Good morning NZ – today is the kind of democracy that tastes like pepper spray

1. “the pigs are smashing down the protestors this morning.” Those “pigs” have endured way more than is acceptable. They have done brilliantly to keep disciplined and restrained in the face of this violent rabble.
   If this rabble has any sense they will walk out, otherwise they will get what they deserve.

2. Protest ideally needs to be coherent, driven by class analysis (a left one imo) and focused on an outcome.

   I helped run a 10 week strike many years ago in South Auckland, we had a village, portaloos, good financial support and all the rest on a very prominent main road site. We reached out to locals, had reasonable relations with the cops who the boss called regularly to try and disrupt us, talked to university campuses, regular media liaison, and at the end all marched back in the gate together with a more than decent settlement. Part of the deal even involved two days on a Marae with Syd Jackson and others educating the racist management and building even more unity among the mainly Polynesian and Māori workforce.

   I did not majorly support the original Occupy movement because it was all over the road and ultimately ate itself over internal contradictions.

   The Wellington Convoy occupation has been the dogs proverbial and will achieve exactly nothing. The cops have been rainbow cops rather than robocops so far but their limit has obviously been reached. I have spent most of my life protesting, picketing, striking and occupying (land issues) so know what I am talking about when I say the fuckwits in Wellington bring shame on legitimate protest. And no, right wingers can of course protest too of course as they sometimes do.

   The state and cops are never the answer to anything substantial, but the occupation around Parliament is way too close in implication to the Jan 6 US attempted coup.

   • I agree with Tiger Mountain.
     Moreover the camp should have been cleared on day one, it was and still remains a public health hazard. It should have been dealt with as such.
     The protesters would still have been free to assemble each day at the site but not to camp overnight.

3. Given that my son –who is one of the working class that keeps the city going at night time, while all you middle-class twats in the commentariat are safe in your bed – has had two run-ins now with these arses simply because he was wearing a mask, and the freedom loving don’t think he should have the freedom to do so, all I can say is … good!

   • Guerilla surgeon. Well done, your son, he’s a son to be proud of, unlike Mrs Mallard’s boy Trevor. I know school children traumatised by the demonstrators and I don’t really care if their tinfoil hats don’t keep them well, but now that the virus is super spreading and RSV is back in the preschools, and the hospital system is creaking to the detriment of folk in undeserved pain, if Jacinda told Andy to go get’em, that’s not unreasonable really.

     Pity the pollies couldn’t have invited them in for a chat in the first place instead of setting ultimatums, but it’s the mum and dad coppers who are at risk now, not them in their well- feathered nests, so fingers crossed for everyone out on the grounds of Parliament.

   • G S you might have to provide Glen evidence otherwise he will say it can’t have happened (to your son)

4. I love the smell of pepper spray in the morning………smells like victory!

   • That made me laugh. Good comment.

5. This rabble has been given every opportunity to leave sensibly and the Police have been very restrained. Wellingtonians have been very patient. They deserve to have their city back.

   • Agree RoiseLee. Waiting for “Omicron or the end of mandates to de-escalate this” would surely mean weeks more not a matter days. If you are directly impacted by this situation it must have felt like a year already.

     • That’s how we feel in Christchurch, with the same sort of feral rabble in our beautiful Cranmer Square. Give the police a deserved week off, then send them down to Cranmer. There’s a few more skinhead and white power types here, so it will be a lot more violent and volatile I would think.

       Even when the mandates are lifted they won’t go home, there seems to be some serious financing behind all of these protests, throughout the country.

       We need to get to the bottom of that funding and bring it into the open. Starve the funding at its source. The western world did the same with the other right-wing destroyer of democracy, Putin.

       My grandfather used a funny term for when they were being shelled during the war.
       “Squeaky sphincter time Bill, squeaky sphincter time!” It will be squeaky sphincter time for all those funding these rabbles across the country.

       And it smells of dirty politics, no matter what the rumours are about ‘serious and heated discussions’ between Luxon and Collins.

   • Aucklanders have not missed any of the irony in this fiasco – whether it’s the MPs and urban Wellingtonians complaining about struggling businesses and their children unbeing able to go to school like normal, or the rural ferals having a big baby tantrum about their lost freedoms, despite having enough freedom to go pitch a tent at parliament for weeks on end.

     Schadenfreude would probably be a little phony to describe our amusement right now, so we just laugh. We’re still taking this crap on the nose while the provinces wring their hands and lose their minds about it all.

6. Our government has finally got around to doing what the Australian and Canadian governments have been doing for quite some time now. Point being, they are all only following the orders of their corporate overlords….with Covid policy, arguably, being thee most important policies government have instituted since neoliberal policy came into being.

