Dear New Zealand – let’s be honest about the Burqa
Admitting that the burqa is a bit scary is fine and human. Using that fear to justify a harsh and authoritarian crack down on what others wear is not fine (but is sadly pretty human).
Martyn Bradbury
-
-
Our complicated relationship with Barack Obama – goodbye Mr President
We loved Barack because of his incredible oratory, because he voiced the vision of what we all believed we wanted America to be.
-
TDB Summer Election Special: What Labour Party MPs need to read today at their New Years Caucus
Labour must do more than not offend people if they want to be the Government. They have to offer hope and vision, and while affordable housing, education/health blah blahs and some tough on crime crap is all fine and dandy, it does nothing to inspire those living with the grim realities of debt and everyday life.
-
Gen Xers to be screwed again by raising Retirement Age
This is the legacy of 30 years of neoliberalism, this is the mythology that success is an individual pursuit that has nothing to do with the hegemonic structures of power within a society and being poor is a personal choice. This idealogical virus has infected user pays society and warped the values.
-
Centrelink scandal has been happening in NZ for decades
Labour and the Greens won’t touch the punitive neoliberal welfare state, but MANA and the Maori Party certainly can.
-
Dear Bill English – are Waitangi Day protests as cringeworthy as you topless doing the haka?
It’s the funny thing about culture in New Zealand isn’t it? At home white Kiwis seem to loath anything to do with the Maori culture because it forces us to consider the past abuses of the State which most of us have benefitted from, yet the bloody second they are drunk on their OE in Europe, they throw off the t-shirt and bust out their best Haka moves.
-
UPDATE: I hate Jordan Williams and the Taxpayer’s Union with a passion – BUT when they are right, they are right
You all know I despise Jordan Williams and his flake David Farrar backed Taxpayer’s Union with a passion.
-
Dear New Zealand – we need to have a chat about Waitangi Day
This is real life, not social media. You can’t just block someone or mute them, you have an obligation to interact civilly and if we as Pakeha want a day where we can celebrate being NZers, then that requires Maori to be with us enjoying the same fruits of the societal harvest.
-
Formal racism vs Casual racism – things the Progressive left still don’t get
NZ is way more formally racist than we liberals in social media bubbles acknowledge, which is why focussing on micro aggression casual racism comes across as pointless alienating self-aggrandisement.
-
Meryl Streep and the horror of post truth politics – Trump DID mock a disabled journalist
…in the far right post truth world of the Alt Right 2 plus 2 equals whatever Donald Trump says they equal.