Hard News: Only in a relative sense
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Who mentioned the Mazengarb report? What a beat up that was. My father and my son's great uncle were members of that committee. Mazengarb, who was a wealthy lawyer, declined payment from the government on behalf of the committee members so my poor father had to run a business and support his family, and work for several months full time, without any income, working out how to stem the depravity of youth. Apart from a steady stream of banned books that my sister took to school, and a second term for the National Government,what did it achieve? A legal ban on contraceptive advice for under 16 year olds that stayed in force for about 4 decades.
An inquiry into boy racers would probably be about as effective. -
Who mentioned the Mazengarb report? What a beat up that was.
But OMG! The teens in Lower Hutt, they were sexing!
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Good to know that I'm not the only one concerned that this policy development process is completely f*cked up. Hey let's start with a punishment, and work backwards to find an offence to fit it...
Then again, we could have a very public glow on for an Australian law to deal with a rather vapourous "gang crisis" when you've no idea whether it actually achieves a damn thing.
Why don't we just bring in free euthanasia for ill-groomed white trash? They can't offend our delicate sensibilities if they're decomposing in a landfill somewhere.
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But OMG! The teens in Lower Hutt, they were sexing!
Can I just report - for no other reason that I feel like doing it - that yesterday we had the first instalment of *the* conversation with my son (who's seven) and what prompted it was his asking "what's a relationship", and how he knew the world "relationship" was through Akbar and Jeff in a Life in Hell collection he found lying around. And so the ground floor of *the* conversation was "gay couple comprising two identical twin brothers" (they aren't, I suppose, but that's what they objectively look like).
I bet that was a first.
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Good to know that I'm not the only one concerned that this policy development process is completely f*cked up. Hey let's start with a punishment, and work backwards to find an offence to fit it...
Motorists who piss me off - I suggest that as a good starting point!!
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And so the ground floor of *the* conversation was "gay couple comprising two identical twin brothers"
I blame Lucy.
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Lx,
But OMG! The teens in Lower Hutt, they were sexing!
Still are, so the report did jack.
What makes CHC's "boy racers" special? Nowhere else in the country do they get to engage with the politicians. Nowhere else do they get any damned say at all, in fact.
That's part of the problem. Nobody's listening to them. In Nelson they've been saying for at least 20 years that they go to Branford Park etc because there's nowhere else. They've said over and over that they'd go to a designated place if a suitable one was to be found/provided. The mayors keep responding that it's great that there's dialogue. That doesn't seem to be translating into cooperative action between the Council and the boy racers.
The other issue is that the cops target them and give them attitude so they take extra pride in pushing the boundaries. I mean, come on, standing there, taking your sweet time to check out every conceivable part of the car that MIGHT not conform and making snide and sometimes downright nasty comments while holding all the power is not calculated to calm the situation.
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Lx,
Tom Beard, that Calimocho sounds unbelievably vile.
Oh but wait! I see it can be improved with the addition of blackberry nip.
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@Hilary
Who mentioned the Mazengarb report? What a beat up that was. My father and my son's great uncle were members of that committee.
You're so getting the call if I make that documentary.
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Russell
Unfortunately, they are both dead, but Redmer Yska managed to interview them for his book on the era.
The Mazengarb incident has been an endless source of amusement for my family. My brother even used it as a topic for his PhD comparing it with a similar Canadian moral panic.
My father was the 'youth' rep (at 40 ish) and a good Jaycee. An editor, he had to do most of the writing. Later I met Jack Somerville, the Presbyterian church rep, who was also bemused by the whole thing.
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Redmer Yska 'All shook up' (1993)
Great book on NZ in the 1950s
And to correct the first sentence of my previous post, Jack and Nigel were still alive then. -
Still, I am going to really enjoy watching the Deputy Leader of the Opposition do a u-turn on ASBOs in clown drag, which she was vaguely keen on back in the day.
That's the problem with courting a skank like Laura Norder -- sure she's popular, but you just know you're going to wake up with a nasty itch in your junk...
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Hey let's start with a punishment, and work backwards to find an offence to fit it...
They already have several offences that'll fit just fine.
