FOR WEEKS, political news was
dominated by allegations swirling around Justice Minister Judith Collins. Night
after night, it was the lead item on television news bulletins.
Press Gallery journalists
closed in, sensing a kill. As the breathless disclosures accumulated, it was
easy to get the impression the government was on the ropes.
Then came the reality check.
Two opinion polls indicate the government hasn’t taken the big hit that might
have been expected. In fact the results suggest the public was pretty relaxed
about the whole affair.
A Colmar Brunton poll for TVNZ
asked respondents whether Collins should remain a minister or resign. They were
split 42 per cent each way – hardly a resounding condemnation.
A question about whether her
behaviour would damage the government drew a slightly stronger response, but hardly
a fatal one. Fifty per cent said it was damaging and 42 per cent thought it
would make no difference.
On the crucial question of
whether the Collins affair would be a factor in deciding who to vote for, the
overwhelming response – from 75 per cent – was a ho-hum “not much”.
Those findings were
reinforced by a Stuff.co.nz/Ipsos poll which showed that National’s support has
remained steady while Labour, which might have been expected to benefit
handsomely from the furore, has slipped.
Should we be surprised?
Probably not. The poll results simply confirm that issues which excite
journalists and political junkies often barely register with the wider
populace.
Press Gallery journalists
live and breathe politics. They immerse themselves in detail – who said what,
to whom and when, or who was at dinner and why – and go to great lengths to
join the dots. But the public hasn’t the time or patience for all the minutiae
and often fails to see what the fuss is about.
Maurice Williamson was
different. The public got that. A ministerial phone call to a senior police
officer about a wealthy Chinese donor to the National Party could look nothing
but dodgy.
But the issues in the Collins
affair were harder to explain. The public struggled to see the smoke, let alone
the gun.
Call it the bubble effect.
Britain has the Westminster bubble, America the Washington bubble and New Zealand
the Wellington bubble. The things that fascinate people inside the
bubble – and that means journalists as well as politicians – often fail to
resonate with those on the outside.* * *
TWITTER is the perfect
protest platform for the social media era. It requires zero effort, no
sacrifice and no risk, yet still imparts a warm glow of self-righteousness.
Millions worldwide have
tweeted their outrage at the terrorist group Boko Haram’s abduction of 300
Nigerian schoolgirls. The fact that weeks had passed before they thought to do
this, and the abductors had long melted into the bush, didn’t seem to matter.
Until it’s happened on Twitter, it hasn’t happened.
Neither did it matter that
the sad-looking African girl whose photo was tweeted in support of the protest
campaign wasn’t from Nigeria and had nothing to do with the abduction.
Who cares whether the photo
was relevant or authentic, when the only purpose is to stir shallow sentiment?
One African girl is as good as the next.
And what will the vacuous
outpourings on Twitter actually achieve? As an article in this paper pointed
out, a video aimed at bringing the murderous Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony to
justice went viral on YouTube two years ago.
Countless millions saw it. For
a few days, Kony was world public enemy No 1. Then social media found something
else to get excited about, and moved on. As it does.
Needless to say, nothing
happened. Kony is still at liberty. People using Twitter and Facebook have the
concentration span of a goldfish. They need to be constantly fed with new
distractions.
There was a time when the act
of protesting required people to put themselves on the line. It meant marching
in the streets or manning picket lines, and risking arrest or abuse. But in the
Twitter age, when it can be done instantly and in comfort, it’s all about
narcissistic self-gratification.* * *
A MAN BASHES his partner’s
2-year-old son so savagely that half his brain dies, turning into what an
expert medical witness calls a watery mush. The basher is sentenced to 3½ years
in jail.
On the same day, a former
teacher is sentenced on charges of sexual grooming, unlawful sexual connection
with girls under 16, offering to supply methamphetamine and trying to flee the
country on a false passport. He gets 9½ years.
The two men were sentenced
last week. Who was the more monstrous offender? The New Zealand public would
have no trouble deciding, even if judges can’t.
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