Nothing sums up the celebration of ignorance in this country quite the way the repeal of section 59 did.
If you ask most NZers what the repeal of section 59 was, they will look at you blankly. Tell them it was the ‘anti-smacking law’ and watch them explode. The fact is most NZers to this day can’t even tell you what the repeal of section 59 was, all they saw was the Government stepping in between them and their child. Explain to them that section 59 was being used as a legal loophole for parents who were being charged by the Police for child abuse to escape prosecution and they look puzzled and spit and hiss a bit more without any real understanding of the issue.
The same example occurred last month when it was falsely but widely reported that Susan Devoy was trying to remove Christmas.
In a country as emotionally stunted as NZ, Rugby is the only real sense of pride we are allowed to publicly feel. This cultural limitation mixes with negative egalitarianism and anti-intellectualism and produces citizens as open to manipulation of their insecurities as Americans are to Trump.
The biggest part of Key’s appeal is that he manages to arouse the anti-intellectualism and negative egalitarianism that lies just beneath the surface of NZ culture. His laid back manner and dislike of thinking connects with middle NZ in a way that only sport, alcoholism and domestic violence does.
This empty aspiration appeals to a user pays youth generation who have no ideological compass, and is best expressed through the naked narcissism of Key’s son.
Being forced to think rather than angrily react to ideas that push beyond their bubble produces a celebration of wilful ignorance.
Trump embodies this, but so does Key. Rather than think about the horror of prison rape, NZers laugh it off loudly so that those who have a problem can hear their contempt. NZers rallied to defend Key after he was found to have bullied a woman in her work place on 10 separate occasions and claimed those who criticised him had ‘over-egged’ their point. Instead of getting angry at Key for diminishing the human rights abuse citizens were facing at the hands of Australians, many NZers agreed that crims deserved the rough treatment. Rather than accept that beneficiaries were given pittance to live on and that inequality had doubled, many NZers nodded their heads when Key claimed inequality was the beneficiaries fault because they liked drugs.
NZers love John Key because he represents all that is shallow and easy in our society. We are a juvenile country with the maturity of a can of coke. The wilful ignorance National voters take such glee in celebrating is the very same mindset that is propelling Trump in America.
Key is Trump without the wig.
Exactly right. Sadly there will always be this sub-culture in any society who will admire how Key and Trump-like personalities operate. To say exactly what they think with have a very ‘casual’ leadership style and proud of it. Yet it’s often superficial, the real motives hidden, somewhat like dating a sociopath. http://bit.ly/johnkeysociopath
Thanks for the link Detrie.
The article is like reading a bio of FJK!
Perhaps Bronagh should read it! But then, I guess she already knows she’s married to a very disturbed, shallow and scary man of dubious character!
@ DETRIE . You write
” Sadly there will always be this sub-culture in any society who will admire how Key and Trump-like personalities operate. ”
But are we not the sub-culture ? We’re the ones in the minority, not the jonky-philes at least according to the polls.
Jonky knows bloody well that he can’t put a perverted foot wrong. And if he does? The media will clean up his spillages while giggling and fawning around him like good little $-six figure minions.
30 years of neo liberalism has arsehole-ified the already dubious middle class and now that their egos have been pumped up on a false economy they’ve become gleeful Nouveau riche libertines. And frankly ? I’d like to give that a go for at least a little while. I’d be an excellent libertine.
Or do I have it wrong? Is a sub-culture different to a minority? Can the ‘majority’ be a sub-culture ? If so , then what an odd imbalance? If I’m in a room with ten others who share a common belief that I don’t happen to agree with but I hold the only sharp axe ? Does that make them the sub-culture? It’d better if they know what’s fucking good for them.
The only thing that defines the jonky is his money. And he has lots of it which means he can buy anybody and anything that can be bought. So long as there’s a price? He has the money to pay.
Our entire culture-lite has been financialised. Every element of what was once a green young country has been swindled into a false economy that’s now able to be raped and pillaged by the jonky’s.
I could mention The Great New Zealand Institutionalised Lie re the swindlings of real farmer money to enable The Jonky to become a Trumpenator clone at this point but I’m going to sip on my cider and hug my dog instead.
Excellent Post @ Martyn Bradbury.
The context here is for years the middle class have been receiving tax brakes to subsidise Foreign investments.
Key has unexplained sex appeal and awakens hidden desires
Key has a quirky receding hair line and a large bald spot.
He is showing his age, he is not in any way “easy to look at” not unlike Hitler, his dark hidden agenda lurks inside that shell of a “hollow man”.
And the eyes Cleangreen. Just look at the eyes. They are cold, calculating and uncaring.
Beneath the dark pit of FJK’s dark, ominous eyes there’s a disturbed terrifying being lurking there!
Anyone remember the silent assassin analogy from Merrill Lynch maybe they were right he was smiling when he sacked them so they say.
Just love your statement “We are a juvenile country with the maturity of a can of coke” – you have said it before and I just have to chuckle (in a sad way) but it’s a perfect explanation for the state this country is in.
