I have only caught snippets of the firework debate on talkback radio, but the strong impression I get is fireworks are polarising people. The PM's edict that they would be banned from sale to the public if people didn't behave (and her accompanying remarks about Khandahar) have got right up people's noses. You can't overstate the effect seemingly small matters can sometimes have. Banning fireworks is one of those camel's back issues which stirs up disproportionate resentment because it is just one more instance of being dictated to.
On Breafast Telly this morning Paul Henry asked National leader, John Key, whether fireworks would be banned. Key's response went some thing like,
Fireworks have given many families a lot of fun over many years. There are lots of good memories tied up with them. There's the odd rogue causing trouble but it seems in this country we are hell bent on banning everything that's fun when there is risk involved in lots of things....
(This is sounding promising I think)
"....but I'm afraid it's inevitable."
WHAT??? You want to be the Prime Minister of this country John. You tell us what you really think, tell us that banning fun has gone too far and that we are all punished for the sake of few bad eggs and then, that you are going to continue to let it happen.
Why not say it won't happen under any government I am leading? What's wrong with you?
Sitting on the frigging fence all the time.
Mike Butler: Maori wards basic facts
8 minutes ago
4 comments:
"...Banning fireworks is one of those camel's back issues which stirs up disproportionate resentment because it is just one more instance of being dictated to..."
That's it in a nutshell!
I think the media is performing a disproportionate roll in making certain issues appear much more important to "the people" than it really is.
Recipe:
Take an event.
Find one person that got hurt by it
Start baying for government action
or
Take a government event
Find one person that is unhappy
Start baying for government to leave things alone, or, to do something equally interfering but different.
I wonder how many undies needed chaning in NZ's press rooms when the word Terrorist appeared in a search warrant.
John Key is getting scarier all the time.
I think that all the talk of banning is what is causing the few problems with fiureworks in the first place. Young people are thinking, hell, they wont be here next year so we might as well go whoopy now.
Brian Smaller
Perhaps by saying nothing he allows the MMP minnows to declare a position other than simply being anti-National.
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