Posts by Hilary Stace
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Hard News: Reading the Numbers, in reply to Steve Barnes,
Tom Semmens, upthread, called TVNZ7 'earnest and dull'. I was suggesting that explosions linked to various scientific theories are neither. There are several wonderful science programmes on 7 and many feature explosions or one type or another, including the original big bang. (I'm going to particularly miss that handsome English academic who narrates various cosmological programmes). Whether scientists are themselves keen on explosions was not the point.
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Tom, you must have missed the great science programmes including those so full of explosions that they make Mythbusters look boring, the NZ teenagers doing work experience at a place of their choice (in the last one I saw a girl went to work at the V factory), even the Young Farmers competition. 7 is my default channel and I am rarely bored by what I find there.
The Wellington protest meeting last week was packed, and it was full of older angry citizens. This is definitely not the end of public service television - just what form it will take is as yet unclear. But this is a powerful demographic that expects to watch intelligent television in real time, and not behind a paywall.
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Hard News: The Editorial Image, in reply to Russell Brown,
Sydney-based Dunedin academic, Stephen Robertson, did his Hons thesis on this inquiry and the related context. He was one of the first to dig out this aspect of NZ's history. I've been referring to this thesis for years without realising that he is Grant Robertson's older brother.
Robertson, S. (1989). Production not reproduction: the problem of mental defect in New Zealand, 1900-1939. Unpublished BA Hons, University of Otago, Dunedin.
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Great to see Trace Hodgson on Media 7 last night. Have long admired his work.
However, going back to the era of Alister Taylor, Earwig and the Cock collective (my ex brother in law is Lyn Brooke White, brother of Chris, and he is still a wonderful storyteller) - they were all young. Probably most were under 30 when they did their most subversive work. So who are the young political cartoonists now?
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Hard News: The Editorial Image, in reply to Russell Brown,
Thanks for that link to my article on eugenics, Russell. I wrote that in the mid 90s, so its a bit out of date now. (The first internet search I ever did was on 'eugenics' which brought up all sorts of references to neo-Nazi groups.) Since then have found out much more about the disability aspect. The Nazi euthanasia programme started with disabled children and then spread to disabled adults and other 'undesirable' groups. The argument was primary economic - about the cost of disabled people, and how it was a cost to the rest of the citizens - and was run by clinicians and supported by medical staff, policymakers and ordinary people. So when I hear politicians targetting medical and other policies to specific groups, citing economic reasons, alarm bells ring.
Here is a poster from Wikipedia that I have linked to before which shows a nice clinician, a miserable disabled person and a caption impying that the disabled person is taking 'your' money. This poster collection (held in a US Catholic university) also has one of disabled children with a caption about the shame this brings to parents.
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I was right about the Pasifika health (and disability) funding. I think Tariana has had some effective lobbying here (although not by rich white men). Good on them.
http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/fund-improve-health-pasifika-communitiesHere is the press release from last week about the extra disability funding - can't find any more detail yet. Some of it is a catch up for the huge waiting lists for equipment, where there is big discrepancy between people funded by the MoH as opposed to those funded through ACC. There is a residential review going on which is behind the residential funding but most of that will go to the big residential providers, the staff (catch up sleepover funding?) and probably not the disabled people themselves (who may also be negatively affected by the welfare 'reforms'). The last item relates to a new way of assessment, but is not about creating or providing more services. But all better than nothing. The big worries on the horizon are the welfare 'reforms' and the education cuts.
http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/budget-2012-144m-more-disability-support-0 -
That removal of the tax credit for very low income earners is mean. It will affect young people doing things like after school jobs, and some students and women who have part time jobs. It's not that small a group when you consider that a large proportion of individuals live on around $14,000. So a single parent whose child delivers papers for some pocket money or a pensioner whose spouse does a little part time work will be the sort of families affected. That is the group who would have benefited most from Labour's policy of no tax on the first $5000 or even Gareth Morgan's Big Kahuna.
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I'm going to be looking closely for disability stuff. However, only the feel good headlines about extra spending will get a mention in the speech - the details about what and where and at what cost to other programmes is usually hidden deep in obscure departmental detail. Fuller details - of all the good news - don't usually come out until the Minister puts out a press release. I am expecting to see some funds for Pacifika disability research and implementation. There will probably be more money for cochlear implants but not any more resourcing for New Zealand Sign Language. Probably also a boost for Individualised Funding, but not to pay parent carers.
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My ex brother-in-law was one of the Cock collective. I think I've still got a few issues around somewhere.
I cheered that Hodgson cartoon. When you think of the changes ahead for disabled people and beneficiaries in the welfare 'reforms' it is quite appropriate to reflect back to another era when disabled people and other groups were seen as less worthy humans, and were targets of state policies.
Tim, thank you for mentioning the Cartoon Archive. I spent a pleasant time a few years ago 'cataloguing' (for Tapuhi) a couple of decades of Nevile Lodge's work, and developed a new respect for the cartoonist's craft.
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I used to love the posters in the staffroom on SS in the 90s. Quite subversive some of them, especially in that neo-lib political era of TINA (there is no alternative).