Public Address | Cafe | Speaker: The Spirit Level

chris

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 20:30:02 +1300

It is, if only it worked on people.

linger

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 20:25:12 +1300

Ah, wholesale char-conversion!
That is a useful thing indeed.

chris

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 20:19:08 +1300

Here you go linger: http://www.piliapp.com/generator/strikethrough-text/

and while It’s on my mind: Çatalhöyük (7500 BC -5700 BC) pop. 5-7000
Çatalhöyük had no apparent social classes, as no houses with distinctive features (belonging to royalty or religious hierarchy, for example) have been found so far. The most recent investigations also reveal little…

linger

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 19:53:10 +1300

!?! How do you format text to get strikethrough on this site?
~~HTML doesn’t work~~; is there some delimiter to use instead?

chris

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 18:55:58 +1300

being a libertarian.

Like, it’s obviously a ridiculous thing to believe in.

Noted. So
1. ̶R̶i̶g̶h̶t̶-̶l̶i̶b̶e̶r̶t̶a̶r̶i̶a̶n̶i̶s̶m̶
2. ̶L̶i̶b̶e̶r̶t̶a̶r̶i̶a̶n̶ ̶s̶o̶c̶i̶a̶l̶i̶s̶m̶

John Farrell

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 08:17:26 +1300

They think, because they have the money, that is was their virtuous behaviour which gained it for them. This reinforces their belief that everyone should be like them.

Che Tibby

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 08:11:02 +1300

They were young, as most are, and mostly you just have to point out how they're wrong and they can actually see it, apologise, and get on with not being a libertarian.

my experience is that many are heavily self-aggrandising. they work in a service station while studying, and finding…

Che Tibby

Sun, 20 Dec 2015 08:04:52 +1300

As for myself, even though I'm in paid work, I've basically found the ladder of opportunity missing all of its rungs.

i've often pondered why i made it out.

i keep landing on "white male".

tussock

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 21:40:30 +1300

I've met several libertarians over the net in the last couple years.

They were young, as most are, and mostly you just have to point out how they're wrong and they can actually see it, apologise, and get on with not being a libertarian.

Like, it's obviously a ridiculous thing…

andin

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 18:51:44 +1300

You misunderstood

What again...well in my defence, it was a link posted with no explanation.
Just the L word

John Farrell

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 14:46:03 +1300

My father used his postwar educational opportunity (he was in the navy) to gain a qualification as a health inspector. When we emigrated to New Zealand, he became middle class – Scots are difficult to "place" by accent.

Joe Wylie

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 13:17:34 +1300

You misunderstood my irony.

There's a bit of that about lately.
Just to be clear on middle class values – when the state no longer offers the means for every citizen to maximise their potential through educational opportunities, such things become restricted to those who can afford them. That libertarian…

John Farrell

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 11:42:24 +1300

You misunderstood my irony.

andin

Sat, 19 Dec 2015 11:18:09 +1300

poor is a choice,
NO its not.
You misunderstood my cynicism. Yes I'm proudly cynical of most human BS and 99% of the nonsense we dream up is BS. Including the post you linked to

Can you choose when and where to be born? Who your parents are? Not that…

John Farrell

Fri, 18 Dec 2015 14:09:04 +1300

My parents were children of the depression, my mother English, my father Scottish. The values I learned from them included frugality – neither were raised in middle class households.

Joe Wylie

Fri, 18 Dec 2015 12:46:18 +1300

Because some (a few) people choose a simpler and/or lower consumption life, then all people who live with less must have chosen to live that way.

And because everyone starts from scratch with middle-class values already hard-wired in, right?

Lucy Telfar Barnard

Fri, 18 Dec 2015 12:18:19 +1300

It's just your basic poor logic. Because some (a few) people choose a simpler and/or lower consumption life, then all people who live with less must have chosen to live that way.

John Farrell

Fri, 18 Dec 2015 08:27:42 +1300

Yup, being poor is a choice, don'tcher know.

andin

Thu, 17 Dec 2015 21:35:07 +1300

The author sez in the comments
" Even those with stupid beliefs and destructive behaviour need a minimal support level to sustain them but provide incentive to change. I would prefer to see these administered by private charitable or professional organisations rather than bureaucracies."
Them poor eh! you can make…

John Farrell

Thu, 17 Dec 2015 14:28:45 +1300

The libertarian view....

http://yournz.org/2015/12/16/poverty-is-a-state-of-mind/

Kumara Republic

Thu, 17 Dec 2015 14:19:34 +1300

so yes, empathy. but even those who have experienced poverty can express a total lack of empathy, because we live in a society that happily accords blame without consideration of cause.

We're currently in an age of just-world dogma – an arm of the Prosperity Gospel – where we're drilled…

Steve Withers

Thu, 17 Dec 2015 11:02:38 +1300

I give Muldoon credit for caring about people. Unfortunately his tactics left a lot to be desired. Looking back, I’m sorry I voted for neo-liberals in 1984 and ’87. Starting in 1990, I never made that mistake again.

chris

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 23:48:53 +1300

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_economics

Rosemary McDonald

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 19:55:07 +1300

This thread has reminded me of this....http://www.cpag.org.nz/assets/PROCEEDINGS%20of%20the%20Forum%2010%20September%202010%20Final%20(2).pdf

Rethinking welfare for the 21st
century: Forum Proceedings
Report from the forum held 10 September 2010,

Five years on....

