religious type that stands directly at the right hand of heaven's door which opens to his whisper. It takes me to a verse from WH Auden's poem 1/9/1939, my talisman.
Exiled Thucydides knew
All that a speech can say
About Democracy,
And what dictators do,
The elderly rubbish they talk
To an apathetic grave;
Analysed all in his book,
The enlightenment driven away,
The habit-forming pain,
Mismanagement and grief:
We must suffer them all again.
https://poets.org/poem/september-1-1939
Just-in case commenters don't know, like me, who Thucydides was and did:
Thucydides is the author of History of the Peloponnesian War, a sweeping contemporary account of the nearly three-decade conflict between Athens and Sparta for dominance of the Greek world. The eight-volume work is regarded as one of the finest works of history ever written.
Britannica
and The Thucydides Trap,...is a term...to describe an apparent tendency towards war when an emerging power threatens to displace an existing great power as a regional or international hegemon. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thucydides_Trap
It’s Karl, Chris, not Justin. And his 5 million figure is a reference to the PM’s team, not to be taken literally. And don’t be too sure about her hold - my conversations with young people show a lot of slippage. Early days yet, but there is a distinct trend. Wiser heads eg Michael Cullen’s, would recommend a cuppa.
What kind of change is imaginable beside the mildly fluctuating status quo ?
More widening income and wealth redistribution for immediate consumption by the poor -
or more widening wealth ownership creation for reducing and eventually eliminating have-not poverty altogether ?
If nothing else can be imagined and suggested, then the choice should not be too difficult.
Whilst I regard Collins chances as non existent there is a fortification of the Right via ACT as the recipient of National supporters. This spells danger as we weary of Covid, housing shortages and price, He Puapua and now 3 Waters.
Heres a few possible scenarios.
*Covid vacinations, so vigorously supported by government health officials become known to be ineffective and dangerous, basically a massive failure of trust. This could destroy Jacindas reputation. Numbers seen overseas appear to indicate something is not right with the official line.
*3 Waters hits ratepayers in the pocket for an extra $1000 per annum whilst giving 50% control to Maori. A double whammy own goalthat would flood votes to the Right.
*A financial crash due to Covid and or housing bubble popping. Voters would blame the incumbent government.
Those are possible, there are more. Labour are sailing into storm winds with extreme hubris.
Gordon McLauchlan’s book would have been more aptly titled "The Fickle Electorate". Du Fresne is just another Mike Hosking, but with a fancier name. It is becoming apparent that percentage by percentage the electorate at large is slowly moving along the road towards a more diverse and inclusive society. The road ahead is going to have some ugly potholes and there is bound to be a few blow outs on the red bus.
However, long may Jacinda Ardern run. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR47-4UoLPg
"So, what is it, really, that’s eating Justin du Fresne? He’s been practicing the craft of journalism long enough to know that this government’s grasp on power is very far from being unassailable." Typo alert - I think you mean Karl. Justin has left his mortal coil.
There can be no radicalness without addressing the main thing.
It is simplistic for du Fresne to say that the cities of New Zealand were British creations. Domestic architecture reflected the unique New Zealand environment, the distinctive weather patterns, the available building materials and so on. The outside architectural influences were from Britain (particularly in the South Island), but also from California and a strange eclectic mix of many other national styles. Much of the initial building work was done by Maori, and Maori remain an essential part of the construction industry. Not just Maori of course. Non-British Europeans, Chinese and many others also left their mark on New Zealand cities.
So why are the names Otautahi, Otipoto, Kirikiriroa, Tamaki makau rau and Te Whanganui a Tara now being used instead of Christchurch, Dunedin, Hamilton, Auckland and Wellington?
