Posts by Andrew Geddis
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It may be that Gower has a zinger about John Key for us tonight. If so, I hope it’s better and more fairly framed than last night’s story was
I was polled in this poll. On the basis of the questions asked me, he doesn't.
There should, however, be a story along the lines of One News' "should Collins resign over Oravida?" Because I was asked that!
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Hard News: The Internet Party, whatever happens, in reply to Vikram Kumar,
In the case of the Internet Party, any member can put up their hand to be a candidate. Members will express their views about the potential candidates and rank those on an “indicative list”. Then the Executive Committee will finalise the list.
Two issues:
(1) The "Executive Committee" doesn't just finalise the list in accordance with the membership's wishes - it has complete discretion over what the final list will be, and also puts together the "indicative list" that members can "express their views" on.
(2) For the 2014 election, this Executive Committee consists solely of the "founders" of the Party, with no membership input at all.
I think there's a very strong argument that this arrangement will breach the requirement of s.71 of the Electoral Act (once the Internet Party is registered) - http://pundit.co.nz/content/clickbait-do-the-internet-partys-rules-breach-the-electoral-act
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Hard News: Inside the Shrine, in reply to Chris Waugh,
Key: “I can tell you I was bought"
If there’s a sentence that should never pass through a politician’s lips, that would have to be it. Seriously.
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Friday Music! On a Wednesday!! When will the madness end!!!
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
...but I’m pretty sure Professor Geddis would most definitely be unleashing the dogs of law if I went on the radio and made grossly defamatory allegations he faked research data, plagiarised other academics and coerced his students into fucking him for good grades.
Or, as we call it down here at Otago, did our jobs.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
Does anyone here think that speech like that of Willie and JT should actually be banned? In the you-commit-a-criminal-offence-if-you-say-it sense?
No (speaking for myself).
Because the State possesses resources and powers that are different to those available to the individual citizen, such that a decision on its part to "ban" a certain form of speech has implications far in excess of an individual deciding to take action to oppose it (even by seeking to impose sanctions on people like Jackson and Tamihere for speaking). There are then a bunch of different prudential reasons not to invoke those resources and powers in regards this specific example of expression:
(1) The consequences of the State "getting it wrong" in its judgment as to what is/is not allowable speech are significantly greater than if I (or others like me) do so;
(2) There are line drawing difficulties associated with designating a kind of speech "criminal", meaning that there is a risk the State will over-police expression (i.e. impose sanctions on people when it is not necessary to do so);
(3) Criminalising speech in this area risks creating "martyrs", in that the issue moves from what they are saying to the right of the State to prohibit it;
(4) It is more effective - in the sense of achieving the desired end of changing rape culture - if the suppression of rape apology comes from the voluntary actions of civil society, rather than formalised legal prohibitions.
Like I say, these are prudential reasons, so they may or may not apply in other circumstances or to other forms of speech. But they do provide a basis for saying "I will personally take action to try and visit consequences on Jackson and Tamihere for their speech, but do not think the State should do so" without contradiction.
TRIGGER WARNING
Now, to put the same sort of test to you - do you think that if Willie and JT had gone on Radio Live and expressly said "Women invent rape stories because they are by nature liars, and these girls were just sluts out for a good time", it would still be "a bad thing" for people to contact Radio Live and/or those who advertise on Radio Live to ask them their views on this speech? What if they had gone on Radio Live and expressly said "there's nothing wrong with giving a 13 year old girl what she wants - and if she's drinking and wearing a short skirt, we all know what she wants."
Just how "free" do Willie and JT get to be on their commercial radio slot, before it is OK to say "these people should be off the air"? Or is there a status quo bias here ... once a commercial radio station decides someone can have a slot on its roster, then "free speech" demands that they get to keep that slot irrespective of what they say on it, or what people think of what they are saying?
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Lucy Telfar Barnard,
You can argue that it’s a slippery slope, but I don’t think it is. Maybe it’s the top step of a sets of stairs, and at the bottom is the world where I don’t get to watch 7 Days or South Park. But I don’t see any sign we’re rushing madly down the staircase. In fact, from where I’m looking, a lot of the stairs in between seem to be… missing.
Exactly.
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Legal Beagle: Think it possible that you…, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
I will make the same argument to Bob McCoskrie, and hope to be (at least partially) successful. Bob is highly concerned about censorship (state or otherwise) of traditional Christian views about a range of issues, such as same-sex marriage. There will be a number of issues where Family First thinks the risk involved is worth it (and I imagine Into the River would be one of them), but on a lot of issues, I’d like to think that Bob could realise that his calling to limit free speech in some way could come back to bite him.
