The ‘Scouring of the Shire’ from Lord of the Rings
Covid 19 coronavirus: Rise in hostility towards Kiwis looking to come home
New Zealanders overseas have noticed a rise in hostility to those having to make the decision to return home, a departure from the kindness the country has been encouraged to show.
Now with daily cases being caught in isolation facilities and high numbers of New Zealanders returning home, those returning feel less welcome than ever.
Some people online have called for flights from global hotspots to be scrapped completely, to limit the numbers of those returning home, or that they should pay the entire quarantine cost.
Clint Heine, who has been in the UK for more than a decade, said he has noticed more anti-returnee sentiment the past couple of weeks.
“From certain elements on social media and the press, no, it’s not so kind.”
I always felt that Peter Jackson left out the best part of our taxpayer funded Aryan fantasy documentary ‘Lord Of The Rings’ when he cut the ‘Scouring of the Shire’ where Frodo returns home to find the very evil he had fought to protect the Shire from had already settled in.
In this ending of LOTR, Tolkien expressed the deepest fears of those fighting in World War 1, that they would return home from this hatred and violence only to find that hatred and violence had already poisoned the home they were fighting for.
In short, homecomings can be complicated.
New Zealand never really ever mentions its diaspora. Jacinda proudly refers to us as the team of 5 million, but there’s another million NZers who fled Godsown whom we barely ever mention.
That’s 20% of us we pretend not to notice not being here. Empty chairs at Christmas, a curt nod and a wink to big ‘OEs’ that never ended.
And why wouldn’t you escape the clique clutch of NuZilinders if you had the talent to run?
The ‘Kiwi way of life’ is a low imagination horizon anti intellectualism based on exploitation of confiscated indigenous resources where ignorance & malice is celebrated by the rural volk while middle class attention is engulfed between school rankings, property speculation, & self-righteously retweeting Spinoff stories on social media.
Who the fuck wouldn’t want to escape such twee small mindedness when the cosmopolitan curvature of the globe is so brazenly flirting?
And the wheat separates from the chaff as it has always been.
Except now.
As TDB has been pointing out endlessly, a new emergent trend from the Covid world is the sudden home coming for the NZ diaspora who see the intense cosmopolitan masses as fuel for plague, not globalised chic.
Returning to the land of the wrong white crowd, to clamber aboard the lifeboat of the gauche, to resettle alongside the unsophisticated and the the socially awkward who resent you for leaving Godsown in the first place will be a cultural friction waiting to erupt.
Returning Kiwis will resent any restrictions making their homecoming more difficult while locals will quickly start blaming the lack of affordable homes and the returning gridlock of infrastructure on these returning Kiwis who turned their backs on us to make their fortunes but who came running home when it wasn’t safe.
The only saving grace from the cultural frictions we are about to plunge into is Māori culture of whanau and Manaakitanga. Their cultural leadership is the only thing that will bridge this looming divide.
Maori and Dave.
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice going into this pandemic and 2020 election – please donate here.
If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media.
New Zealand is run by (and for) the ‘stay-behinds’. Few MPs have made careers overseas before returning, and it’s the same with our public servants.
The returning former Kiwis will alter the voting population towards favouring a more dynamic and competitive economy.
@ Ada. What you say, is simply not accurate. If you skim through the list of Rhodes Scholars alone, you will see that many NZ’ers have not just distinguished themselves academically overseas, but have also worked successfully in various international fora, before returning here and pursuing careers in both politics, and as public servants. And that’s just the Rhodes Scholars.
In academia, in science, and in many other work milieu, being able to be measured by international criteria, has been historically essential to be competitive in the upper echelons of their occupations, and to be able to make a productive contribution to society.
Further, many make considerable personal sacrifice, and experience family dislocation, to gain expertise in their chosen field – living and working in London or Heidelberg is not exactly cheap.
Nor can you assume that returning Kiwis are some sort a homogeneous group with the same sort of values which will “alter the voting population”; one of the beauties of immersion in other cultures can be a reshaping of one’s values, a broadening of horizons, and acceptance that money isn’t everything, that co-operation may in fact be more productive than competition, that absolutes are not necessarily so.
Rhodes scholars.
Any one who worships Rhodes has backed the wrong horse.
Ada – ” Few MPs have made careers overseas before returning, and it’s the same with our public servants.”
At least two recent distinguished NZ Prime Ministers have. During the 1960’s, lawyer David Lange worked at the West London Methodist Mission with Donald Soper – later Baron Soper, member of the House of Lords. Lange was deeply influenced by Soper’s interpretation of Christian Socialism, became a Methodist lay preacher, returned to NZ, entered politics, became PM.
Geoffrey Palmer, post-grad at the University of Chicago’s law school; professor at the University of Iowa College of Law; left to be a visiting prof at the University of Virginia College of Law. Eventually, in 1974, appointed to a professorship of law at Victoria University of Wellington, bringing him back to New Zealand; entered politics, became PM.
