If you've got it, flaunt it.

So I did something stupid.

I READ THE COMMENTS SECTION. On an article about something I care about. Interestingly there were very few nasty comments. Instead there was the even more dangerous moderate undercurrent.

It went along these lines...

"I've got nothing against gays, I just wish they didn't shove it in my face."

and my least favourite

"I mean straight people don't flaunt it in public."

The. Hell. We. Don't.

We wander around blithely holding hands with the one we love, we hug and kiss goodbye and hello. We marry in public spaces. We buy his & hers this that and the other. We go on dates, we snog in the back of movie theatres. We visit each other in hospital without needing someone else's permission.

We are free to love who we want, when we want. That is all they are asking for.

Peace. Out.

Sheeple need not apply

Voting. It's one of those things that we don't think about all that much, except for that frenzy that comes upon us when a general election looms. And even then many people choose still not to think about it.

But it's important. Really important, and for more than the obvious reasons. 

When we choose people to govern our land, from a community perspective it matters that everyone take part. Community is a concept that many people really fail to grasp (sadly I think particularly our politicians fail to grasp this). Society is held together by community. The sharing of skills and ideas, the shared responsibility to uphold laws, raise contributing adults and to care for the vulnerable. Choosing who governs us is another shared responsibility.

Please don't imagine that my writing about the importance of casting your vote is going to be 'vote for who I said'. I don't work that way. Whomever you choose to vote for, the act of voting is important. Every vote counts, even if the team you chose don't win. Not to mention that it's massively hypocritical to whine about the current government if you didn't actually cast a vote. Even if the vote you cast was FOR those numpties, you have granted yourself the privilege to reasonably say, "well you dickbags haven't lived up to my expectations then, have you?" 

So, let's assume for the sake of my sanity that you have now decided that maybe voting is a good plan. What now? Pick your favourite party and go for it? That depends on the situation, there are things to consider. What outcome do you want and realistically could it happen? Sometimes there's a gap between what you want to do and what you should do to achieve the best possible result. Last time I cast my vote not to get a party to win, but to try to stop another party from winning. 

Last time around people abandoned the Labour Party in droves, huge terrifying droves. Not surprising really, the reds have been a ship adrift for some while now, even staunch Labour supporters began to wonder if they were actually up to the job. Wishy-washy leadership, incoherent and minimalist policies. So there was a large shift (mostly to the Greens, who lets face it didn't have a hope (of doing more than getting a couple of seats)) Sometimes you have to kind of 'do the math' to figure out where you vote is best used. And who can be bothered with that much thinking amiright? Thinking. It's so important. 

I posit this: These people, once chosen, will govern the country for a significant period, in a position to do immense damage if they are no good at it (or just no good) perhaps putting a little thought into it is not such a big ask.

So: CAN your party win? If they can't is your vote still best cast with them, or is it worth voting for someone else who MIGHT be able to win with a bit of a push - if it will prevent someone you actually DON'T want getting in, this is worth considering. Is a coalition a reasonable idea? Or would it be a good thing to try and push for another seat for a minor party? The trouble with answering questions like this is that you have to have some idea of what the current political climate is like and some idea of the policies and candidates for each party. If you just make assumptions about each one based on nothing more than their party name or that the local candidate is cute or some other facile reason, you'll do some of them a disservice (not to mention the country). And potentially vote for a madman. 

You don't need to become a sociopolitical genius, just take a look at the options and judge for yourself. Form an opinion. I'm full of them.

Peace. Out.

In a less confrontational tone; Dear Sirs and Madams, what you are doing is not logical (PART II, PART I is much angrier)

Well obviously to YOU it is, your pockets are getting lined.

But if you think collectively, consider the community, what you are doing is not only illogical it's disgraceful. I talked about remembering a better time in New Zealand. I do, a much better time - I don't understand how so many people seem to have forgotten. We used to be a functional and successful welfare state. Please don't instantly switch off at those words, they are not the dreadful mantra you seem to think they are. 