I'm sure Bob is. But he's also the head of a pressure group, that exists for the purpose of … pressuring on things. And in order to keep that group in the public eye (as well as maintain its membership flow and donation stream), it has to be seen to take stances against forms of expression that the group disapproves of.
Hence, news releases like this one: https://www.familyfirst.org.nz/2013/11/lady-gaga-bus-ad-causes-a-stir/
Now, you may go to Bob and say, "stop your pressure activities, because they may cause others to respond by pressuring against speech you like". To which I'll bet Bob says "sorry - pressuring on moral issues is what we do … if and when it appears that our pressuring is actually counter-productive and contributing to the censorship of good things, then maybe we'll think again, but until then if we don't pressure then there's no reason for us to exist."
So … why should Giovanni et al do any differently?
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This boils down to two deceptively simple, but incredibly difficult to answer in practice, questions:
(1) Is a message to advertisers/booksellers that you object to a certain kind of speech (be it JT/Jackson or King's book), and (whether explicit or implicitly stated) will think less of them for their connection to it, the best sort of response in the circumstances to speech that you think harmful?
(2) Even if in the immediate case your judgment is that sending advertisers/booksellers a message is the "best sort" of response, will the long-term effect of this decision be to foster some kind of "boycott culture", in which other forms of speech that you think are desirable end up being silenced?
It seems to me there is no "right" answer to either of these questions.
(1) Deciding what is the "best" response to a certain form of speech depends on an assessment of the degree of "harm" being done by it, as well as the effectiveness of "more speech" as a solution to that harm. After all, no-one thinks the answer to ALL forms of speech is more speech … if I offer readers $50,000 to murder Graeme, I doubt he'd complain about the police moving to arrest me on the basis that the better response would be for him to be able to provide counter-arguments as to why murdering him is not a good idea.
So, in the case of JT/Jackson and King's book, there are a set of nested value judgments. What was the "harm" caused by this expression (where "harm" is not measurable on any neat set of scales)? How could those who believe there is harm involved respond by airing counter views? Would that response be effective in mitigating/cancelling the harm of the original expression? Or, is the more effective mitigation/cancellation strategy to try and impose consequences on the original speaker, to express (and yes, it is a form of expression) collective disapproval of the words/message?
We can argue about this and try to convince each other that one or another strategy is the "best" one to take. But there's no pipeline to the stars on this … no "right" answer, as we might expect in (say) a Maths or Physics problem.
(2) Deciding how much your individual decision to express displeasure to advertisers/booksellers might contribute to a "boycott culture" similarly requires a bunch of very difficult judgments. It is, in effect, a sort of slippery slope argument - if you are effective in generating a response to this expression, then it may lead to other cases . But everything is a "slippery slope" … what if, for instance, lots of people like me ringing up Radio Live and saying on air that we think JT and Jackson are wrong in their views causes Radio Live's management to cancel their show? Doesn't that risk then mean I shouldn't ring up Radio Live, in case the cancellation of their show leads in the future to something I like hearing being taken off the air?
That then requires an assessment of the factual question as to whether my action in approaching the advertiser/bookseller in this particular case is going to actually make it easier for others in the future to silence speech I like. Is this a "truly exceptional" example of harmful speech, such that the response to it has little or no precedent value for the future? Or, is it a run-of-the-mill example, and if I am successful in getting advertisers/booksellers to respond I'll be complicit in setting a low bar for the future.
Equally, the argument assumes that if I hold-off approaching advertisers/booksellers, then others will be more likely to do the same. But is that true? Will, say, Family First stop calling for booksellers not to sell "Go the Fuck to Sleep", or buses to stop carrying Lady Gaga ads, if I don't act against JT/Jackson and King's book? Or, will this be a form of unilateral disarmament - in which people who don't really care about "free speech" at all keep on doing what they are doing, and only suckers like me give up the fight because of fears about "boycotts" … which are going to take place in any case? Meaning that only speech that I (as a good lefty liberal) like will be threatened, whilst speech that the bad guys (Family First, etc) like will flourish unencumbered. Which actually is the worst of all possible worlds for me.
So … shorter version … do what you think is best, because there is no definitive way to say that you are wrong to do so.
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Speaker: Gender quotas (and helping…, in reply to nzlemming,
I think it’s because they actually treat women as people.
Well, they have always (I think) run a "zipped list" - alternating female/male/female/male (and then also considering other matters such as ethnicity, etc in the overall individual rankings). Which guarantees at least 50% women representing the party - which in turn probably makes standing as a candidate a somewhat more attractive proposition to female Green Party members (he speculates, being neither female or a Green Party member).
Of course, the Greens are list-only in their representation, so don't have the complications of electorate MPs (who are predominantly male) to consider. Which is why Labour can't rely on adopting a similar, pretty simple measure to ensure gender equality.