That a blue-eyed, pink-skinned, blonde MP, Todd McClay, tagging along after ex-Whanganui mayor Michael Laws, wants gang patches banned, illustrates the ignorance of even intelligent people when they demand draconian laws against whatever they dislike or don't understand.

I don't like what gangs do either, but I'd be tempted to join Harawira and wear a patch myself in protest against such a dopey idea if the law change ever happens. And when I link McClay's mission to advertising man John Ansell, another pink person, who wants a referendum linked to his 'Colour Blind' campaign, I wonder what planet they live on. Read more

Sources

• Rosemary McLeod in The Press
• Image: TV3News

Mr de Bres says it is typical of New Zealand media to give plenty of coverage to controversial figures making strong statements rather than focussing on the actual story.

He says this kind of coverage harms race relations and the media need to think whether they are being responsible before repeating such a debate.

By contrast on his blog, Maui Street, Morgan Godfrey urges his readers to view the Maori TV documentary on the "Urewera Four" which he says "sets the standard for current affairs in New Zealand and on Monday night the show raised the standard - again."

"We have very clear Catholic social teaching on racism but, more broadly, as an international Church we also have learned many lessons about living with cultural diversity." Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand

Source

• Radio New Zealand
• Maui St
• Image: Stuff.co.nz

Godfrey has expressed disappointment at the manner in which the debate was conducted

"I was, more than anything, stunned and confused with what was said last night," says Godfrey, "and, I think understandably, angry with Mark Sainsbury's unwillingness to shift the conversation towards reason, as opposed to hyperbole, misrepresentations and lies which is where Sainsbury directed the discussion."

Tuesday's programme was a follow up to a Closeup inerview on Monday night with Wikatana Popata, who said he had "had enough of Pakeha. Close Up's Facebook page went into overdrive with nearly 2000 comments on this one issue. Some were in support of Popata, but the overwhelming majority were not.

Morgan Godfrey is a Wellington-based law student and commentator on Maori politics.

Source

• Maui Street
• Image: ScreenShot TVNZ

I follow his case with interest. Nobody who was at university at the same time as Rick could forget him, in part because he was a top English literature student, in part because of his vocals in local bands, and partly because he was there in the great late 60s rush into dope, which back then was a novelty.

I'm not breaking confidence here, since Rick has admitted to a long-standing use of cannabis.

He has now been jailed twice for drug crimes, has 14 previous drug convictions, and is three months into a two-year sentence for having cannabis to sell, along with having small amounts of cannabis oil, ecstasy and cocaine at his place.

My point is not about him in particular - I'm sorry to see he's in this position - but about the attitudes among middle-class people of that era that surface when they run into difficulties with the police.

They adopt a posture that's part aristocratic disdain, and part disbelief: police exist to hassle other people, surely, not people who've read Dostoevsky and know how to hold a knife and fork. You get this, too, with fraudsters who are suddenly called to account, and with bad drivers.

Perhaps it was this instinctive understanding that made ACT leader Don Brash, keen to slash Government spending, moot legalising cannabis and making dope-dealing OK.

That might be the one politically appealing idea Brash will ever come up with that could attract old stoners, though unfortunately they're the last people who would vote for him.

Rick wants home detention, and who can blame him? He has a music room at home, and creature comforts, and could easily pretend the whole darn court thing had never happened. Prison is not a nice place: he knew that already: its unpleasantness is meant to be its point.

But his arguments could only have been dreamed up by a white middle-class offender who'd woken from a bad dream only to discover he was living it.

No Maori, let's say, the 12 per cent of the population who make up half this country's prison population, would dream of appealing on the grounds - among other things - of not belonging there because you don't get enough sunshine, and you don't like air conditioning.

What made me think about this is Hone Harawira, who snarled about the appalling Maori rate of imprisonment on TV7 the other night. I wonder how successful Maori are at getting home detention.

Harawira is hard to take, but often right.

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• Source: Rosemary McLeod in The Press
• Image: topnews.net.nz