Club Politique by Che Tibby

In line with a concerted, if not somewhat patronising, attempt on my part to try and understand the minds of the average Right-Wing-Death-Beast I blundered willingly into the fray this past week. In an effort to find out if their bad behaviour in the online comments feature of various New Zealand blogs really was like watching a nightmare of unsolicited letters to the editor explode in devastating bundles of poorly formed sentences and circular arguments.

After a few tentative foray into bulletin boards in the mid-1990s I stayed well away from this sort of forum, on account of quickly realising it was much like trying to argue with drunk blokes in the pub, i.e. lots of piss and vinegar. But, to be more specific, it was a very particular type of pub ranter.

I’ve always been of the opinion you can pretty much peg someone when they’re a kid and guess how they’ll turn out. RWDB online are usually much like that annoying fat kid at intermediate, the one who’s sure he’s got the entire world well and truly sorted out (and of course it pivots on him), but if only someone would listen. On the other hand, conscientious Lefties are more often than not like the willowy goth kid at High School, the one who carries the world on his narrow, slightly hunched, angsty shoulders.

Anyway, based on my previous experiment, I figured that I would be pretty damn easy to pick a fight with the RWDB, and almost impossible to rile the Lefties. There’s no point getting into details, or pointing any fingers, but let me say this. While the ‘Lefties’ we all too happy to apologise for saying something inappropriate (say, in regard to the early claims that the London bombings were actually ‘power surges’ in an effort to do a cover-up), more often than not being even slightly questioned by people seems to push the average RWDB into a freaking frenzy.

Guys, let me say this. Where I come from, if you behaved like that in the pub, there would be no end of people willing to take you outside and help you calm down a little. More than willing. Maybe you should start to think of moderation as a survival instinct.

In their defence though, the types of stuff being spouted by some of these assholes is little different in content to some newspaper editors, such as this bloke over at The Australian doing his ‘nana in an effort to absolve the West of any responsibility for the attitudes of Islamic Extremists. Frankly, this type of ‘they just hate us because we’re great’ attitude reflects an ostriching of the head like no other.

When I wasn’t making a pratt of myself firing out comments to annoy RWDB this week I was stepping back and taking a look at the state of morality in ‘the West’. Let’s face facts. The only thing I possibly agree about with a leather-pants wearing fundamentalist like Brian Tamaki about is the decline of morality in New Zealand (as an example). Our society is currently more hedonistic, more morally relative, and more lax in its Judeo-Christian values than at any other time in our history.

The difference between me and Brian?

I kind of like it.

But going back to the bigger picture, there’s only one major difference between the message that Brian is peddling and message of the Islamic Extremists. Brian isn’t likely to disappear in an explosion of teeth whitener, mousse, and tan-in-a-can anytime soon. So Brian may well be a closed minded dickhead who’s loving his bringing it to his people from behind the banner of absolute morality, but I can’t see him actually condone killing anyone. Although, if history has taught one lesson again and again it’s that the ones who trumpet values and morality from the rooftops are usually the ones with something to hide. Time will tell.

So, while our lax morality may well peeve the Extremists, trying to blame the excesses of the West for the entire pantheon of Islamic fundamentalist movements is a little too solipsistic even for RWDB. Has anyone forgotten the number one issue in the Middle East since 1948? Has anyone forgotten that Al Qaeda had long demanded that the US remove its excesses from the sacred soil of Saudi Arabia?

Ignoring these issues in favour of a grand conflation of all Islamic movements into one great satan is simply ignorant.

Look, what it all seems to boil down to is that like all conservatives, RWDB are characteristically unwilling to even glimpse the possibility of change on their part. It is always someone else who has the problem, or someone else who is leading to the downfall of society, or someone else who needs to improve their act. And meanwhile, they wave their arms and scream and yell that everything would be better had someone listened to their narrow, aggro, petty points of view.

And my message? Get out of your jim-jams, and go talk to some real people, the fresh air will do you good.

The interesting thing about a blog is that it starts to become something of a life lived online. And being a blogger and blogging is opening yourself up to all kinds of criticism about things you’ve blogged. Mind you, I wouldn’t be phased if the blogsphere wasn’t populated with all too many persons infected with blogmania, they are after all, our readers.

As it is, even the cursory inspection of any New Zealand blogroll will undoubtedly turn up a number of characters all competing for the same blogshare. And readers are usually only willing to increase their numbers in the event of a blogstorm the likes of which we saw last Friday. And, should such a blog swarm occur, you can bet it will pretty quickly shorten tempers in the blogging community.

