Why The New Conservatives Could Get 5% In September

Following overseas trends, it’s apparent that an intense degree of discontentment exists among Western voters. There are protests all over the West – some violent, most confined to the ballot boxes for now. This article explores the possibility that discontentment in New Zealand could see the New Conservative Party get 5% of the vote in this year’s election.

It’s all but official that the neo-Nazi Sweden Democrats are the most popular party in Sweden now. Five opinion polls in a row, all from different polling companies, have established that the Sweden Democrats have more current support than any other party. A moving average of recent polls suggests that their support is at least 25%.

The Sweden Democrats might be the most aggressive of the European alt-right parties, having been founded by former Waffen-SS members. Although it’s not an official position, prominent elements within their membership speak of repatriating everyone of a non-Swedish background. They are taking full advantage of the fact that support for the Social Democrats is at its lowest ever level.

In France, opinion polls suggest that the National Rally’s Marine Le Pen, long decried as an extremist, is threatening to win the French Presidential election in 2022. She is polling equal to Emmanuel Macron on the first round, and is polling at 45% to his 55% on the second. This is well up from Le Pen’s 33% result in the second round of the previous Presidential election.

In Germany, the Alternative fuer Deutschland is polling at around 15%. In the Netherlands, Thierry Baudet’s Forum for Democracy is the second-strongest party right now, having briefly been the strongest earlier this year. In Italy, the nationalist Lega Nord is now dominant. In Spain, the right-wing populist bloc is now polling at 17%, up from 10% in the general election less than a year ago.

The mainstream New Zealand media will never report on any of this.

The reason for all this discontent is the increasingly apparent failure of the Establishment to manage the Western World in a way that reduces the suffering of the Western people. The ruling class of the West transparently stopped giving a fuck about their people’s suffering many years ago, and the ensuing resentment has become bitter.

The mass immigration to Europe of Muslims and Africans over recent decades has heavily lowered the standard of living of the average European citizen. On the flipside, however, it has generated immense profits for those who benefit from this suffering. Those with an interest in hiring cheap labour, selling accommodation to the highest bidder or profiting from ethnic strife and division have seen their stocks rise handsomely.

This oversupply of cheap labour has made it all but impossible for young, working-class people to get into a position where they own a home suitable to raise a family in. Young people in New Zealand have less than 40% of the house-buying power that their parents had, and it’s getting worse. Most aggravating of all, the Western Establishment has shown no interest in changing this state of affairs.

This refusal to change course, when the current course only benefits 5-10% of the population, is the ultimate reason for most of the current discontent in the Western World. We can conclude from the examples in Europe that any party taking a meaningful stand against the New Zealand Establishment has the potential to win up to 25% of the vote.

The New Conservatives are the most prominent of the parties on the right that oppose the Establishment. Therefore, they are the only party appealing to the Kiwi equivalents of the Sweden Democrats, National Rally, Liga Nord etc. voters. Their constituency is angry, white, rural and male – the same demographic that won the World Wars.

It’s obvious to most by now that there is no meaningful difference between National and Labour, both being business-as-usual neoliberals whose overriding concern is keeping the economy going at full tilt.

The big problem is that there’s no meaningful difference between these two parties and any of the Greens, ACT or New Zealand First. The Greens are even more globalist than Labour, and ACT are even more globalist than National. For anyone who opposes globalism the traditional choice has been New Zealand First, but their close co-operation with Labour and the Greens has now made clear to all that they are as globalist as the rest.

In the minds of most dissenters, this leaves few options. Leftist discontents have been fond of throwing a vote towards the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party, and no doubt many who turn out for the cannabis referendum will do so again this year. Most of the discontent at the moment, however, is inspired by right-wing sentiments, and people motivated by this tend to despise cannabis users and consider them subhuman.

For the right-wing discontents, the realistic options are ACT and New Conservative.

As this column has previously argued, ACT could get 5% if they were willing to step into the alt-right niche, instead of merely following puppy-like behind the National Party. However, they are clearly not willing. ACT is perfectly comfortable being the party of big-money corporate neoliberals, because that ensures that they get plenty of funding. David Seymour flirts with anti-Establishment positions, but his heart isn’t in it.

For this reason, the New Conservatives are the only party that are primed to take advantage of the wave of discontent that is sweeping the West.

At the time of the most recent poll, the New Conservatives apparently had less than 1% support. However, that poll was almost two months ago. Since then, several things have happened, and all of them follow the general trend of stoking discontentment towards the Establishment. If they keep happening – if that great wave of populist discontent reaches New Zealand – the New Conservatives might rise all the way to 5% before September 19.

As Dan McGlashan showed in Understanding New Zealand, there is a very strong correlation between voting Conservative and voting National (0.77), and therefore a strong New Conservative vote is likely to significantly weaken the National vote. If it does, it will not shift the balance of power in 2020. In fact, it could even strengthen Labour’s position if the New Conservatives get less than 5%, thereby causing the votes of many people who would otherwise have voted National to be wasted.

