Who are the biggest snowflakes? Gun owners, Landlords or Farmers?

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Who are the real snowflakes? Who are the people in NZ who are in such denial about their impact on the rest of us that they desperately need safe spaces because they’ll scream micro aggression if confronted with their privilege?

The first are Gun Owners and their neurotic fetishisation of guns as an extension to their spiritual being…

Gun owners feel targeted – hunters

Dave Hern has been in the hunting and fishing industry for about 40 years.

The owner of Waipukurau’s Fishing and Shooting Outfitters Ltd has been involved with firearms even longer, and witnessed attitudes toward firearms – and their owners – change over that time.

“In the old days we could walk down the street with our firearm and into the shop [to] get it repaired, nobody batted an eyelid.”

But, he says if he walked down the main street of town these days, “it wouldn’t take long for someone to be ringing 111 to say there’s a man walking down the street with a gun”.
A Government Law and Order Committee has proposed tighter firearm controls to target gangs and knuckle down on illegal firearm possession.

…that’s right folks, because Dave can’t wander down the main street with a gun anymore, he feels persecuted.

In the pantheon of civil liberties, being able to walk bring with a fucking gun is very low on my scale. Crack down on all guns immediately, Dave’s inadequacies mean very little to me.

The second biggest snowflakes in NZ are property speculating Landlords…

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

Investors feeling unfairly targeted for growing housing boom

Property investors say they are being unfairly blamed for the ever-widening property boom now spreading to the regions.

House prices are rising across the country by $10,000 a month, prompting speculation that the Reserve Bank might outline further measures to curb house prices on Thursday.

Some of those measures could be “debt-to-income” limits for borrowers, raising the minimum equity that Auckland investors need for a home loan, or by increasing loan to value ratios (LVRs) generally across the country.

Property Investors Federation executive director Andrew King said investors were feeling unfairly targeted.

…not only do Landlord’s have the audacity to greedily complain about the grotesque profits they’ve made for themselves through tax loopholes and generational advantage, when challenged to look after the welfare of their tenants with new laws, look at their response…

73.6 per cent of landlords plan rent rises if Labour wins
A group of landlords has decried Labour’s rent plan, saying they would push up rents if changes come into force after this month’s election.

The 816 landlords answered a New Zealand Property Investors’ Federation survey and 73.6 per cent said they would increase rents if a “suite of policies aimed at making it harder for them to provide rental properties was introduced”, the federation said.

…like 2 year old toddlers throwing a wobbly because someone has come along and asked them to share their toys, the property speculating Landlord greed and selfishness is almost meth addict like in its toxicity.

As despicable as Landlords are though, no one can top the NZ Dairy Farmer for champion snowflake.

After selling 49% of our state asset energy companies to create a $400million irrigation slush fund to turn ever square inch of NZ into a fucking Dairy Farm, you would think Farmer’s after stealing and polluting our water might show a tiny amount of embarrassment at how outrageously good they’ve had it.

You might think they would acknowledge the impact they’ve had on climate change producing gasses.

You might think they would acknowledge their role in pollution and be up front about it.

You might think they would at least accept the science.

You might think all those things, but you would be completely wrong.

So large are the chips on the shoulders of NZ Dairy farmers, so out of whack are their paranoid insecurities that they actively deny the science…

Doug Edmeades: Is Mike Joy a biased scientist?

It might have made good TV but it was, from my perspective at least, bad science. I’m referring to those pictures of Dr Mike Joy, a fresh water ecologist from Massey University, standing in the dry bed of Selwyn River lamenting about the poor state of New Zealand’s rivers.

Those pictures and his words perpetuate what appears to be his considered opinion that, when it comes to water quantity and quality, all roads lead to any combination of nitrogen, dairying and irrigation – intensification of dairying full stop.

From my reading and understanding of the science of water quality, noting that this is not my specialty, it seems to me that Dr Joy’s opinions on this subject are biased. I know some water quality experts who agree with this assessment.

…scream about any critical media attention as fake news…

Federated Farmers: It’s damn lies and alternative facts
The use of the words ‘opinion, damn lies and alternative facts’, generally combined with some fancy report from an organisation that has just jumped on the bandwagon, is wearing thin.

It used to be ‘lies, damn lies, and statistics’, now we’re fed irrelevant theories partially linked by academic economists engaged by organisations hardly anyone has heard of.
The latest few are around resource exploitation and climate change from two largely irrelevant organisations, the OECD and Globe NZ.

I won’t even give the OECD report the time of day, as this is an organisation that has overseen the biggest financial crisis since the great depression and is totally happy with both Europe and the US continuing to print money as a way of getting out of jail. Another irrelevant, hot-air producing organisation

…and when confronted by water charges to help repair their damage they lie it will break them when it won’t…

Water tax negligible for most dairy farms – industry figures
Five out of six dairy farms will be largely unaffected by Labour’s proposed water tax, according to figures supplied by an industry group.

…Dairy Farmers are the biggest whinging, whining, bitching, safe space demanding snowflakes in the country. Totally blinded by their own privilege under National and tone deaf to reality, we have allowed these precious wee darlings to dictate the political agenda for far too bloody long.

