Posts by Yamis
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Russell, don't do what Martin Crowe did and try to fiddle one down to 3rd man for his triple hundred and get caught behind.
Slam it straight through the covers!
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Check again later. The headline will probably read "Census shows surgeon in Asian population".
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No-one's telling you that your ethnicity has to be more important than your national identity, and no-one's forcing you to choose one over the other simply by asking a Census question - we have plenty of other opportunities to state and affirm our national identity. So why pretend one *is* the other? That's actually rather unfair to the rest of us.
The problem (for me) is that you can't state both. You are asked what your ethnic group is and there is nowhere to put what you identify as. I made a political statement I guess by ticking New Zealander. As I suggested in my post on page 5? they should allow room for people to express who they are in one question and what the colour of their skin is in another. What would the harm be?
They would get their nice table showing the skin colour (or shades of) of every bugger in NZ and then they could have a nice revealing graph showing what people identify as which I would be WAY, WAY more interested in. People could tick New Zealander if they were Korean, or New Zealand Korean if that's how they felt, or they could tick Korean if they didn't feel like either of the first two etc etc.
Lets make statistics fun!!!
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Cool thread.
I put "New Zealander" and would like to think that I'm some distance from the right wing. Especially since I have voted for the Greens in the last two elections.
I put a fair amount of thought into it in the period leading up to the census and for the life of me I couldn't think why I should put "European" ahead of "New Zealander" (I'm talking about my thinking on the matter, not anybody elses opinion as they don't know me, apart from my mum, who knows me quite well).
To me the solution seems obvious but I haven't sat down and thought through the pros and cons for hours so could be persuaded to change my mind.
Two parts to "the question". The first part you tick the box or boxes which express your 'cultural identity' (in other words who you feel like or identify most strongly with) and in the second part you can tick the box or boxes which express your 'ethnic' group(s).
I would then be able to say that I am a New Zealander of European descent (or Scottish, English and Welsh to be exact, and then going back further scandinavian, probably back through Germany and then .... Africa. Once you go black you never go back baby!).
The reason for needing the stats (like somebody pointed out earlier) is not crystal clear and there needs to be more media coverage or statements by those using the stats as to what they want to know and why. The obvious is to find out who is doing well in NZ and who isn't, where different ethnic groups are living etc etc but if that is the case then why not go a whole step further and get a lot more detailed data rather than have somebody like me tick the "New Zealander" box and then sit round speculating about what ethnic group I might be.
I think the census figures could be a great way to bring NZ together. Wouldn't it be fantastic to have 80% of the population saying that they are a "New Zealander" and then separately have ethnic breakdowns as to how that is made up. Time to take the next step and start pulling a few more fences down I think. They are starting to fall down every 5 years anyway so why not help them topple a bit faster?
On another 'thing'. "Pakeha" means non-Maori so if you are Asian you are "pakeha". I know it has traditionally been a term for Europeans because they were basically the only group of people that Maori encountered for a long period but having asked Maori if it means "non Maori" and being told "yes" then that'll do me.
I've been fortunate enough to be on three different Marae in the last 2 years and on each one I, like everybody else was asked to say my name, where I am from and something about myself. Like most of the other Pakeha there the place I said I was from was a place in New Zealand which was always greeted positively by the elders present. They didn't say "no, where in Europe are you from?, you can't be from Aotearoa".
Anyways, back to te topic, if I'm expected to put "European" on a census form as my ethnic group then I expect Maori to put "Polynesian" on it or "Pacific Peoples". And I expect neither so until they change or add to the census questions and allow me to state my cultural identity and my ethnic past then I will not bother disrespecting myself by not stating who I really am. A New Zealander.
aigghht?!
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I remember being dropped off at my grand parents house at the age of 5 because my parents were going into Queen Street to join the protest march. If I'd been a few years older I would've been in there too wreckin shit.
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Course not, it'd be renamed after someone more appropriate. possibly a famous old boy. Or maybe after a famous local - pick a famous Westie to name a school after...
My pick - The Sheldon Woolridge School Of RockAs a born and bred Westie let me suggest "Lion Red High School" with "Holden Intermediate" as it's main feeder school. Kid at school today was boozed on gin though.
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Craig:
I don't necessarily think it's a flaw for someone to respond to a question with "I don't know" or even (shock! horror!) "You know, I thought I knew and I was wrong." It's all very well to "absorb the minutiae" of any subject (or think you do) and be able to rattle off bullet points at a presser, but a little intellectual modesty - and good grace when you get things wrong - is a mark of leadership too. Very smart people aren't immune from holding really dumb opinions and saying stupid things.
I'd like to see that too. As a teacher we are in the position of not being able to answer questions constantly as the kids ask some pretty random stuff about whatever it is we are studying (alongside the completely random like them holding up a real estate picture of a house in Swanson and asking how much it might be worth in the middle of a lesson on the second world war). Of course on occassion we bullshit an answer but its a damn sight more sensible to simply say "I don't know, that's a good question I'll try and find out the answer or get back to you after I've thought about it or researched it". People (and kids) tend to see through the fake crap. But there tends to be too much pride at stake for most people anywhere up any ladder in society. We are in an age where there is soo much going on and information changing so quickly that it's perfectly normal to become lost on issues at express pace unless you are following them every waking moment. To be able to do that on political issues is a total and utter impossibility. It's like asking the principal to come in and teach a lesson in each of the 40 different subject areas in the space of a week.
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Gets me thinking actually (I don't often because it hurts). Would people agree that there is less of a gap between Labour and National than between Labour and say the Alliance or Progressives or Greens, or between National and ACT ? I really don't study policy that closely because it's about as fun as running a cheese grater down your face (or my face, I'm not proposing anybody lets me run a cheese grater down their face).
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Craig, you seem overly sensitive to my observations thus far of Key differing from Brash to the point of being closer to Labour on the aforementioned issues by a) being nice to maori, b) coming out firmly on climate change, c) saying nice things about the importance of our welfare system, d) being CLEARLY anti-nuke, e) CLEARLY stating National would not have supported troops going to Iraq. Quite why it took this long to clarify "e)" says a hell of a lot about Brash's dithering on the topic really.
Of course National aren't proposing abolishing social welfare. That's a no brainer (I would have thought), but it was (as far as I'm aware) one of the first things he commented on and more than a throw away line which I found telling since it was coming from the supposed right ;)
Brash and the opposition in general have spent years slagging Labours every move which is hardly surprising as that seems to be what politics is all about. It has nearly worked but I think National about bottomed out with its current level of support and now it's about getting the right face out front and engaging brain ona few issues. I have found it refreshing thus far for sensible ideas and actions to be repeated by both sides of the fence. Maybe it is a sign of the future like somebody suggested earlier about the 'end' to 'ideology' and now government will be more about pragmatism and managing things issue by issue in a more measured way.
Mind you if that happens we will end up with a 'super' party in the middle winning 60-80% of the votes and little 'extreme' groups on the fringes of the spectrum tugging here and there for the other 20%.
Ah buggered if I know, I'm tired.
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Speaking of prizes, at our school prizegiving recently three students were announced as having gone through high school with 100% attendance. There were stunned gasps of astonishment, amazement, bewilderment and general awe. I think I missed 3-5 days every term for the duration which would add up to about 50 days over five years. How somebody doesn't miss one day is beyond me and indeed the few hundred in attendance as well. Well done those young champs!