Hard News: How much speech does it take?
554 Responses
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Rich Lock, in reply to
It makes me wonder just what Farrar's "essential values" of New Zealanders might be. Can you imagine even trying to start agreeing on what those are? The term is, essentially, meaningless.
It's a debate that's been going on in the UK for quite a number of years. There is now a government-produced 'life in the uk' test that immigrants are supposed to take, but it has been heavily criticised.
It seems to me that a lot of cultural characteristics are defined by saying what the culture 'isn't' - a negative definition where you point to an aspect of another culture and say 'well, we're not like that'.
When you try and define the culture positively, the terms generally seem to become a bit imprecise, or so broad as to be meaningless. 'Inclusive', 'tolerant', 'stiff upper lip' etc.
This take on the Norway events comes at it from a male-threatened-by-female approach, which is an interesting perspective.
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
That’s an inane discussion …
At least our inane discussions are about important things … like coffee
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Che Tibby, in reply to
When you try and define the culture positively, the terms generally seem to become a bit imprecise, or so broad as to be meaningless.
my experience too. in the end i resorted to a subjective-acceptance. i need to be able to claim that i am something, i.e. "i am a kiwi", and have "kiwis" agree with me.
hence, che saying: "i am a londoner" might fly with some drunk americans i'm lying to in a pub, but will not fly with anyone who actually knows what a londoner is.
i make a subjective claim, they accept it. therefore, i am what i say i am.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
This take on the Norway events comes at it from a male-threatened-by-female approach, which is an interesting perspective.
Not to be flippant, but
In that setting, men are not men anymore, but metro sexual and emotional beings that are there to serve the purpose as a never-criticising soul mate to the new age feminist woman goddess.”
Fuck, I wish.
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Far fucking out. That’s an inane discussion …
And not for the first time, I wonder why Farrar didn't either leave the comments closed or park 'em up in a moderation queue and quietly delete the ones that made Beck look rational by comparison. He can do both.
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Rich Lock, in reply to
Didn't agree with all of it, but thought it offered an interesting and different perspective.
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Danielle, in reply to
Teh Standard has all the hallmarks of ‘we ARE struggling together!”.
And women are welcome as long as they're quiet, supportive, and supply the tea and scones.
That being said, Kiwiblog is several orders of magnitude worse.
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merc,
What is amazing right now is how the Herald can turn certain opinions round so fast and in such a weighted manner,
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10741135
I can't even begin to decipher what Flavell is on about, really, he is all over the place. -
Bart Janssen, in reply to
In that setting, men are not men anymore, but metro sexual and emotional beings that are there to serve the purpose as a never-criticising soul mate to the new age feminist woman goddess.”
And that's a bad thing because??????
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I do wonder how deep-seated the biological/psychlogical urge to 'other' those who are different is.
Clearly, there are some people who have real problems with 'difference': women in the workplace, 'ethnics' running the dairy, 'gays'...more or less anywhere.
It does, to a greater or lesser degree, seem to be quite deep-rooted in the human psyche. How do we deal with that?
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Rich Lock, in reply to
And that's a bad thing because??????
We can't watch sports in our gruds all Sunday afternoon while occasionally lifting our legs to fart loudly?
Damn you, wimminz! Damn you all to heck and back!
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
This is what I'm saying. What I want to know is where is my non-critical metro soul mate?
That being said, Kiwiblog is several orders of magnitude worse.
Oh, very much so.
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Rich Lock, in reply to
There's a book someone on here recommended a bit back: 'the hidden rules of english behaviour', which makes a stab at a more objective definition of how the English behave in various situations.
I got a copy out of the library, but it's a hard read - rather like looking a too-honest mirror. 'Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the most-repressed englishman of them all?'
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
I'd argue (if I may) that it's basically wrongheaded for a state to try to impose any sort of normative culture (as the Brits are doing with citizenship tests, which are of course for immigrants, nobody suggests that the natives should take one and be thrown out if they fail).