I'd say that s22A of the Land Transport Act 1998 covers things quite nicely. It's the general "boy racer" section. All they're doing is upping the punishment for things that are already against the law. They don't need to come up with some mystical new offences, there's quite the smorgasbord from which to select. -
That's the problem
awh... I am having dinner Craig. :)
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Then again, we could have a very public glow on for an Australian law to deal with a rather vapourous "gang crisis" when you've no idea whether it actually achieves a damn thing.
And really open up a big can of infringing-civil-liberties worms while we're at it. I wasn't too keen on Goff becoming leader of Labour, largely because the man is a closet fascist. His drooling over the thought of the kind of anti-association legislation that would be required to facilitate this just affirms that fear. We've got a conservative government peopled with the likes of McCully and Smith, and the opposition is lead by a man who quite likes the idea of disposing of civil liberties because they're a pesky nuisance. It's an awful combination.
Somehow I can't see Act opposing it either, even though it's precisely the kind of legislation that a truly social liberal party should be strongly against.
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Tom Beard, that Calimocho sounds unbelievably vile.
It's actually surprisingly palatable, especially over lots of ice on a hot day. I read somewhere that it was a recipe "passed on from father to son" in Spain. Then again, I read somewhere else that that only applied if the son was under 15 and the father had prison tatts...
...which brings us neatly back to Lower Hutt and boy racers.
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I wasn't too keen on Goff becoming leader of Labour, largely because the man is a closet fascist. His drooling over the thought of the kind of anti-association legislation that would be required to facilitate this just affirms that fear. We've got a conservative government peopled with the likes of McCully and Smith, and the opposition is lead by a man who quite likes the idea of disposing of civil liberties because they're a pesky nuisance. It's an awful combination.
A-fucking-men, brother.
Now help me with this barricade, I've run out of sofas.
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Oh, the Mazengarb Report and licentious behaviour in Lower Hutt! I have a copy of the document somewhere.
My favourite piece of 1950s legislation (because it was so daft), was the 1955 Rabbits Amendment Act. Sponsored by Mabel Howard, it was intended to deter the skinning of innocent bunnies, to halt the manufacture of local versions of Davy Crockett 'coon-skin' hats--and thus prevent little Kiwis from turning into little Americans.
And then there were bodgies and widgies ...
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The Mazengarb incident has been an endless source of amusement for my family.
Been ages since I skimmed through it, but I was highly tickled by the term 'bodgie "high priest"', as in someone who presides over the ritualised corruption of the innocent. No mention of Satan as far as I recall.
I read somewhere that it was a recipe "passed on from father to son" in Spain.
In a similar way to that in which one "passes" a kidney stone, perhaps?
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A copy of the Mazengarb report was sent to every home just before the 1954 election to scare the public and show the government was acting. National increased its majority. I expect Key's advisors to take note of this tactic.
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To have only been old enough to have joined a milk bar gang.. regrets...
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A copy of the Mazengarb report was sent to every home just before the 1954 election to scare the public and show the government was acting.
So that's how the bloody thing got there.
While my parents would have rather died than vote National, they dutifully stashed their copy in a bottom drawer. What a sneaky barrel of laughs it proved to be for us kids once we found it. -
And apparently Ian Wishart thinks the boy racer problem is all the fault of the "bloody wimmin".
On a wider scale, would things have to go Greek before people are jolted to their senses?
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http://www.timeout.com/cn/en/beijing/aroundtown/feature/6333/the-king-of-the-second-ring.html
A paragraph missing from the net version of this article beings;
"Zhang is right in the midst of the Beijing scene. He lived in New Zealand from the age of 15 until his early twenties, and became heavily involved in the rampant illegal racing scene, appearing in court four times for dangerous driving. When he returned to China, he was good enough to get a racing licence and briefly raced professionally"
world famous in the world
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re: that article blamming the wimmin Deep Red, I felt the authr briefly had some kind of a point about the spaying of the family
So politicians have spotted a vote winning opportunity: we’ll do the job of the parents.
Encouraged by the supine complicity – or, in the weird case of some publications, a cheerleading press – the ruling political class has seen fit to barge into our homes and tell our children how to behave without ever asking us.
before diving off to underworld.
The breakdown of the family does play a huge role in this kind of stuff, but I find the anti governmental jibes wear a little thin, especially in light of the fact that it wasn't actually the government who instructed the baby boomers to start divorcing en mass.
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