Enjoy your Christmas Martyn and thank you for your insightful commentary throughout this year. You need to be published in MSM regularly for our benefit but I daresay you would feel like needing a shower if you took on that sort of job. Keep up the good work and to more of it next year. It’s a ray of sunlight reading your commentaries.
This country doesn’t have the maturity of a can of Coke, it has the maturity of a can of Coke Zero.
If JK was in the US would he be a Democrat or a Republican? I think the former. But that doesn’t signify much. Both parties are right of center. Obama is compromised often to the point where he doesn’t seem to function in any meaningful or progressive way but his mindset is probably less neo-lib than is JK’s – but JK’s might be fractionally less neo-lib than Trumpy. I have no confidence in any of them.
You suggest letting terrorists roam free, obtain a nuclear weapon, detonate it, knock the earth off its axis, destroying humanity ? I prefer the U.S. military intervention thanks.
We had US military intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq. How’s that going, Dean?
Hey. If Dean had any kind of idea about what he’s talking about, we would be bombing the sheet out of Pakistan right now.
Better than not having it!
On the subject of Section 59. I have a fellow worker who, whenever the subject of this comes up, starts ranting on about how Labour created a nanny state with this stupid law. Every time I remind him that it wasn’t a Labour government bill and it was a private members bill sponsored by a Green Party MP and his dear leader (John Key) voted FOR it, not against it.
Either he thinks I’m joking or it simply doesn’t sink in, because the very next time it comes up he says the same thing.
It seems that National wants us to become a nation of sheep, like the sheep in George Orwell’s Animal Farm who would break into endless chants of “Four legs good, two legs bad!” at a signal from dear leader Napoleon.
It really makes you despair sometimes. Grrrr!
Brilliantly said Martyn. I totally agree and though we have not always seen eye to eye, I appreciate your work and what you do here.
Too bad there are not more like you in the MSM.
An old can of coke that’s lost its fizz.
It was barely half of those that bothered voting last election who voted for Key and National, so I think that this is not so much a case of so many New Zealanders adoring our “Esteemed Leader”.
But it is the rather casual attitude that too many have towards anything that has to do with politics, with complex economic, social and other issues and topics. Also there is a contempt towards administration, commonly referred to as “the bureaucracy”.
Instead of actually standing up and confronting things that many dislike, they rather rant on about it, like some do on talk back, or they do so after a few beers at the pub or during a barbeque in the backyard.
Many can then be loud, noisy, angry, passionate even, about what they despise, disagree with and also hate, but once they are asked to go and explain their points, and what the issues are, especially when it comes to offering solutions, most shrug their shoulders and walk away.
There are not many countries where a government leader would get away with what John Key does, but the so backbone lacking, unprincipled, self focused ones that make up too large a portion of the population, they allow John (Not the Baptist) Key do almost anything he likes.
Others simply do not even notice what goes on. I get people on the phone who do not even know that Jon Gadsby has just passed away, I hear others show astonishment about things reported on the news, because they do not follow ANY news, there are so many that are too busy with work, shopping, going to the gym, with the DIY on the weekend, and now the holiday planning for the coming days and weeks. Let us not forget mowing the lawns, a matter of highest importance in my suburban Auckland area, where the motors of lawn mowers have filled the air for days now, it all has to be cut neatly before the Christmas BBQ or holiday outing.
Pack the care, fill the chilly bins, go and get the ice and beer, do not forget the chops for the grill, and the sweets and lemonade for the kids, who gives a damn about government.
Who actually gives a hoot about the country, the future, we are on holidays, after we have done the rounds in the Malls, that is the reality of Auckland on 22 Dec. 2015.
Long may our ‘Esteemed Leader’ live and reign, he has unlimited potential, it seems, a skin like teflon and will get a fourth and fifth term in government no time, as nobody really cares and notices much anymore.
Most people can’t be bothered with the BS
Future historians will scratch their heads in perplexment at how Key managed to fool voters for so long…
Maybe they’re putting LSD in them thar chemtrails……..?
What exactly is a ‘Muslim country’?
Topic? Missed it? Get another beer, drown the disappointment, perhaps.
What exactly is your question “What exactly is a ‘Muslim country’?”?
Even for you, Gosman, that is a particularly dim-witted question.
I too, have been seeing the same sentiments driving Trump’s popularity as Key’s.
It’s like there is a significant number of men in society who are sick of behaving well, respecting women and just want to return to their boorish ways, to be able to overtly scratch their balls and fart aloud in public again without reproach.
Most Tories are rednecks and racists!
I think back to the Muldoon wise crack era. He also said dumb shit that other people had thought up for him, carried around a mind that contained little else. He also borrowed money for crack pot ideas. Kiwis just love grinning idiots. Labour are not making any efforts and the Greens won’t get in until the environment is completely stuffed and we will give them a week to fix it. We drive this country like we stole it. Well we did! Didn’t we?
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