It’s only a few days before enrollment for voting closes in Aotearoa New Zealand, and it appears corporate media and the right have found their “Ram Raid” moment.
When the media set upon Labour in mid 2023 for “out of control” raids, ram raids had already been coming down for well over a year, and reached their lowest point in September 2023, just a month before the 2023 election.
Most Kiwis would have seen the news headlines about “out of control” ram raids, but they probably didn’t hear about their low point in September – and how it was already coming down well before that.
That’s because corporate media didn’t promote the latter, but certainly spent a lot of attention on the former.
The moment now looks to be “gang photos”.
Apparently, one campaign stop by Te Pati Maori was a bridge too far for New Zealand. In this country, gangs rose up from Abuse in State Care; i.e. after having suffered violent physical and sexual abuse, gangs formed from within. Luxon is well aware of this, because he launched the findings of the Royal Commission into Abuse at State Care, and was informed at length of the origination stories.
This isn’t to excuse gangs, or any of their crimes and conduct, but to reflect on their part in a society frequently betrodden by poverty and grievance.
Reaching out to find pockets of rehabilitation and connection shouldn’t be a crime.
But it is the inconsistency among Kiwis that is the question mark here.
Remember when Luxon’s Chief Policy Advisor and ex-Atlas Network partner, NZ Initiative staffer , Matt Burgess, asked Fonterra and Z Energy to use private emails to avoid public awareness?
And then copied and pasted Z and Fonterra’s law requests into law as National Party policy?
That’s criminal, but apparently it doesn’t matter if you’re not brown or poor or not in the halls of power. I say the former sentence partly facetiously, but also out of bewilderment at what we choose to be shocked at.
Let’s also take a moment to remember how David Seymour shielded a pedophile in his midst, tried to redirect victims away from police and to his party lawyer, and gave Tim Jago the power to determine whether there had been sexual assaults committed within his own Party. And ACT affiliated parties then allowed Jago to conceal his identity for years.
Then there was Seymou leaning on Auckland police to go easy on his constituent Philip Polkinghorne, despite Polkinghorne being the sole suspect in his wife’s death, and it being a live, ongoing investigation.
When is association and crime bad?
And when is it not?
War is bad too its effecting our cost of living and what are we are doing about it sucking up to the perpetrators