What does it mean to be a proud New Zealander? Does everyone actually understand democracy? Do only some people get to have opinions on politics?
These questions and many others came swooping into my mind yesterday after listening to Sean Plunket’s frankly bewildering Radio Live rant about Eleanor Catton.
Follow up questions included “who stole Sean Plunket’s brain and replaced it with a swarm of angry wasps?” and “What country am I in right now?”
In case you’re not caught up, Eleanor Catton, Man-Booker prize-winning author, recently made some remarks about New Zealand, many of them rather critical. The comments that seem to have particularly bothered Plunket are to do with our current government, the neo-liberal tendencies of which Catton is not particulary impressed with. She doesn’t equivocate and the comments are harsh. They’re supposed to be.
No doubt it was concern that the National Party caucus was taking this to heart, collectively weeping in the corridors of power that urged Plunket to spout the most incomprehensible, jingoistic nonsense I’ve heard since the last time I had the misfortune of accidentally channel surfing into the bizarre alternate reality that is Fox News.
I was particularly bothered by Plunket’s strange interpretation of democracy. His argument went roughly as follows. New Zealand is a democracy which means that the people vote in the government and the politicians that make up that government. If you are critical of the government you are therefore critical of New Zealanders, or as he put it “all of us”. So just shut up, okay?
Now, there are a few things wrong with that. First off, the fact that anyone would, without a trace of irony, launch into a condescending “explanation” of democracy whilst simultaneously discouraging someone from expressing a political view (the ability to do this being one of the “core values” of a democratic system) just makes me, well, THIS.
I mean, are we seriously supposed to take it personally every time someone disagrees with the government? If so, this might explain why Sean is feeling so hostile. Every day it must be an epic battle to feel okay about himself, what with everyone having a go at him constantly about asset sales, unemployment and child poverty.
I’m sorry, but I don’t buy this. I think reasonable people, upon hearing somebody criticise the government, probably just take it as it is meant, i.e. as a criticism of the government.
Another rather disturbing portion of this rant was when Plunket brought up the fact that Catton has a university job which is funded by the government. He seemed to be saying that if the government, someway down the line, pays your bills you do not get to publicly speak against them. It’s rude and ungrateful, okay? Let me be quite clear. We absolutely do not want to live in a society where the most educated, learned people are not allowed to question the status quo. Or anyone for that matter, but educators especially.
The implications of gagging our scientists, economists and yes, writers are serious and worrying. Universities (and their staff) are legally obligated to question and critique. That’s the whole point of them. Take that ability away and you no longer have a place of learning, you have an “indoctrination centre”.
And bear in mind that working for an institution that is government funded is not at all like working for the government. TVNZ and Radio New Zealand are both state-funded. Do we really want them to adopt a “he who pays gets a free ride” policy? Because isn’t that essentially propaganda? Don’t we regularly take the piss out of North Korea for doing that?
Plunket also plants a sly suggestion that Catton may have been writing during work time which completely ignores the fact she wrote her famous novel before she even got her university job. But why include facts in a rant when a bit of innuendo will do for rarking up the listeners?
And then there’s the bit where he calls Catton a “traitor”. I mean, really?
Is this what we’ve descended to? It’s now okay to use words like “traitor” against someone who has different political beliefs? Again, I’m finding it hard not to draw parallels with Fox News.
Remember during the Gulf War (part 2) when America went all “you’re either with us, or you’re against us”? To the degree that they renamed french fries “freedom fries” simply because France chose not to join that happy gang otherwise known as “The Coalition of The Willing”? During that time there was also a lot of framing of any criticism of the Bush administration as “anti-American”. Did we not all think that was insane? Could we maybe not do that here?
Eleanor Catton is not a traitor to New Zealand. Whether or not you share her political views, or even if you think it’s “not her place” to share them, it is very evident that she cares a great deal about her country. At least she’s bothered to spend some time thinking about how the country should be run and what she’d like New Zealand to be like.
If that’s what a traitor looks like then I’m happy to be one right along with her.
Do you think Sean Plunket is angling for a job at Fox News? Didn’t he used to be an actual journalist? Is all this as nuts as I think it is?
Originally published on Stuff, 29/01/2015
(Eleanor Catton image by NZatFrankfurt, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.)