The headline this morning reads: “Act backer: We all dislike Maori.” Smooth…

First paragraph:

The biggest donor to the Act Party says he gave the money to Don Brash and John Banks so they could stop special treatment for Maori who were “either in jail or on welfare”.

Ironically, this would have been better as an anonymous donation.

As if the New Zealand Herald doesn’t hate the ACT party enough, they’ve published a very controversial article this morning that almost unashamedly paints the ACT party as racist bigots. Good timing too, when Winston Peters (Mr Jan Trotman, 67, pensioner and kept man of St Mary’s Bay) made a racist and xenophobic rant about the 150 restaurants down Dominion Road with non English language signs. Difference is, we all know that Mr Jan Trotman and his Winston First part are likely to gain support for this kind of racism, whereas ACT got another bullet in the leg.

I got woken up by a txt from a friend alerting me about this article. Whoever let Crimp tell the media that ACT stands for pissing all over a whole culture’s heritage and customs is ridiculous, especially considering they are the indigenous people of New Zealand, and a large part of what makes up this country. The Herald’s innate bias against ACT means that the article is framed and angled so that the reader believes Crimp is representing ACT values. After Dr Don Brash and the Orewa speech, seems legit, but actually isn’t. The article might say over and over again, that Crimp is expressing his own views, and they are not those of the ACT party; but people only read the headline and the first paragraph. The mainstream media sure do pick favorites.

ACT people like Chris Simmons appeared to be complicit in Crimp’s views, this was probably Herald propaganda again, coming down to what questions they were asked. The article makes it seem that ACT thinks “it’s not our policy, we don’t mind his opinion, we like his money though,” which is hardly the case.

It’s similar to something to a conversation I was having with a girl outside an Aotearoa: Not For Sale presentation with Hone Harawira. I’m not sure how the conversation started, but the girl asked Brogan (ACT on Campus Auckland colleague) and I whether Nazis are entitled to free speech. Naturally, Brogan and I simultaneously replied a deadpan “yes.” The look of horror on her face was priceless, of course free speech should extend to anyone’s opinion!

As much as everyone is entitled to freedom of speech, you need to own what you say, otherwise debate and conversation are meaningless. The Herald in its 2 star journalism here, has framed an interview about a person’s bizarre opinion, as an insight into ACT policy. We know that this stuff is good for selling newspapers, but this isn’t even a subtle attack on ACT, and the public are eating it up.

Fuck you MSM.

University quality is slipping, and not enough is being done for students. This seems to be agreed upon by all parties in the debate on how to improve tertiary education.

On one hand, the rank of University of Auckland has dropped from being among the top 50 institutions of the world to barely making the top 100. The countless lefty organizations at UoA say that education is a human right and not a business, that the current system is failing too many students, and needs an overhaul rather than an adjustment.

Education is indeed a right, as part of our rights to think and speak for ourselves. However formal education at the tertiary level in an accredited institution is indeed a business. Learning can be done without the flash buildings and teachers, you could learn a great deal from living at the library or on Wikipedia. Serious students are paying for the assisted learning, and the certificate of achievement that recognizes the effort.

New Zealand already has the world’s most generous tertiary education and support funding, despite the ‘cuts’ that has lefty groups like AUSA (Auckland University Student Association) furious. From the results of this funding, it seems we are not spending all this money wisely. Despite AUSA’s dislike for Professor Stuart McCutcheon, Vice-Chancellor of UoA, they agree that central government needs to better fund universities directly.

They’re missing the point.

Universities are way too big. The University of Auckland alone has over 40000 students, which is more than the population of urban Hastings. It’s a phenomenal number, but it’s not unique in catering for too many students. Massey University, Victoria University of Wellington, and Otago University all have student rolls of 16000-22000 students. Just the four tertiary providers mentioned have a combined roll of over 100000 students. That’s really unsustainable.

Universities indeed are run like businesses, and it fits their business model to have dropkick dumbarse deadshits study there, as long as they keep paying to do so. Even though this comes at the cost of the university’s reputation and takes resources away from deserving students.

Lefties defend the high roll numbers on the assumption that having so many students will see a more educated society and a more skilled economy. Bullshit. For one, the number of graduates that bugger off overseas is an extraordinary amount of resources that we’ve invested, only to be pissed into the wind. Secondly, and more importantly, we are wasting resources on a vast number of students at university who really shouldn’t be there.

