Hard News: I'm a Pakeha and you can stick your war
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michael laws: two words, "eye" + "liner".
He should perhaps also note that if he's going to complain about Teh Gays, it would be wise to not write columns going into quite so much detail about Doug Howlett's pumping thighs.
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There is however the partial defence of - I forget what it's technically called - blind rage.
The partial defence (that turns a murder rap into manslaughter) is provocation.
The Law Commission has recommended getting rid of it. It largely stems from a time when the death penalty was mandatory for murder and there were some people whom we felt sorry enough for that we didn't think they deserved to die.
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There is however the partial defence of - I forget what it's technically called - blind rage.
This is basically a defence of insanity, I think, albeit temporary. It's the old "I was out of control and therefore not responsible for my actions" one.
And yes, the gay panic defence was absolutely disgusting and I hope it gets excised from the case law at the earliest possible opportunity. Perhaps McVicar is wanting to create a tagger panic defence too?
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Oh sorry, I simul-posted with Graeme - I would trust his legal advice far ahead of mine, I didn't finish law school.
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Dave Hansford, formerly and controversially of the Listener, won his category and was in the final three for best overall columnist, which was won (cue massed gritting of teeth in the room) by Paul Holmes, who can actually write, dammit.
Russell, is there any way we can read Paul Holmes' winning columns or are they not available on the net? It hurts me physically to think he won a national writing award. Okay, he CAN write and I did find his article on P interesting (one of the rare occasions I bought the HoS) but with Holmes it is always about HIM and surely, surely, surely we have better writers with better insights than Holmes. Some of the writings of Dave Hayward are brilliant and column-ish- hmmm - not in print though.
And I have often had a look at the winning blog and think of it as too esoteric to be a national winner. But then again, I don't know what the criteria are. So condolences - you should have been there.
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I long ago decided that listening to or reading Michael Laws was like accidentally seeing some beastiality on your PC - before you realise it, you've lost something you can never get back.
So I don't listen to him or read his words. Simple.
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Garth George was one of the judges according to th website
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Russell, is there any way we can read Paul Holmes' winning columns or are they not available on the net? It hurts me physically to think he won a national writing award.
It shouldn't, really. I wouldn't say he's my favourite columnist, but he writes authentically and with some heart. You know what he's said when you finish reading. I'll happily read him, which I can't say for Laws or Martin Devlin.
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And yes, the gay panic defence was absolutely disgusting and I hope it gets excised from the case law at the earliest possible opportunity.
Don't say that too loudly around McVicar and the rest of the SST/Family Fist crowd. You'll be contributing to the moral decline of society if you don't let God-fearing heterosexual males beat the life out of any of those limp-wristed nancy boys who makes a pass!
</completely unveiled sarcasm>There're a goodly number of crimes on the books that should be removed/rewritten. One that really gets up my nose is the decision by our wonderful leaders (and this goes for pretty much every party) to continue the inequity that says that males cannot be raped. We can be sexually violated, with the same book penalties as for rape, but "sexual violation" just doesn't have the same emotional connotations in society's collective mind.
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I wouldn't say he's my favourite columnist, but he writes authentically and with some heart.
I know what you mean - the column I read was heartfelt and engaging.
But I feel that his heart is sentimental - and he has no self-irony.
And I find it hard to forgive him for Holmes!
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I think the elected mayor concept just encourages egotripping assholes (it's just the same in the UK)
the horrifying Boris....should i read his first novel "Seventy two Virgins" I wonder??
I can't fathom how he won. Surely it isn't just becoz he's a famous dickhead. Hope it's not becoz voters are so disillusioned they vote in any old prat.
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I can't fathom how he won.
Because he was on the other team from Gordon Brown. Simple, really.
Though the fact that Red Ken was actually pursuing a left-wing agenda in London made it far more difficult for Boris than his party-mates had it in the rest of the country.
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McVicar really is from the Seniel Sentences Trust.
I can't quite understand how he can maitain such bitterness and loathing for others.
Does he have a hard done-by story?
His identifying with the guy who stabbed the youth, is it age, race, class?
Is he finding an acceptable outlet for racism like Greg O'Connor does?
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I basically haven't listened to talkback radio since about 1995 (well, excluding radio sport which on a rare occasion can get me hitting the off dial, like during Veitch, Deaker, Lose... OK so half of it).
I replaced all that time with bourban's & Cokes and plenty of beer.
It's been a beautiful time in my life.
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Nick, your comment seems to have escaped notice.
I have seen the Holocaust misused often for petty unsubstantial political agendas, right and left ... but the complaint you make against Laws is real and serious. Frankly, the guy should be off radio and print for that shit. It's outrageous.
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I think the elected mayor concept just encourages egotripping assholes (it's just the same in the UK)..
Boris Johnson won. Get over it. And at the risk of being a tad bitchy, this is about as tiresome as the numptys over on Kiwiblog who think MMP is an unmitigated disaster because it doesn't deliver the results they like.