And then there’s Key.
Well, that’s a few.
Ada – Hey – a few here – a few there – everywhere. Knew a few. Did you ?
Remember Roger Kerr, Ada, remember Roger Kerr ? Darling of right wing femmes – or thought that he was. Now Roger, Ada, incredibly, unbelievably Roger worked as a Diplomat in Brussels. Had it been while I was there, would I have glimpsed him ? Roger worked Melbourne too 1996 -2000, but like Bo Peep’s sheep, he made his wagging way back to our green pastures.
Green – James Shaw, VUW grad, moved to London, lived/worked there 12 years, returned to New Zealand in 2010. Shaw also completed an MSc in sustainability and business leadership at the University of Bath School of Management. Twelve years is a decent sort of time, but it’s the second overseas uni degree which impresses me, because having a trained mind has its own advantages from which the whole community can benefit, think I.
There are many pathways – Ada – and a man who can build a house from the bricks which he made himself, as the good man Kirk did, is not one whom I would label a ‘stay behind’ in the way that you do; Norman Kirk showed us something fundamentally and impressively diligent and decent, making me ponder whether pigeon holes are best reserved for pigeons, and not for the lazy categorising of people.
Martyn, you say of NZ “a low imagination horizon anti intellectualism based on exploitation of confiscated indigenous resources where ignorance & malice is celebrated by the rural volk while middle class attention is engulfed between school rankings, property speculation, & self-righteously retweeting…….”
And few would disagree.
But I wonder what the returnees would say of the places they abandoned NZ for, like the USA and the UK?
It appears they can’t be that great, if they want to come back here.
I don’t see my fellow countrymen as unsophisticated ignoramus hicks, maybe some didn’t get a kick out of what’s overseas or maybe they lived from week to week and didn’t have the security to get all worldly and cosmopolitan like our overseas based New Zealanders. Maybe they tired of hearing how NZ just was no use to these more advanced creatures but wonder why they rush back home now when this land was not good enough before. Or just maybe they just like NZ.
Whatever the reason for this resentment is, from some, I’m going to safely assume it is based off the hourly rage radiating from our shitty media that loves feeding off the brew of anger it serves up as “news”. It sells advertising does this hatred. It gets votes too if you ask angry Todd Muller.
I think you’re missing a main point here. We don’t resent NZ born returning, we do question permanent residents and the Peter Thiel’s of the world returning. They get everything for free and have no real abiding ties or loyalty to NZ, hence they should pay.
Hear hear
@ nukefacts … spot on there. 100% agree.
The Kiwis that left meant the rest of us have been over-burdened and undermined by the huge annual immigration intakes of the last 10 or more years. That is what I resent, but I am happy “ours” are coming home and I am sure we will not need to bring in new skills for a good while to come or I hope ever again, as long as they are coming home to stay , not use us to shelter from Covid.
On the N.I. east coast here where these folks are I don’t care about payments, just that they keep their beliefs out of our politics. With their money. The more years they spend here the more they think, with their nonunderstanding of us, they can change us with their money. They flew America because they thought it was becoming too democratic!!! They hadn’t destroyed it enough.
I think a lot of the returnees were fleeing the chronically depressed career prospects NZ has offered since Rogergnomics. I know that’s why I left.
Agree with nukefacts ‘we don’t resent NZ born returning’ but we do resent how some people got citizenship and how it has been handed out like lollies and how temporary visas and education have been used to gain citizenship (backdoor jobs) and how some people here can get cheap on the tap labour.
Yes, absolutely.
Many seem to forget that young Kiwis have always done the OE thing. Good on them. But it’s perfectly natural for them to want to come home with the shit that this pandemic is generating.
You are absolutely right and we need to be much more hardnosed about the backdoor entrants and the scams around their “education”, immigration and jobs.
Michelle – Agree; and they are not infrequently exploited, and deliberately used to maintain a low wage economy.
Totally agree nukefacts and michelle, especially the likes of thiel who could for all we know be skulking in queens-town as we write?
I think a lot of Kiwi’s who have mainly stayed put have done so by choice. Not because they can’t, or there too dim to do well overseas. To Kiwi’s the bigger/older countries represent just even bigger rat races, with some very annoying inhabitants included (aussie), pollution china/india. Nothing is better in these places only if your chasing money, kiwis are too laid back. I’m surprised that the sleepy hobbits are getting all wound up about returning kiwis, they just need to chill. This is the new normal. The china virus is rampant outside our borders and we can’t shut down the whole world.