Joe Wylie

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 19:38:51 +1300

Nothng new about 'the deserving poor' as a notion
How about the undeserving disabled? For example, Christchurch's "skinhead" community, most of whom, IMHE, appear to be in receipt of some form of disability benefit.

When activism focuses on what can be immediately changed, i.e. those social attitudes that disadvantage the…

Sacha

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 18:53:29 +1300

Great to see media finally realising that being on heavy dialysis might impinge on your earnings, despite superstar credibility as one of the greatest sportspeople of all time, in any sport. Antidote to all those "doesn't stop her" stories they love peddling.

Yet let's not hold our breath they will…

Sacha

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 18:47:32 +1300

Nothng new about 'the deserving poor' as a notion – and Hilary can probably supply references. :)

There is a huge historic moral underpinning to the distinction between people born disabled or who joined in later, especially by 'accident'. Across cultures, even.

Also between those who have never had socially-sanctioned…

Lucy Telfar Barnard

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 18:04:39 +1300

I’ve never been poor and hope never to be, because I’ve seen what poor is like and I don’t want to go there. And it is high on my list of “things we need systematic solutions to”, so I vote and donate accordingly. Unfortunately I’m in a tiny minority with…

Moz

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 17:22:07 +1300

what conventionally passes for the Christmas spirit,

I give you the voice of that great Christian scholar and gentleman, the former prime minister of Australia, the Right Honourable Tony Abbott:

Jesus knew that there was a place for everything and it’s not necessarily everyone’s place to come to Australia.

I've…

B Jones

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 17:11:39 +1300

I'm not one for faith based sentimentality, being an atheist and all, but I can't help being struck by the contrast between what conventionally passes for the Christmas spirit, and what people are prepared at the moment to do and say in real life. We hear too much about children…

Lucy Telfar Barnard

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 16:59:29 +1300

"For the fact was, the school the Burnell children went to was not at all the kind of place their parents would have chosen if there had been any choice. But there was none. It was the only school for miles. And the consequence was all the children in the…

bob daktari

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 14:33:31 +1300

But it feels different now, like it’s become more of an actual class than a temporary state that unfortunate people live through.

from my seat the biggest change is the state seems happy to accept this as the norm – many of us here (it seems) grew up before the…

BenWilson

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 14:04:04 +1300

Yeah I don't think negative attitudes to poverty are new. What's new is the amount of poverty around to have a negative attitude to. "New" as in it wasn't like this when I was a kid, anyway – it's not like I can remember the Great Depression or anything. And…

Che Tibby

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 13:53:55 +1300

We should be able to imagine what it might be like to face this kind of hardship, and then respond with empathy. Because that's what decent people do.

thing is, I often see statements where people claim that negative attitudes to poverty are a new thing, or perhaps "a product…

Rosemary McDonald

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 12:50:42 +1300

No Widows’ Benefit any more.

So, if you're feeling the spirit of giving coming upon you and you're not sure of worthy recipients...here's a widow and her poor wee boys who need a helping $ or two...backed by Our Leader no less...

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11561132

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=11561837

"He did an awful lot of…

Joe Wylie

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 12:34:55 +1300

1982 was the heyday of PEP schemes, where those drawn from the ranks of the unemployed were generally paid the award wage of the union of whichever local authority provided the bridging finance. With the Auckland City Council it was the Northern Regional Local Government Officers' Union.

As Colin Scrimgeour…

Hilary Stace

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 12:08:05 +1300

No Widows’ Benefit any more. Paula Bennett got rid of it a couple of years ago. There is just the Jobseeker and you are expected to look for work regardless of grief, kids etc. And the Sole Parent which expects work unless children are just babies.

TracyMac

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 11:52:45 +1300

Yup, often it's those who barely have enough for themselves who give – tangibly – more. We were on both sides of that one when I was a kid, and you don't forget.

Tom Semmens

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 11:49:58 +1300

I’m still trying to work it why this government having a surplus meant there was enough money for a flag referendum, but not enough money for Pharmac to fund life-saving melanoma treatments.

For the same reason that while we all nod our heads at the need to do something about…

Deborah

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 10:41:28 +1300

Yes. Not in my own lived experience, but I know there were times when things were very tight indeed for my parents, and they went without so they could feed us.

But we shouldn't have to experience hardship ourselves in order to try to make the world, or maybe just…

Steve Withers

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 10:35:32 +1300

Awesome.

Some of us still hold to this.

I'm still trying to work it why this government having a surplus meant there was enough money for a flag referendum, but not enough money for Pharmac to fund life-saving melanoma treatments.

Something deeply messed up in that. They just don't care.

Public Address

Wed, 16 Dec 2015 10:35:32 +1300

Discussion from blog post.