Universities are full of kids who are there because their parents forced them too, because they need something to occupy themselves with, or because they want to get away from home to do stupid things. I knew plenty of wankers who finished high school, were forced to go to university, and are failing their bullshit degree by drinking instead of going to class.

Foreign students are no exception, Auckland is full of reluctant Asian students whose parents wanted a better education for them in New Zealand, only to use the opportunity as an excuse to piss around in a foreign country, away from the restrictions of their parents and laws back home.

Kids who don’t study hard at school don’t do well at university. If they can’t pass exams and finish assignments at school, how they fuck are they going to achieve anything at university?! Same applies to the affirmative action schemes at university, where Māori and Pacific Island students can pass at a fraction of the threshold that pākeha students need to achieve.

There seems to be a huge societal pressure to go to university, with the assumption that society is more competitive. Of course it is, the labor market is so saturated by degrees, you almost need one to clean a toilet. A degree is not the only way to get ahead, only too many kids are finding the high school dropouts that went into the trades are the ones making the cash at the moment, especially compared with tens of thousands of dollars of debt per student.

This is about the point where arts students also deserve a mention. I’d like to know which professional career starts with BA in sociology and women’s studies. They tend to be the same students who go on to get PhDs or masters degrees and expect Studylink to fund their lifestyle until they’ve had enough study. They’re the ones grizzling that student allowances are capped to 4 years of study, which is plenty of funding for the rest of us doing degrees that allow us to become lawyers, doctors, engineers, architects, scientists, and other constructive professions.

One of the things I like about my degree is the exclusivity, where places are limited and the entry threshold is high. You had to do well in the last year of high school to make the grade, amongst other hurdles and restrictions as part of the UoA points system. Every student has the opportunity to strive for making these requirements, it ensures only determined and serious students can get places. There is no reason why these high standards can’t be set across the board, should UoA want to maintain its prestige.

 

In short, there are too many kids at university, and the solution is exclusivity. Not everyone needs a degree, and not everyone is capable of studying for one. The government and the tertiary education sector are doing a disservice to the country by letting nearly anyone study. We are wasting a vast amount of resources in doing so, at the expense of deserving students, the taxpayer, and the prestige and reputation of education providers.

On the other hand, this is not a sliver bullet, and will not solve anything in isolation. Let’s not forget that more importantly, we need jobs for graduates. This must be done only in conjunction with plans to find and create more jobs, such as the university partnering with potential employers, and the government’s commitment to employment and economic growth.

Paula Bennett has announced the government was to make contraceptives completely free of charge to beneficiaries, to give women better choices about whether they want to have children or not. The lefties are screaming…

The Herald has run several stories since the announcement, all playing to the noisy opposition who believes that it’s a violation of human rights. I find it damned ironic that the lefty feminists want free everything for beneficiaries, except free access to a healthcare service that gives them freedom and choice. The contraception is entirely voluntary to use, while the government can suggest that women use it, there is no obligation to do so, therefore it is not the evil eugenics scheme the left believe is part of a government plan to sterilize the most vulnerable in society.

I fully support this move, and would support a friend’s suggestion to make all contraception free for community services card holders, male or female. In a rare departure from lefty pandering in the Herald, an editorial today supported the move because they recognized the pattern of welfare mums having kids who go onto welfare. The chain must be broken somewhere, otherwise we will continue having a society that produces children who cannot be supported by their parents. We have an emergency in this country of child poverty, and the left are completely ignoring the systematic production of child poverty. This new move gives women freedom and choice, to make their own lives better, and the empowerment to break the chain.

Colin Craig of the CCCP (Colin Craig Conservative Party) says that women in New Zealand are the most promiscuous in the world, and we do not need to be dishing out contraception for free. His mother should’ve used contraception. Promiscuity does not relate directly to fertility rates, simply because of contraception. His logic would lead you to believe fire extinguishers cause fires too.

Despite Hayden Fitzgerald’s faux pas on Back Benches a few weeks ago saying that beneficiaries should not be having children, beneficiaries shouldn’t be forcing the rest of us to pay for their choices. Having children they cannot afford comes at our expense, by giving women the option not to have children until they are ready, this will save taxpayers a fortune in the long run. Having children needs to be a clear and informed choice that individuals are responsible for, free contraception means that beneficiaries can now make these choices more easily, which includes the decision whether they are ready to bear the financial responsibility of having a child, which is a decision beneficiaries need to take more seriously.

