Cut to Shakespeare funding not ‘indicative of a culture war in New Zealand’, says Jacinda Ardern
Jacinda Ardern has said the decision to scrap funding for a long-running Shakespere education festival is not “indicative of a culture war in New Zealand”.
But it is though eh Prime Minister?
See, if Creative NZ had simply said, ‘hey guys, sorry but we are going in a new direction for funding this year’, we would have to take them at their word, because they are the appropriate gatekeepers of this funding for our Arts, but they didn’t fucking say that did they?
They released commentary bragging that they were cancelling Shakespeare and these woke little Wellington fucks thought they were going to get a round of applause on Twitter didn’t they?
That’s why the released the commentary, because as far as they are concerned, Shakespeare is the epitome of heteronormative white cis male privilege whose work is centred in Imperialism and this was a means to decolonise Aotearoa.
These Wellington woke fascists made it a culture war!
The Prime Minister has suggested a hui to discuss the issues, when in reality she should be threatening to sack the Board for such a stupid political stunt!
The joy of the Boomer King Wayne Burns napalming the feckless bureaucrats of the CCOs is a joy to behold, but it also tells the self serving public service their are actual consequences to fucking up.
The Prime Minister shouldn’t be calling for another hug-a-thon, she should be putting the stick about while screaming,
“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with the Wellington Professional Class dead! Cry ‘Havoc! , and let slip the vegans of war.”
The Wellington Bureaucracy, the self serving public service, know only the threat of being sacked. In cancelling Shakespeare for crimes against woke dogma, these morons are providing the ammunition for the right to win point after point the longer this drags on!
This is why the Left will lose the election next year, we keep handing the right ammunition!
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Of course it’s a culture war and I won’t accept someone with a crappy degree from the Deck Chair University saying that it isn’t, just because she happens to be PM. How on earth would she know ?
Absolutely an attack by those who seek to “decolonize “ NZ. Wtf does that even mean
I agree the message should have been, “hey guys, sorry but we are going in a new direction for funding this year.”
That said, if Creative NZ is to be about the ‘canons of imperialism’ and ‘decolonising Aotearoa’ maybe they should show some balls (oops, five years solitary on Curtis Island for saying that) and lead the way in getting rid of all imperialist and colonisation art from our galleries and the study of such stuff in our schools.
Peter I think the bastards may have started. The Canterbury Musuem in Christchurch used to have an excellent Early Settlers section, presented in series of tableaux. I read recently that it had to go. Our hard working pioneering ancestors have now been demonised as ‘colonialists,’ and hordes of ignorami from Kelvin Davis up, hate contemporary Pakeha for utterly inexcusable reason.
I’m seriously considering voting NZ First & Winnie for the first time ever. I’m horrified at the thought of a National + ACT government just as much as a Labour + Green government. Seriously I don’t know which would be worse.
Cancel culture and the criminalisation of speech is a one way ticket one party state authoritarianism. While I shudder to think what National + ACT will lead to
Terry. Do whatever it takes to get rid of authoritarian censor-the-world Ardern and the loopy Greens.
It could mean ACT, but there ‘s still time for smaller parties to come thru’. But Labour and the Greens squandered the chances we gave them, and need to be punished. They could emerge the better for it. National are also pretty damn useless; they were also too timid to engage with the Parliamentary protestors, but they do support keeping the much needed Commissioner for Children, Labour seem to be the only group wanting to axe that office.
Terry .. you will have a ton of company doing exactly the same thing. Kiwis are FINALLY waking up to this mind fuck of a govt, and a lot don’t see too much better in Suxon and especially a union with that little Star Trek fan club president and hall monitor C-more… Winny P come on down!
I have found myself in exactly the same position Terry . . between a rock and a hard place with Winnie smiling winningly between ’em . .
Sounds like Moaist Culture Revolution – destroy the old, cancel Shakespeare, topple the settler and war hero statues, desecrate the churches and replace with what? Decolonisation. Don Selwyn will be laughing at them from the grave.
“When I was going to school they brought Shakespeare in to colonise me,” Selwyn told Herald writer Michele Hewitson. “Now I’ve put it into Māori language I’ve colonised Shakespeare.”
https://youtu.be/seWszkBD6Cw
Where art thou job, where art thou health services the act party cancelled them.
