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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   27876 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 27, 2023

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I've been waiting for the details to be finalised but we have a new government here in New Zealand, with the required CW controversy.

The first piece is the new government directing departments to prefer english in communications over the pidgin that had formed over the last government. This one is getting less coverage in the international media.

The second big controversy that made it to international media was reversing the previous government's lifetime ban on tobacco for anyone born after 2009. Weirdly, the usual weed legaliser types were in favour of the ban.

Link to full agreement: https://www.national.org.nz/national_act_and_new_zealand_first_to_deliver_for_all_new_zealanders

By pidgin do they mean the annoying tendency of the NZ government to sprinkle in Maori words in press releases?

Yes, though many government departments and place names have been translated into Te Reo as well, with often the Te Reo name taking priority over the English one.

It seems like a pretty spectacularly bad policy, one seemly optimized for divisiveness.

Very cringe that the official subreddit is named Aotearoa rather than just New Zealand. On the other hand, I suppose it’s an interesting form of accepted cultural appropriation, whites are encouraged to use the Maori terms and the white rugby players do the Haka, whereas in other Anglo settler colonies like the US or Canada or even Australia whites putting on Indian chief hats and LARPing Navajo rituals has gradually become less socially acceptable, at least in the PMC.

Weirdly, the usual weed legaliser types were in favour of the ban.

To be clear, I think there is a principled objective policy debate about legal pot to be had. But, and this but has sir mix a lot singing odes to it, it's window dressing for legal pot- the core pro-pot argument is "it's less bad for you than alcohol because I like potheads and not alcoholics, so it's just not fair that weed is banned" and the core anti-pot argument is "potheads should be forced to get a haircut on national television, the dirty hippies". In other words it's mostly a who/whom argument, and if I had to guess where tobacco users would come down on the who/whom, well...

Looks like a lot of libertarian-ish stuff in the National and ACT agreement which sounds good to me.

Can you imagine being dumped by a girl because she wants a man old enough to buy her cigarettes? But you're 27?

It'll be interesting to see how the tobacco ban plays out for immigrants. I'm guessing that in 10 years the law just won't be enforced for PoC.

Weirdly, the usual weed legaliser types were in favour of the ban.

That's not surprising, the weed legalizers generally aren't libertarians. They just really really like weed.

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