Partly because they relate more directly to our sense of identity as a people than do the names of British generals, admirals, governors and other assorted imperial notables from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. To be fair, Christchurch, Dunedin, Milton and Cromwell are names which reflect a different and arguably more acceptable side of the British heritage. But while Hastings, Napier, Nelson, Marlborough, Wellington and so on are all very well as names for the cities of a self-consciously British colony, Aotearoa is in the process of re-emerging as a uniquely independent nation whose roots go much deeper into the past than 1840 and in which there is no call to celebrate feats of empire.
Why would du Fresne want to keep New Zealand place names which commemorate the scions of British aristocracy?
Perhaps because he remains a colonialist at heart, not yet ready to take his place as tangata motu. Let him have as much time as he needs. Destiny is on our side and therefore we are in no hurry.
Karl not Justin.
An edit is required - you have morphed Karl du Fresne into his late brother Justin!
A couple of points; Du Fresne's Spectator essay predates both the recent, huge, farmer driven protests and the recent poll results showing the almost 10% collapse in support for Labour.
Yes Chris, we know everything bad is supposed to be down to "neoliberalism" but contemporaneous with economic liberalism was a huge shift towards social liberalism, the pig in a python baby boomer demographic reaching maturity, the loss of religious faith, the rise of third world competitors (China), the rise of the internet and social media. Those developments have also been economically, socially and psychologically profoundly destabilising. It's far from clear whether the unsettling effects of economic liberalism are any greater than any one of the other major changes.
Our news media are untrustworthy and people aren't always honest so it's hard to get a handle on what people really think about the fundamental changes being thrust upon us. My observation is that people with children (and grandchildren) are more likely to be worried about the direction the country is taking. For example; my daughter and some of her friends have, or are considering, pulling their kids out of school over the rising CRT based racism the kids are being propagandised with. There's a lot of concern out there.
Some of the stuff being rammed down our throats is almost impossible to believe. K F was saying that if you've got a young teen confused about their gender you've got to go along with their delusions. Simply counselling them against going the whole hog with irreversible chemical and surgical interventions could see a parent facing charges and up to five years in prison. What level of insane is that, do they think we're all as equally mad?
The conservative politicians need to make a courageous stand, forthrightly tell their story and they will win. The media will give them absolute hell of course but that's all to the good. The media have lost their credibility and the pronouncements from their pet coterie of pearl clutching lovies increasingly dismissed and despised.
Chris: "Pakeha males of a certain age in sensing that the power they have carried in their hands for so long is beginning to slip through their fingers"
Absent any actual evidence that's just speculation. I'm also willing to speculate that for most of us "of a certain age" our concerns are a lot less selfish than implied (intended?) by that slight. It's poor form, but regrettably common to intentionally attribute someone's position to some sort of moral failing. A ploy to avoid having to properly confront the issue?
I think it's a seriously bad idea to force some sort of hybrid language onto the people, it's degrading to both languages. There's no good reason to encourage the development of a new amalgamated language unintelligible to rest of the English speaking world or the billions of English-as -second-language speakers. "Trans whanau" was one recent abomination.
I don't know the motivation, perhaps the wokesters want to wind up the wacists? It does come across as false, an affectation at best.
They didnt lose faith in Big Norms Dream. He died and Rowling was inept in keeping it going. Had Kirk lived I dont think Muldoon could have pulled it off.
To pick up your last two sentences; "They are voters - and they want change. Now." Isn't this the very risk that the government is currently incurring? Too much change happening too quickly. Especially, as you have identified in the past, since Jacinda's majority comes from the middle, not the left.
I would think Labour is right now assessing how much change is actually possible. There is little point in having a radical agenda if all it does is lose the next election. It would be a clear signal to an incoming conservative coalition to undo the great bulk of what Labour has done. It is much more sensible to dial back a bit, get re-elected and cement in the type of changes that can actually survive a change of government.
Helen Clark is the model for successful Labour governments. Much of the agenda of her government survived the change.
Quite a big thing, 'The Passionless People' in its day. Perhaps because it was one of the first books discussing us. The 70s were, in reflection, our adolescent growth phase. His chapter about doctors as the apex of our social structure was quite right. Since I grew up in Napier where he gathered that info I often heard echoes. Perhaps Gordon was just referring to the anti-emotion of those times. Or, to be accurate, anti-display of emotion.
