What many pundits and mainstream media don’t appreciate about the sudden rise of Jacinda is that there has been a deep seated resentment about the current economic settings in terms of inequality and poverty for a very long time.
Stuff’s huge poll (admittedly online) showed that even amongst male National voters there was a deep seated resentment against the current Government, and a recent poll showed most NZers believe the system is rigged against them.
All that political angst was waiting for was a Leader to channel all that energy.
Jacinda is that Leader.
Her emotional intelligence and her empathy make her a powerful leader and she seems so fresh because she represents an enormous generational shift.
Jacinda is the first political representation of Gen Y. The thing that makes her so unique is her total lack of Ego. She is conscientious to a fault, she’s part of a Generation that was taught empathy and compassion and consideration for others and recycling.
Always with the bloody recycling.
Put bluntly.
Baby Boomers – “Me, me, me”.
Gen Xers – “Why me, why me, why me”.
Gen Y – “Why you, why I, Why us”.
She’s part of a kinder Generation taught and brought up in a culture that was desperate to be inclusive of others and that ignoring inclusivity was the greatest sin.
This is why she is so widely popular. She brings with, she doesn’t talk down to, she is all about getting agreement to move forward because that was how decision making was being taught in our education system.
Jacinda is a product of her generation, and because most of the pundits are older than her, they judge her by their own generations combativeness and cynicism.
Which is why they don’t get her.
Jacinda as a Gen Y brings a totally different skill set to the table and her popularity with younger voters has to do with her reflecting those values on inclusivity.
Jacindamania isn’t going away because what Jacinda is projecting as a leader is real emotional connection to an empathy that voters are desperate to feel.
National Policy has left most feeling cheated and resentful, Labour is offering policy wrapped in care.
New Zealanders have been desperate to find someone to believe in and they’ve found that in Jacinda.
Jacinda’s rise isn’t for shallow smile and wave no policy reasons, it’s a measure of how long many have been without hope.
The danger in igniting peoples real hope is that if she doesn’t deliver they will turn with terrible anger on her and the Labour Party.
Jacinda isn’t just winning for a Government, she’s carrying a huge number of NZers genuine hopes and dreams with her. She is going to have to deliver a lot, she’s everyone’s collective lotto ticket and we all believe we’ll have won if she does as well.
This Baby Boomer has felt that deep seated resentment for the past 9 long years. That a lot of my generation seemed to forget the ideology of our youth so fast bewildered me, and still does. Everyone conformed during the 80’s to become the greedy property investors and business leaders of today and who cause so much poverty and inequality, while only a few stayed true to egalitarian belief and were anti environmental destruction, and nuclear free, concerned with injustice, but saw ever more unemployment and low wages because of government policy pandering to business over people.
For me it’s been building for a long time and the hope which Jacinda portrays cuts across generations because we need to be able to see hope and a future for our children and grandchildren. I am a fan and I really hope she can pull this off.
100% SARAH,
Me to you said what is always on my 73yr old mind thanks
Also me too.
Having to find money every week for a 25 year old friends meds because the state wont give him a benefit or find job in the Hawkes bay for is disgusting.
100% SARAH,
Me to you said what is always on my 73yr old mind thanks
I cringe when I now hear the term “Baby Boomer” as it usually refers to the greedies, yet I suspect 50% of us older ones are not well off and live from pension day to pension day.
And we are hoping and praying that Jacinda will be our PM in a month.
She must have had an appalling time working for Blair then.
I wonder why she’s never talked about that, and highlighted that she stands for a newer kinder Labour, with no Third Way, New Labour neoliberalism/austerity carry on???
hmmmm?
Even weirder…why do the Herald like her so much? Have they had an overnight epiphany?
Yes, I too share your cynicism Siobhan.
And in doing so I am completely aware that I am framing with my generation (boomers).
However dismissing me as a boomer does nothing to answer your (and my) valid question.
Two things : Jacinda talks about working in the Cabinet office when Blair was in office on Stuff today – straight from volunteering in a soup kitchen and a workers rights campaign in the States. And did you read her speech that she made at the launch?
Thanks Darien.
Sorry, what a poor survey, do you really take that seriously?
I’m with you Jacinda…..not because you’re Jacinda…..but because you’re our best voice. And because I think you’re up to it. I handle the picture of you being PM.
Feel and think the same as you North.
That picture of Helen and Jacinda. Look at Helen giving her ahua, her power. Bloody beautiful !
Yeah I love that one too North.
Me to;
Those two ladies are awesome.
Except they won’t bring their anger on her if Labour don’t deliver. They’ll give up. Raising peoples hopes here, and on such a clearly wrong vehicle as the Labour party, only serves to make their inevitable betrayal a crushing one.
But the “inevitable betrayal a crushing one” is what this current National government has already delivered Always anti racist. So where to from here at the bottom? change the bloody Nat government and start rising to the top, its worth trying rather than suffocating in baseless pessimism.
