Posts by BenWilson
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to giovanni tiso,
When do we all get one of those then?
I don't even want one of those.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Lilith __,
We can’t have a reasonable debate if we get to make up our own meanings for the words we use.
I don't really think it's going to help make this debate more reasonable to indulge in a fight over language. Even if Russell wins, Graeme backs down, says the word boycott was used wrongly, that makes no impression whatsoever on the substantive case he was making about whether it's an appropriate use of free speech in this instance, or any other. And this could go on for days.
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Hard News: Housing: the Feudal Model, in reply to James Bremner,
A CGT or financial transaction tax would only get added to the price of real estate, further screwing those who don’t own property.
That's not the only reason for a CGT. The other is because it is actually real income that goes completely untaxed. Whether it is fueling speculation is a sidebar. I think it is, certainly it discourages other forms of investment, certainly has for me.
LVRs seem to have backfired a bit, I think they should have been applied to purchases of existing houses only. That would work to direct demand to creating increased supply.
Well it's done a sterling job of blocking out first home buyers immediately. But it's hard to be sure what the long term effect is yet. It's a requirement that could easily take a long time to bite, but people being unable to apply massive leverage multipliers to their property profits should make speculation less.
If land bankers knew that someone could easily build a house on some new land for less than they think their land is worth, do you think that will change their behavior? You bet it would.
Yes, they'd buy that land too. In fact, they already have. All of the land is owned by someone already, and of course they'd love to sell it for heaps more than it's worth with cattle on it.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Russell Brown,
I disagree. I think it’s an important distinction.
Sorry, I didn't really get that out the way I wanted, had to bail in a few mins. What I mean is that arguing over that distinction is a distraction, from the way I've seen this debate play out. It's not about "is it a boycott or not a boycott?". It's about "was it right or wrong?" There's plenty of wiggle room in the definitional debate. To me it looks like a boycott, quacks like one. But so what? It's a good boycott.
I get sick of the semantic discussion with the fall back on dictionaries and quotes from dead white men holding quills in which the message is eventually completely lost shortly before it is subsumed. Don't play that game with a lawyer, unless you think it's a good idea to get in a farting match with a skunk.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Russell Brown,
What happened was not a boycott and it’s misleading to characterise it that way.
I don't know if this is really a quibble that matters.
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Gio's other post should definitely be linked. In which he explains how it went down.
He's at pains to point out that it wasn't only his efforts that led to this. Nor even social media as the main agitator. This was a society wide response, and calling advertisers wouldn't have worked if it wasn't.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I can actually see the point Graeme’s making, even agree with a lot of it, but let’s be honest with ourselves that these arguments very often come from a place of epic (and often unexamined) social, economic and political privilege.
Yup, Danyl made this point beautifully on Chris Trotter's earlier version of what Graeme has written here.
Can they be used against mainstream progressive left-wing commentators? Well, these people don't really exist in New Zealand: we're doomed to be hectored and talked down to by droves of reactionary bewildered old men instead;
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
Whereas I’d say: it’s not going to die until you counter the idea, rather than silence some of those who give it wide currency.
It's got plenty wide enough currency. It doesn't need to get currency from advertisers who don't want anything to do with it.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Deborah,
I’m hearing overtones of a fancied up version of “women, get to the back of the bus and wait your turn” in this analysis.
Or worse, wait until rape culture and it’s apologists die of natural causes. Considering the Roast Busters are 25 years my junior, that’s not really fast enough. It’s only going to die if society actually kills it.
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How many minds could have been changed if the response to Willie and JT was not to contact their advertisers, but to contact their switchboards, and flood the airwaves with the views of those appalled at their treatment of Amy? We’ll never know, but I’m guessing it would have been more than were changed by their silencing.
Gut feeling is that would have achieved exactly jack shit. Pissed off people call them all the time, and they just get cut off. Then they give much much longer air time to angry conservative dad who agrees with them.
I can't really buy anything in what you're saying here, Graeme.
Of course, they are themselves an exercise of freedom of speech, even if it is speech that detracts from the marketplace of ideas.
No, it IS an expression of an idea. A very strong expression of a widely felt and held idea. It entered the marketplace and crushed the competition.
But I would like those who engage in this sort of speech to take more care.
No dude, you're saying that it doesn't ever matter how grotesque the views are, a advertiser boycott should NEVER happen. You just took a million words to say it.
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