As one kiwi who returned to raise a family and regretted it I resent the erroneous assumption based on zero experience being promoted by Brook Sabin et al that Kiwis who work overseas pay no tax here. Uk . Oz US all have reciprocal agreements with the IRD. If you are a kiwi living overseas you can still file an annual tax return based on tax paid overseas. Yes it’s a hassle especially if you leave it for acouple of years.
Personally the NZ Bomber describes is one I am all too familiar with. The envy the ignorance and the disrespect for those who gain skills thru hard won overseas opportunities that they bring back here to share ( in my case as a voluntary worker for more than 30 years)is depressing and isolating. Then you get to retirement age and WINZ treats your overseas experience like time spent behind bars where you have ” overseas income” and denies you a full pension until clearance from the IRD who already have your records because you have ALWAYS filed a tax return in NZ,Oh and WINZ also have the info but prefer to exhibit prejudice based on envy. So Winz taxes you at 45% and never gives you the money back. You have to wait until you file a return. So the sad fact that my offspring chose to work overseas does not surprise me at all.
Recently I’ve realized the worth of skills. The respect we should show. I remember a cleaner tagging her opthalmologist employer about his conduct. I don’t know the moral but the other side consider themselves entirely superior these many decades of their ‘meritocratic’ rule.
Sigh…..When you have a government and media driven narrative with an emotional, as opposed to a logical approach this is the type of behavior you get from the ‘middle’. Remembering the middle behaves politically like a 2-year old having a temper tantrum and the above is further evidence of this. The risk of community spread is still incredibly low and (i’m hoping) that the government and the health ministry is going hell for leather as we speak to ensure this doesn’t occur (if they aren’t well….)
This is all on the government and Jacinda’s minders who have piloted this course themselves by building a health equivalent of the Maginot line and then magically expecting quarantine and border control to take care of itself. Before anyone barks that this is not Jacinda’s fault please provide a logical argument that under Helen Clarke this level if incompetency would have a). occurred; and b). without heads rolling.
The only bright spot for the left is there remains little on the other side of the coin with Muller trying hard not to put his entire leg in his mouth and Kaye being well Kaye…..In short the political equivalent of the muppets versus the wombles
Why did those trying to come home leave in the first place dumbasses ?
It’s because you stay-at-homes were too gutless to do battle with the evil robo-gnome roger douglas with and on their behalf. Woger the wicked little weevil, by his greedy interventions in our lives for his, and his boy band rich-as sycophants sent many of us away in desperation so as they could make billions.
And you do know what, right? He’s still doing it and he’s doing it unfettered and without consequence.
And if he’s not ‘doing it’ directly then he has his small-ball cupping, roger-clones doing it for him in national and in labour. To this day! TO THIS DAY…. !!!!
For example, goff the gap toothed goon is the mayor of the largest logical fallacy I can think of while the rest of you count the money you’ll soon not have in your house, the one you’ll point at one day while tearfully saying I used to own that. Now I sleep in a car.
AO/NZ’s like someone poisoned the water with a dumb-fuck toxin.
Glad you said it because I couldn’t be bothered. There were / are 650,000 NZ’ers permanently living in Australia that will never return home as a direct result of Big Roger and Big Ruth ( Employment Contracts Act 1991).
They were the smart ones or the ones that could. And many of them drove bulldozers and delivery vans. Good on them too, – they saw the writing on the wall. You want ‘ immigrant labour’ big business?- here’s your chance all over again. Just don’t expect em to work for your disgusting minimum wages, however.
Bill English is no longer PM or Finance minister in case you haven’t noticed. And paying NZ’ers peasant wages and bragging about a low wage economy because it encourages ‘overseas investment’ aint popular anymore either.
So why should family’s who have returning sons and daughters have to hide the fact that they are happy to see their offspring returning? What sort of asshole people cant see that ? The sort of people who in a war would leave behind the wounded on the field?
I say bring our people home if they so desire to come back. Whether they are ex pats or those short termer’s who for whatever reason are caught up in this covid crap.
And while we are doing that , – lets as a country have a wee chat about Big Roger and Big Ruth and the criminal ideology they undemocratic-ally foisted upon us that created these conditions in the first place, shall we?
NZ: It’s a land of immigrants. People come and people go.
Add the many ‘Kiwis’ that got PR and chose to go back to home countries to do business and work, and now suddenly discover, I have a right to return, to take advantage of Jacinda’s ‘kindness’ and a humble but secure welfare system and free healthcare. Many recent Covid cases from returnees have been from flights coming in from India for example.
Let’s face it, Aotearoa under Jacinda and Ashley defeated Covid 19 in a way that Trump and the MAGA horde could not.
The right in New Zealand have mobilised the media using their considerable national foreign wealth, internal emigres and nimby backers. They have fired flaming arrows, and undercut the banks of the sacred moat, to mount an attack worthy of storming the citadel of the yellow Beehive Covid-19 briefing room near Helm’s Deep.
