Hard News by Russell Brown

Read Post

Hard News: What the kids do

189 Responses

First ←Older Page 1 4 5 6 7 8 Newer→ Last

  • Craig Ranapia, in reply to BenWilson,

    Quite - don't mean to offend-troll any atheists around here, but God does enjoy obliging people who say "X. will happen over my dead body". So it does - there you go, and here we are. :)

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • James Butler, in reply to Craig Ranapia,

    Quite – don’t mean to offend-troll any atheists around here, but God does enjoy obliging people who say “X. will happen over my dead body”.

    I suspect Garth may have cause to rethink a number of things when his time comes, and he is touched by His Noodly Appendage.

    Auckland • Since Jan 2009 • 856 posts Report Reply

  • Rich Lock, in reply to webweaver,

    Being surrounded by thousands of people celebrating madly when you're not feeling the same way can be the loneliest experience in the world.

    Oh, is this the way they say The Future's meant to feel?
    Or just twenty thousand people dancing in a field?

    back in the mother countr… • Since Feb 2007 • 2728 posts Report Reply

  • webweaver,

    heh. I was thinking about 20,000 people dancing in a field - but feel free to extrapolate outwards to The Future if you so wish... depressing as it may be :)

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 332 posts Report Reply

  • Jeremy Andrew,

    As long as we're sorted for E's and wizz.

    Hamiltron - City of the F… • Since Nov 2006 • 900 posts Report Reply

  • DexterX,

    Just like to say I support Garf George 100% - and yes it can be arranged.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1224 posts Report Reply

  • DexterX,

    On the matter I don't support legalisation of Marijuana, the dealing of and sale should remain illegal. Decriminalisation, with the sale or supply to minors being criminal bearing in mind the bottom run of the drug pyramid is yoof, makes more sense to me..

    With Marijuana being “illegal” it is more marketable as a form of rebellion against the man, and this masks the fact that it is a stupefier and not at all like this:

    (Stoners being sent to a hippy happy nirvana heaven somewhere in the middle of the desert plateau where they can grow and smoke their own, sit on the same furniture they were sitting on when they first left school, telling the same stories over and over and over, laughing at the same joke and dancing in the street and loving everybody – just as long as they get to live far away from me when they crank the stereo up and vegetate to Pink Floyd)

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1224 posts Report Reply

  • andin, in reply to DexterX,

    Is that a parody? If it is it’s brilliant Dex…ETA your whole post I mean.

    but God does enjoy obliging people who say “X. will happen over my dead body”.

    bloody god getting all the fun, sitting up there, watching our words, waiting till one of us foretells our death. I bet he’s sending an angel to dust off Gaff G’s pew as we write.

    raglan • Since Mar 2007 • 1891 posts Report Reply

  • chris,

    I really do think you’re drawing a long bow saying that the Smokefree policy has had no effect.

    I didn’t mean to imply there was no effect Russell, simply the time wasted and the massive expense hasn’t made a significantly cost effective dent in the issue. Some things, such as the banning of smoking in public places, work better than others.

    As Chris Waugh said:

    I’ve seen very young kids buying a bottle of booze and some cigarettes for Daddy from their neighbourhood store,

    Harking back to the late eighties when the major furor about the sale of cigarettes to minors kicked in. I recall a friend at school received a sitting ovation in assembly for his part in an underage tobacco sales exposé written by his mother , the editor of a local paper in Masterton.

    she made news with an ambitious article about the sale of cigarettes to minors. the research for which involved her driving around the town's dairies and sending her son in to buy cigarettes for her.

    I'm not sure if this was an isolated incident or if a number of newspapers were doing this at the time, but this kind of activity had a large impact on public opinion culminating in the 16 years age restriction being enacted in 1990.

    It unequivocally proved that dairies were selling cigarettes to minors, but more poignantly it indicated that parents were successfully sending their own children to buy cigarettes for them. That this had become a standard practice left a door open for underage smokers.

    Most of us have seen the film ‘Boy’ and I think it executes the potential for wayard parental influence with an adequate degree of accuracy, boy sees dad knocking them back, he starts drinking, boy sees dad puffing on the wacky backy, he has a puff.