There seems to be an assumption many people make that a welfare state is solely about giving people who somehow don't deserve it something for nothing. This is not the primary function of a welfare state, it's just one fairly minor aspect. And trust me, no matter what system you choose to run things under there will ALWAYS be a group of people willing to take advantage of it.

Do you remember how things used to be in this country? I think the point at which I was certain things had taken a dangerous turn for the worse was when education started to get expensive. And getting a good education became far more expensive than getting a merely acceptable education. The more we have to pay to gain a reasonable level of education, the further the poor fall behind. I know a lot of people would say, so what? But here is what: The larger the education gap ( the gap between what the rich can afford and what the poor can afford ) the smaller the pool of well educated citizens becomes. The more under-educated people there are the harder it is to fill jobs at a certain level of technical ability and above, and the more people there are needing lower grade jobs. Unemployment rises. The need to bring overseas talent in to fill the top jobs raises wages and the top end of the spectrum, which increases the gap between rich and poor, which increases the cost of education. Do you see where this is going? Is this sounding familiar at all? I realise that in your cushy offices and luxury homes it's hard to imagine that this affects you in any way, but can you at least see that you have a responsibility to ALL the people of New Zealand not just those on the gravy train? Does not your moral compass quiver at the thought of all those people abandoned?

You keep pretending that things will get better for everyone, but things will not. In the long run they will eventually become worse for YOU too. Do we want a country where people are forced to live on the streets, slowly starving for want of a hand up? Are we ok with being a people who ignore the suffering of others? Because this is the decision we are being led to. 

I will borrow for a moment from something a good man wrote as a piece of black humour.

The idea of a civilisation that had gotten rid of the middle class. They did it rather differently, but the net result was that they were all wiped out by a disease contracted from a dirty telephone.

Funny or not the point is that every section of a community is important. I'm not into labeling or a class system as such I'd rather think of it all as sides of a regular shape. Each side is important in holding the structure together. if you remove a side you weaken the structure and open it to outside stresses.

I realise that I tend to harp on about education. But really it is SO important. It's the root of civilisation. Without it we might as well climb back up into the trees. Education allows us to live up to our potential, educated to a level appropriate to our abilities makes us a happier people. Variation in potential allows us to fill all the levels of society. But NOT if we do not allow those with the greatest potential to reach it. One should not assume that the smart are always rich, or that the poor are always stupid. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with not being smart, or anything inherently great about being smart. As in all things, it's what you do with what you have that matters. There's nothing wrong with cleaning telephones for a living, every niche must be filled or it lessens us all. 

The primary function of a welfare state is to allow all people the ability to reach their potential. Yes, I am aware that an (actually insignificant) area of society take advantage of that but as I mentioned earlier it doesn't matter what system you use there are always a few who will work the loopholes. I'd rather go with a system that benefits society as a whole than just watch the fortunate few get more fortunate.

Peace. Out.

Dear National, STOP FUCKING MY COUNTRY UP. PLEASE.

The country I grew up in, the New Zealand I remember as a child was a land of compassion; a land of hope. A place where everyone had a reasonable chance of success, and no one had to live in ignominy. We were in fact what America has so long pretended to be. A land of freedom, a land of milk and honey. GODZONE (I seriously hate that term, but grasp it's intent). 

What have we become? I lament.

What drove us to this dirty bottom? A place where our leaders believe it is acceptable to take those most vulnerable people and make them MORE VULNERABLE; Acceptable to discard our collective responsibility to care for ALL our people; Acceptable to treat the unfortunate as criminals. What did we all do so very WRONG?

In the wake of a huge step in the right direction, in the shining light of our finally giving our people the option to marry whatever other thinking adult they choose to love, are we about to take a giant filthy leap into the dark ages? 