The slobbering, frothing Smeagol Muller armies of “reality” and “reason” and “outrage” and “faux outrage” and “commonsense” are sniffing and snarling around Key points, trying to find a weak crack, a treasonous insider or an under-siege burger to let them into the castle, through the dirty politic sewers and closer to the fire, near the fire and seat of power.
All the while, the golden Beehive ring, with 62 inscribed within the its outer surface of power shines brightly over the Covid-free land.
Smeagol Muller’s minions, slobber, cower and plot, they urinate and growl, they whimper and simper and sniff each others’ butt holes as national norms would expect them to do. They intimidate, they create diversions, and faux attacks to help them pick off the weakest links. And they take without prisoner, disembowelling and rolling their backs in the muck and mire and blood froth.
They set off bush-fires in the wings to distract the steadfast Covid defenders at Helm’s Deep, wasting time and energy, steadfastness and unity tracking down false leads, following false rumour, and planted leads and untruths started by the Bishop in the woodhouse.
Stand fast 5 million.
Stave off the slobbering national horde, who act as if they are entitled to rule, to kill the legacy of the elders of Helm’s Deep.
And there are many more returning to join the 5 million, but some returners have been away while the steadfast 5 million hunkered down and fought the Level 4 and 3 and 2 wars with Smeagol Muller and Orange Trump and the MAGA selfish army.
An army of selfishness and entitlement, wanting to rob the 5 million of their hard-won victory.
Sleepy Hobbits wake up.
You know it took three months cowering in our hobbit holes to defeat the first war of Covid.
Now it’s time to say “NO” to mercenary and gorilla (deliberate misspell) wars being incited by Smeagol Muller and Crusher Collins and Bumbling Bishop and Weaselly Woodhouse and their Key-English armies of disinformation, deception and Muttley dastardliness.
Can the brave and compassionate defenders of Covid-Free Aotearoa of Jacinda and Winston and Ashley, defeat the MAGA hoards?
The writer could quote Obama and say “Yes we can!”
But the brave 5 million hobbits must yell out in unison “Get back under your rock Smeagol Muller and your motley crew!”
We’ve got this! Yes we can!
The National Party want to divide kiwis and turn us against one another. Kiwi against returning Kiwi.
Trump is doing the same in USA – mask against no-mask. Herd immunity versus “sleepy Jo in a bunker”
Trump calls Covid, Kung-flu. It’s divisive white-male-ego-driven-testosterone-filled Trumpism, and Muller, bought the cap and is following his cult-leader, hook, line and bullshit.
But, if the MAGA-cap fits, then own it Todd. You look up to Trump and his divisiveness. You look up to John Key and Bill English and Stephen “Dildo” Joyce for inspiration.
I remember and ad for the Police Force which said “Get better stories!”. Todd Muller, you need to “Get better mentors!”
5 MILLION people stood behind Jacinda and Ashley and defeated Covid. 5 million Kiwis look up to Jacinda and Ashley for their compassion, their kindness and their aroha.
National and the Dirty Politics Krew are phoning talkbacks, seeding right-leaning journalists and speaking at every opportunity to “make returning” kiwis pay the Kiwi-taxpayers. Just to divide us.
Bishop-Woodhouse lobbied for 2 isolated returners to get out of isolation, then sat on the information that these two were symptomatic for at least 10 hours, so as to divide the country and bring down our team leaders and captains courageous Jacinda and Ashley. All they did was aid and abet 2 people to spread the virus around the country and divide 5 million kiwis.
During lockdowns, I looked forward to seeing Jacinda and Ashley on at 1.00pm each day during lockdown telling us how well we were doing. I skipped out to teh kitchen after every success with a”Yeeesss!”
Smeagol Muller, Bumbling Bishop and Weaselly Woodhouse. You are political Dad jokes, Sad excuses for humour, politicians and human beings, who are seeking to divide 5 million New Zealanders, instead of being kind to ALL 5 million by supporting our border controls. As long as my nether-regions point downwards, I would never look forward to 1.00pm to listen to you, or John Key, or Bill English, or Stephen Joyce, or the Bishop-Woodhouse. EVER!
Put on your red divisive MAGA hats, insult 5 million kiwis who suffered through Covid lockdowns to work together and defeat a virus. Then get on the first plane to the USA and kiss DJT on both cheeks, gargle with bleach and shine sunlight up each others’ anuses (anii?).
Bye bye!
Yes your right Diane the national party are using the old divide and conquer antics and so are NZ first. I think both parties are doing this because they are desperate for power. When there is a small cut they try and turn it into an infection they smell blood and like true predators they go in for the kill.
New Zealand has eliminated Covid-19
It’s like we won lotto and now our ex wants to get back with us.
And while the ex was away and we won Lotto, the ex contracted a virus.
Double reason not to have them back.
Comments are closed.