"Students" protested in Auckland yesterday afternoon, disrupting peak-hour traffic in Queen Street. But have a look at this TVNZ footage; there are a lot of Unite Union placards, and Socialist Aotearoa banners evident in the thick of the action.
Joe Carolan of Socialist Aotearoa said students were dressed up in togas and waving red flags to accept English's challenge to protest like the Greeks.He described police as "aggressive" and explains at one point they came into the crowd and arrested a petite Asian girl which caused boos from protesters and onlookers.He was not sure why people were arrested saying it was their democratic right to march.
There's a subtle difference between marching and deliberately obstructing traffic Joe, but then again, you probably knew that. It's something we'll return to soon.
And the Otago Daily Times mentions another familiar name:
Senior lecturer in the Department of Sociology, Campbell Jones, said police had hit and dragged a number of students.Mr Jones delivered a lecture at the protest, reading Plato to the students just before police broke up the crowd."What they're protesting today is a disgraceful political decision."The elite will have education and others won't,'' he said.
Think back to late 2011. Campbell Jones was the go-to guy for media at Occupy Auckland. Joe Carolan was also a key person in the Occupy movement, and Socialist Aotearoa and the Unite Union were also to the forefront.
So was this REALLY a student protest? The highest figure we've seen for yesterday was around 300 protesters. Take away the unionists and the socialists, and how many students were actually there?
The University of Auckland website claims that UoA is the biggest university in New Zealand "with 38,500 students, nearly 10,000 of whom graduate annually.". Let's be charitable, and say that there were 200 real students there yesterday. That's 0.52% of the university's student population; hardly an overwhelming majority, but not unlike the Occupy protesters who purported to be the 99% when in reality they were perhaps the 0.5% at best.
Now we don't have any issue at all with students, Unite Union, Socialist Aotearoa or anyone protesting, and we can remember joining anti-Vietnam War protests in the early 1970's when we were still but callow and youthful, and very impressionable. But deliberately impeding peak hour traffic is stupid and irresponsible, and the police were well within their rights to try and clear the intersection.
29 comments:
The heavy-handed police behaviour, added to the stupid mistakes from Parata over the Intermediate schools have swung the public in behind the teachers and students.
Nice work.
D'you think so Robert? I've just had someone from the media tell me quite the opposite; that people are really annoyed and unsympathetic to the students and their mates after yesterday's stunt.
That's not what we are hearing KS. Everyone we've spoken to is disgusted about the sneaky (or inept) class size changes which affect all New Zealanders who cannot afford the smaller class sizes of private schools. Interestingly most of the Ministers of the Government send (or have sent) their own children to private schools where small class sizes are advertised as a selling point. Further, John Key even mentioned small class sizes as a reason for choosing private schools for his own children.
Then you've been misinformed Mel; that's not what yesterday's protest was about.
Protestor Thomas Dykes…
Craccum Editor Thomas Dykes may lose his position next week following a petition from 20 members of the Auckland University Student Association (AUSA) which calls for a motion of no confidence against him.
The petition claims that Craccum (Auckland University’s student magazine) has been overtly political, offensive, and unrepresentative of all students under Dykes’s editorship.
http://www.critic.co.nz/news/article/1794/plot-to-overthrow-auckland-student-magazine-editor
Good find Pete.
And unsurprisingly he was part of Occupy...
Protest spokesman Thomas Dykes says the group felt its occupation would be compromised if they moved.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/rwc-in-auckland/5816373/Council-attempts-to-move-protesters
Mel - with the way politicians are thought of and treated in this country, I would advise ANY politician to send their children to a private school where they may have a slightly better chance of not being bullied or ridiculed because of their parents occupation.
Pete's just like his puffy boss - an opportunist snitch. Don't encourage him, Keeping Stock.
Mel hasn't been 'misinformed'. She, like almost every other New Zealander who's not sold their soul to the John Key Party, can see with her own two eyes and hear with the ears on the sides of her head, that the Government has stuffed-up their attempts to demonise the education professionals of New Zealand and split the country into State and Private, through manipulating the education system. Mel can see it, Keeping Stock, but you are blinded by ideology, and can't.
"but you are blinded by ideology"
If ever there was a pot + kettle moment, there it is.
