Thursday, October 18, 2007

Section 59 poem

by my sister over at most-tranquil.blogspot.com

The sky is blue, the sun is hot,
Two redheads wait in a shady spot,
In front of them a table stands,
A trusty, stable Bunnings brand.

To a pole and a fence signs are taped,
The content of which make people gape,
'What's this about?' a person asks,
'A stupid legislation has just been passed.'

'Under this law, if you smack your child,
(They don't care if his behavior's wild),
Into your house civil servants will come,
Beating upon their proverbial drum.

'“So you smack your child,' is what they'll say,
We're sorry, we must take your child away,
Because, (and we're certain that you'll agree)
For your child, State care is a necessity.”

And that's exactly what they'll do,
Your child will enter a State run zoo,
If you dare to use your parental right,
Your child will be in a miserable plight.

So help us today, and sign the petition,
Make an end to Sue Bradford's ambition,
If you don't do it now it might be too late,
Please save our kids from a horrible fate.

Violence rocks "anti-smacking" Sweden

Ruby Harold Claesson reports from Sweden.

I have some devastating news from Sweden, but I haven't had the time to write an article as yet. You see, violence among juveniles - even those belonging to the upper middle class - is at its peek. On October 6 inst. a father shot and killed a 15-yr old and seriously wounded a 16 yr old. The gang of mopedist (motor driven cycle) youngsters had terrorised the man's family for more than two years, their reports to the police were ignored etc. That night the youngsters entered the family's home, threatening then with sticks and other arms and the man acted in self-defence.

Same night October 6, a 16-yr old in Stockholm was clubbed and kicked to death by youngsters of the same age.

June 19, 2007, two 15 yr olds and a 16 yr old torture a handicapped man to death.

The list can be made much longer.

"We are now beginning to see the results of the general lack of standards that the social-democrats made their political agenda during the 1960's and 70's. It was about their views of the family, school and teaching and also about law and justice on the whole", wrote Justice minister Gun Hellsvik and School minister Beatrice ask in their article "Youngsters must be faced with a firm reaction", that was published in "Burning point", in the Swedish Daily on Sept. 5, 1993. The Govt. ministers (conservative) stipulated that Sweden needs a new family policy.

Commissioner wants child poverty addressed

"It is my job to ensure the rights of every child and young person in New Zealand are recognised and each enjoys good health, education, safety and economic well being."

No the heck it isn't.  The title of "children's commissioner" is a very new one and created by this Labour Government.  She is simply another tool in Nanny State's hand, attempting to scare New Zealanders into embracing more state control of their lives.  No the Government is not responsible to ensure that every child is healthy or has a good education or economic well being.  Safety is an area where I grant you, the Government should have some jurisdiction.  However for the other four areas mentioned, it is clearly the job of the parents to manage these aspects in the life of their child on a day to day basis.  At some point, without a question, it becomes necessary for the Government to step in to halt a horrible miscarriage of justice, of parents upon their own children.

Legislating against every single family is simply going to make the situation worse.  What is needed, and it is painfully obvious, is sensible sentencing.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Turning the tables

by Lavinia Ngatoko from The Challenge Weekly

New Zealanders are being urged to get involved in a campaign aimed at getting the required number of signatures needed for referenda on the anti-smacking law and family issues.

Unity for Liberty, a recently formed group of people fighting the legislation, is running The Great New Zealand Table Challenge next month.

The aim is to get people armed with pens, tables and petitions out into their communities to help get the 300,000 signatures required to force a referendum at next year’s elections. These must be collected by March 1 next year.

There are two petitions, one against the anti-smacking law and the other covering the wider issue of family breakdown in the country.

Craig Hill of Unity for Liberty is asking for 2,500 volunteers, each pledging to get 40 signatures, to come out on the first Saturday of November.

This would result in the collection of 100,000 signatures, he said.

He warned that although the group sympathised with those calling for harsher penalties, it was concerned that good parents were not protected under the current law.

“It will require more than hype and hysteria to change this situation and turn our society from total disaster,” he said.

“To effect change requires calm and deliberate steps to be made. The first step for New Zealanders is to petition for a citizens’ initiated referendum so they can have their say at the 2008 election.” Mr Hill is encouraging those who would like to get involved to start preparing now by ringing their local shops or banks to ask for permission to set up tables outside their premises.

Although people are being encouraged to do this every Saturday of November, if they can get involved on more days that would be even better.

Mr Hill said his group had initially tried to find volunteers to hold placards on footpaths to raise awareness, but had found that difficult to achieve.

“People are willing to sign, but churches don’t seem interested in getting involved,” he said. Petition forms can be downloaded from www.unityforliberty.net.nz/petition.html or www.familyfirst.org.nz

Forum photos

Bradford.

The panel, left to right: Judith Collins (National), Pita Parone (New Zealand First), Secretary of ACT, Russell Fairbrother (Labour), Sue Bradford (Greens), Gordon Copeland (Future New Zealand) and Judy Turner (United Future)

Forum on the Family

It's 48 minutes into tomorrow, so I will give a very quick report on the Forum on the Family hosted by Family First on Monday 15 October 2007.

We heard an excellent address from Garth McVicar of the Sensible Sentencing Trust. He is calling not primarily for longer sentences as such, but just that there would be integrity in our justice system, so that for instance, when a life sentence is handed out, it is in fact a life sentence. Currently, prisoners can get out on an automatic 1/3 of their sentence on parole. Many violent offenders (and that's a very politically correct way of putting it - what about scum of the earth) re-offend while out on bail, go back into jail for a few more years of the easy life, then back out onto the street again to molest or murder a few more innocent victims before the mind-numbingly stupid cycle again repeats itself.

John Tamihere spoke well about not much in particular.

Ian Grant captivated us with down to earth parenting tips. Quite frankly, I wasn't at the forum for parenting tips as I'm one or two years away from being in a position where such information would be helpful. :)

Christine Rankin gave a rousing commentary on her life, and how we should say positive things about people. Apparently she's a buddhist, well she's the blimmin well best buddhist I've met.

Ali Harley, despite her starting off comments, actually had a lot of useful things to say. Her big thing was "if you want to make a difference, if you want to get into the media, make sure that it is dead easy for the media, the reporters to get in touch with you - have your cellphone on!"

Mr. Guyan had some good points too. He's into Christian media. His message was "images are so much more powerful than words, it is images that stick in people's minds."

John Tamihere and Ian Grant disappointed me with their unnecessary use of the B word relating to paedophilia. I'm not going to rave about the low points, there weren't many. It was a good conference thanks Bob, and the good strong coffee and the fantastic food were really appreciated.

If you didn't make it to the forum this time round, be there in 2008.