Hearing Mclaughlin on Nat Rad near his death he seemed to have changed his mind about 1984. Saying change was necessary. No shit, but not leaving the neediest behind.
What's with this Aotearoa or New Zealand, stuff, Chris?
Surely it's just like the frag debate, a big national distraction? That will go nowhere but generate a lot of op-eds and give MPs relief from the threat of questions about something that matters, which they could allow to make them seem incompetent or stupid, or in the most desirable cases bruise cultural egos or inflame a need, psychological and culturally Catholic, to acknowledge their sins and express repentance.
The latter is highly preferable as it does not just deflect from difficult questions but typically casts the questioner as beyond serious engagement, usefully, in a way makes it difficult for conversation partners to address claims on their merit or discover the speaker's intention, because one only has to feel hurt, and point out something that a speaker says that could be interpreted as being hurtful to one's feelings.
The racialization of everything, ever debate and every political disagreement, and now the foistering on us of a national racialized debate, is helpful to an incompetent government and a hopelessly lost opposition. We will suffer an endless bore of opinion pieces, as we did with the "flag debate", but it will be that much nastier and more racialized, as befits the times.
What's with this "Aotearoa or New Zealand", stuff, Chris?
Surely, it's just like the flag debate, a big national distraction? One that will go nowhere but generate a lot of op-eds and give MPs relief from the threat of questions about something that matters, questions which they could allow to make them seem incompetent or stupid, or, in the most desirable of cases, let bruise cultural egos or inflame the need, psychological and culturally Catholic if now sublimated to the unconscious, to acknowledge sin and express repentance.
The latter eventuality is highly preferable as it does not just deflect from difficult questions but typically casts the questioner as beyond serious engagement; usefully, in a way that makes it difficult for conversation partners to address claims on their merit or discover the speaker's intention. Because one only has to feel hurt, and point out something that a speaker says that could be interpreted as being hurtful to one's feelings, and affirm one's identity, play Rosa Parkes, and get a pat on the head from an opinion writer.
The Pakeha typically fulfils the masochistic role, which is not required for the dominant role player to fulfil theirs but required of the masochist or masochist-by-circumstance if they want to be seen to have achieved or to be on the road to achieving repentance. Some parade like Tractarians, which they must enjoy or have come to believe is cosmologically necessary. Freud might say they are people who live in shame and apology because they were not potty trained by the time they were dropped off at kindergarten.
The Pakeha is necessary to the Maori or erstwhile minority. What they intended is not important. If you have ever visited a dominatrix, you might appreciate how that kind of deal might be attractive to the masochist Pakeha. "Aotearoa" is the Maori position, "New Zealand" is the white position. Luckily, it also doesn't matter whether the person taking the Pakeha position is Pakeha, Maori, or of another minority, because they can be said to have "internalised whiteness" and so be defacto white.
Yes, you have to be really silly to get to worked up about the naming of the country, if you really care about it that much. It's not a debate because the debate is pitched in terms of good guys and bad guys, and as we all know the good persons always win since Jacinda Ardern's been Prime Minister.
The racialization of everything, every debate and every political disagreement and now the foistering on us of another "national debate" where there wasn't one before is helpful to an incompetent government and a hopelessly lost opposition.
To us, it should be meaningless, just as it is meaningless against all the measures the government laid out to later measure itself with - housing, homelessness, etcetera.
For the political and strategic geniuses in the National Party who neither have the the habits of serious readers nor the mental agility and seriousness to be able to see what sits right beside them and understand what's in it - the philosophy and history section of the Parliamentary library, including several books on the history and philosophy of science - the debate will prove intractable. There's no Marcus Aurelius among them, that's for sure.
