Our never-ending, horrifying dance with drowning
And while our love of H2O is deep, our respect for it is shallow which exerts a terrible cost – one of the highest drowning rates in the developed world. The good news is that it has halved from a peak in 1984 of 163 to a 10-year average of 82. The bad news? A spike in the last two years, that saw 94 deaths in 2022 and 90 last year.
You know why we don’t give a shit about water deaths in NZ?
Because driving those numbers is a “kick her in the guts Trev, she’ll be right” attitude, interwoven with vague and erratic policy from government. And when it comes to personal responsibility, it is all about Trev. Last year 83% of the drownings were men, with 58% over the age of 45. Of the seven people who drowned between December 22 and last Wednesday, all were men.
Because it’s men who drown and as a society, we don’t give a fuck about men.
If it was women drowning at this rate there would already be an annual $5million dollar social media campaign on The Spinoff in association with Stuff and RNZ fronted by Robyn Malcolm and a NZ on Air funded podcast hosted by Alice Soper, Emily Writes and Michelle A’Court called ‘Ladies Float’ which would last 5 episodes until someone complained about the lack of diversity and the whole thing got cancelled by the Woke.
We don’t give a shit about men killing themselves as long as they are only hurting themselves, murder-suicide and a manifesto is a step too far.
The lower social economic pressures that close the local school pool plus the mediocrity of most mens actual physical capabilities vs their own over valued and highly false impression of their own skill set all combine to help sink most men to the bottom of the ocean floor pretty quickly.
We need blokes other blokes listen to sort out our drowning stats, but because we don’t really care all that much if men drown, it is highly unlikely anything will get done.
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Martyn – Sad, but true.
A fair description of things but can you imagine the outrage from loud mouth men if we set limits on boating, diving and other water activities? You also neglected the men who died trying to save others, while the situation may have been beyond their skill level I prefer to remember them for their willingness to risk themself for the good of others which is rare in our society where selfishness is the norm.
People don’t drown tor no reason. What’s the main reason men drown?
So many expensive boys’ toys require water, on which to be shown off.
Add to that, men reaching the age of feeling they haven’t achieved as well as they’d hoped in life and rather than accept that, they try to be compensate in other ways, by showing off their water prowess or driving skill.
We had Greg Murphy telling us how to drive, years ago. Did that work?
We have TV fishing programmes where they never go home with wet tails and no fish.
You can change peoples’ behavior temporarily with ‘education’ but eventually a person’s true nature reasserts itself.
We do care about drownings and those individual families which lose a loved one unnecessarily. But a sense of personal responsibility will always be more effective than any education or messages from well-known people, however much we might admire them.
” We don’t give a shit about men killing themselves as long as they are only hurting themselves, murder-suicide and a manifesto is a step too far ”
The stats regarding drownings have always been atrocious and regarding males there has always been the ” macho ” effect and rules just don’t apply to me and well being warnings are just there for someone else they just don’t apply to ” me ” and the good old Kiwi belief that ” she will be right ” has been handed down through the generations with ” personal responsibility ” is not personal and that however bad my actions are someone else will pick up the pieces , pay the price , tidy up the carnage as long as there is minimal disruption to my continued arrogant existence and even the courts will be lenient if you happen to maim or kill someone else in the process and then its nine months home detention unless of course you pay the ultimate price and lose your life.
The move to neo liberal economics has excerbated all the stats including the the high rate of death at work in a number of industries including mining with weak health and safety law that is designed to protect the companies continued profit while placing all the burden on the employee in dangerous situations. The market and its corporates exploit expendable labour.
Road safety is another casualty like drownings but the number are far larger and don’t discriminate between Male , Female or children.
The Police ” plead ” every year during the holiday seasons for responsibility on the roads but yet the toll keeps climbing despite all these bullshit publicity campaigns for zero by 2030 that never get achieved it just gives the premise of spending money on a marketing campaign that is doomed to fail because like drownings the root causes never get addressed because it will cost money or enrage New Zealanders who will not be told , ticketed , educated that their driving is dangerous , discourteous or face consequences in a court of law when they maim or kill other drivers by claiming it is their right to drive how they like which in a small country and population they actually believe they actually own the road and drive accordingly. You can see them coming a mile off and see the attitude before they come up close by the way they drive.
Life in New Zealand is expendable which is why Neo liberal policies work so well in Gods Own when it comes to starving public services like the Police who merged with the M.O.T ( ministry of transport ) in 1992 to save money and drive efficiency and since then the road toll has climbed as the Police retreated from road safety ( seen by Police as a role you got when you couldn’t cut it out on the beat or were demoted to traffic duty ) and with serious inequities in driver licensing and strict penalties being enforced along with less traffic enforcement has led to the situation we see currently in the road toll and general terrible driving in most places in New Zealand.
The drowning epidemic like so many other horrifying stats are a symptom of resources starved of funding in the drive for efficiency at central and local government level and education in the case of water and road safety needs to start from our youngest children and a renewed emphasis of actual self responsibility that has to be enforced by stricter measures and consequences that when you get right down to it is life and death.
The ” male deficit ” Bomber I agree is a extremely serious one particularly when it comes to these horrifying stats where males are concerned as with the horrible rates of death in drownings and suicide.
” We need blokes other blokes listen to sort out our drowning stats, but because we don’t really care all that much if men drown, it is highly unlikely anything will get done ”
I totally agree with your statement and the best investment all Kiwi responsible males can make including those in leadership positions is to educate , support and mentor our young guys to be well supported and confident as they evolve into our next generation of male New Zealanders and it has to be backed by responsible legislation and a change of attitude when it comes to Kiwi male challenges and consequences.
Our young and mature guys deserve better than to be just another expendable stastic that is looked at then quickly forgotten.
I don’t think it’s fair to say we “don’t give a shit” about drownings, any more than we “don’t give a shit” about road deaths. Obviously people are affected by this on a personal level. I’m not into men claiming victim status, but maybe we should look at our education system and give boys some more positive role models. Cause the women are beating us in the education stakes.