Trying to explain the relevance of a ‘blawg’ to a mainstream media person, thereby increasing the chance of being included in any forthcoming blogumentary discussion, inevitably brings back the chances of having to mention persons of exceptional blogebrity, such as myself of course, but also persons like DPF (who seems to use his site as a photoblog more often than not).

David, we’re all waiting for the podcast to begin. Come on now, don’t be shy, we know you’re dead-set on podcasting, and there’s a world of National Party podcasters waiting to follow your lead.

Still, DPF could put up a warblog, which would dent what I consider to be his relative professionalism. Despite his obvious partisan leanings that is. All warblogger retards should be banned from warblogging or any other kind of commentary full stop. Guys, no one out there cares if you’ve gone and bought yourself an iPod to get some ‘street cred’. We all know there are iPodders and there are Warhammer nerds. Enough said.

But, all these things said, having to e-nable my half-baked opinions twice a week or more, find the correct Public Address URL, and loan in all the things I need to say to piss off everyone with the suffix ‘Pundit’, is providing a bigger task than trying to figure out why they never use the prefix ‘Pundit’. Which is something you can never explain to the ignorant fuckers in the Liberal Media when they’re thinking of making that documentary about this new internet phenomena.

I’m thinking that I might just give up, and try to do something that will automatically result in the addition of the suffix ‘gate’ to my activities, and publicise the entire procedure on a couple of great overseas sites like Xanga or LiveJournal. This would probably require something of a content management system (or CMS for short) or failing that, a killer app to coordinate the vast socialist conspiracy a good scandal requires.

Alternatively, I could just get in a webmistress, because girls are better at organising things than boys. Naturally she’ll recommend a good trackback function, so we can see who out there is taking my thoughts to pieces and using them against me, while we just go overseas for a weekend and record it all on the appropriate travelblog. I’m no Emo.

Although, I have been accused of considering myself metrosexual for all that talk of recipes. My counter-assertions that my interest in fishing and diving makes me a retrosexual only seems to warrant decent attention in friendblogs mind you. These are the same sorts of friends who put you up to dares involving trying to find places for words like watchblog, videoblog, Vlog, Vog, Vloggers, Vlogging and Vlogged, so they can sit and giggle on their moblog readers.

It’s becoming a sad, sad world people.

I should address a few of the replies from last Fridays post. But first, thanks to those who wrote, and it was good to hear from friends in London who got in touch through the reply button. I sincerely hope knowing that 'home' was still a safe place helped to soothe the nerves a little.

Second, let's face facts, all killing is murder, whether you're dressed in a uniform and accidentally killing your own forces in 'friendly fire', civilians in 'collateral damage', blokes in some other uniform who might be legitimate targets, or guerrillas who'd just as quickly do the same thing to you. Whatever way you dress it up, get emotional about it, or try not to enjoy it, killing is killing.

So while it would be delightful to all live in some utopia where this sort of thing never happens, we all know that it's not going to happen in our lifetime. You can be the most loving, famously half-naked hippy in history, and there's still a chance some lunatic will shoot you at the door to your hotel room.

Strangely, 'peace' is not a particularly infectious meme. But 'hate' and 'anger' are.

And New Zealand is not some perfect haven from the hate building across the globe. But, I'm sticking to my guns on this one, I simply cannot see New Zealand as a credible target in the eyes of the current batch Islamic extremists.

Now taiho there people, before you go racing to the reply button to take a piece out of me, hear me out. I'm not arguing that New Zealand is not a target in the war on terror. I'm arguing that New Zealand is a small and unimportant target, one waaaay down the list of possible places to strike.

I know that New Zealanders like to think that we're movers and shakers in the heady world of political affairs, but sorry, no. New Zealand is a little place thousands of miles from anywhere. We might be active players through our troops in Afghanistan and a navy involved in the Gulf, but as far as global events go, we simply don't register on the radar.

Why do I think this? Because one of the characteristics of guerrilla and terror conflicts is the limited power and resources of one side of the conflict. Naturally there are exceptions to this, but what you can point to in wars like the American War of Independence, the Boer War, the New Zealand Land Wars, or any other asymmetrical conflagration is one side having to avoid any stand-up fight with the bigger player.

OK, now let's put aside all the emotive feeling about Islamic extremists and what they've been doing, and look at the realities. These groups do not have unlimited resources. While they could well have substantial resources, they do not have an endless reach.