No, we will suffer an endless bore of opinion pieces, as we did with the "flag debate", but it will be that much nastier and more racialized, as befits the times. The opposition will play their part wittingly or not.
And it ain't over. There are literally thousands of street signs to contend with, not to mention road names, the names of institutions - it will be endless and all equally useful to our hopeless political class and lazy media.
Why the hit-job? I have never perceived Karl du Fresne as a "neoliberal". He's a rare beacon of common sense in these increasingly disturbing times.
To: Marty Silva, Unknown, Rowan G., Max Ritchie, Greywarbler:
Many thanks for spotting the typo!
Duly corrected. (With apologies to the shade of Justin - Karl's much more reasonable brother!)
Wayne, there is always tension between the reason for gaining power, and wanting to retain it. You obviously understand how to entrench the reason for seeking power better than the current crop of Labour and Green newbies. Not since Douglas and his acolytes have I seen so many radicals so intent on becoming one or two term MPs to get their agenda across the line.
As you note, thats no way to make lasting changes when you get voted out and the incoming government reverses change. He Puapua, new school curriculum, 3Waters, ute tax et al, yeah, nah.
Dawdling my way to my Four Square 5 minutes walk away for the millionth time in 13 years I suddenly recognised the name of the cul de sac en route, 'Bryce' St. Named after the notorious fellow who broke up Parihaka. Deep in the heart of 40 % Maori Gisborne.
My grandma lived immured in good and bad history back in Scotland. Her landlord's family was responsible for a local massacre in the 1600s. But her family had benefitted by that massacre also. And if Bonnie Prince Charlie had won at Culloden the family would have had to flee. They left that bloody complexity and moved straight into John Bryce's fabulous Wanganui house, built on the back of stealing Maori land. No escape.
I'm sure I've said this before but I'm working on the telling.
GS: "if McLachlan had hung around here, he would have called his book "The Humourless People".
I'm not sure that this blog is unusual in that regard, perhaps you've got some suggestions?
I enjoy reading Taki; who else could finish an essay with something like this:
"Last week my daughter and Alexander Schwarzenberg gave a riotous dinner at a taverna downtown, followed by some heroic drinking up at the piazza. A woman approached me as I was starting to feel comatose and told me I had been rude in print about her father. His name, she said, was Chalabi, the very con man who talked the half-wit Bush and mendacious Blair into attacking Iraq. After one million dead, Chalabi had the grace to drop dead himself. I said that it was the column I was most proud of. Tamara Chalabi accepted it with grace."
UnHerd and Quillette have some brilliant writers: Mary Harrington and Douglas Murray, for example, are interesting and original with a dash of British wit. There's some good writing in the New Zealand blogs, Karl De Fresne writes well, The Daily Blog generally very poorly, Lushington D Brady on BFD is good and they do have two comedy sections every day plus the special non PC jokes on Monday evenings. Chris writes well and with a twinkle in his eye at times I suspect.
The TV shows are terrible, decidedly childish and so terrified of giving offence they've becoming predicable and boring. Comedy has been effectively canceled, the wonderful, healing capacity to laugh at ourselves, at some revealed truth, self-denied and institutionally supressed to our very great loss.
'They are voters – and they want change. Now.' This I can agree with.
The problem is neither party seems to understand what changes are wanted. Labour is tinkering away with things that are of little real importance. My daughter, plus her friends, was a firm supporter of Jacinda over two elections. No longer, hope has been replaced with disappointment. In her views the cost of finding a place to live and the increasing plight of those at the bottom need to be dealt with in a meaningful way. Jacinda was given a mandate to do this, yet she has shied away, making no real effort apart from PR platitudes to try and keep the masses appeased. Sadly, instead of going down in history as a leader who brought much needed change, she will be one who was weak and brought division and disparity.
On Humour:
"Not to be outdone by human hubris or vanity, it appears that Fate, or the Divine, has a sense of humour as well. I find it a source of gallows humour that a man who once found the grace to forgive the man who set alight and murdered his father, now find himself the victim of a small crowd of unforgiving PC authoritarian bigots, undoubtedly from far more privileged backgrounds than a working-class comic and poet made-good.
