How ACT use the Jordan Peterson effect to become politically relevant again
ACT have rebranded themselves from a far right punitive crime vigilante Party who want flat tax to a far right punitive crime vigilante Party who want flat tax and to scare you into believing free speech is being threatened.
The bloody problem is that the response by the Left will probably inadvertently give Seymour the victimhood he so desperately wants.
The relaunch of the same vile selfishness masquerading as self-sufficiency was made interesting by David’s sudden yearning for the right to use racist, sexist and homophobic slurs in public.
I’m not sure who exactly we are wanting to make free here. Racist, sexist homophobes?
Seeng as we so rarely invoke hate speech laws, (preciously because we value freedom of speech in a progressive liberal democracy), fearing mass arrests for racist abuse is optimistic but highly unlikely. To dismantle Human Rights law we uphold when we sense the debate has genuinely crossed the line between that quaint garden variety racism most people over 70 intrinsically have and a cross burning Nazi is actually removing our right to enforce these issues when we are motivated by actions to respond.
The casual laid back manner in which we treat these issues can actually be one of our saving graces.
Seymour’s solutions are garbage and actually corrosive to the progress of human rights. He wants to legalise hate speech, that’s not progress, that’s creepy and a tad fascist.
Sadly however, Seymour’s wider concerns of free speech and the constrictive self censoring nature of social media (thanks to the micro aggression policing outrage olympics brigade) will find fertile ground.
There are plenty of good reasons to disagree with Jordan Peterson, but the manner in which his detractors protest against him by shouting him down and attempting to deplatform hm generates an automatic knee-jerk defensive response that actually empowers Peterson, it doesn’t counter him.
That’s the effect Seymour will be trying to generate here now for political relevance. The manner in which the woke will scream to limit free speech will give ACT all the evidence and ammunition they need.
The activist Left should be championing free speech, acknowledging that restrictions are always used by the State to suffocate those voices they don’t want heard. Instead the woke have empowered Molyneux, Southern and Brash while National called on Chelsea Manning to not enter the country.
Seymour’s simplistic neoliberal solutions to free speech should be rightfully mocked, but the blind anger and depltforming wokeness brigade will attempt to interpret Seymour as a Nazi and drown him in all the bile vegans can manage to retch up.
The ease with which the Left can be goaded into doing what the Right want to convince the middle that we are the threat and not them is as disappointing as it is effective.
A cracker with no rhythm who twerks does not deserve this level of relevance dammit!
I think Martyn Bradbury had it correct the first time – we don’t want the government to have real time surveillance powers.
Police doing there job our side a court room or in the process of crown control is one. Arresting some one for disorderly behavoir or saying something stupid to incite mayhem then I’d expect the cops to nip that in the bud. But showing upto some guys house who is on the other side of town and arresting someone for muttering something is just going way to hard.
The fact that state surveillance laws was set so low and broad that people can be warned, not even fined or sent to jail but just frowned at means the survelince acts was designed to be way to broad. If it was terrorist we were truely after then set the penalties for 15 year jail terms or what ever threshold comes out of the Tarrant case.
To develop laws around high speed commendation technology an educated population is required. We allowed this monster to grow on us because our education system is simply not sophisticated enough to deal with modern high speed technology and nuance. We don’t just have to play with the things we have to be able to screw up and then fix it quick, Y’know. And with the current colonial testing regime a lot of nuance is lost in the ticking of boxes.
So yeah we just have to go right back to first principles, Y’know? Who are we, where are we from, keep telling our stories. And don’t take no shit from no one,
He’s just exploiting the work of the Free Speech Coalition for his political purposes.
His tax policy, the work of the Taxpayers Union.
This is why we can’t have nice things. No one wants to pat taxes until they really have to.
The best way to deplatform Seymour is to completely ignore him. He already gets a disproportionate amount of airtime compared to vote percentage. Every time someone screams about what he’s said the media instantly put him on the tv/radio and it gives him a boost. Any publicity is good publicity right?
As far back as I can remember every mino and micro party always complains about the lack of media coverage of minor parties. Okay so coverage is being heaped on ACT but do we really want to lessen coverage of minor parties just because it is ACT.