Posts by Sam F
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Its the most stupidist sized piece of paper ever invented.
I'm used to this stuff from work. Always makes the photocopier throw a fit. Hit size override to A4, proceed as normal, rinse, repeat...
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Over at DPF's latest post on the issue, a commenter connects the sterilisation-eugenics dots:
FFS Surely the medical fraternity can identify a train wreck from the time a female presents herself at a doctors in a pregnant condition.
Is it not totally irresponsible to the unborn child and society who will have to bear the ongoing costs for some positive actions and interfaces to occur at that point. Or do we have a Pontius Pilate medical profession.
If anyone's stomach remains unturned out there now...
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This week John Drinnan delivers just a few modest questions regarding the RNZ debate:
* Have any of the passionate advocates for National Radio listened to Chris Laidlaw on a Sunday morning, an important timeslot for public radio? It should be called the Death Warmed Up show.
* Is Radio New Zealand offering such good public radio that it could be harmed by considering a few new ideas?
* Do the broadcasters at Radio New Zealand think that it has been well managed?
* Why do most campaigners ignore the underfunding of RNZ under Labour?
* How come Radio New Zealand is based in Wellington but has no relationship or rapport with successive Governments?
* Some on the right want to tear Radio New Zealand down. What happened to the middle ground in the debate about the future of RNZ?I had a go:
1. This is often commented on even by RNZ fans. But by all means let's start talking about changing and improving RNZ's offerings rather than starving it to death?
2. "Do the same or more, with less" is not really a cogent 'new idea' for improving RNZ's public radio service - and most of the ideas already floated do involve some harm to quality in some sense (reduced overnight service, some loss of FM broadcasting, etc). But the government thinks this is drama queen stuff. So where to from here?
3. Probably. Certainly KPMG did, in basically concluding that the station was being as well managed as possible given roughly 25% underfunding. If RNZ bosses do another round of self-examination and the answer is still "yes we're doing what we can", will Drinnan accept this or will he just keep on making jibes about Wellington Civil Servant Labour Voter Radio?
4. It's a widely accepted concept in political activism that you lobby the people who are in power now, not (for instance) another bunch that were voted out a year and a half ago. And even so, what about Labour treating RNZ badly makes it beyond questioning for National to treat it even worse?
5. This may come down to that pesky thing of being a non-political independent public broadcaster. Funny, Drinnan decided last week that there was some basis in calling RNZ "Radio Labour", and that this was a bad thing, and now 'rapport' with government is something that RNZ should have been aiming for? Beats me too.
6. It's still out there, but its natural flora has been heavily colonised by the hardy crossbreed language of 'rationalisation' and privatisation, which is choking out the language of public service broadcasting which was previously native to discussion about... a public service broadcaster. I wonder who, given their regular opportunity to comment on the matter in the print media, might have some minor culpability in this?
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Am I looking forward to the inevitable Your Views on Garrett's sterilisation plan.
Wherein the general consensus will be that the plan's only fault is that it isn't mandatory. I suppose you saw Redbaiter's response to Garrett clarifying "no compulsion" in the Kiwiblog thread?
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Oh wow, nobody comes out of this one well.
It's a strange thread when even Chuck Bird winds up looking relatively reasonable.
Regarding the Fabian Society: as much as I love the idea of totally unrestrained progressive debate, it'd be good to get some kind of initial statement of where the Fabians are at, as others have requested earlier upthread. It may likely be a failure of education on my part, but I had thought of the Fabians as a largely vanished historical movement and could use some bringing up to speed on the whole thing.
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Oh jeez, I missed that bit. Seconding Andre's thoughtful response.
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Back somewhat to the original topic: it appears we have David Garrett musing on the benefits of incentivised sterilisation on Kiwiblog. Hat tip to the ever-eagle-eyed Danyl at The Dim-Post.
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It's doubly hilarious how the print story then points you to "Key meets the girls" on Page A6 - where a large publicity shot from the school visit is attached to a different story, this time about raising the driving age. Because both stories involve young people, I suppose, and that photo had to go in the paper somewhere...
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I'll slip into something more comfortable then, shall i ?.
I recommend "hiding"...
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Perhaps on next week's show you can try and cover off what the hell is going on here?
(Hat tip as ever to James Coe, Editing the Herald)