Posts by Hilary Stace
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Hard News: The Boom Crash, in reply to Chris Waugh,
Hours of fun. You can look up all your friends and neighbours' properties. Found the lowest valued property in our street is actually a $140,000 section on the side of a cliff.
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There's a great website in Wellington called Watch My Street. It tells you about the value of your property, the highest and lowest value of your street and where your house fits in that scale. Nice aerial photos. I have a shabby, unrenovated house in a rather nice street. Mine is the 57th in value of the street which goes from $2.2 million to $150,000.
But like most of the properties I checked, there has been no change in value since the last valuation in 2009. Come and live in Wellington.
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They seemed to be playing on a Sunday afternoon on Radio NZ. I heard the Jesse Mulligan one last Sunday about 4 pm.
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I have been surprised by some people's reactions to the original post that surely NZ wasn't as eugenic as other countries, weren't we nicer?
The reality is that governments govern for those like them (ie basically well-off white able bodied males). Any of our progressive policies such as votes for women, the establishment of the welfare state, pensions, pay equity, the closing of sheltered workshops etc only happened after decades of activism and the activists finally winning enough political power to implement the policies. This power was often short term and the improvements soon rolled back. Our political history is one of brief moments of reform that improved the lives of many followed by long periods when these advances are pulled back, or business as usual.
Occasionally the politicians get it and we had the establishment of ACC because some MPs knew about physical injuries from their war experience (but again that was only for one group of 'respectable' disabled people).
The norm for governments now and historically are policies based on fear of difference and designed to exclude those who are not the powerful elite. Eg in Australia the stolen children and the current anti refugee laws are just examples of politics as usual. In NZ we have constant benefit reforms, much harsher punishment for those who do small benefit fraud while massive corporate fraud goes unchallenged, restricted resources for disabled kids to access education and of course policies such as Funded Family Care. They are all about limiting and constraining those labelled 'other'.
Eugenic attitudes are always just below the surface. That is why we need to know our history and remain vigilant.
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Great to hear Robert Martin's biography written by John McRae has finally been published. http://www.craigpotton.co.nz/store/becoming-a-person
In shops now. Can't wait to read it. I read an early draft and used some of Robert's information for earlier Access posts. He's a hero. -
Access: Some aspects of New Zealand’s…, in reply to Rosemary McDonald,
Did you hear that the FFC policy is having a review? Apparently hardly anyone took it up (as we could have told them with all those draconian conditions) and the fund is hugely underspent. Fancy that. The review is not on the Ministry of Health website but Carers NZ know about it and is developing a submission.
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Access: Some aspects of New Zealand’s…, in reply to Kumara Republic,
Sweden has a shameful eugenics past that was only revealed in the 1990s. But most countries do. Sterilisation of undesirable people has been widespread everywhere and remnants remain with the debates about the sterilisation of disabled girls and women in many countries.
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Access: Some aspects of New Zealand’s…, in reply to Craig Young,
I have a memory of seeing a movie of Intensive Care, many decades ago.
Yes need to have more disability history in mainstream histories, in museum exhibitions, art etc. Most of our big written histories overlook disability altogether, apart from the occasional reference to mental illness. I have just been researching polio and that is another whole area of disability history. Where are the displays of iron lungs or callipers in our museums?
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Access: Some aspects of New Zealand’s…, in reply to EliotBlennerhassett,
Oops, thanks.
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Hope more people dive in and have a go at writing their versions/stories.