The far-right populists have shown in Europe that, in times of high discontentment, it’s possible for them to attract voters from otherwise left-wing demographics. New Conservative will attract anti-Establishment voters from National, but they could also attract a significant number of voters from those who would otherwise have cast their lot in with Labour, New Zealand First or ACT. If they succeed at this, New Zealand could be in for an electoral surprise in September.

If you enjoyed reading this essay, you can get a compilation of the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2019 from Amazon for Kindle or Amazon for CreateSpace (for international readers), or TradeMe (for Kiwis). A compilation of the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2018 and the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2017 are also available.

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Where In The World Does New Zealand Rank On Cannabis Law Reform?

New Zealand was once looked to for moral leadership. We were the first country to give women the vote and the first to institute a universal old-age pension, but these were 19th Century issues. On 21st Century issues, such as cannabis law reform, we are no longer close to the frontrunners. This article attempts to determine how far we have fallen.

Perhaps the first major crack in the cannabis prohibition dam came with the legalisation of medicinal cannabis in California in 1996. In the near quarter-century since then, a tidal wave of cannabis law reform has rolled around the world. New Zealand has made a determined attempt to resist this wave, and has stayed loyal to the idea that cannabis users are scum who should be persecuted.

Cannabis is now recreationally legal in California, as it is in Alaska, Colorado, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Washington and the District of Colombia. That makes for 12 places in just one country that are more enlightened than New Zealand on the cannabis issue – over 100 million people.

Even if a person would say, uncharitably, that all these places are just one country, there are now several other countries that have legalised recreational cannabis. Uruguay did so in 2013 and never looked back. Canada did so in 2018. Georgia and South Africa have also legalised recreational cannabis for possession and consumption (although not yet for sale).

So that makes five countries that have legalised recreational cannabis to some extent – but they’re not the only ones ahead of New Zealand on cannabis law reform.

Many other countries have legal arrangements where cannabis is tolerated without being fully legal. The most famous example is the Netherlands, where cannabis is openly sold from licensed cafes, on the proviso that the cafe is willing to operate under a strict set of conditions. This is not de jure legal, but there is an understanding on the part of the Police that such activity is to be tolerated (provided it stays within certain limits).

Spain has a similar arrangement, where cannabis is legal if kept to private areas such as the personal home or in cannabis social clubs. In this sense, many countries have decriminalised cannabis to a greater extent than what New Zealand has done.

Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Austria, Barbados, Belgium, Belize, Bermuda, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, India, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Luxembourg, Malta, Mexico, Moldova, Nepal, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Slovenia, Switzerland and Trinidad and Tobago have all decriminalised cannabis to some degree.

It might come as a blow to the Kiwi ego that several Third World countries are now more advanced than us when it comes to a major moral issue such as cannabis law reform. But it gets worse – even Australia is ahead of New Zealand in this regard now. Cannabis will be legal in the ACT as of next week, and it has already been decriminalised in the Northern Territory and in South Australia.

So that makes 40 countries that have either legalised or decriminalised cannabis to some degree – but the true picture is even worse than this, because New Zealand doesn’t even have medicinal cannabis yet.

Since becoming legal in California 24 years ago, medicinal cannabis has now become legal in a further 32 American states and four territories. Even if we apply the rule from above (according to which all these states and territories only count as one country) there are still many other countries with more tolerant medicinal cannabis laws than New Zealand.

Even Zimbabwe has more enlightened medicinal cannabis laws than New Zealand does – they legalised it in 2018. It might sound incredible to some Kiwi ears that a place with the reputation for corruption and backwardsness of Zimbabwe could be ahead of New Zealand in a major area of medical knowledge. Alas, it’s the truth.

In reality, every single country already mentioned is ahead of New Zealand when it comes to cannabis law reform. We have neither legalisation nor decriminalisation of recreational cannabis, and medicinal cannabis is de facto illegal on account of that virtually no-one can afford what’s on offer.

We were first in the world to repeal the prohibition on women voting. When we eventually get around to repealing elements of cannabis prohibition, we will be no earlier than 70th in the world to have begun to do so. If you count the American states separately, New Zealand will be no earlier than 100th or so.

It might not be easy for the Kiwi ego to accept, but not only are we years behind backwards American states like Louisiana and Alabama, but we are also years behind Third World nations such as Uruguay, South Africa and Zimbabwe. If we ever had any special ability to read the winds of change, or to provide moral leadership to a world desperately in need of it, that is now gone.

By 2020 New Zealand is, morally speaking, right back in the pack. Far from being leaders, we now respond with sheep-like herd instinct to patterns that we’re not intelligent enough to understand. The only way to lift this state of disgrace is to legalise cannabis immediately and across the board.

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Narcissistic Sadism And Narcissistic Masochism

Narcissistic people pose a number of challenges for the societies in which they reside. Their selfishness is liable to cause suffering to those around them, and the indifference that the typical narcissist shows to this suffering is liable to cause violence. As this essay will examine, however, there are two distinct types of narcissism.

Narcissistic sadism is what most people think of when they think about the problems that narcissism causes. This is when a person puts their own ego above all other considerations, to the point where they harm others for no good reason. Narcissistic sadism is behind most cases of bullying and many cases of physical abuse.