   • Really AO. Do you think that our COVID response over the last two years has been dictated by corporate overlords? This is the ‘smug hermit kingdom’ we are talking about right? I think our low death rates might have been the product of not bowing to corporate pressure

     • Correct, Wheel. We, like the rest of the world, simply instigated actions formulated by the big wigs upstairs, the World Economic Forum being one of the more well known string-pullers upstairs. The BIS being another. And these actions have allowed the necessary policy framework to be put in place and this is where we are currently at.

       • New World Order – QAnon WWG1WGA
         When is John F Kennedy turning up at the Wellington Train Station AO?
         At least they got rid of one of the baby-eating pedophiles and severely hampered at least one of the others. Just wait till Ghislaine Maxwell’s list of 8 prominent men is revealed!!
         Put the tin-foil back on AO!

       • Perfectly understandable response(s). I have skipped a step or two ahead, therefore this all looks crazy. A world wide coordinated response to a pandemic whereupon every country (certainly Western countries anyway) sang the same tune, implemented the same policies, all with the same end goal in mind – vaccination. Once upon a time it took, highly publicized global meetings to get this sort of worldwide, coordinated action into being, but now, now that we’ve got organizations like WHO and the UN sitting below the aforementioned string-pulling leaders, formulating policy to governments, such global-scale meetings are no longer needed.

         Otherwise, substitute New World Order for “Build Back Better” (there is a reason why this slogan is prominent) and watch our economies purposefully tank as the string pullers continue their merry dance to their beautiful control-centric new world. Conspiracy, as in coming our way soon, absolutely – turn to Canada for a sniff of things to come

7. This is the labor governments ”basket of deplorables’ moment. There will be a political price to pay at the next election. My disappointment in this action is deep and my faith in our PM has been lost. Beneath the protests is economic injustice and hardship which has been allowed to become a toxic division in the team of 5 million.

8. The rabble deserve their jobs back and for Christ sake we need the teachers, midwives, nurses etc.
   This was getting embarrassing for the government – with 1000 countdown workers off, 800 off From one DHB alone, over 200 Navy personnel isolating, 648 cases in one university halls of residence and the protest reported as a superspreader event with 17 confirmed cases! (Surely it’s a pandemic of the vaccinated!) The government couldn’t let them destroy the narrative and justification for destroying lives, they had to move them on before they fully proved the vaccines and mandates were a waste of time for most. Vaccinate the vulnerable and everyone else get healthy and improve your immunity. This will also reduce the over 30000 people that die every year from preventable disease. Yes that’s right we accept that every year with government going fuK all to improve things. They even told the nurses there was no money left to give them a pay rise! Well today is a dark day and as you point out the government is to blame and Wellington may get its streets back but it’s a giant leap backwards for the country.

   • “The rabble deserve their jobs back and for Christ sake we need the teachers, midwives, nurses etc.”

     Piss off. We don’t need unvaxxed nurses dealing with sick and vulnerable. Nor have unvaxxed hidden in other occupations where those they interact with are both vulnerable and have no choice in their ability to avoid them.
     You people have it all arse backwards.

     • The mandates have surely worked to weed out those in the public service who are easily manipulated by social media and we are better off without them permanently . I do not want an unvaccinated teaching my grandchildren r looking after me in hospital.

       • Ummm read my comment 800 off work in one DHB? You are more likely to be cared for by a vaxxed person with COVID! The UK dropped mandates for health care and surprisingly it made no difference – how could that be? The government and followers like you have dropped the ball – protect the vulnerable vaxxed or unvaxxed as they will get fuked over by COVID! Every COVID death is preventable and not by having 100% vaxxed! The rest of us grow some balls and look after our own health. 8 people a day dying from preventable stomach cancers – WTF that’s an outrage! Get some placards and walk down the street before you get a caramel latte and a muffin cos that’s how we protest in NZ according to our “glorious leader”.!

   • Mostly agree embarrassed kiwi

9. Maybe the Police could’ve gone home weeks ago. Then we would have had the real smell of real democracy.

   Now let’s see, following the storming of Parliament who would they have installed as the new Prime Minister (or whatever they’d decided to call the leader)? Brian Tamaki? Matt King? Lizz Gunn? Not Leighton Baker, he would likely have been “taken out.” Kelvyn Alp? I’m sure some would’ve wanted Philip Arps. That would’ve been fun, the folk of the Destiny Church led by the white supremacist.

10. This was a leaderless rabble so which group would you have had the PM meet. It would have been wrong on so many levels to have given the false prophet Tamaki any respectablity by choosing him. I am sure there were some there with good intent and honestly held grips against mandates and what they stand for . In normal circumstances I am all for personnal choice and freedom but there are certain areas that the good of all has to be the greater need. The police have played a game of wait and see and gave those who wanted to a chance to leave with dignity u til it was only the hardcore left. They are to be congratulated as is could have been ugly.. All parties come out of this with respect except for Mallard he showed his bully boy style which only inflamed the situation. Jacinda has to remove him.