In the same Herald editorial, it’s been pointed out that the opposition is simply political rivalry, since this is a policy proposed by a National government. So true. If Labour proposed this plan, it would have been lauded by feminists and socialists. But of course, they’re making it into a spin about how it’s part of an evil right wing neoliberal agenda to sterilize minorities and beneficiaries. What an utter load of shit. Even David Shearer supports this move.

I can’t think of a better policy to empower the most vulnerable women in society with freedom and choice. I’m sure Sue Bradford’s just jealous she didn’t think of it first.

The government’s Alcohol Reform Bill is topical again – my time to write. The plans are a whole range of new regulations based on the recommendations put forward by a Law Commission report led by Sir Geoffrey Palmer. Plans include creating two minimum ages for purchasing alcohol (18 on license, 20 off license), mandating the mix of RTDs, and express consent from parents if minors do drink.

ACT on Campus definitely is opposed to many of these changes, but so is Young Labour, Young Nats, Young Greens, and other groups, especially the non-partisan Keep It 18 movement. The old saying that “you can go to war at 18, but can’t have a drink until 20” argument doesn’t seem to be enough. The Herald, along with the rest of mainstream media is scaremongering the public into going along with these changes though.

But people don’t need to think, they just need to do as the media tells them. We have opinion columns and editorial selection to do the thinking for us. The government and the general public seem so out of touch with the actual alcohol problems we have, because the problems this law tries to tackle are artificially created by the media. If you believed everything you read in the Herald, you’d think the streets of Central Auckland are dangerous after 10PM, that crime and dangerous behavior are everywhere, people are vomiting and dying on the streets, and 2+2=5.

As a 19 year old, my regular first-hand experiences with young people drinking would have some authority, rather than the third-hand hear-say the politicians get. I thought I’d address the problems, and how the proposed law changes won’t fix them.

Binge Drinking

Apparently, more than 5 standard drinks in one sitting is a binge drinking session. Find any young person over the age of 14 in this country that will drink less than that in a night. No one would bother drinking if they were only going to have less than 5 drinks. If you’re going to drink, you’re going to do it properly. By definition, most New Zealanders binge drink, whether 15 or 51, and do so at least once a month. But to call it a problem, you need to demonstrate how it is a problem.

On the basis that most New Zealanders binge drink without issue, that logic would say that binge drinking is largely without issue. You’d need a lot more than 5 drinks to cause problems, the real dickheads would have 3 times that number before doing something stupid. Of course, this raises the issue of how to prevent this activity. Punishing everyone for the behavior of a few is unfair, and won’t work.

Bars need to be accountable for not letting patrons become too intoxicated, and send heavily intoxicated people home, rather than just refusing them entry and leaving them on the street. If a bouncer at a bar refuses entry to a wasted 20 year old, the young person will just stumble to another bar where standards are lax.

The hidden problem of people binge drinking at home is a difficult one. It requires more of an attitude shift in people than legislation, a sort of collective responsibility to stop your mate from doing stupid stuff when he’s on the piss. The bottom line is that someone is responsible for the social drinking gathering, whether the party host or the bar manager. They should have the responsibility, not the government.

RTD Alcohol Limits

Restricting the sales of RTDs will make this worse, as at least an RTD is still mostly mixer than alcohol. Preventing the RTD from having more than 6% alcohol will just mean people buy the big bottle of spirits instead. Unlike sculling a bottle of vodka, sculling RTDs will fill you up with mixer and force you to vomit before the alcohol does serious damage. The ‘experts’ on the topic say that because RTDs are sweet, they encourage young people to get a taste for drinking, and have earned the name ‘alcopops‘ in mainstream media, which is scaremongering fear of the unknown to paranoid parents who’ve never heard the term.

If you’re not sure of what an RTD is, it stands for ready to drink, which means they are premixed drinks such as bourbon and cola, rum and cola, vodka and lemonade, gin and tonic, etc. The purpose of the drinks is to save you buying a liter bottle of vodka, and ensuring the mixer to alcohol ratio is consistent. These are reasons why RTDs should be more lauded than hated. While RTDs usually have the same alcohol percentage as beer (5%), the highest RTD alcohol percentage is usually 8-9%, which is less than the 12-13% in wine, and the 35%+ in straight spirits. If you don’t want people getting alcohol poisoning, best to keep the RTDs actually.

