View from the National Party
Just in case anyone thought National? had not bought into the “only men commit violence’ argument…
Blue has also said she wants? Women’s? Affairs expanded and given more power and funding under National, as they try to? gain the Women’s vote that they believe cost them the last election.?
___________
“Anyone who considers that women have reached equality and that these pioneering groups are redundant, should look at the grim statistics on violence against women and children and talk to the volunteers at women’s refuges.”
? ___________________________?
114 Years Since Suffrage – But Still Work To Do
Press Release by New Zealand National Party at 8:57 am, 17 Sep 2007
It is 114 years since women were given the vote, but there is still work to do, says National’s Women’s Affairs spokeswoman, Dr Jackie Blue.
“Many women’s groups established in the first half of the 20th century still exist today and continue to be strong advocates for women’s rights.
“Just three years after women were given the vote in 1896 the National Council of Women, with Kate Sheppard as president, was the first to set up. This organisation is still going strong today, influencing policy and keeping successive governments firmly to account.”
Others quickly followed and it is a credit that they remain active today:
Plunket (1908); New Zealand Federation of Country Women’s Institutes (1921); New Zealand Federation of Graduate Women (1922); The Women’s Division of Federated Farmers – now known as Rural Women (1925); The Sex Hygiene and Birth Regulation Society – now known as Family Planning (1935); The New Zealand Federation of Business and Professional Women (1939); The Maori Women’s Welfare League (1951).
“Anyone who considers that women have reached equality and that these pioneering groups are redundant, should look at the grim statistics on violence against women and children and talk to the volunteers at women’s refuges.
“A recent example of a modern-day advocacy group is the Breast Cancer Aotearoa Coalition, which was established in 2004 and is fighting to obtain funding for a 12-month course of Herceptin, which is the international standard of care for women with an aggressive form of breast cancer.
“Suffrage week is an ideal opportunity to congratulate the groups, both past and present, that continue the fight.”
ENDS
If it is suffrage week, I would like to remember all those brave men who fought for a vote for their family, especially those that gave their life so that their descendants might enjoy that priviledge.
Comment by Bevan Berg — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 10:02 am
Here here!
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 10:40 am
Hear hear!
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 10:40 am
Harre harre!
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 10:41 am
As it’s nearly upon us, perhaps we could use Suffrage week to let the public know when all men got one vote each. It was 1890 – a whopping 3 years before the women.
All men were finally granted a vote in 1881. Prior to then, only men who owned land could vote. From 1881 to 1890, men who owned land in several electorates got to vote several times.
So the truth is, when women first got the right to vote, voting was a novelty to most men as well.
Comment by Rob Case — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 11:47 am
MY father was a prisoner of war for 4 years and just what privilege am I enjoying now? The only ones enjoying the privileges are those like my ex-wife, whos father worked for the Nazis in the second world war.
Comment by Kenny — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 11:59 am
Some people think women have got a copyright on suffrage. Men got out and fought for suffrage, and women want all the credit, but thats not how it will be in the news next week.
Comment by Bevan Berg — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 1:42 pm
National cannot understand that children do not need a Minstry of Women ‘s Affairs if there isn’t a Ministry of Mens Affairs .
Children need balanced adults from both agenda’s that are not affected by insipid ideology’s that taint children’s behaviours .
Go Miss Blue , go National fancy nancy girls, go , increase fatherlessness in society with your old fashioned deranged thinking . We can expect the same old crap under National wimps !
Children look set to suffer under a blue or red regime, as the all powerful sisterhood is the gutless/jellyfish politicians Goddess of destruction of the family and fathers !
We sent men to die on battlefields so we could protect the family unit , now the government is in the fractured family business. Go figure and I am ashamed to have helped bring four kiwi born kids into this stuffed country of nutbar politicians .
Comment by dad4justice — Mon 17th September 2007 @ 4:33 pm
Peter,
the limit of reply to the nutbar politics so far, from our side of the fence resides predonimantly in the housing structure of a men’s affairs.
We complain, reasonably about child tax. We prove that governmnet is not only taking advantage of interest factors transferring funds from separated parent to day to day caring parent, but that they are also dipping into the nett earnings of that separated parent, filling their pockets saying that this is a justification in the interests of the child.
Then we arrive at the commitment of those on our side of this very high fence to say at the point of separation we request mediation and not arbitration, and to some degree this request has been recognised. Yet the domestic violence industry is in overdrive reportedly from extraordinary incidents of domestic violence, brutal beatings and infanticide – galore. So the domestic violecne industry has been ramped up and direct attidudinal behaviour focusing on male violence has been applied so that every woman who goes to hospital is asked an intrusive and directly unlawfully discriminatorily biased question of “does a bloke knock you around?”.
So in some ways the stakes have been raised. And the points of reply from the other side of the fence have been made more pointed and noisier. We in turn, in our weaker condition (because they are just about everyone and we are just about nobody) also ramp up our voice.
So; does a Ministry of Men’s Affairs cut it? Does government cut it, if they are not prepared to listen to what is being said? The answer, most obviously is No. Government does not cut it if they are not prepared to listen. We should cut the cake.