Changes to benefits happen all the time, I was a beneficiary for a long time - sickness is a respecter of no one. But the changes we are looking at now are a sickness in themselves. Compulsory pre-employment drug testing? What the ACTUAL FUCK? At the expense of the beneficiary no less. If a prospective employer wants a fucking drug test, they can fucking ask for one and fucking pay for it them fucking selves. Is this suddenly Nazi Germany (sorry Germany, you have come a very long way since those dark days)? read here about the latest travesty

Dodgy new laws invading personal privacy? Sure we can do that; what the fuck, why not! SERIOUSLY NATIONAL PUT A FUCKING TIN FOIL HAT ON YOU CRAZY BASTARDS. Stop it right now.

I could continue but I'm actually starting to froth a little, so I shall restore sanity and continue in peace.

Bizarre idea I know, but what about actually trying to HELP these people? Recently the concept of benefits as an addictive influence on people has been mooted. That handing someone with no current means of survival a lifeline is tantamount to handing them a bong. Well, I can see a certain train of logic in it and I'm pretty sure it's the same train of thought that the person(s) who initially suggested this were on. For some people going from a panic situation with no money, no job no prospects to a wage they can get for doing NOTHING could conceivably be like a drug, but I think that's actually a pretty small percentage of the total adult population. The people who will treat it like a drug for the most part are the ones who are at risk of all kinds of similar issues anyway. The ones who are raised in a naf situation and raised to expect they will never be able to get out of it no matter what they do. The ones who don't believe in themselves in the first place. And what do we achieve by making the system harder for them? We make them even less likely to ever even TRY to raise themselves up. Mark my words National, you will create a new culture of criminal, those who feel they have no place else to go. What you save in making peoples lives more miserable you will loose in so many other ways. Handing someone the means to pull themselves out of the gutter will never be a wasted effort no matter the result. We are judged by how we treat those fallen from fortune, and if we do not try we cannot succeed.

I'm not suggesting that there are no people who will take advantage of a welfare system. I am suggesting that those people are a tiny minority. I am suggesting that taking food from these peoples mouths will not magically make jobs appear, will not magically make them qualified for the jobs that are out there. I'm suggesting that making things harder for the ones who actually want to try will only hold them back.

If you want to make a real change you are starting in the wrong place. The place where the change must come, as all change must come, is with the young. Start in schools, improve our education system (which you have so far continued your crazy path by dismantling further) teach children to respect themselves, to respect others. Teach them to believe they can be everything they are capable of, that if they try they can make more of themselves than what they see. ALL children, not just the privileged few. Make sure that they have enough to eat, a roof over their heads, clothes on their back. Make sure that no child is left behind, that no child feels they are not worth as much as the next. Change for good is a long process, but quick change for a quick profit will turn to ashes in your mouth. 

Take some of the bollocks that no one actually needs to learn out of the education system at put in the skills that will help them GET A JOB. The skills to make a good choice in further training. The education system is a monolith that needs a facelift, a massive facelift. Restructuring to a system that teaches a mixture of what you need to know and what you want to learn. I look at the state of our current education system and weep. Teachers under paid and under valued. For goodness sake how the fuck long have they had to put up with the NOVOPAY debacle? If that was politicians wages getting fucked up it wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes. School was hardly perfect when I was there, lets face it schools worldwide are by and large a bit crap - unless they happen to have a shed load of cash available to them. But when I was a kid it was still a respected institution, not an irritation that you had to tolerate in order to get on with your life (ok I probably have a pretty twisted attitude towards school both past and present, sue me). Teachers don't have time to put into the students, students don't have freedom to learn, and to find their own path. Parents treat schools like daycare and seldom have the spare time to put into helping their kids find that path. All that money you want to put into invading our privacy and policing our poor, put it into helping them to raise a healthier, happier next generation. A generation of young adults who believe in themselves, believe in their homeland and want to make this a better world. I dare you to.

Peace. Out.

Which way to the Trans bathroom?

*DISCLAIMER - I'm not an expert on transgender politics. No offence is intended. You know, unless you're a douchebag.


