About Anita

A Wellington feminist wondering how to make politics something real people can do.

KP search terms: objectivism, werewolves and tumeke bro!

Posted on August 6, 2009 by Anita

I happened to be looking at our logs (weird malformed URLs which 404 *shrug*) and noticed our search terms listing, odd as usual, so here are some of my favourites from the last week:

objectivism and harry potter
should women only use provacation as a defence
werewolf ian wishert â€“ 5 hits, really!
who is matthew hooton
why is new zealand racist sexist and homophobic
Latin America progressive forces on the decline
tumeke bro
herald mental illness 2009
mutual exploitation model of the media
social movement unionism
what will happen if there’s no intellectual property
taliban negotiating table afghanistan mission territories

and finally, the ever present reminder of this post:

pink

Looking at the search terms always makes me marvel at the eclectic readership we must have, but today I’m concerned that we’re not meeting your expectations. So, in the spirit of BLiP, can anyone answer in 25 words any of the implicit questions? After all, what is the connection between objectivism and Harry Potter? Why is New Zealand racist, sexist and homophobic? and who really is Matthew Hooton?

John A at The Standard â€“Â hypocritical and spiteful at the same time

Posted on August 5, 2009 by Anita

Today John A on The Standard decided to post the street address of the Deputy Prime Minister’s wife and children. It was unnecessary, it was hypocritical, and it was spiteful.

I would love to see The Standard playing a clean fair game, but if they’re not going to then they could at least stop picking on politician’s kids and families.

Update: Exact same criticism of Toad at Greenvoices, again unnecessary, and spiteful.

Update 2: Some good-hearted Standardista has removed the address detail, good on you!

Update 3: Toad too – thanks!!

Allowing people a voice

Posted on August 1, 2009 by Anita

Sam speaks out publicly about the fact that ACC payments for counselling do not cover the full cost of each counselling session and victims of crime like Sam are left to scrape together the difference. What information should Nick Smith be able to release about Sam’s circumstances? Should that include that Sam, who was sexually abused by a female caregiver when he was a child, insists on seeing a male counsellor, and in his small town there is only one appropriately qualified male counsellor and his rates are higher than average?

Chris is on the sickness benefit and speaks out publicly about the fact MSD won’t help with the high transport costs of getting to specialist appointments. What information should Paula Bennett be able to release about Chris? Should that include the fact that since Chris’ last psychotic episode, in which she threatened to stab her nieces and nephew, she has moved out of her sister’s home near the specialist and back to her parents who live in a semi-rural area with no public transport?

Moana, who has a full time job, speaks to the select committee considering leave provisions about the hardship that compulsory christmas closedowns cause non-custodial parents and talks about her employer requiring a three week closedown. What information should Moana’s employer be able to release? Should that include the fact that Moana’s leave situation is atypical in that workplace and is due her taking extended leave earlier in the year to attend a residential alcohol programme and using annual leave to have supervised contact with her children whose father moved them out of town when her violence and drinking became dangerous?

Sam, Chris and Moana should feel safe speaking publicly about those issues of government policy. None are lying, none are misrepresenting their own situation, each is raising a genuine issue of policy. For each the disclosure of their personal circumstances could cause significant shame, damage to relationships and support networks, and provide a huge disincentive to speaking publicly.

Being a democracy is about more than giving everyone a vote, it’s about allowing everyone a voice.

[This post was originally a comment in reply to jcuknz in this thread.]

A note to Paula Bennett, her cabinet colleagues, and their staff

Posted on July 29, 2009 by Anita

On this blog it is likely that, from time to time, the authors and commenters will criticise government policy, speeches, and political tactics.

We would like to reassert that this is neither explicit nor implicit consent to release any private information about the authors or commenters that is held by any government agency, minister’s office, local government organisation, political party, or any other person, organisation or agency.

For the purposes of clarification this non-consent includes, but is not limited to, the following information:

benefit status or history;
family status or history;
ACC status or history;
health status or history â€“ including information held by DHBs, PHOs, central government agencies and private providers whether directly or indirectly contracted by the state;
interactions with justice or law enforcement â€“ including complaints, interviews, interactions, documents supplied;
employment status or history;
any grants applied for or received; and
tax payments, status or history.

In addition we would like to restate that posting or commenting here does not give implicit or explicit consent for any private information held about any author or commenter to be used for a purpose other than the purpose for which is was supplied. This non-consent includes, but is not limited to, the reuse of personal information for political purposes.

[Update after r0b’s comment â€“ any other blogger or author of any internet or other commentary or correspondence critical of the government is welcome to reproduce this with or without alteration]

If Bronagh Key is a solo mum then I’m an Iraqi refugee

Posted on July 26, 2009 by Anita

Bronagh Key has a husband who is home a couple of nights a week, who brings in a good income, who loves her and supports her, who goes shopping for tea pots and oven mitts with her in the weekend, who attends their kids sports matches and events, and who goes on family holidays with her and the kids. Apparently that’s what John Key thinks isÂ the life of a solo mum.