KS, most of today's politicans were given the benefit of a totally free university education. That is unfair for a start. Why is this fact always brushed under the carpet, I wonder? A free university education, no debt ever and big fat degrees!!! They ware the really lucky ones.
@ Anon (7.13pm) - got it in one, not that Robert will see the irony.
@ Anon (8.27pm) - and one former MP and Minister proudly boasted about how he ripped off wealthy farmers when he got a scholarship to a certain private school in the South Island. And he's going to be a talking point in a couple of days; just mark my words.
But I don't think you can be too hard on MP's of all stripes who may have benefitted in the past. Circumstances change, and people will always avail themselves of whatever is provided for them.
So let us consider this totally free education.
No loans for books, no loans for accommodation, no loans to enable them to get on the suds four or five days a week.
Parents supported (completely) some students, others worked part time and "holidays" simply to cover costs and a damned sight more simply didn't attend university or did so part time while working full time.
The lucky ones had employment that allowed them to study at the bosses expense albeit on their own time.
Wonderful stuff that "free" education - if you could afford it.
pot/kettle - I've never seen the phrase used so often as it is here on keeping Stock.
I'm a University of Auckland student, and I was there.
This post is great, I've linked it on my Facebook page. It really is a pot and kettle thing, they accuse National of being ideology driven (the buzzword is neoliberal, it's worse than calling someone a Nazi on campus these days), and everything is constantly hijacked by Unite, Mana, Socialist Aotearoa, or the SFWU.
I was also at the meeting to boot Tom Dykes, which failed, because petitioners underestimated the organizing power of lefties, who hijacked the meeting and kept Tom Dykes in.
As for the protest, the number of spectators to protesters was 3:1 at least. The lefties are complaining about student apathy on politics, or that the rest of us are deluded by neoliberal brainwashing. If the protest said anything, it says most students are happy with their lot, and the protesters are the deluded ones.
Large numbers of students at UoA are international students, and so allowance changes don't affect them. Still, some did come out in solidarity. Most of the students "satisfied with their lot" are children of the elite whose parents are picking up the tab for their education, so I would be surprised if they would be feeling any pain. Mumsy and Pater have got their backs.
These and other facts mean the numbers were about right on the day. Those with the courage to get arrested for principle will always be a tiny minority, though there are legions who sympathise silently.
These allowance changes strike directly at the poorer students, who rely on them if they are to have any hope of doing higher degrees.
As for SA, Unite and the SFWU being there, why the hell not? Poor university students provide an endless stream of minimum wage counter-fodder for KFC, MacDonalds and other companies, and these Union and Socialist organisations have to deal with the human cost of squeezing kids dry every day. Poor students are workers first, and graduates if they survive. And since the government isn't providing jobs, they will no doubt stay trapped forever in their low estate, making them a growing army of lifelong socialists if this keeps up.
Liars, damned liars and statisticians build cases out of isolated facts and exceptions, but here's a Universal Principle you can take to the bank; the poor outnumber the privileged a hundred to one, and these poor are rising up worldwide. Expect to see a lot more of this, and before long, expect too to find yourself apologizing for the callous stance you've taken today. Hunger speaks vastly louder than the rhetoric of privilege, and you neoliberals are sounding more shrill and desperate by the day.
Thanks for commenting Sarah; but repeating the rhetoric about the 99% and the 1% doesn't actually give it any more truth. The real truth is that the top ten percent of taxpayers pay 74% of nett taxation; the taxes that fund your education and the other public services that we all benefit from.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Business/QOA/1/1/e/49HansQ_20100518_00000012-12-Taxation-Capital-Gains-Tax.htm
Oh; and governments don't provide jobs; employers who are putting their own money on the line do that. And just so you don't think that I'm spouting empty words, the several businesses I have an interest in have increased their staffing by over a third in the first five months of this yer, and all the jobs have been at pay rates well above the minimum wage. We've had to take out loans to grow our businesses too, but the difference is that we have to pay commercial interest rates. Maybe things really aren't that bad after all...
@ Cameron; having not been back to university since 1974 (I only lasted two terms as they were in those dark ages), those big words that the Left uses like "neoliberal" are wasted on me! Good on you for standing up for the vast majority of students, and not letting a vocal few purport to speak for all, and cheers for the link.
