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In This Issue:
Smarten up!
I detest smartphones: the source of endless trouble in the classrooms of this country, they epitomise the technological marvels of Artificial Stupidity. But it’s not just that: they appear to endow their owners with a sense of contemptuous invulnerability that allows them to cross busy roads without looking left or right as their gaze is fixed upon the all-important screen and their eager thumbs flick busily across its inviting keyboard.
When an anxious or frustrated motorist honks the horn, they dare to seem offended. Public footpaths are their undisputed domain. One of their screen-obsessed number recently cannoned into my wife, looking up from her phone only to snarl, “YOU should look where you’re going!”
Such reactions are symptomatic of a sense of narcissistic entitlement nurtured by these contraptions – something…
It’s not all about US
I appreciate Pete McKenzie’s thorough outlining of recent events in US/NZ military relationships (“Our very special friend”, May 18), and while aghast at the idea that NZ might get closer to the US militarily, I agree with his final statement that “NZ must choose: it can no longer pursue a foreign policy of independent drift.” What might this independent policy look like if it isn’t a “drift”?
First of all, to follow the US, which is systematically destroying trust in international humanitarian law and undermining the UN, as shown in its support for Israel’s deadly war on Gaza, is ignoring the fact that the unipolar world that had the US as the only superpower is dead. A multipolar world is emerging, which foresees a world based on mutual respect for…
Bright Lines
Creative words competition
For Competition No 44, we asked for ahaiku about winter heating costs.
FINALISTS:
Frozen bank accounts From burning money for warmth; Winter heating costs.
‒Jason Morgan, Wellington
Snug on the duvet, cat rates the power bill as worth every cent.
‒Chris Greenwood, Motueka
Socks, slippers, mittens Hat, scarf, jacket. I’m ready To leave the bedroom
‒Garth Thornton, Wellington
To heat or not to?
Purse suffers slings and arrows of outrageous costs
‒Martyn Brown, Christchurch
The grass is frosty, power prices relentless. Three-dog night again.
‒Stephanie Parkes, Auckland
WINNER:
Heated discussions Can increase temperature Without raising costs. ‒Raywyn Little, Wellington
For the next Bright Lines competition, we have the Headline Competition. Please write a headline of up to seven words on Budget 2024.
Don’t forget to include your…
Quips & Quotes
“I think, culturally, we are prudes ... We’re raised in environments where we’re not allowed to express or engage, we’re taught to be ashamed of things that make us human.” “There were intersections on fire … there were the gendarmerie in full gear … we’re feeling that people in New Zealand are really not understanding how serious this is.” “I paint the world as I see it. People don’t have to like my paintings, but I hope they take the time to look and think, ‘Why has this Aboriginal bloke painted these powerful people? What is he trying to say?’” “This is my life. My wife fully knows that. My love for football has always been there since before I met her.” “Life would be grand if it weren’t for…
10 Quick Questions
1. French artist Paul Gauguin was a digger on the Suez Canal.
❑ True
❑ False
2. In the movie Legally Blonde, which university is Elle Woods applying to?
❑ Princeton
❑ Yale
❑ Harvard
❑ Cornell
3. The three volumes of the Lord of the Rings were published in which decade?
❑ 1930s
❑ 1940s
❑ 1950s
❑ 1960s
4. What animal is known in various European languages as paard, hest, cavallo?
❑ Sheep
❑ Cow
❑ Deer
❑ Horse
5. How many litres in a barrel of oil?
❑ 123
❑ 141
❑ 159
❑ 167
6. Who was the Roman god of youth?
❑ Luna
❑ Juventas
❑ Minerva
❑ Vesta
7. A brumby is a:
❑ Marsupial
❑ Horse
❑ Sandwich
❑ Insect
8. Abraham Lincoln…
Lifting the lid
It’s the bitterest debate in modern politics. Fights over transgender rights have contaminated political debate in the US, UK and Australia but they’ve mostly passed New Zealand by. In 2021, a self-ID law making it easier to alter sex records on birth certificates and other documentation was passed unanimously. A small number of doctors and academics, including emeritus professor Charlotte Paul, have spoken up about the exponential growth rate of prescriptions for puberty blockers – allegedly 10 times the rate per capita of the UK. But in the past 10 years, the political, media and health establishments have generally taken the side of the transgender community and supported their right to healthcare and legislation that affirms their identity.
That bipartisan consensus is unravelling. The coalition government has agreed to “ensure…
Ditch the rich
Aneighbour recently told me he’s going Jeff Bezos-free, a decision that resonated with me immediately, as I have long resented the cone-headed tycoon for stealing the name of the world’s mightiest river to drown the rest of us in his lucre lust. But it also made me think how best to not add to the obscenely bloated coffers of the world’s complement of, at present, 2668 billionaires.
Now, even I don’t have time to research that many mega-moneyed humans, so what follows is my effort to break up with 10 of the richest on the planet. Here goes:
1. Elon Musk. For me, erasing Musk is downright joyful. Teslas are overpriced and, in my unscientific but keenly observed anecdotal survey, their drivers are the leading producers of road rage. As…
He is here
In the week my brother died, there was a storm in the universe. Giant flares erupted from the sun and a pink aurora lit up the Auckland night. I woke to a smell of burning. The sky had turned hard, cloudless blue; the days shone with photographic clarity.
I swam in a full tide at Cheltenham. I thought, my brother should be here. The horizon traced a sharp, turquoise line and Rangitoto Island looked strangely close. The sky was an aquamarine skin, the air was still and the sea was glassy. The colours seemed mineral, chemical, intense. There was a lurid wash over the world. The universe was blazing.
The last time I visited my brother in Wellington, the wind blew open the door and his papers whirled around us.…
Don’t call us …
Finland’s ingenuity galvanised the rapid global uptake of cellphones, so it’s paradoxical the country’s latest claim to fame should be the elevation of no-speakies to a new commercial opportunity.
Helsinki hairdresser Kati Hakomeri has divided global opinion by introducing a chat-free service. The silent hair appointment – practically an oxymoronic concept – has brought a clamour of requests to make the option compulsory everywhere – and extend it to taxis – while traditionalists have mourned another symptom of the decline of civil society.
But a recent British survey suggests taciturnity is not just for the Finns. On top of data charting 33 billion fewer minutes spent on the phone in the UK than a decade ago, a poll found a quarter of Gen Zers and Millennials (18to 35-year-olds) claim…
The point of Peters
When Ruth Richardson finished delivering the Mother of All Budgets in 1991, her fellow National Party MPs rose as one in the House to give her a standing ovation. Well, almost as one.
Throughout the speech, Māori Affairs Minister Winston Peters had kept his head down at his desk, preoccupied with correspondence. By pure chance his need to stand, stretch his legs and shake out the crumpled pages of the evening paper coincided with the standing ovation. Understandably, he found it difficult to clap while gathering up his papers at the same time.
That night, you might say, New Zealand First was born. Peters was making his distaste for Richardson’s policies plain, and he went on doing it so publicly that three months later, he was sacked from the Cabinet…
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