Split Age

The motivation behind the split age is to curb underage drinking, and the problems affiliated with it.  At no point has the question been raised – where do underage drinkers get the alcohol from? If they did, they’d quickly find the answer is not 18-19 year olds. The government seems to think that all the 13-17 year olds get their booze from 18-19 year olds. Bullshit – they get it from their parents.

At high school, next to everyone in my year group was drinking by the end of 5th form. Some of us had older siblings or older friends, but the overwhelming majority just got their parents to buy the alcohol – many of whom paid for it too. If young people are drinking too much, blame the person not just responsible for them, but also responsible for providing the alcohol for them! If a 16 year old kid shows up to his friend’s party with a box of 24 beers, why would you not blame the dumb parents?! My mum used to buy for me when I was underaged too, but she would limit how much alcohol I was allowed to have.

Assuming the law did pass, I don’t think anyone sensible believes it would work. If 14 year olds are getting wasted with a purchasing age of 18 at present, it shows the problem is not the age we’ve set, but that there is other ways of getting alcohol besides purchasing it first-hand. Moving the age to 20 just means 18-19 year olds with older friends – or who still live with their parents – will just find someone else to purchase on their behalf. University students would find this only too easy.

Drink Driving

It’s a stupid thing to do. I don’t know anyone my age who would be stupid enough to do it. Maybe it would seem I have sensible friends, but would be a blatant lie. The reality is drink driving is far less prevalent among young people today than young people in the past. In fact, young people today are less likely to drink drive than their parents.  Lowering the blood alcohol limit doesn’t deter drink drivers, if you’re thinking about going for a drive when you’re pissed, you’re a deadshit already. The problem on our roads is repeat offenders, those people way over the limit, and older generations who grew up when drink driving was far more prevalent and acceptable.

Dangerous Streets, Limiting Bar Hours, and Liquor Ban Zones

Auckland doesn’t necessarily have this problem so much. Bars here can be open as late as 9am (which is not a nice time to be still out drinking), and I’ve been caught nearly a dozen times drinking in the Auckland Domain by the police without even a warning. In Havelock North, Hawkes Bay – bars are forced to close at 3am and the village center is a liquor ban area. Neither of these things fix anything.

The recommendation for bars to close at an arbitrary time, and have a one-way door policy an hour prior to closing (where people can leave, but not enter) simply forces people to go back out onto the streets. It doesn’t get people to do their drinking early and go home early, it just makes people leave the bar at closing time and continue drinking somewhere else. It essentially moves drinking out of sight, and out of mind, away from liquor license owners where people can do stupid things unsupervised.

Same logic in liquor ban areas, which are designed to keep areas safe and prevent vandalism, usually town centers. This usually creates a donut effect, where the town center is empty, but people drink in residential areas unsupervised instead. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and supervision is key to minimizing the harm caused by alcohol. A responsible person can prevent people getting out of hand, and respond quickly to any issues.

Anyone who thinks the proposed law changes will make New Zealand any healthier or safer is more naïve than someone who grew up on Mars. Youth drinking will still be there, binge drinking will still be there, drink driving will still be there, and the only thing that will change is that the responsible people will be irate.

Whale’s controversial blog post has people up in arms. I don’t agree with this statement completely, with its sweeping generalizations, but the idea is clear.

“So [Māori] will march in the streets for some broken down farms in the Central North Island but won’t lift a finger to stop bashing and killing their kids?”

It’s similar to the opinion piece I covered by Paul Holmes on Waitangi Day this year, where he said:

“Never mind the child stats, never mind the national truancy stats, never mind the hopeless failure of Maori to educate their children and stop them bashing their babies. No, it’s all the Pakeha’s fault. It’s all about hating whitey.”

So this is not as simple as Cameron Slater being a lone right wing racist. Both articles have received plenty of support, along with the inevitable howls of criticism from the angry mob Thought Police. Wharfies and meatworkers supporter Simon Oosterman is asking people to share an image of Slater, calling him a “fraud” and a “blogger who sells fraudulent goods.”

I like the image, he must have had this made in case Whale wrote something really controversial. Maybe he got bored and thought ‘hey, I can use that dry pun and picture that’s been sitting around for a while.’ As far as I know, Slater isn’t a fraud (unlike the weirdos who write for The Standard), and doesn’t peddle anything outright deceptive. Maybe the truth is just hard to swallow, denial is a natural reaction.