I see a whitewashed plantation porch before the Civil War. And I hear the tinkling of silver spoons in mint julip glasses as more and more wildly you gesticulate in defense of slavery. As if you could ward off the inevitable by simply disbelieving in it. Or by appeal to reason, citing your obvious nobility and breeding as evidence of your natural right to rule, you explain without a shred of credulity how these poor unfortunates should be grateful for the jobs you create for them.
Yes, so many times the same pattern repeats, just before the fall, the same smugness, mingled with surprise, and anger, so very characteristic of people just beginning to sense that history is about to turn and savage them.
I see a whitewashed plantation porch before the Civil War. And I hear the tinkling of silver spoons in mint julip glasses as more and more wildly you gesticulate in defense of slavery. As if you could ward off the inevitable by simply disbelieving in it. Or by appeal to reason, citing your obvious nobility and breeding as evidence of your natural right to rule, you explain without a shred of credulity how these poor unfortunates should be grateful for the jobs you create for them.
Such word pictures Linda! It's just a shame that it bears no relationship to the truth.
My father was made redundant in the 1960's, long before redundancy was popularised by Rogernomics, and long before you actually got a payout. A proud man and WWII veteran, he chose to cash up what superannuation he had rather than register as unemployed. That left him without a self-funded retirement income. My mother had a lifelong battle with depression, including two failed suicide attempts, and numerous courses of ECT which stole her personality. I have been unemployed myself, and it's only in recent years that my wife and I have had the opportunity to employ people.
So sorry; there's no "whitewashed plantation porch", no slaves, and certainly no born-to-rule mentality. What we have, we have worked bloody hard for; a work ethic we each inheritied from our respective parents. If you and your ilk spent more of your obvious intelligence and your effort on getting ahead instead of despising those who have been successful, you'd see the future much differently
Linda's pinged you, Keeping Stock. She makes it very clear here:
" As if you could ward off the inevitable by simply disbelieving in it."
And here:
"Yes, so many times the same pattern repeats, just before the fall, the same smugness, mingled with surprise, and anger, so very characteristic of people just beginning to sense that history is about to turn and savage them."
The ' mint julip' stuff is the matador's red cape, KS, and you're el toro.
The ' mint julip' stuff is the matador's red cape, KS, and you're el toro.
More bulldust from Robert. Even MY patience has limits, and you Sir, are pushing them...take the warning seriously.
What are you going to do, hit him?
Linda was right, I see the whip hand now.
You scare me. We are right to rebel. We are going to get that whip out of your hand fast.
Cheers KS. The University of Auckland is at near 40000 students,which is nearly double the roll it had 20 years ago, so the reality is that kids from poor backgrounds have a much better lot now than previously.
Committed students would go to university, regardless of whether their loans are interest free or not. Most students just want to study, get their degree, and spend their student allowance at the pub. We all thought it was rich that they were protesting cuts to education by holding up the university the week before exams begin!
No need to be scared Sarah, and I'm not into whips or dominance.
The warning to Robert is merely a reminder that he is exhibiting the kind of behaviours that have seen him banished from here in the past, then rehabilitated by yours truly; off-topic comments, trolling, and the like. Robert knows what I'm talking about, and likes to push the boundaries as far as he can.
You see, Sarah, permission to post here comes with the proviso that I keep withing the clearly defined limits, stay on the track, heed the warnings and don't cross the line.
Your suggestion that our host is an Authoritarian, is crazy talk.
Oh nonsense Robert. It's a matter of simple courtesies; if I come to visit at your home, I will be respectful of your customs, values and houserules. I wouldn't presume to set the agenda at your place, and nor do I expect you to set the agenda here, irrespective of how much you antagonise and/or provoke.
Sarah and Linda - dreams of being the revolution like yours have come and gone for a very long time. And most fade into adulthood. A few become temporary disasters.
Do you know of Baader Meinhof?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Baader_Meinhof_Complex
I grew up in better times than both my parents who lived through the Great Depression. And I grew up with less money than most families have available today, even those on benefits. Most of my clothes were hand-me-downs, or old jerseys unpicked and reknitted to fit. I doubt you would understand. I earnt a work ethic, and to be grateful for what I could achieve for myself.
Youngest in the family Pete? I was, and most certainly remember hand-me-downs, together with lots of hand- knitted stuff. No labels, no Nikes, no Doc Martens for me...
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