Posts by Rich of Observationz
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what ways can we improve public behaviour that don't involve the use of the punitive parts of the state apparat?
Exactly, but I don;'t think you'll convince the Ayatollahs around here that any answer than more jails/more cops will work.
For a more nuanced view, see David Nutt in today's Guardian - reckons legalising cannabis might cut alcohol consumption.
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A drivers license is a right - it's part of a right to free movement. It can be bridged or removed if you commit a motoring offence or haven't passed a test, but by default, one is entitled to drive a car.
A society where normal activities are 'privileges' conferred at whim is not a liberal democracy.
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Because being threatened in the street by drunks, and not feeling safe to socialize is also a form of repression
Somehow, I think I prefer drunks to secret policemen. Let alone drunk secret policemen.
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Hard News: Drunk Town, in reply to bob daktari,
If the youth had more optimism in their lives (refer to lack of jobs) I doubt there would be such a violent attitude displayed...
Word.
Prohibition doesn't work (Saudi Arabia, where booze is totally illegal, has a *higher* rate of alcohol related deaths than New Zealand).
Improving people's life-outlook and self respect might.
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Hard News: Drunk Town, in reply to Matthew Poole,
I thought you meant this longer article. Opium den reference at para 4.
And I don't really see the difference between getting drunk in someone's garage (legal), getting drunk in a hotel room (legal I think) and getting drunk in a private room in a karaoke club (illegal).
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There was an article in Granny
I saw that article, and thought it was one of the more egregious thousand words of casual racism I'd seen, even in a media that prides itself on that sort of thing. Evil foreign swine getting drunk in darkened rooms! With hookers and blow and knives and guns! They even tripped out the old opium den cliche - it could be 1881 all over again.
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I think worrying about this (like the prominence that's given to road accidents and petty vandalism) is a bit of a "comfortable world problem".
Like some cop saying of Ireland: 'if [getting shitfaced is] a representation of what they do in their own country they've got big problems over there'
Well, they do have a few problems and maybe getting a bit pissed is a welcome relief.
Most countries have similar laws to us about not serving drunks and so on, but NZ is one of the few that actually takes them at all seriously. I was in a pub in Derry a while ago, and the bar staff were probably more pissed than the punters. But happily drunk - after tipping red wine over us, the bartender bought us a round.
If anything I think NZ doesn't have a drinking problem, it's got a violence problem, and the booze just brings it out.
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he North Shore tribe is populated by self-made men and women – self- starters with large doses of ambition, aspiration, perseverance and achievement. There’s a simple and powerful philosophy underpinning this set of tribal values:
Mortgage fraud.
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Hard News: Briefing, blaming, backing down, in reply to Hilary Stace,
My bad, read '99 for '09. Blame old age....
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why should an increase in taxes on the wealthier be an uunpopular policy?
It's unpopular with the wealthy, and the many who have a deluded identification with the wealthy.
Didn't Labour have this as part of their policy in 1999?
Yes. Didn't seem to help them win the election.
I believe that National *did* have asset sales in their manifesto. A majority might have been mildly opposed to this, but they were won over by the whole "less tax hate the brown and poor people" idiom that National espoused.
Maybe what you're actually after is a written constitution that ringfences certain things from voteocracy, like the proposed new Icelandic one which protects social rights and national assets.