Gangland
Our rather small and boring town (and to clarify I mean boring in the positive sense of pleasantly predictable and quiet before the natives lynch me in a pleasantly predictable way) has suddenly hit the news here:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/location/story.cfm?l_id=131&objectid=10438111
so we are now getting cast as a hotbed of gangland activity. There is no doubt that a gang culture exists here both in the town and as one of the sides of the country the world does not hear about. But compared to other places we've lived it all seems pretty small scale. I've never lived anywhere quite as quiet downtown in the evening (both when we've been out and on my regular evening runs), even the drunks falling out of the pubs are few and far between.
In some ways New Zealand is a fairly violent place, at least in the sense that violence is tolerated among both Polynesian and Pakeha populations. Family violence is historically high and obviously the country excels at and glorys in the violent sport of rugby. The outcry here when a Green Party MP introduced an anti-smacking bill suggests that there are plenty of people who want to beat their kids, though even the conservative National Party agreed to support the legislation when opposition to it threatened to link them up with a "lunatic fringe"of religious and right wing groups.
However the country does well in most measures of crime and factors that predict crime. Quality of life for a large % of the population is high, violent crime is low by international standards and income distribution is good. Conservatives undid some of the reasonably effective social safety net in the 80s, and the same people who rail against criminals would dismantle it further (yeah, that works great in the rest of the world for detering crime!). But the New Zealand way which seems to me to comprise a combination of a reasonably strong state social system with a relatively socially conservative mindset and respect for individualism is not the worst way to balance different sides of the political spectrum.
Wanganui has been trying to up its profile and attract people, it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.
Our rather small and boring town (and to clarify I mean boring in the positive sense of pleasantly predictable and quiet before the natives lynch me in a pleasantly predictable way) has suddenly hit the news here:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/location/story.cfm?l_id=131&objectid=10438111
so we are now getting cast as a hotbed of gangland activity. There is no doubt that a gang culture exists here both in the town and as one of the sides of the country the world does not hear about. But compared to other places we've lived it all seems pretty small scale. I've never lived anywhere quite as quiet downtown in the evening (both when we've been out and on my regular evening runs), even the drunks falling out of the pubs are few and far between.
In some ways New Zealand is a fairly violent place, at least in the sense that violence is tolerated among both Polynesian and Pakeha populations. Family violence is historically high and obviously the country excels at and glorys in the violent sport of rugby. The outcry here when a Green Party MP introduced an anti-smacking bill suggests that there are plenty of people who want to beat their kids, though even the conservative National Party agreed to support the legislation when opposition to it threatened to link them up with a "lunatic fringe"of religious and right wing groups.
However the country does well in most measures of crime and factors that predict crime. Quality of life for a large % of the population is high, violent crime is low by international standards and income distribution is good. Conservatives undid some of the reasonably effective social safety net in the 80s, and the same people who rail against criminals would dismantle it further (yeah, that works great in the rest of the world for detering crime!). But the New Zealand way which seems to me to comprise a combination of a reasonably strong state social system with a relatively socially conservative mindset and respect for individualism is not the worst way to balance different sides of the political spectrum.
Wanganui has been trying to up its profile and attract people, it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.
posted by Tim | 2:30 AM
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