    • Trevor Sennitt “ Jacinda has to remove him” indeed. If Mallard is such a hot shot, send him to Ukraine, along with John get-some-guts Key, and the dog man of Iraq, Crusher Collins, Davidson and the Greens, Brian and the Tamaki’s, plus a handful of media to gasp and adulate and if they all end up in Siberia it is stunningly beautiful, although I daresay that they could find a way to grubby it without even trying.

11. What would the left be thinking if this was a climate demonstration? Or a Maori land occupation.

    There was a film here recently on the women of Grenham Common (hope I have spelt that right). Interestingly enough they were called ferel, dirty and righteous concern was expressed about their children. Oldest trick in th book is to smear and discredit your opposition. Happens against gender critical (or pro reality) feminists. We are terfs, bigots and transphobic. Who wants to listen to what we are saying now that we have been so demonised.

    I also hope when abusive anti social types camped on parliament grounds (some of them appear to be), that the MP’s were able to have an enlightened moment about State house anti social tenants who they have refused to evict. The poor having to endure their abuse and threats day and night were ignored.

12. If “we have lost our moral compass on the left”, where’s it gone?
    For sure it’s not moved, ever or at all, towards the right or extreme right….
    Or was it there – anywhere – in the first place?
    Just hopeful, hollow semantics, perhaps?

13. It seems that the government wants the clean lawns before they will have to declare the end of mandates and passports. How is it posible that we still have them after the court decision and after everybody can see their futility?

14. They had their right to protest, now time (and should have been done earlier) to stop this super spreader event in the neighbourhoods surrounding parliament.

    Already the hospitals are at capacity.

    Imagine if instead of trying to prop up billionaire golf estates, prop up Air NZ (led by exWallMart that sacked their staff pretty quickly during Covid and are apparently self proclaimed well run NZ business that took nearly a billion in free government loans – corporate welfare NZ superstars), and prop up exploiter liquor mangers and poorly run, socially poor, small business since Covid, the government actually planned for more doctors and nurses.

    You know triple the numbers of doctors being trained in NZ, make it free to do nurse and teacher training like it used to be for NZ citizens two years ago, and spent the above billions in corporate welfare on the health system – in particular the human capital needed to cope with Covid.

    Imagine. Well looks like they didn’t do that, and now opening the borders for more Covid cases to hit NZ hospitals and health care!

    End New Zealand’s Covid mandates too quickly and the mistake could be measured in funerals
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2022/feb/25/end-new-zealands-covid-mandates-too-quickly-and-the-mistake-could-be-measured-in-funerals

    ‘We feel unseen’: An Auckland ED doctor responds to calls to ditch Covid restrictions
    https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/01-03-2022/we-feel-unseen-an-auckland-ed-doctor-responds-to-calls-to-ditch-covid-restrictions

15. In my view Martyn is right that the left must have lost its moral compass if it celebrates this. Time for a new one.

    Those commenters who would celebrate violence on their fellow New Zealanders really need to pause. Would you say this in person to a representative section of the community, rather than being comfortable merely bashing your keyboards? Get a grip guys. The notion is appalling.

    More importantly, learn to disagree with a bit of grace. If for example many down there have been manipulated – as so many say – have some empathy for them. We all share a polluted info ecology.

    If you can’t, as TM, Gagarin etc – can’t seem to, do us a favour – go grab a joint, have a laugh with a mate, tell war-story-lies about your days on picket lines or whatever. But do get off the internet.

    • Nicely put Brenty

    • Thanks for your erudite remarks but I will keep commenting actually. I know three people at the Wellington occupation and one of them is a Hare Krishna cook who I have bought Samosas and bread from for years. The other two are raving 5G lunatics, sovereign citizens that have bludged on activity that others have organised for 15 odd years in the Far North. They turn up and try to create disunity where ever they go.

      I have much empathy for long distance protestors being one myself. I have experienced the whole deal from sourcing food and shelter and sanitation, to support and hatred from some, dealing with heavy handed cops and duplicitous media.

      Quite frankly I would not in my dreams have expected to spend even one night on Parliament’s lawn without getting a good kicking from the state forces.