Also, terrorism is all about symbolism and fear. If this is the correct group, by their own admission, Thursday's bombers were striking because of Blair's involvement in the 'liberation of Iraq', and wanted to make the British burn with 'fear and panic'. Of course, the British said 'get fucked', and despite the sickening media frenzy trying to prove the contrary, don't appear to be particularly phased (as an ex-flatmate, a born and bred Londoner, replied to me "Hello, I'm fine thanks, just another day in London town. I'm sort of used to it, growing up with I.R.A attacks and wotnot.")

Like Madrid, London wasn't a random target seized on by madmen, it was a deliberate target because of Blair's policies and close relationship with Bush. You can try and repaint that picture any way you like, but it's the cold hard fact of the matter. Downing Street is, as is the Beehive, a willing participant in the war on terror.

Consequently, like London, New Zealand has to be considered a legitimate target. But let's return to the issue of resources. My knowledge of Islamic extremists in our part of the world is sketchy at best, I've spent the last few years reading into how to make people getting along as idiot-proof as possible, but I do not think that we are the target in this region. If you have limited resources you pick your targets very carefully.

And if what you have is limited resources and need to get the biggest media concentration possible, are you going to hit New Zealand? Sure, a strike all the way over here would demonstrate to the world that absolutely no one is safe, but there will be the question, why Auckland? Helen hasn't been cozying up to the Americans, hasn't been making grandiose statements about New Zealand's unwavering dedication to the war on terror, and hasn't been making veiled threats to kick arse in South East Asia should the need arise. New Zealand may well have troops in the Middle East, but our contingent is so very much smaller than everyone else we slip under the radar.

Try and think like a terrorist for a moment. You're going to nail Sydney.

Yes, I have many friends and family living in London, and I too am worried about them. To my infinite relief the emails home have already begun to flood in. But I also fear for what it must be like to be Muslim in Britain today. It is a bad, bad day to be black under the Union Jack.

I say this because, though London is yet another tragedy in the war on terror, we can't have the deaths of all those innocent lives provide yet another rod to beat the backs of an entire other group of innocents.

And that's my fear, that simply being Muslim will be enough to incur the wrath of angry, bewildered and vengeful citizens of many countries, not just Britain. Once again, the spectre of fundamentalist Islam will be raised by those who want to scare you into hating innocent Muslims in quiet havens like New Zealand.

But, let me make one point very clear, Al Qaeda is to Islam what the IRA is to Catholicism. The IRA exploding bombs in London did not equate to Catholicism being a threat to everyone. No-one invented farcical terms like 'Islamopopists'.

Let me repeat the title above. DO NOT BE AFRAID. This type of attack will not occur in New Zealand. We have not made any insane enemies. We have not followed our powerful friends into any foolhardy, greedy wars. Since long before September 11 we have been known as an open and tolerant country that accepted 'others' like Muslims into our society. Nothing that has happened over the past few years should change that, and nothing that has happened can justify ever changing that.

But in Britain? The British already have far, far too many kinderfascists who will already be using this attack to galvanise their support. Already the angry words are being muttered, soon to be screamed at people who do not deserve hatred. Already the spectre of the Jewish pogroms that beset innocents in another age will be waiting just over the rise. And I say that we should have no part of it, lest we become the animals all these fundamentalists are.

Again. Do not be afraid. Do not ignore that the lives of ordinary people have been taken. But do not give in to the purpose of these acts; to make us have to hate.

And what can we then do? Oppose fundamentalism in ANY form. Oppose the National Front. Oppose haters like the Destiny Church. Oppose our most xenophobic leaders, who would bring such a war to our doorstep to satisfy their own Byzantine ambition. Oppose Right-Wing-Death-Beasts and their petty, mindless vitriol. Oppose anyone who would prevent such fools as these having their own stupid, blinkered voices. Oppose killing any person for any reason.

And be thankful you are safe in New Zealand, while others will fall victim to a war spiralling out of control.

One of things I’ve always loved about being a New Zealander is having to maintain ‘the reputation’. After all, reputation is what sustains us when we’re overseas. So for example you have to ensure that you work your backside off when you’re in Australia, because we are the hard workers, and the Aussies are lazy bastards.

When I first heard that I had to perform when I was out of the country I was a little taken aback, at first mistaking the comment as an insult on my ability to put in the hard yard, but soon woke up to the fact that it’s in every Kiwi’s best interest to maintain the reputation. As it was, Kiwi’s were always employed in places I looked for work, because ‘everybody knows’ we can get the job done.