Gender is in the brain. This is a hard concept for many to understand, as it goes against what most of us think we know about human gender. But more and more science is coming to understand that the important bit is in your head not your genitalia. For most of us, this is a moot point – I think I’m a girl, and you see a girl. I’m a girl. Easy. But what happens when the inner and outer don’t match? If you understand that your gender is inside your brain, then you should be able to see that given the vagaries of genetics sometimes someone will be born without a correctly matched set. Like sometimes people are born with the wrong number of toes, or two different coloured eyes. Things are not always the way we expect them to be, and transgender is no different – except that it’s invisible. And gets close to sex and sexuality, so it’s all icky and difficult. AND I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT!

So before you go judging someone for an existence that you don't understand, take a step back and think about how it might feel to be that kind of different. The kind of different that 'normal' people are at a loss to understand at all. THERE IS NO NORMAL. Trust me, no matter how normal you think you are, someone out there thinks you're a freak.

*wandering off course for an example* I have a friend, who is deeply Christian (in that unbelievably annoying holier than thou kind of way) she's nice enough most of the time. Then she says things like "I just wish everyone was normal like me". And I'm forced to explain reality to her. She is a narrow minded bigot. Who actually believes that believing in God makes it all ok. For her, being a Christian is a licence to commit whatever douchebaggery takes her fancy, as long as she thinks God agrees with her. And telling her that her idea of God makes me glad I'm an atheist just makes her sad for my immortal soul. As the number of topics I simply will not discuss with her grows I spend less time bothering to find space for her in my life.

But it's not about sex. And it's REALLY not about sexuality. It's about how we perceive ourselves and how others perceive us. I have it pretty easy. I know I'm a girl on the inside, most people see a girl on the outside. But growing up it wasn't always like that. I was kind of a tomboy, I liked my hair short, I played rugby and I didn't like to hang around with the other girls. I hated skirts. I lived in shorts and T-shirts. It wasn't about sexuality at all. It was about me being comfortable. It wasn't anything to do with gender either, except the piece of me that saw that boys got to have sensible hair cut and wear comfortable clothes and I didn't see any reason why I shouldn't too. I guess I have it lucky there too, I don't really give a damn what anyone else thinks about my decisions. I can thank my father for that. Among other things.

But when I got older, it got a hell of a lot more obvious I was a girl no matter what I wore and no matter how short my hair was.

It's been shorter.

So I have it easy. I know who I am, and so do you. But for many it isn't that easy. I want you to try a little thought exercise: Imagine that tomorrow morning you wake up and you're Chinese. (I apologise for this arbitrary choice, I am aiming for a group whose culture and race are far different from my own - should Chinese be an inappropriate choice for you, please choose another.)

But it's more complicated than that. On the outside you're Chinese, but on the inside you're the same as you were yesterday. And you don't really understand Chinese. Your brain knows what all the words are but they just don't make proper sense to you. Worse and worse, no matter what you try to do about it people just keep treating you like you're Chinese. Uncomfortable yet? Of course you are, because NO ONE likes being treated like something they are not. Even when it's a pretty innocuous seeming thing like being expected to want to play with dolls when you like rugby.

Everyone is different. Sometimes a person’s difference is harder to understand but that is not even in the same ball park as being wrong. That way madness lies.

When I meet intolerance in my life, I try to meet it with understanding. I try to get people to look at their prejudice from a different direction. Because everyone has something that makes them uncomfortable. And nobody wants to be uncomfortable. Sometimes understanding your douchebaggery only comes when you understand how it might be applied to YOU.

So try stopping and imagining your opinion being applied to you before you go sticking your size twelves in. You are not obliged to agree with a persons lifestyle, but try not to be a dick about it.

Peace. Out.

A brief outburst

I am an angry pedestrian. Usually I am a moderately restrained angry pedestrian, who just goes home muttering under my breath when someone is a douchebag at my expense. Today I shall throw 2c in the well instead.

