Posts by BenWilson
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I was born a generation too early. Or maybe two.
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Samuel, I'm not happy with all trial by media. But in this case I'm not really complaining about it. I think the conduct of these guys was disgraceful, if not actually illegal, and people knowing about it has to be a little bit of a deterrent.
I'm not judging them for wanting group sex or any sexual preference at all. It's the abuse of their position that I dislike. It's rather similar to a high school teacher ripping into a student. It may not be actually illegal, if the student is old enough, but professionally and morally it's usually disgraceful.
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Good luck with moving PA in a commercial direction. I think it's a brave move, but fortune favours that..
As for the dirty coppers, their failure to be convicted doesn't mean they're off scot free. Reputationally, they are ruined. Which doesn't bother me at all. There should be consequences for actions that are immoral but not found illegal - total social disapproval is a surprisingly powerful force.
And if there is a hard core of people who still like these guys, whose trust and faith hasn't been rocked by some of the facts that have emerged, then there is probably a reason for that too - maybe they have lived better lives since those days. But surely most people who don't know them will be judging them very harshly, whatever the jury found.
Certainly what they did and got away with has brought the Force into disrepute. I would not like to think that such characters are common in the NZ Police Force. Sadly, the few coppers that I know personally give me the impression that they're a lot more common than I had previously thought.
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I was thinking Nitrous Oxide. I was blippin & bleapin & movin last time that button was pushed.
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Paul, you're right in that it's overstating it to say *any* immigration policy must be racist. But I think almost every policy will unfairly disadvantage some group, probably along racial lines.
I'm just following your numbers argument to the conclusion. I actually think you're right - the flow should be controlled to some extent. I just don't particularly like the social engineering that seems to always accompany that. You could control flow fairly - if we decide we can't take more than, say, 50,000 new immigrants every year, then we could just randomly select amongst however many applicants there are (keeping families together of course). And that's only *if* there really is a problem. Currently that's only hypothesized.
Planning is all very well, but if your planning involves making some desired demographic blueprint around your plans, I think they're not serving the purpose, they are driving it.
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Paul, most of the planet had an open door policy prior to the 20th century. The benefits are obvious - people can move around freely as need and desire dictate. The only time it's necessary to close borders is when you are at war, or about to be. NZ is not at war.
I don't get why we need to have exclusively skilled workers. That just displaces existing skilled workers. Unskilled workers can still work, and their work is a large part of what makes society tick. It may be that there are no jobs for the ones that can't speak english and have no skills. If that is the case they will not want to come here.
Rich, I don't see it as immediately obvious that a sudden massive increase in NZ's population would be that bad. Nor is it obvious that would happen. I think an increase would be likely, but it would be much slower than you think. I guess I wouldn't like to receive boatloads of people from countries that are at war, with populations being deliberately displaced. They should certainly be refugees.
Rogerd,
"So, in 10 years Aucklanders would be drinking recycled waste-water?"
Touche. I'm looking from the point of view that most people in the world would rather live in Sydney than Auckland, and that could reverse quickly. I think more people preferring to live in Oz than NZ would take a lot longer. Water and space limits are self regulating.
That you don't want to be like Britain or Japan (unlike most of the world and most of the skilled educated NZers), says your X is "people" too?
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Rogerd and Lyndon, criminality is just about the only thing I agree on. Only if they're actually wanted for some crime though. If they've done their time, well, it's not so clear to me.
I don't know how you'd know if someone was into genocide, unless they had actually done it, in which case the criminality criterion is surely sufficient.
It's interesting that we have such difficulty dealing with the idea of no borders, and yet almost everywhere it's actually tried, there is no real problem. The borders create the problems that everyone worries about.
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Paul, if our infrastructure was strained, which is the main counterargument so far provided to the no-policy-policy, then there would be plenty of demand. If there was no demand then surely there would also be no problem?
Why do you think it's unreasonable to allow people to do work that others won't? If that is better for them than living wherever they were, it's got to be to their advantage. If immigrants can't get ahead in NZ they won't come here. The whole problem just balances out.
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Most of the immigrants I meet are my neighbors and they work for a living in various jobs. None of them are professionals, but they're not a drain on the state either - they drive trucks and work on the roads and suchlike, all stuff that needs to get done. They're a shitload more motivated to work than most of the guys I was at school with, a goodly proportion of whom spend most of their time working out how to avoid work and tax, and bugger off overseas to avoid paying back student loans.
Also taxi drivers, of course. It's probably keeping the cost of cabs down, something I'm glad about, living in Auckland.
I think if we had an open door policy, Auckland would outstrip Sydney in under 10 years. NZ would outstrip Oz in every way except quantity of sand within 20.
Of course Maori would become even more of a minority. White people would probably become a minority. But if we planned ahead, both groups could be *rich and powerful* minorities.
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"I assume the class doesn't consider it a matter of racism to, for example, exclude people who you don't reasonably expect to make a positive contribution to that economy thingy."
Depends why you don't reasonably expect it.
Building a sewerage system and schools and hospitals requires labour. The cheap labour of unskilled immigrants working on infrastructure projects for NZ would entirely cover the cost of those immigrants, and then some. They would be paying tax, spending money, and working. All good. I don't really get the problem at all. That is *exactly* how the wealthiest parts of the New World were made. You don't get educated professionals making roads and railways, even if roads and railways are what you need.
I suppose it is risky. So is *not* doing it. Everything in life has risk.
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