We get a chance to end their taking our democracy hostage this election.

Vote now.

You can enrol, and vote, at your nearest Advance Voting polling station (check out their locations at www.elections.org.nz ) right up until 22 September. It isn’t possible to enrol on Election Day itself (Saturday, 23 September) so – VOTE EARLY.

And once you’ve enrolled and voted, make sure everyone you know, who’s 18 or over, and wants to change the government, DOES THE SAME.

17 COMMENTS

  1. Landlord Snowflakes .

    … ” like 2 year old toddlers throwing a wobbly because someone has come along and asked them to share their toys, the property speculating Landlord greed and selfishness is almost meth addict like in its toxicity ”…

    And they will be doing the same when Labour puts the clamps on foreign housing speculation as well. Putting up the rent .

    Funny how the neo liberal squeals the loudest when their privileges are curtailed, – even when it was THEIR CHOICE to overreach during an obvious housing bubble that was bound to burst.

    So what do they want ?… a ‘too big to fail’ tax payer bail out as well ?

    So they had their time in the sun making tens of thousands of people live in poverty , … now its ‘ pay the piper ‘ time.

    As soon as Labour / Greens get in lets hope they really enforce their policy’s about frequency of rent hikes.

    • Auckland landlords ; as they have set the terrible TV highlighted low standard that now it seems most other regions are sadly now adopting.

      Like sheep we all follow the leaders.

  2. Martyn
    Your article conveys the impression of vitriolic disdain for members of our community based entirely on the avenue they have chosen to make their living. The latter two an essential part of our economy.
    If there are distortions occurring in the economy that create unfair advantage or windfall gains for some sectors from time to time it is for government to correct the structural imbalance. It’s not the fault of a landlord that the property market is going crazy it’s the fault of govt. policy.
    I don’t think such a vitriolic condemnation of some sectors does the cause of social democracy any favours at all.
    D J S

    • It’s not the fault of a landlord that the property market is going crazy it’s the fault of govt. policy.

      I disagree, David. Landlords do have a responsibility when they actively oppose steps that would counter distortions in our economy such as a capital gains tax;

      The NZPIF has been campaigning on behalf of it’s members in opposition to proposals to introduce a Capital Gains Tax for Property Investors. (2009)

      ref: https://www.nzpif.org.nz/news/view/54100

      And,

      “It’s definitely an unfair tax, it’s ridiculous. It’s not just unfair on us it’s unfair to the tenants because it will add to the cost of providing rental property so rents will go up. At the end of the day it’s going to be tenants that are going to end up paying for this. – Andrew King, the Property Investors Federation president, 2011”

      ref: https://www.nzpif.org.nz/news/view/54882

      So you can’t wash your hands of the situation when landlords are part of the problem when they actively campaign against solutions- and they shed crocodile tears by citing “unfairness to tenants”.

      • But Frank,
        he did have a point re the vitriolic post.
        Perhaps an extra helping of vitriol for brekkie, but from reading what Dave said I didn’t get
        …that’s right folks, because Dave can’t wander down the main street with a gun anymore he feels persecuted.”
        My reading was that Dave was merely commenting on changing attitudes towards firearms.
        When I was a kid dad had a 22 rifle and we used to occasionally shoot the odd rabbit. He handed it in to the police 40 years ago.
        I don’t own a rifle and the last rabbit I shot I was in 1964.
        But, by the same token, I respect the right, of mainly country people, to hunt game.
        Many people don’t and I respect their views too.
        Martyn does tend to denigrate anyone who has a different view to his own.
        Firearms in the hands of responsible hunters is very different from crims with firearms.

      • All sectors of the community argue their own corner Frank. It’s inevitable. Its up to government to see fair play and listen to arguments about having to put up rents etc. But the rent level is set by what the market will bare in our capitalist state ,so if they could put them up they would already have done so. But over time owning houses to rent will become less attractive cf other investments so rental houses will become more scarce , and come under more intense competition, and the price will go up all things staying the same .Which they won’t. Already letting must be quite an unattractive proposition or there wouldn’t be so many empty houses, just waiting for the capital gain. If the CG tax is sufficient to kill the speculation bubble some of the overcommitted landlords will loose their shirts, and the empty houses will fill up because there will be no other return coming from them, but nature will likely have taken it’s corse by the next election and that function of a CG tax will not be necessary.
        Patrick; Yes that too.
        D J S

        • My issue is the rent increases that Auckland landlords are now raising so rapidly and said widely inn the press.

          I have a daughter that is a landlord and rents her house inn Gisborne, and in three years has refrained from increasing her rent to her tenants but how many times in the last three years have Auckland landlords raised their rent and by how much?

          We saw they have rised the rent at least 10% each six month period and that is 20% per annum.

          This is just criminal at least as it cannot be sustainable.
          They are rorting the rental market system and it should be controlled by regulation if it has this problem.

          Frank is correct here.