The Prime Minister is part of Wokeborg. She is hardly going to go to war with her own kind.
Well well well. Carmel Sepuloni. Minister of Arts and Culture, and of Keeping the Poor poor, and Putting the Boot into the Children’s Commissioner, looks as if she could be the biggest part of the problem here.
VU’s James Wensley writes today of the shocking underfunding of the arts in New Zealand generally. In pandemic times, when even the odd politician recognises that mental health has taken a hit right throughout the community, I would have expected reasonable funding to be made available to help people’s well being here, but it looks as if Sepuloni doesn’t really care about anybody at all.
It would be unfair to expect a Tongan lady to have any appreciation of Shakespeare, or knowledge of
his massive and enriching impact throughout history ever since, but as the Minister, puzzlingly
responsible for Arts and Culture, she should have been ensuring that funding is maintained ,and increased, and she hasn’t, just like she hasn’t been a voice for the children of the poor. What a piece of work.
I do hope that Dr Wensley does’t lose his job for speaking out about funding issues and so on, and kudos to him for doing so. The picture seems to me to be of a culture war with the Labour Government V The People of New Zealand.
I decided to apply for a role online recently. Perfect fit with my experience which was great.
Until I discovered, at the bottom of the job ad, ‘Māori, pasifika or women preferred’. WTF – that used to be illegal.
Thought there must be some mistake. So I emailed the human rights commission – who told me this was called positive discrimination and was perfectly ok and encouraged.
Didn’t seem that positive to me.
I posted this online somewhere. Someone I knew saw it and warned me not to say anything else I’ll end up branded ‘stale, pale and male’. That these three words are ageist, racist and sexist didn’t seem to occur to them.
I decided to check out from society.
Jays. Mr Peters recognises the importance of leisure and pleasure more than any of our overseers in the current government ever will, they’re too busy keeping people grovelling, preferably in silence.
Mr Peters is a racing man, and that’s a fairly simple example of pleasure having positive spin-offs. In the sadistic department I had the misfortune to work in, we had a hat competition on Melbourne Cup days – initiated by staff not management with their childish USA imported team building exercises. It was fun, and hugely creative. A Parata won once with a stylish woven flax cloche adorned with greenery, and Josh, a Samoan guy, scored with a crown of corrugated cardboard, slightly pissing off when I made it when we were sneaking smokes together illicitly in the landing bay out the back, and he got to keep the prize of chocolate – Cadbury’s from Dunedin, once the best, and pretty indigenous.
The quiet former teacher recovering from a nervous breakdown who used to pray that John Key would get cancer and die, won once, and the lifting of her spirits was contagious, everybody did a Siegfried Sassoon- refer “ Everybody Sang”.
Peters is no worse than anybody else, and has a verbal fluency unmatched by any of the dolts in there now, although James Shaw did make a good Christmas speech a few years ago, and Chris Finlayson had an acerbic show-offy intellectualism which has left a vacuum.
“ What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare ? “
If Winston Peters can provide any distraction from the doom and gloom merchants squeezing us now, he’s welcome to.
Jimbo. There’s nothing to stop you ID’ing as Maori, Pacifica, or a woman right now. The Greens got the legislation through empowering you to, and your kids too, and if you try and stop your kids doing so, they can lock you up. Considering how “colonialists” buggered up the gender fluency and diversity of Elizabeth Kerekere’s ancestors, this is an opportunity for you to redress historical wrongs, so seize the day, it could be the making of you. You may go slightly mad, in which case join a political party and become a politician among others just like yourself.
Let’s face it though SK if she did get involved, she would be attacked for it would be the end of democracy for stepping on the toes of an independent body, or she would be accused of worrying about a festival while people are doing it tough etc.
Yeah, we need to ban all that colonially imposed, racist stuff like….the written word.
/sarc
Andrew. The PM has already addressed the UNO about the desirability of banning, and it wasn’t talking that she talked about, it was the post post-modern modes of expression. Hide your digits.
So now the PM has stepped in and the thespian rapture looks set to continue. She said she didn’t agree with original decision.
Now queue all the whinging old prats who say she should not get involved.
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