The culture of the state is the sum of the people who happen to be living in that state. NZ culture now includes aspects of Chinese, Pasifika, Indian and many other peoples cultures.
Human rights is an overlay on that of course - just because my ancestors systematically violated peoples rights doesn't mean that I have a right to continue doing that.
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Idiot Savant, in reply to
And not for the first time, I wonder why Farrar didn't either leave the comments closed or park 'em up in a moderation queue and quietly delete the ones that made Beck look rational by comparison. He can do both.
My gut instinct? Because that would be work.
This was one of the reasons I shut down comments on NRT: I thought about the work that would be required to police comments, and the criticism it would inevitably engender, and went "fuck that, I'm not playing that game, that's time I could spend posting". And DPF has an order of magnitude more comments than I ever did.
At the same time, the fact that he hasn't pulled the plug yet tells us that DPF is happy enough with the current situation. Which in turn tells us quite a lot about his character.
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merc,
He's doing a great job for someone,
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/farrar20labour/search/results.cfm?kw1=Farrar%20Labour&kw2=&st=gsa
I wonder how the journalists at NZHerald feel about their workmate? -
I actually read Kiwiblog far more often than The Standard, because I find it more difficult to hear people being idiotic about things I might mostly agree with than people being idiotic about, well, idiotic stuff. And I have never commented on The Standard because I don't have a feel for how to say something without being shat on - whereas I (occasionally) comment on Kiwiblog with the full intention of being shat on, which makes it OK somehow.
I think DPF honestly thinks that his hands-off moderating is a virtue precisely because anyone has a right to share their views - without realizing how that attitude has fostered exactly the opposite of broad engagement.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
My gut instinct? Because that would be work.
This was one of the reasons I shut down comments on NRT: I thought about the work that would be required to police comments, and the criticism it would inevitably engender, and went “fuck that, I’m not playing that game, that’s time I could spend posting”. And DPF has an order of magnitude more comments than I ever did.
It is a lot of work, and sometimes it's emotionally draining too. My view is that the best way to keep a discussion on track is to actively participate in it -- it's a show of good faith apart from anything else -- but not everyone has the time for that.
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Carol Stewart, in reply to
This take on the Norway events comes at it from a male-threatened-by-female approach, which is an interesting perspective.
The DomPost had a profile on Breivik's background yesterday, and something jumped out at me
Breivik's grudge against society appears to have its roots in the humiliation he felt at being forced to learn to knit at Smestad primary school in Oslo. He says it was introduced to feminise European boys in their insane quest to attempt to create the Marxist utopia consisting of 'true equality between the sexes'. I remember I dreaded these courses as it felt very unnatural and was a complete waste of time.".. that doesn't seem all that far removed from John Ansell's hateful and bizarre rants published in the Dompost and elsewhere where he decries the 'feminisation' of our menfolk.
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Emma Hart, in reply to
What I want to know is where is my non-critical metro soul mate?
*cough*
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Russell Brown, in reply to
.. that doesn’t seem all that far removed from John Ansell’s hateful and bizarre rants published in the Dompost and elsewhere where he decries the ‘feminisation’ of our menfolk.
It's a fairly common trope amongst that crowd, yes.
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Danielle, in reply to
It’s a fairly common trope amongst that crowd, yes.
It's also a trope for them to be all 'but that's not SEXIST, just DESCRIPTIVE' when called on it. 'It's merely associating everything we consider bad in society with stuff we think women are/do. So that couldn't possibly be sexist!'
Oh wait.
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That reminds me of high school where there were typing classes. They were optional, but all us boys thought the classes were really for girls.
And now look, I can type with the best of em!!
I'm off to knit some nice wooly lingerie.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
Yes, and where the bloody hell are you? Living in a whole different city to me, that's where.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
That reminds me of high school where there were typing classes. They were optional, but all us boys thought the classes were really for girls.
Typing classes would have been a lot more use to me than bloody woodwork ever was. OTOH, being rubbish at something was probably salutary, little smartarse that I probably was.
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