          • I’m over contributing to this, but I think there are two markets in the Ak housing scene. The speculators and the landlords. The speculators are people with spare capital for investment, local and foreign . They are in the market for the rapid capital gain available, don’t need cash-flow and don’t let their spare houses out because tenants can be a nuisance and a liability, and most of the return they expect to gain is coming from the rapid increase of the house’s value anyway. So they don’t become landlords.
            The landlord on the other hand are in the business of letting houses, some have been in it for a long time, some have jobs and have managed to get a second house to rent and every dollar coming in is accounted for, and spent before it arrives. Leaving the property empty is out of the question.
            It is the speculators who don’t let their houses out that are creating the problems, both the skyrocketing purchase prices and the lack of availability / price of rentals. More so than the typical landlord. (IMHO)
            D J S

        • All of which is a damned good reason to curtail the speculative property market and to utile more state housing. If the capitalist market can’t work just because they have to pay their fair share of tax, then it’s obviously a failed market. Having some in the capitalist market pay tax by others don’t is not a level playing field, David.

          • No quarrel with that Samwise . I’m just saying how I think thins are, not how I think they should be. But the CGT would presumably be permanent whereas this house price bubble will run out of steam sometime.by itself. So the CGT would want to be justified for long term reasons, not just to kill this bubble. I would like to see how eliminating offshore purchases effected the market first.
            D J S

  3. And was there any poll on how many landlords will increase once the Accommodation Supplement has been increased as from 1 April 2018, as both National and Labour plan?

    I bet that there will be at least as many landlords increasing rents for that reason, as they can get away with hiking rents, the government will subsidise them or their tenants.

  4. If you can’t work out that the housing shortage has been caused by National’s 73,000 inward migrants last year alone, less the 1600 people that left NZ and that massive immigration cycle has been going on for 9 years under the National government – something is wrong!

    Nobody needs to rent any properties out now because they are owner occupied by the incoming residents or part of the 0% tax haven economy that is completely non transparent, championed by John Key and part of the EU investigation into money laundering.

    I think commentators are completely missing the point. There is a shortage of rentals not because landlords are snowflakes but because circumstances are making landlords obsolete at the same time they are actually needed the most.

    Whether you think landlords should be government owned state houses or in the private sector or a mixture of both. There’s a shortage. Everywhere now due to massive demand for housing.

    Added to that, Natz couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery so that they are throwing out copious amounts of money to PPP or zoning changes for developer mates type deals that delivers little housing with less affordability, not controlling immigration and selling off state houses and ramping up the building costs (while lowering building quality standards) so that their mates can make more profit. That’s the problem!

    Apparently the National government spent 4 million on consultants to sell of the state houses – WTF – in a building boom where average Joe can just list with an agent and have 10 offers in a week while achieving record prices?? Now that’s up there with the mysterious Saudi missing millions with only dead sheep to show for it and the never to be mentioned conference centre in Niue and the ‘coincidental’ $101,000 to National donation the month before.

    For every house built there’s 1 laughably “semi skilled” worker coming into NZ that needs a house, 1 baby and 1 grandparent added to the NZ population to support while losing 1 state house, 2 buildings to redevelopment and 1 house to disasters.

    We didn’t have a housing shortage until neoliberalism bought nearly a million new people under the Natz, climate change and natural disasters are knocking houses down as fast as they are building them and that so many IYI class can’t look at the wider issues.

    Have a look around at the countries that have equality still, they are sparsely populated, Finland, Norway, Sweden…. etc etc

    Hopefully Bills last desperate threat that Labour will depopulate the cities will work out the opposite way and people flock to the polls to make it so, so they can get to the hospital in under 2 hours and then not wait 8 hours to be seen in an Emergency. That’s including recent migrants already here who probably don’t want to be competing with another 73,000 new people next year under National’s plans.

    If Natz get in again maybe their next big idea is to sell the hospital’s to developer mates to run and leave them empty for 5 years while putting out tenders while borrowing money to convert hotels to hospitals? Hey don’t worry about the deaths and inconvenience in the mean time.

    Fueled by Fuck ups should be the Natz new motto.

    There is little point attacking various voting groups as snowflakes, in fact just turning voters in those voter rich sectors, to National to make more damage to this country.

    The main source of all the screw ups leads back to National.

  5. I don’t think gun owners belong in this post. I’m no great fan of guns or hunting, and certainly no opponent of sensible gun regulation. But I’m also incredibly skeptical of any law change justified by waving around the “gangs” boogieman. It usually means the laws aren’t really justified, and the government are attempting to use fear and guilt trips to avoid too much public scrutiny.

    Totally agree about the agri-business and property speculation industries though. Their businesses are mostly based on mining value created by someone else (eg tenants or the environment), and they destroy far more than they create. The way they try to protect their ill-gotten gains by telling blatant lies and blackmailing voters makes me sick to the stomach. I look forward to a government that will ignore their media-amplified lies and listen to the economists and ecologists who spend their careers seeking truth to share with their fellow kiwis. You know, the people the farming and property speculators write off as biased and self-interested (oh the irony!).

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