We'd be better off with leaders chosen by a (preferably proportionately elected) council majority - that way, we'd get someone who could build a broad coalition of supporters.
To be a little cynical, we might just end up getting a mayor who makes enough promsies behind closed doors to swing a majority. Don't see how that's much of an improvement.
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Nick & Don, the comments were noticed but I don't listen to Laws & this jem isn't online so over to you to get a recording of it and make it known or make a complaint.
Once a recording or transcript is in the open I'll comment then.
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The 'broken windows' thing works for graffiti. At least in toilets.
A long, long time ago, I was researching gender differences in toilet graffiti, and noticed that some rest-rooms had none, while others had large amounts of 'data'. The previous research suggested that prompt cleaning reduced the overall volume, and this was borne out with some conversations with the cleaners of the non-graffitied toilets. (Blatant plug: If you wanna read the resulting article, feel free to email me for a copy)
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The most disgusting views I have had heard Laws express on Radio were those on the family who had their power cut off and the mother, who needed a mains powered oxygen machine to assist with breathing, died.
His lack of empathy on a wide range of issues I cannot reconcile, it is his nature to be insulting in the extreme. The extreme standpoints he takes are a method of fostering debate, getting callers and attention.
Some of the concerns/viewpoints he expresses are a litmus test/indicator of what amounts to valid concerns and others are just nasty and puerile.
The problem with journalism in NZ, IMHO, is the prevalence of the “Look at me, look at me, look at meeeee” factor.
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What a yucky strange man Mr Laws is.
I'm ranting, raving lunatic with paranoia that our major newspaper publishers are trying kill me (Russ will attest to my freakouts) so this just further cements my fear that New Zealanders have gone mad.
The 'broken window', zero tolerance policy that Guliani (himself a very strange man who now profits off fear....he's like some terror threat consultant) introduced were brought in to a city with outrageous crime levels. It doesn't matter if they worked or if the downturn in crime was caused by other economic factors, New Zealand simply isn't a crack house crammed hell whole of homeless junkies stealing your grandma's purse.
I noticed in the Dom P today that there was another doom and gloom article about house prices. The ridiculous thing was the stats showed that house prices are actual up on this time last year.
PANIC!!!!!
15 year old 'ethnic' children are spraying my mortgage with gansta rappings.
I think tagging is much less ugly than say 60% of the post war buildings in Wellington. Or say 100% of the houses in churton park.
Give taggers a break. What else are kids who can only afford two glasses of milk a day gonna do? I mean if this was the good old days they 'd just be sitting around putting on eyeliner and drinking milk non-stop.
.....eee gads, and the Austrian dungeon reference.
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I've been thinking about line that today. I'm more shocked that no editor had the good sense and decency to yank it out.
Sorry for being a broken record here, but I'm still trying to fathom why Cate Brett hasn't had the contents of her desk thrown out the nearest window.
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@ Che:
michael laws: two words, "eye" + "liner".
I thought it was one word, "mascara"?
@ Nick: Thanks for the radio report; perhaps my earlier analogy was not so wrong after all. A person would really have to be thinking like a Nazi to argue that they didn't kill "their own people," no? And even if you did want to make that comparison, maybe you could advance a half-decent notion about what the Burmese junta counts as "their own people," which would at least be interesting, if not getting us very far in changing the junta's mind about anything.
In any case, I would have thought a more compelling analogy than the Holocaust (hello, Mr Godwin!) would be the US federal government turning away foreign aid after Hurricane Katrina, less than three years ago. Fresh and relevant and controversial.
You'd have thought Laws' own recent family troubles - and the accompanying public sympathy, including mine - might have tempered his reflexive tendency to put rhetoric before ethics like a bad high school debater. But no.
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You'd have thought Laws' own recent family troubles - and the accompanying public sympathy, including mine - might have tempered his reflexive tendency to put rhetoric before ethics like a bad high school debater. But no.
That's the first thing I thought when I read Russell's post, Jolisa. I felt terribly sorry for Laws when the news about his daughter came out. I've had a husband with leukemia, so I know the treatment is rough, and I would imagine it's all very hard on one so small. I too would have thought that his empathy levels would have risen somewhat. It speaks volumes, however, about him as a person that all this could happen to him, and he's still a showoff prick.
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I can't fathom how he (BorisJohnson)) won. Surely it isn't just becoz he's a famous dickhead.
Well, it works in Auckland and Wanganui, why not London?
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You'd have thought Laws' own recent family troubles - and the accompanying public sympathy, including mine - might have tempered his reflexive tendency to put rhetoric before ethics like a bad high school debater. But no.
I don't see why -- I know some thoroughly appalling people whose deep love for their families are their sole redeeming feature. Otherwise, still triple-decker turd burgers.
Well, it works in Auckland and Wanganui, why not London?
To play devil's advocate for a moment, perhaps Messers Hubbard and Livingstone would have been returned to office if they'd expended as much time and energy on articulating 'why I deserve another go around" as they did saying 'my opponent eats kittens'.
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