The point I am making here is that we have passed worrying about the substantive component of the argument about policy. MOMA (interesting reflection that) isn’t the point of focus building into the election, it is more about which party will be honest. That is something we can force on to parliament because the reason we are all in our condition is because we ahve been “handled” by a group of people willing to exploit the truth, ignoring the problems that are real for ordinary people.
For example. What has happened to teh six cases before the Families Commission? Has anyone rung you up and said “Mr. Burns, thank you for your letter on your case. We appreciate that your allegations on the bad way you have been treated are significant”. Again the answer is no.
Why is the answer “no”. Because the judiciary, as you are aware, is an independent body. Judge Boshier, as inconsistent with the second principle of natural justice sets policy on how the courts will determine cases and then sits on cases as if his view is the only view that could determine a fair decision: and this is very wrong.
So the problem doesn’t look like it will be solved by a Ministry of Men’s Affairs, because they will all ask Judge Boshier or other such employees, what it means to be a “man” and he or other such minions would advise the ministry what it is like to be a man. And that would be the state of affairs. So the only vehicle you have is truth.
Today, I will push a little more into the media, where they have the “truth” about how the system is working, yet are holding on to it, still allowing for the direct damage to a child, as if the truth is their property, as if they (just like Judge Boshier) have the right to define who gets hurt and who stays protected: and, of course, women are to be protected, because they are different from men and need more protection, whether or not they would exploit that condition.
If we are, as men, to curtail the direct discrimination against men, and we are to meet the raising of the stakes where the focus in society is deeply concentrated on domestic violence, without being, or speaking violently in order to justify those allegations, and without pandering to an idea (at the moment) that the eventual resolution will have anything to do with a Ministry of Men’s Affairs – or education even – what can the menz’ movement do to bring parties like National to the cold and hard front that fatherhood has been damaged and discriminated against and that not to pay attention to these facts going into the election will be disasterouos for the parties, society, fatherhood and most importantly – the children.
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Tue 18th September 2007 @ 10:25 am
Any man who thinks National is pro male need look no further than Blues Clues comments in this media release.
Johnny the Kid is desperate to obtain office and will horse trade whatever it takes to achieve that. (For example his flip flop on repeal of section 59)
When men wake up and realise that Lational and Nabour are no different then real change will occur.
Regards
Scrap
Comment by Scrap_The_CSA — Tue 18th September 2007 @ 3:49 pm
Anyone who thinks men have reached equality should look at the grim statistics on male suicide, male lifespan, male educational achievement, male prostate cancer, the relative amounts spent by the state on prostate cancer vs breast and cervical cancer, male homelessness, male imprisonment, male drug and alcohol addiction, male deaths at work, male serious injuries at work, male alienation from their children, the number of male partners being financially supported by women vs the number of women being financially supported by men, the number of men enslaved by the state to pay for the ongoing lifestyles of women who betrayed them, attention to male welfare by the state, the number of ministries for men’s affairs, the number of government services committed to men’s welfare.
Comment by Hans Laven — Tue 18th September 2007 @ 6:28 pm
That’s right Hans it’s men’s fault, they still run and own the system. More women in power is the only answer.
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Wed 19th September 2007 @ 10:55 am
Also, Ms Blue’s statement needs challenging (and I shall do so) concerning its logic. Suggesting that we evaluate major socio-political change by focusing on only one indicator, that of “violence against women and children”, is little more than mischievous propaganda. Firstly, it is not an indicator of the laws, rights, services and expenditure that our state applies to women vs men; an honest measure would show women are well ahead of men in that regard. Secondly, it reflects relative size and strength of the genders more than matters of social equality. Few would disagree that further efforts are desirable to change attitudes in that very small proportion of men who use their greater size and strength to control their partners and children through violence. However, that phenomenon doesn’t measure socio-political gender equality, and doesn’t justify ongoing massive imbalance in state provision for women’s vs men’s welfare in every sphere. Thirdly, the “grim statistics” Dr Blue refers to are generally highly unreliable, based on preconceptions held by police and other agencies who generate those statistics by formulating all cases as persecuting women and ignoring almost all incidents of domestic violence against men. When such measures are done objectively as in NZ’s two large longitudinal studies, a much more equal picture of doemstic violence becomes apparent.
Further, Dr Blue’s suggested indicator of “violence against women and children” if compared with “violence against men”, would show exactly the reverse of what she is arguing, because men have always been subject to more violence than women. This is true from state-controlled violence such as that caused through military service, to criminal and gang violence on our streets.
Finally, suggesting that we evaluate gender socio-political equality by speaking to “volunteers at women’s refuges” is like suggesting we evaluate the nation’s crime rates by speaking to prison officers. Or even more apt, that we evaluate the world’s religious equality by talking to Muslim extremists.
Comment by Hans Laven — Thu 20th September 2007 @ 8:07 am
Bring on the Great Darkness!
Comment by Ethos — Tue 25th September 2007 @ 9:25 pm
Ethos – what is “the Great Darkness”?
Comment by Benjamin Easton — Wed 26th September 2007 @ 11:12 am