Now I’m not saying that her life is as easy as it would be if he wasn’t PM, but it is nothing like the life of a solo mother. That Key thinks it’s a sensible comparison says a lot about the rose tinted world he lives in, and how disconnected he is from the real lives of real New Zealanders.

We live in a country where thousands of children will go to school hungry tomorrow, where nutrient deficiencies affect the health of one in ten children in our largest city, where poor overcrowded housing is linked to outbreaks of TB amongst children, and where about quarter of a million children live in households below the income poverty line. National has done nothing for those children and it has done nothing for the thousands of actual solo parents in New Zealand.

In the midst of the noise about the cycleway, the jobs summit, the recession, the credit rating and the fortification of bread the poor have been forgotten again as National, Labour and the media talk up the difficulties of the middle class.

So next time John Key waxes lyrical about the need to “balance the demands and requirements of all New Zealanders” it might be worth asking if he’s actually aware that there are poor New Zealanders, or perhaps we should just borrow Bronagh Dougan’s response to John Key’s aspirations:

“Whatever”

If you’re interested in more detail about our child poverty problem I recommend these reports by the Children’s Commissioner and the Child Poverty Action Group.

Doing filtering right

Posted on July 17, 2009 by Anita

Once upon a time quite a long time ago I was involved in the implementation of a porn filter at a public institution. At the time part of my role included “inappropriate use” investigations. I’ve spent far too many hours sifting through web and other access logs, writing up material for handover to the authorities, seizing equipment and seeing the flow on effect of a search warrant executed on someone’s home. I’ve sat across a table from someone I knew and made eye contact while I explained how I had discovered evidence he had repeatedly accessed a bestiality porn site. I wish I wasn’t so aware of just how bad porn has to be before it becomes illegal.

I strongly support voluntary at the border filtering for child porn, if I ran an ISP I would implement it and I would be grateful for any help the government provided. But… the government’s support and actions must be scoped, controlled and open to public scrutiny.

DIA should be doing this, but they should also be doing it right:

The process should be public
The scope should be public
Both should be open to public scrutiny and comment (including a without prejudice process for challenging the filtering of a site).

Releasing the list of sites would be counterproductive but we do have a right to know what they’re up to. Is their mandate only child porn (2(a) of the definition of objectionable) or the other criteria as well? Who will make the decision? What is the review process? Will any monitoring be undertaken? Could that trigger an investigation? Will they guarantee it is only objectionable material? Is there scope for political interference? What does “voluntary” mean? Will there be negative consequences for ISPs that don’t opt in?

I totally support DIA’s stated intention, but the way they are approaching it is just plain wrong.

Provocation and victims of domestic violence

Posted on July 14, 2009 by Anita

[I just wrote a rather long comment at The Hand Mirror about battered women and provocation, in response to people suggesting we need to maintain the partial defence of provocation to protect battered women. I am reproducing it here as it shows that the provocation does not help battered women, in fact it only protects their abusers]

The Law Commission has done a lot of work on this, and it appears that the provocation defence is not of value in “battered women syndrome” killings, so we lose no protection for women victims of domestic violence by repealing it.

Some Criminal Defences with Particular Reference to Battered Defendants

The Law Commission did a piece of work which focussed solely on defences for battered defendants completed in 2001 (Some Criminal Defences with Particular Reference to Battered Defendants – NZLC R 73. It shows that provocation is not an effective defence for battered women, and even that it has been successfully used by a perpetrator of domestic violence.

In R v Tepu a man successfully used provocation as a partial defence when he beaten his wife to death â€“ her provoking act? going to the Police when he severely beat her

Partly in response to recommendations in that report the mandatory life sentence for murder was abolished in 2002, and judges have sentencing discretion for battered defendants.

The Partial Defence Of Provocation – NZLC R 98

From 2004 to 2007 the Law Commission did work specifically on provocation (The Partial Defence of Provocation) resulting in a recommendation for its repeal. As part of that they rechecked there would be no disadvantage for battered women and, in fact, did some handy stats.

Of the 81 homicide trials they looked at (2001 to 2005, Auckland and Wellington) in 15 provocation was used as a defence. In only one of those was provocation used as a defence by a woman. In that case, while the killer had experienced domestic violence, she killed her husband because he said he was leaving her. I won’t copy the description here (see p103 of report if you really want to), but it’s exactly the kind of killing-someone-because-they-say-they’re-leaving that we shouldn’t allow to be called manslaughter.

So there were go, the Law Commission has worked really hard on the issue, and provocation is not helping battered women who kill to protect themselves.

Kiwipolitico

Author Archives: Anita