For the audience, the Comedy that is left is a hollowed out shell of its former glory. Here’s a hint- if there is a pause between a stand-ups joke and the audience laughing (whilst their furious little brains work out whether it is OK to laugh at the specific punch-line), then the experience has already been ruined and it wasn’t worth anyone showing up."
https://geary.substack.com/p/how-elite-sensibilities-and-class/comments
"For the audience, the Comedy that is left is a hollowed out shell of its former glory. "
The man sounds like a whiner to me. As usual taking fringe statements and assuming that the majority of the left approve of them.
I don't hear Frankie boy whining about being sidelined. He's left wing and a damn sight less politically correct than most.
Ah, the famous Taki – or as our American friends would say "the convicted felon Taki" right wing humour is almost all punching down therefore by definition not funny. As Terry Pratchett said, Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at the people who are hurting, it's not satire, it's bullying. "
Comedy hasn't been shut down by the PC brigade that's just one of those talking points that comes up again and again in Goebbels fashion, because as he said - if you repeat a lie often enough people will believe it. Anyone who thinks comedy has been stifled by the PC brigade has never watched Frankie Boyle or Jimmy Carr, at least one of which is far to the left of me. I spent some time looking at people like Douglas Murray at someone's behest – maybe yours? I was not impressed either by their thinking all their wit.
I was speaking mainly of this blog however where people seem to spend most of their time whining about inconsequential things like a few Maori words on the radio – a station which according to them is communist and they shouldn't probably be listening to anyway – rather than some of the real issues of the day as CXH mentioned – housing. Most of whom it would seem to me, wouldn't recognise a proper joke if it bit them in the arse. Not unless it was racist or demeaning of poor people anyway.
I very much doubt you would get Alf Garnett or Archie Bunker, those great parodies of racist bigotry on TV now. Instead of being allowed to be instructive by example they would be cancelled as unsafe and harmful.
I had thought you were above doing hit jobs on fellow journalists, Chris.
There-sa this thing called climate change. War govt.
Shouldn't we concentrate on the main positive thing for the humans? It draws out all the divisive poisons. As per the vegetarian, phrenological, endlessly alternative Leftos of the 30s that Orwell humorously denigrated.
Biden knows what to say but not what to do. Thankful he knows the first. They would have destroyed/killed Bernie in that plutocracy. Divide and rule, rark! The powers that be instead of the powers that need to be. Where you come in, Chris.
"...the pages of the Australian Spectator."
It's instructive to note that du Fresne - and Amy Brooke - apparently have to resort to an Australian magazine to get their articles published. This is eloquent evidence of the extent to which our free speech rights have already been crimped. People don't have to like what they say, but they should be free to say it in a NZ publication.
"...“an agenda of radical transformation quite unlike any the country has experienced.”"
In my view, what's happening is qualitatively different from Rogernomics (even if that was implemented with a similar lack of mandate from the electorate). Democracy is being eroded, in a way that it wasn't back then. Although to be sure, it was during the 80s that Geoff Palmer sowed the seeds for our current parlous constitutional situation.
"“Maorification”.... is....all about allowing these activists to “exercise power and influence that would otherwise not be available to them.”"
He's right about this. The Maori elite (for want of a better word) aren't interested in democracy. Some have said as much. They prefer to deal directly with government and local Councils, bypassing the route of democratic representation upon which the rest of us must rely. This is why they like having nominated reps (paid and with voting rights in Wellington) on Council committees. Nothing dreary like elections for them! And now we have the creation of Maori wards at local level: a further extension of the racist Maori electoral system. Indisputably it fits the definition of racism. The fact that NZ has had Maori seats since the 19th century entails nothing about whether they ought to exist, or are compatible with a modern representative democracy such as NZ is supposed to be.