FUCK YOU, STUPID BITCH WHO SWORE A BLUE STREAM AT ME WHEN SHE CUT OFF MY RIGHT OF WAY CROSSING THE ROAD TODAY. Fuck you in the ear.

Does any Christchurch driver know what the road rules with regards to pedestrians are? Seriously I am beginning to wonder. (I give my friends  the benefit of the doubt here, as _almost_ everyone I've driven with appears sane behind the wheel)

Dear stupid lady,

Had I been stupid enough to step out without looking as you clearly thought I was going to, you would probably have hit me. And then you would be facing at the very least reckless driving charges. It's a bit of a shame you didn't bother to stop to continue swearing at me, because I would have greatly enjoyed explaining to you calmly exactly which laws you broke. Possibly you could consider slowing down at corners so that the next somebody looks like maybe they might step out to cross you won't be taken by surprise.

Possibly you could also invest in a copy of the road code.

No thanks.
Me.

Two sides of the same coin? Not this time.

I have been watching the American presidential campaign with what I can only describe as baited breath. Much of the world is watching this one. Why? The rest of the world doesn't generally give a damn who some other country might elect. But this time, a country that is well known for it's interfering and aggressive foreign policy has someone I can only describe as insane trying to take the top job.

Insane? That's a big word, surely I could have just called him a dickbag as I usually would and moved along. But no. This man strikes me as having something actually wrong with him.

I've watched news broadcasts, interviews, debates, campaign ads.... from both sides, and here's what I see.

On the one side you have this black guy who finally, for the love of god, managed to get the racist douchenozzles to shut up long enough for him to get elected. Who has strong family values - real ones, not that fake shit about gays making a mockery of marriage blah blah blah, all that 'teach your kids to hate' bullshit that makes me so angry - who looks at his country and asks 'how can I make things better for the most people' not 'how can I make things better for ME'. A guy who cares about freedom for all, not just the people he agrees with. A guy who cares that his wife and every other woman has the same freedoms he does. A guy who wants every kid to have a proper education, not just the ones who can afford it. Sure he has big dreams, but if he can make even some of it happen, he'll have done a good thing. He's already done away with Don't Ask, Don't Tell, which took balls since there are a lot of morons around who just don't get it that if you take away one mans freedom it lessens us ALL. He may not have done a completely awesome job in his first term - though I think that's very debatable, I think he's done quite well considering the obstacles in his path - but he has always shown strength of character and moral fibre that I can get behind. While I was hoping that Hillary might pip him to the post and run for president when they battled for the right, in many ways I'm glad he got his go. Lets face it Hillary was basically running the show when old Billy-Boy had the chair. I think she is more jaded than Barack, and it's nice to see a president with a some enthusiasm for his job.

The other guy though, he scares me quite a bit. He wants everyone to take a big step backwards. Except him. And his fellow uber-rich (but only by default, since the things that will make his existence even more plush and sweet, will by a happy accident make all those other harry-have-it-all's lives even sweeter too). He wants women back in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant. He wants the poor to just go away. He wants homosexuals to be second-class citizens. He wants them out of the military AND he wants more wars. He wants to take rights away from considerably more than half the population of America. It beggars belief that there is even a chance that this guy might be elected. How can someone be taking your rights away and you still want to vote for him? WAKE UP PEOPLE. He comes across as an arrogant, heartless, ignorant, greedy man. He pretends to a religious faith that he does not adhere to, except the bits that suit him. And he seems to be just a bit insane. Mere inches from rabid frothing sometimes.

OK, maybe it's because 98% of what he spouts makes me want to throw up, but he seriously to me seems like he is either insane or hasn't thought through his choices very far.

This is the difference: Every time I hear Barack Obama speak, I can hear a subtext of 'I have really thought about this, and how it will affect people', 'I have really considered the options and believe this is the best course'. Every time I hear Mitt Romney speak, all I can hear is more self absorbed and thoughtless plotting. Obama is a person I can imagine being friends with. Romney is someone I would avoid on the street.