Hail the stale pale male
When Jehan Casinader wrote about the staleness of the white middle-aged male (Opinion, May 2), he forgot to compare it to an alternative, or anything relevant, for that matter.
Has he forgotten, that up to just a few decades ago the same stale males were the very ones who could hold down a job for more than a few weeks, who were instrumental in building our infrastructure, power generation, and were able to fix close to anything you could think of back then?
This young generation will one day need to build and provide for the future, but at present can barely move away from their interactive screens
Now that our society has become more inclusive and multicultural, we should not rub too much salt in the wounds of the (not so) stale grey males of our – currently rather pleasant – society, and let them just be as they please.
Their lives have already been changed by much more demanding and far less hardworking younger generations, so why not cut them some slack and use their wisdom and experience, which younger people can learn from. If we are not to value their input, we could well end up with a ‘‘stalemate’’ on our journey to a more productive society.
As gratitude for other people’s inputs becomes rarer these days, let’s celebrate what we, as a nation, have truly achieved. Rene´ Blezer, Taupo
Oh well, I suppose it had to come. Not enough men of my generation were knocked off in a war, so now we are the insufferable old farts at the Christmas dinner table.
Still, I fondly recall the Man magazine that showed partly clad bosoms. It was the best part of going to the barber’s on Friday night on the bar of dad’s bike – apart from the fish and chips after. I sure wouldn’t swap it for a tablet and sushi.
John Leith, Oakura
Simmering mood
What a great editorial by Tracy Watkins (‘‘Collins taps into a simmering mood’’, May 2).
It should be one law for all in this country but our Government is pushing everything Ma¯ ori with a separate health authority, and non-elected Ma¯ ori wards with full voting rights on our councils. The amount of te reo spoken on television and radio is not of interest to the general population.
On Anzac Day, I was also surprised to hear a karakia, and Aotearoa mentioned instead of New Zealand – the land that our brave soldiers fought for. Arthur Bott, Hastings
Action on diabetes
Virginia Fallon’s article on diabetes (Focus, May 2) highlighted an important issue and a few excellent strategies.
Another important fact is that one of the main reasons for T2 diabetes is obesity, which is a significant cause of heart disease, strokes, high blood pressure and certain types of cancer.
Many of the strategies proposed for tackling diabetes will also reduce all these related diseases and have a far greater impact on reducing health spending and suffering.
I hope that our politicians will set aside their differences on significant health issues affecting New Zealanders regarding proven solutions like a sugar tax, curbs on fast food advertising and changes to school canteen menu choices. These issues are politicised far too often and, alongside industry lobbies, pose significant barriers to implementation.
Kushlan Sugathapala, Epsom
Climate crisis
A mass of ice in Antarctica, the Thwaites Glacier, is melting fast. Within 10 years we’ll know if it’s going to break up and raise the sea level 650mm.
Joe Biden is on the warpath; John Kerry has already given Australia the message: Reduce emissions. The UK has pledged a 78 per cent reduction by 2035 compared to 1990 levels? Effectively 11 per cent.
It’s no good dreaming about more hydro and geothermal or tidal; we need wind and solar now. It’s intermittent. For storage, pumped-hydro is best, but few sites are suitable. Obviously the North Island would be preferable, but beggars can’t be choosers; the world will not excuse Kiwis because Lake Onslow is not perfect (Letters, May 2).
Kevin Anderson, former director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and now Professor of Energy and Climate Change at Manchester, is quite blunt: We need to go onto a war footing. Anderson is no ivory-tower academic, he is a former oil company engineer. Dennis N Horne, Howick
Raoul slaves
The article on the deaths of the slaves at Raoul Island was horrible and interesting at the same time (News, May 2). They were not ‘‘NZ’s forgotten slaves’’ as stated in the headline. These slaves were imported and for Peruvian use, not in New Zealand. As far as I know, the Government of the time knew nothing about the trade or the deaths. They were not New Zealand’s slaves, nor are they forgotten, for at least two books on Raoul mention the incident.
Just because they were landed and died on a New Zealand-annexed island does not mean we are to blame. Put up a memorial by all means but don’t