Attempting to rename this country, and without a mandate, constitutes further evidence of what du Fresne is talking about. It's revisionism of the most egregious sort for people to claim that "Aotearoa" was NZ's original name. It wasn't.
The worst thing is, all of this stuff comes with an un-ordered (and unwanted) side helping of ethno-nationalism. This is fascism: absolutely the last thing we need here. Democratic it surely ain't.
"...by no means alone among Pakeha males of a certain age in sensing that the power they have carried in their hands for so long is beginning to slip through their fingers.""
This is a loaded statement. In virtue of what would anyone think that it's only this demographic which is unhappy with what's going on?
"“So far, the smiling zombies – five million of them – have tacitly encouraged all this radical transformation through their silence.”"
Smiling zombies may be a bit too strong a term for some people's taste, but nonetheless, it's true that there's been silence. However, from what I've seen, it's beginning to dawn on some voters that the rough beast of ethno-nationalism is slouching towards the corridors of power. Even if they don't think of it as fascism, they're beginning to realise that all is not well. The polls may be evidence of this growing unease.
"...2020 General Election Labour attracted an astonishing 50.01 percent of the Party Vote, and the Greens 7.86 percent. A resounding vote of confidence in the parties of the Left."
That vote was one of fear: voters had had the wind put up them by media reports about the pandemic overseas, and by government stand-ups almost every day during house arrest. They believed that the current government would continue to keep them safe by keeping the borders closed. Former National voters said as much to me: they weren't confident that the Natz could do as well. It didn't in any way constitute a mandate for the current radical agenda - Labour hid He Puapua from the rest of us, and of course from Peters - and campaigned without there being a whisper of it.
I discussed the election result with a Green voter, who was astonished that they hadn't got a bigger share of the vote. This was particularly noticeable in those southern electorates which had helped to vote Labour in. That was in my view an effort to prevent the Greens from having too much power. Definitely not a vote for left-wing policies.
"...Maori place names, most previously unheard of by most New Zealanders and unused even by people of Maori descent, have displaced official names bestowed by British colonists..."
A thing to remember: we're NZers, just as much as are Maori. We're the descendants of colonists, but not ourselves colonists. We pakeha are born here, and countless immigrants have made NZ their own. Names reflect our heritage, which also matters to us. Maori names certainly haven't been erased from the landscape: they're a source of puzzlement to our Australian family, who wrestle with the pronunciation of them.
Like many people, I'm rather irritated by the pepper-potting of Maori words into English. It's not clear what advocates are trying to achieve, but if it's language revitalisation, it's a lost cause. Long years ago as a young adult, I learned te reo to passable fluency. I was taught by one of the many native speakers around at that time. For survival, any language needs native speakers: Maori is no exception. Census stats suggest that the number of native speakers is vanishingly small to non-existent. If there are none, the language is dead. It may well survive for years yet (as Latin has done), if it's the second language of enough people. But it won't be a living language.
"A government that is pitifully thin on ministerial ability and experience is busy re-inventing the wheel, and doing it at such speed that the public has barely had time to catch its breath."
He's also right about this. The government, being unable through incompetence or unwillingness (or both) to do the things it ought to be doing, is busy doing other stuff which helps to further the ethno-nationalist project - whether or not it fully understands that this is what it's doing.
"They can vote the politicians responsible out of office."
Yes they can. And we did, with the remnants of the Lange government. But, as those of us who were voters back then know full well, it doesn't at all follow that the "hostile takeover" is rolled back by an incoming government. We got shot of Labour, but we didn't get shot of the hated neoliberalism. And now, it's embedded in NZ to the extent that rolling it back is nigh on impossible.
This is the same problem we face with the current government: the opposition parties may claim that they'll roll back its changes, but hard experience says otherwise.
"What du Fresne, and all those who cling to the Right’s discredited neoliberal dream..."