Like my grandfather said to me one time when I was a lad, do it once and do it right.

The other great thing about being a New Zealander is having to maintain the reputation for hospitality. Sure, there’s a lot of ‘blah’ about this in the media just at the moment on account of people opening doors left, right and centre to accommodate the Lions and get Willy’s attention, but year by year I’m convinced that it is the case.

Don’t you just feel stink if you can’t take something over to someone’s place if they invite you round for dinner? Even if it’s a packet of biscuits hastily bought from a price-gouging corner dairy, you just have to take something. Unless you’re staying with Mum. Likewise, if you have people over to stay you have to put on a decent meal for them, or make sure they’ve got a comfy place to sleep.

And, whether we admit it to ourselves or not, we feel a little pissed off if guests don’t ‘bring something with’.

Hospitality is after all a two-way street. You take something to show you appreciate them putting you up, or just plain putting up with you, and they do what they can to make you feel as at home as possible. It’s just the right way to do things.

You can imagine my consternation then at having a tribe of Americans living with us who haven’t brought so much as fish and chips into the house, despite us consistently making extra room at the table for them. In their defence, they did leave us most of a bottle of vodka, because they tried and didn’t like it. And, they leave tomorrow, so there’s still time for them to surprise me.

Anyhow. I escaped the loudness of my flat to a mate’s place last night, taking a bottle of ‘very very expensive’ wine, on account of a particular tradition taking pace. I thought I might record the event, and translate it to you, the reader.

The Tory’s Curry Night
Pretty much as long as I’ve know this couple Tuesdays is Curry Night. As it turns out, the recipe they use is almost exactly the same as a recipe I first tried when spearfishing up on the East Coast a few years back. I’d brought back a bunch of these cod and they were in a word, ordinary. I disguised the taste with the curry sauce. So, you can use fish if you want, but the Torys usually buy chicken.

To feed two people you’ll need,
Two medium to small pots and matching lids.
A couple of tea-towels.
Wooden Spoon.

About 300-400g of diced chicken, fish, tofu, whatever you want to include.
50g, or, a tablespoon of curry paste.
One tin of coconut cream, whatever type you want, there’s not too much difference except price.
Two tablespoons of olive oil.
One cup of frozen green peas.
Half a cup of rice per person.

First get the rice on. This is a little tricky. Put it in one of the pots, and fill it with water to about 1cm above the level of the rice. Put it on an element and turn up the heat to full. When the rice begins to boil, let it do that for about two minutes.

Now, if you’re time dyslexic or don’t carry a watch, here’s an old trick. Chuck a bit of bread in the microwave, and set it for two minutes. When it goes ‘bong’, you’re done.

Switch off the element under the rice, and cover the pot with its lid. Then cover the lid with the two tea-towels, which should be folded so they sit neatly over the top, but don’t touch any hot bits, like gas flames… If you have to ask why, get someone else to do the cooking.

Then just leave the rice to steam. The idea is that the tea-towels keep the lid down and the steam in. By the time you’ve cooked the curry (about twenty minutes), it’ll be good to go.

This curry is not complicated. The one trick is the curry paste. DO NOT USE CURRY POWDER. Powders are for people called ‘Gladys’ or ‘Flo’. As it is there are a hundred different pastes on the market, red, green, massam, thai, etc. so just try one you like the look of. You can buy it in sachets that are about enough to flavour a meal for two, or you can buy it in jars that have enough for a number of meals. If you buy the latter then just use a little over a tablespoon for two people.

OK, so now to the cooking. Heat the oil in a pot till it’s quite warm, then add the curry paste. While it’s heating through, open your tin of coconut cream, and when the paste is really bubbling, add about half the tin.

Then, reduce the heat to a simmer, and stir the mixture till the oil starts to look like it’s separating out of the coconut cream, maybe three minutes. Add the meat and cook for another five to eight minutes. When you can’t see pink on any bits of the chicken, break a bit with the wooden spoon. If it’s cooked thru, add the peas, and the rest of the coconut cream.

Finally heat the lot till you’re sure the peas are heated through, serve the rice onto plates or bowls, add the curry, pour yourself a wine (if you haven’t already), and you’re good to go!

Oh, and ‘flash’ cooks will substitute the last half the coconut cream for the same amount of stock (make sure you reduce to get good consistency), add a dash of fish sauce to the adding meat stage, and garnish with fresh coriander and fried shallots. Make this one for your next house guests. Enjoy.