Why we should do the exact opposite of what David Seymour is saying about public holidays
No David. Just, no!
Public holidays a sign of a ‘fascist state’ – David Seymour
David Seymour says Government-recognised public holidays are emblematic of a “fascist state”, claiming New Zealand should dump all but two of them.“I don’t think the Government needs to tell people when to have a holiday and when to celebrate things,” he said in Parliament on Wednesday.
No, no no.
We should not be making public holidays free market, we should see them as the nation building exercise and shared cultural values they establish for us.
I’ve always believed that public holidays should be mandatory.
I care deeply about the need for us all to put down tools as citizens on specific days and all of us venture out into our amazing public spaces and be friendly with one another.
The importance of our civility in public towards one another, the importance of being tolerant of each other while sharing the same space and the importance to actually stop working and enjoy doing nothing but spend time with our family, friends and whanau would do more to building that sense of nationhood than any amount of debate over changing the flag or replacing Waitangi Day with NZ Day could ever achieve.
As citizens, we have earned the right to have days off, and we need to hold onto this right and understand it is the universal application that is so important. It’s the need to share our beaches and out door spaces together on these days that builds bonds between families and groups of people who would never otherwise meet in their busy 9-5, 5-9 lives.
For those public servants forced to work while the rest of us play, the media should be full of ‘spare a thought for’ type stories so that our public servants who must continue to staff essential services while the rest of us relax are given the respect and admiration they deserve for their selfless functions.
That sense of self identity and nationhood that we always whine about not being present during Waitangi Day takes effort and can’t simply be left up to the ‘free market’. The space where that national identity can take shape has to be universally applied in the form of mandatory public holidays and not left to be traded in by unscrupulous employers who if given half a chance would make ‘Hi Ho, hi ho, it’s off to work we go’ the new anthem.
The thousands of different interactions generated by us all respectfully sharing the same space together on set days would do more for our understanding of each other than a million trolling by Bob Jones would ever create.
What is the point of being a citizen in a democracy if we can’t enjoy the leisure of spending time outside in this glorious country? Are we really all wage slaves? Is that what a modern democracy has been denigrated too?
We need more time and space to bond collectively, not less!
Abolishing state/community-sanctioned holidays is a prime agenda of the New Right and Libertarians.
State/community-sanctioned holidays are a sign of a cohesive society.
Making holidays the decision of individuals does precisely that: elevating Individualism above Community. And without a Cult of Individualism, a neo-liberal, free market, dog-eat-dog, me-first, cannot thrive.
That is Seymour’s agenda.
Exactly , Frank.
The mere fact there ARE public holidays demonstrates the neo liberal hates that collective cohesion that the public displays.
And just like the trading hours, they cribbed and badgered until now weekend work til all hours is the norm. Couple that also with a low wage economy and you can see their plan a mile off.
However … we could go the opposite way and have a national Rimmer day for all sorts of humorous entertainments, capital ‘H’s could be handed out on paper flags at festivals, children could have cup and spoon races with Rimmers face painted on one side and a capital ‘H’ on the other and a thousand other permutations.
We could actually have a joke holiday like that in honour of the mans stupidity to be enshrined as an example of just what sort of scumbags neo liberals actually are and as a future warning for future generations to avoid.
The same thought crossed my mind ss well, Katipo. We’ve lost penal rates of pay for working weekends, in the name of “freedom” to work on weekends. Now Seymour wants us to give away our public hols as well?. Well, just FUCK THAT SHIT! That coming from the guy with his snout in the public trough. If Seymour is such a fan of usrr-pays, why is the taxpayer funding Seyour in Parliament? Shouldn’t his supporters be paying his salary directly?
We need to have an independence day celebrating our constitution/D.O.I. Considering how badly defunct Waitangi day is due to it
disrespecting all that
Playing devil’s advocate here, but aren’t all the Christian religious holidays exclusive to, well, Christians? I’m assuming Jews and Muslims (to name but two) wouldn’t be all that impressed. As an atheist I find these holidays only semi-pointless (really more delusional than anything), but I can imagine that those historically at the receiving end of “Christian ideals” would be far less enthused than I am about celebrating them.
In our so-called “melting pot”, advocating for mandatory holidays celebrating nonsense that many don’t believe in (or actively despise) is imo intolerance of NZ’s diverse culture and beliefs.
This from a bloke who is presumably still receiving his full parliamentary salary while he takes time off to be a dickhead on reality TV for 3 months?
Um…OK.
agree with SIMONM who is paying his wages while he is attempting to dance on the DWS show is he using his annual leave like the rests of us would be expected to do. My partner and I couldn’t stop laughing last night he is making a mockery of this show. He looks like a clown and remind us of a character of the thunderbirds, aren’t they puppets?
Given Seymour’s twerking dance style may I suggest the name of this idiotic programme ‘Dancing with the Stars’ be renamed by deleting the first two letters of the last word in the title, perhaps adding an ‘e’ on the end.
Basically just an attack on workers having a holiday
what a bloody hypocrite this guy is while he is having a holiday on us the tax payer he is trying to get rid of our holidays hopefully the clown/muppet will be gone next election