Does he and do they? I'm not so sure about the "clinging to" thing: I doubt that it can be rolled back, at least not entirely. The consequences might well be worse than what currently prevails. For instance, the Three Waters project looks on the face of it to be a rollback of neoliberalism. In reality, it looks like the worst combination of big - and incompetent - government and ethno-nationalism. Local democracy has been elbowed out of the way, it seems.
"...a very similar loss of faith has taken place in the hearts and minds of Māori, Pasifika, women and young New Zealanders. Jacinda Ardern’s “politics of kindness”..."
Politics of kindness? Right: tell that to beneficiaries still on criminally low incomes. And to those homeless through no fault of their own. Government actions have had the disastrous and unintended consequence of producing vaulting rental and house prices.
With regard to Maori, Pacific people, the young and women, one thing we've learned from neoliberalism and the flood of migrants it's brought here, is that it's class (broadly characterised in NZ as income level) which determines success in education, access to health services and jobs. It isn't skin colour, ethnicity or gender.
So: sneaking through structural and constitutional changes which privilege Maori over everyone else will not fix what ails the very poorest Maori. It certainly won't help the rest of the very poorest, either.
"...the pages of the Australian Spectator."
It's instructive to note that du Fresne - and Amy Brooke - apparently have to resort to an Australian magazine to get their articles published. This is eloquent evidence of the extent to which our free speech rights have already been crimped. People don't have to like what they say, but they should be free to say it in a NZ publication.
Yes D'Esterre, it tells you a lot when informed and articulate commentators are sidelined or, in the case of Michael Bassett, banned completely from our mainstream publications.
Karl has a current essay up on his blog page that he penned for the NBR. They refused to print it and he no longer writes for them.
Surprisingly similar to Chris's latest offering on BFD in which he says:
"The hyper-liberal revolution is already well-advanced in “Aotearoa”. Its promoters are deeply entrenched in the Labour and Green parties, the public service, the mainstream news media, the universities, and even in the executive ranks of some of this country’s largest businesses. From these commanding cultural heights, they have unleashed a bewildering series of policy initiatives which, if carried to their logical conclusion, would produce a society very different from the one in which most New Zealanders have grown up."
https://thebfd.co.nz/2021/08/09/let-classical-liberalism-lead-the-people/ (Paywalled)
Karl:
"I’ve heard similar sentiments expressed by other friends whose normal inclination is to support Labour. Underlying their concern is a sense that the country is being radically re-invented without public approval, or even a proper debate.
When former union firebrand and political activist Matt McCarten joins the Free Speech Union because he’s concerned for the health of democracy, you just know the political planets are undergoing an unusual realignment.
The standard, sneering response from the so-called “progressive” left – let’s call them the “new” left to differentiate them from people like my friend – is that resistance to the government’s agenda is coming mainly from ageing white men like me. We’re supposed to get out of the way and shut up.
Woke people call us dinosaurs and reactionaries, but the counter-argument is that age gives you a loftier vantage point from which to survey the past and judge the present. To put it another way, it gives us a deeper appreciation of what we (and by that I mean all of us) stand to lose."
https://karldufresne.blogspot.com/2021/08/a-transformational-government-unlike.html
Aotearoa - The Long White Cloud Land - could be anywhere, as e.g. in southern Chile.
But New Zealand as the last substantial island-land discovered by mankind is more historically memorable and meaningful for the whole world, including Maori and other Pacific Islanders.
Or not ?
New Zealand - New Land of the Sea - could be anywhere, as in Iceland.
If other people want to call New Zealand 'Aotearoa', that is their choice.
To me, Aotearoa is a name for the North Island.
The Maori name for New Zealand is Nui Tireni, says so in the Treaty of Waitangi.
I like the name New Zealand and I like our flag.
Rule Zealandia!
Yes, Shane McDowall - Iceland and all other similar discoveries were potential "New S(Z)ealands" at their time of discovery, but unknown to its original discoverers, our New Zealand acquired the special distinction of being the last or newest one in the world.
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