    The fundamental element missing in that albeit caricatured example is good parenting. Good examples. Good communication. By introducing these prohibitive age limits we hasten the elimination of trust in our society, a boy goes to a dairy to buy cigarettes which he claims are for his mother, why should the dairy owner disbelieve him? Why should the parents not be able to smell the smoke on his jersey? Why don’t they care?

    I’d wager nary a person reading didn’t drink alcohol underage. We probably couldn’t buy it in dairies way back when, but we didn’t need to because as others have mentioned, anything can be sourced if you know the right people.

    Most worryingly in all this is that elected representatives and prominent political and social commentators who make a living off insisting that the responsibility for the well being and health of our children be placed on businesses. That is exactly what these legal age restrictions do, and these people will spend hours of their lives trumping the benefits of age limits, when that time could be better spent communicating with their own children, their nieces, their nephews, the kids next door or down the street – and these kids' parents. Most importantly this time could be better spent setting good examples.

    These people who fritter away hours of their own time advocating business and government take responsibility for their and others children rather than taking direct responsibility for their own, themselves.

    I’m firmly of the belief that the freedom of self-determination begets personal responsibility, when we decide we can’t take responsibility for our children, that the responsibility for their alcohol intake should be foisted on non-affiliated business owners, then we are giving up responsibility for our families, it’s an admission that we don’t trust our children, an admission that we can’t communicate with or adequately educate our children, an admission that as a society our parental abilities are left wanting, and acknowledgment that we are ill equipped to educate our society how to be better parents, that we can’t deal with the source of the problem, we’re only just able to fight fires if and when they combust.

    Back-to-front governance.

    And when legislation like this comes about due to factors as arbitrary as a newspaper editor exploiting her parental responsibility (I mean no disrespect to her in saying that - this was a rabidly consumed media spin fest) for her 12 year old son to further her career by grandstanding on an issue which in turn diminishes filial trust nationwide, then perhaps something is amiss.

    Mawkland • Since Jan 2010 • 1302 posts Report Reply

  • chris, in reply to DexterX,

    The fines for any outlets selling to minors should be substantive perhaps starting in the order of $100,000 per offence and a permanent cancellation of the license.

    Or if you'd prefer to see a rapid change in societal attitudes. fine the parents - $100!

    Mawkland • Since Jan 2010 • 1302 posts Report Reply

  • chris,

    This being the the most recent of a number of drug related posts this year, I’m concerned that this intent focus on psychoactive substances has become something of a glamor topic in the blogosphere. In this specific case, touting the restriction of availability of Kronic at dairies (with the entailing costs) does seem an unduly anti-holistic angle to take with human health given that on the whole, a vast proportion of the products dairies offer, fuck us up one way or another.

    dental decay remains the most prevalent chronic (and irreversible) disease in New Zealand, and disparities still exist in oral health in New Zealand. In 2009, one in three adults had untreated coronal decay, and one in ten had root decay. There was evidence of active decay in all age groups, including older age groups.

    Among adults with natural teeth, one in four (23%) had experienced trauma to one or more of their upper six front teeth, as had one in six (16%) children and adolescents aged 7–17 years.

    There was clear evidence of unmet need for dental care among adults, with nearly half of adults feeling they currently needed dental treatment. In the past year, nearly half of all adults had avoided dental care due to cost and one in four adults had gone without recommended routine dental treatment due to cost.

    Dental problems have an indirect cost to society, with one in ten adults aged 18–64 years having taken, on average, 2.1 days off work or school in the previous year due to problems with their teeth or mouth.

    Obesity in New Zealand has become an important national health concern in recent years, with high numbers of people afflicted in every age and ethnic group.[1] As of June 2008, 26.5% of New Zealanders are obese,[1] a number only surpassed in the Anglosphere by the United States.[1][2]

    .

    Mawkland • Since Jan 2010 • 1302 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    I only just spotted this, and am not sure if it already came up, but Ross Meurant on decriminalization in Granny last week had an interesting take from the side of enforcers.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Michael Savidge,

    I wonder how many of the kids - and big kids - out there are using this?

    Somewhere near Wellington… • Since Nov 2006 • 324 posts Report Reply

  • chris,

    Mawkland • Since Jan 2010 • 1302 posts Report Reply

First ←Older Page 1 4 5 6 7 8 Newer→ Last

Post your response…

Please sign in using your Public Address credentials…

Login

You may also create an account or retrieve your password.