Emotions are running very high on TV One's Eye to Eye as Hone Harawira and Lindsay Perigo go head-to-head over banning tobacco. Hone says tobacco came with colonisation and Perigo says so did cars, refrigerators and tvs. This is b...s... Grow-up. When asked by host Willie Jackson if he'd given up smoking Perigo replied, yes, he had but he thought he would take it up again the moment he got out of the studio.
Look, Harawira's loathing of the white tobacco manufacturers for "killing his people" is palpable. This is a race issue for him. But his desire to stop his people smoking is absolutely genuine and Perigo encouraged Hone's passionate appeals to his people - moral persuasion. But legislation to ban tobacco will not work.
Asked for the way forward Perigo said, put a tattoo on all politician's foreheads, health warning - dictatorship is bad for you.
(The programme replays on Tuesday evening)
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5 comments:
With all due respect, Hone may be smoke-free but, in my experience, most of my whanau would do better if they started eating more puha and less porkbones. But I think that will go down with the flaxroots like the proverbial bucket of cold sick. :)
Dictatorships are bad for your health. But there is another saying he should keep in mind: "It takes one to know one and he knows them all."
Advertise till your blue in the face about the health issues relating to smoking some people are always going to smoke.
Some people do it to debunk the system. I would suggest it is part of the Maori culture though and if Hone wants to stop Maori smoking he should look more closely at the attitudes that motivate Maori to smoke rather than changing tobacco laws.
Gloria
Gloria, I'm with you. (Generalising) Maori tend towards living in the day and worrying less about tomorrow. Now that can be healthy and other cultures may need to do more of it. But it has its downsides also.
Hone, should try to propose a legislation to ban Maori from being too many in prison. How about that for a start?
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