Fight outside of parliment. Accept that we don’t get to have reputation, or support parties who at least fleetingly seem to have principles like the Greens. Just don’t buy into the “Change The Government” claptrap. Stop telling people to throw away their principles in order to serve some crass parliamentary tactics. Stop telling survivors they need to accept and support apologists. Stop telling queer* people they need to shut up so as not to scare off Labour supportors. Stop using those in poverty as rhetorical tools, knowing that those you support will do eff all for them.
Have principles. And act on them.
Yes, Martyn,
We are aware that we are living in the age that values appearance over substance.
You’ll see.
The post-World-War-Two period was unique in history. Rapidly rising global oil extraction led to all sorts of short-term economic benefits and social benefits never seen in all of human history.
The price for all that was a buggered-up future. We now live in that buggered-up future, suffering the effects of overpopulation, meltdown of the ice sheets and the Sixth Great Extinction Event etc .
The writing has been clearly written on the wall since 2008, the warning of the unravelling of industrial civilization that is as inevitable as day following night. And the warnings have been assiduously ignored for a decade. It is now only the culture of denial of reality that allows dysfunctional arrangements to continue.
It’s all going to get a lot worse a lot faster for the vast majority of people on this planet from around 2020 on, when the globalized oil economy starts to really wind down….with NOTHING to replace oil and no acknowledgement in political circles of the crucial role oil plays, nor any acknowledgement of the dire consequences of overconsumption of oil (and other fossil fuels).
Politics in a vacuum.
Jacinda was passed a torch, to keep Labour relevant.
She took it, and using her skills presented a more inclusive future which has most on the Left believing and feeling relevant again.
Her presentation of vision and policy struck a chord and it resonates, especially with those looking for a kinder way to live.
Her love of people shines through because it is genuine, and her attitude towards climate change is a relief as we worry about the degradation of our air land and waters.
Jacinda’s team believes as well now, and this we welcome as a sign of cooperative problem solving. Skills needed more than ever to bring meaningful change.
Jacinda is offering a chance for that change to begin. Are we ready??
Or are we throwing our past hurts fears and anger up instead of ideas?
We have a choice on the 23rd. Are WE brave enough to support her to see it through?
We are fearful that powerful forces will attack her from all sides and she may be influenced by more timid advisors into choosing the status quo.
Some have already made bridges of fear and misery to cross their rivers of pain and despair, too afraid to believe in possible change on the scale needed.
On the 23rd we have a choice to make. Are we ready?
Yeah I’m ready to kick those bastards out and change the government LETS DO THIS and anyone that wants the Gnats to remain in the seat of power after whats happened over the past 9 years doesn’t give a stuff about the people or the country and should be ashamed of themselves for their greedy selfishness
I am more than ready to say good riddance to that pack of mendacious and incompetent parasites.
Whilst some on the left are sitting around finding reasons not to vote, or debating if 50 Shades of Neoliberalism is lurking in Jacinda’s paperback collection, the rest of us will taking the best goddamned opportunity in nearly a decade to wipe the slime of Key & his minions away.
Sure, it’s not the frickin’ socialist revolution some of us want, but for Christ’s sake, the policy direction is a damn sight better than what we’ll experience under Bullshit Bill and his Bastard Brigade of Banksta Barons.
The MSM love Jacinda. BFD. They loved Key too (even though he was clearly a psychopath). Let’s just enjoy the boot being on the other foot for a change.
Vote Labour/Green!!
Couldn’t agree with you more Quicksilver.
Good on you , QUICKSILVER !
Our prime objective is to dismantle National and get rid of them. That is first and foremost . After that ? ,… the long rebuild cleaning up after Nationals destruction starts.
And its going to be a long walk to get this place up and running after so much neglect.
We should all be bloody pissed off National let this nation and its peoples standard of living go to wrack and ruin.
Not long to go now , though.
Change is coming.
Beautiful words patricia you stole my heart.
Jacinda has also given us all great hope too.
Helen did this for us when she entered the race in 1999 and now the next phase to repair our broken lives is about to begin.
Thank you CLEANGREEN. I am 76 in November. A win by Labour Green would be the best gift of my life.
Well said – not only is she kind and genuine – she is intelligent and a good person
Im sold 100% and as per usual you are onto it Martyn, Jacinda is as you say and more, she’s got grace and is grounded, how many politicians can you say are that? I feel she has the intention to deliver on what she’s proposing or will die trying. Sure thats the hope as you have astutely pointed out in your writings but she’s determined, one can see that so its not just saying the words she means what she says. My views have done a complete turn around over the past few weeks and couldn’t be more pleased on how wrong I was initially.
While we are all getting carried away with the prospect of Jacinda being PM and sweeping the country red we need a strong Green party right along side.
I want a Labour- GREEN government with a mandate and Winston on the cross benches while Shane is growing his puku.
And as for National they are history …….and about bloody time.
Perhaps labour could appoint female only leaders from now on, no all candidates must be female, no no make it an all female party and the country will do great things for everyone. Seriously. Can’t be worse than the current endemic criminality we have in this country.
its not about gender its about the right person
Let’s Do This! But it is going to take many terms to undo the mess that john/bill/andthewholerottenlotofNats have wrought on NZ!
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