16. Just an observation for what it’s worth. There’s been diminishing numbers or homeless folk ‘littering’ doorways along the so-called Golden Mile during the so-called protest.
    Most of them cottoned on to the fact that if they migrated to the village, they’d get free kai, Mother Earth & Crystal Karen medical treatment and counselling, interaction with other human beings and a bit of music to send them to sleep. And at off times, they could still do a bit of begging – enough to supply them with their bottle for the day.
    As soon as the helicopter passed overhead early this morning on its way to get fuelled up, I could tell something was up. 4 hours later, the homeless are back on the streets – simply begging for enough coin to
    score some P pot or piss.
    Does anybody else remember that movie/promo way back in the 70s or 80s (Japan I think) Called “This is New Zealand”.
    It needs an update.
    What’s more, a good many of the protesters wouldn’t know what FREEDOM was if it jumped up and bit them in the bum

17. Too bad the Globalist Left dont have the courage and competency to run a weeks long outdoor political occupation these “Deplorables” have done. You are the Reactionaries now.

18. Our police response has been hands off for long enough.
    There are numerous breaches of the law, council by-laws and public health.
    Violence, intimidation and threats have been plentiful reason to remove protestors.
    Police have been extremely tolerant and have not tooled up until now.
    The rule of law that the majority of citizens are expected to obey is weakened when enforcement is not enacted.
    What is left now appear to be gang members, anarchists, insurrectunists and a rent a crowd.
    The end of mandates is in sight. Sticking around so you can claim illigitemate victory over a system you despise is laughable.

19. Parliament belongs to everyone not just these people. Their occupation has meant no protest on housing climate mental health or even a peace vigil can be held at parliament cos they are bogarting the peoples house .

    As a min wage worker whose been off and on dole due to mental health issues and know how cruel the state can be and is by no means middle class, I say bullsh*t , the police tried for weeks and weeks to keep this as peaceful as possible. They stood by while war memorials were vandalized, while trash and human waste filled the streets, while people screamed for armed insurrections, assassinations and murder, threatened local businesses and scared the crap out of the public. My mate works min wage as a barista next door to parliament and has been intimidated, assaulted etc.

    These people aren’t working class they are entitled middle to upper class entitled brats. No working class people can afford this, no working class person is letting their car be towed. Working class people can’t even afford groceries let alone a fully stocked tent that’s better equipped than most homes.

    This isn’t on the government. The government was right not to meet with anyone calling for executions, insurrections, throwing poo and dumping excrement, assaulting police and threatening the locals for apparently giving them radiation poisoning. No.

    There are far more important, larger and righteous protests that govts have refused to meet setting a precedent that this behavior gets you what you want is dangerous.

    Not to mention the public would be disgusted if the government met with these people.

    As for OT. Everyone’s been telling the protesters that to keep your children in filth out in Wellington rain, wind and summer heat and to use them as human shields surrounded by lunatics, agitators in an environment in constant threat of stamped violence or riot is literally willful child endangerment.

    Genuine working class people have lost their kids over a lot less than this I have no sympathy. Neither do the voters.

    This has been tried for weeks to be settled peacefully. It’s been utterly highjacked by agitators,lunatics and bad actors. When they brought nooses and pitchforks and threatened to raid the building…

    The state is vindictive and vengeful. I wouldn’t be surprised if the protesters end up on no fly lists, intelligence watch lists and fail security checks when going for jobs and houses over this … some of them genuinely deserve it… A lot of them don’t and have been sucked in by con artists and charlatans.

    We need to learn how to talk to each other again so we’re not flung down rabbit holes

    There was only one way this was going to end. The state for weeks showed incredible restraint

    If people think this is extreme state violence it just shows how lucky this country is… In almost every other OECD nation they’d have been removed by force on day one and no attempt at letting them wear themselves out would have been made ..

    If you wanna see state violence go look at China and Russia disappearing their protesters.

    Now. That that’s over can we pressure the govt to do actual sane things like break up the supermarket duopoly, remove GST off food for atleast six months and a capital gains tax.

20. Awwwwwe! terribull! terribull!
    What the fuck did the protester muppets at parliament think was going to happen. (That’s a question for you to answer too @Denny as you plunge down the conspiratorial rabbit hole)

    Next you’ll be expecting me to expend my finite emotional capital on feeling sorry – EMPATHISING even with them.
    You too @ CB – in that space, going forward. (Kick back, imbibe a few decent drugs and watch it happen, Really – it needs to just play out. What will be will be. Rest assured there are politicians and senior civil servants undertaking a number of pieces of work trying to understand the situation).

21. Pepper spray! Some like it hot, chili and stuff. They might get takeaways they didn’t expect. And what did they expect?

22. So many here manipulated by right wing media, Seymour, Qanon etc, I truly feel pity.

23. If you think democracy came from peaceful negotiation you are absolutely insane. Our forefathers paved the way – some with their lives in various war efforts – for us to enjoy the freedoms we have. But make no mistake – democratic freedom did not come from being nice.

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