At its most extreme, narcissistic sadism manifests in conditions such as psychopathy, in which other people are considered nothing more than tools for gratification. Psychopaths act as if the suffering of others is entirely meaningless, particularly when it stands in the way of the desire of the psychopath. People like this are all but indistinguishable from demons, as if brought to Earth specifically to wreak misery.

There is, however, another form of narcissism that arguably does just as much damage, if not more. This is narcissistic masochism – when one sacrifices oneself unnecessarily to glorify one’s own moral rectitude or fortitude. It is the act of putting oneself first by putting oneself last.

At first, this doesn’t sound like that much of a problem, considering that masochism primarily does damage to oneself. However, the fact that all individuals are part of a countless number of overlapping systems means that, in much the same way that it’s impossible to remove one knot without damaging the whole net, it’s impossible to damage oneself without damaging other people.

The most striking examples of narcissistic masochism right now are the repeated displays of feet-kissing by Pope Francis. These performances are supposed to broadcast the humility of the Pope to the entire world – but, naturally, Francis only does them when the cameras are in position and rolling. In his abject submission, Francis supposes that he’s demonstrating his superior moral sophistication to the world.

All kinds of martyr complexes could fall under this rubric of narcissistic masochism. The common element is that narcissistic masochists will glorify themselves as they are destroyed, usually in the belief that they have established some kind of moral supremacy over the rest of humanity. They believe that their destruction has occurred on account of that they are too good or pure for this world.

A more nefarious example of this phenomenon is collective narcissistic masochism. This is most obviously seen today in the form of ethnomasochism.

In particular, there is a strain of ethnomasochism that is constantly berating itself for its supposed role in various historical crimes, in particular colonialism and slavery. This strain believes that collective narcissistic sadism (which perhaps reached its apogee in Germany between 1939-45) is the world’s foremost danger, so much so that we ought to go as far as possible in the opposite direction.

This strain of narcissistic masochism leads to people supporting the mass importation of “refugees” from various disadvantaged parts of the world. Even when these people are told that these imports will commit a massively disproportionate amount of sex crimes, this is waved away as some kind of karmic payback for the nebulous historical crimes of the white man.

The psychology involved here is very similar to that of a masochist who pays a dominatrix to beat him on the grounds that he has misbehaved terribly in the past. In principle there’s little difference between someone grovelling before a dominatrix and someone grovelling because they believe that they have inherited the sins of their ancestors. The brain circuitry that inspires either action is broadly the same.

The archetypal narcissistic sadist is little more than an overgrown toddler. They never grew past the phase of responding primarily to egoic desires. Although their actions may have become more complicated and sophisticated as they became adults, the basic motivation is the same aggression that motivates small children and wild animals – an instinct that puts itself first before any other consideration.

The archetypal narcissistic masochist is the one who hates his family, hates his neighbourhood, hates his city, hates his country and hates his race. He will not admit to hating the world, because that doesn’t give him the opportunity to glorify himself. Anything associated with himself, however, he hates. Therefore, he derives gratification from destroying himself and anything associated with him.

The major difference between the two is that the sadist is other-focused, whereas the narcissist is self-focused. Although both are self-centred, the sadist focuses on destroying the other, whereas the masochist focuses on destroying himself (or any group that he may belong to).

If men like Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer best represent narcissistic sadism, perhaps people like Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron and Pope Francis best represent narcissistic masochism. The latter group of people – although most don’t realise it – cause just as much suffering and misery as the former, if not more. They also cause it for equally narcissistic reasons.

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The Gentlemen Shows That The Normalisation Of Cannabis Is All But Complete

Guy Ritchie’s latest crime caper film, The Gentlemen, is the rollicking, romping gorefest that one has come to expect from the director of Snatch. Behind the larger-than-life characters and the brilliant dialogue, however, are a few hints about where society is going, and a few things made to look normal that aren’t usually normalised. This article explains.

Cannabis users who stopped to think about it may have noticed a few things in The Gentlemen that are different to the usual messages contained within big-budget films. Normally alcohol, tobacco, adrenaline and oxytocin are all portrayed as acceptable forms of enjoyment, but cannabis is not. Cannabis tends to get lumped with opium and heroin as a drug of despair.

The hero of the story, Mickey Pearson, is a British cannabis tycoon. The character, played by Matthew McConaughey, is in charge of an empire that produces 50 tons of skunk every year. Yes, he has done some bad things on the way up through the underworld, but he’s very much a moral player, someone with far more class than the average criminal.

This weed-dealing protagonist is presented as the good guy, who the audience is invited to sympathise with. Not a good guy – because he’s certainly capable of violent crime still – but the good guy. This makes a change from the usual popular culture treatment of cannabis users. Aside from this central fact, several scenes in the film serve to normalise the idea of cannabis in the eyes of the audience.

In one scene, Mickey speaks to a Chinese gangster and heroin dealer named Lord George. Mickey makes the point that the drug he himself deals doesn’t kill anyone, unlike the heroin that George deals. It’s uncommon for a popular culture film to draw a distinction between cannabis dealers and “other” drug dealers. Usually the two are lumped in together, but here Lord George is presented as distinctly less moral than Mickey.

In another scene, Mickey’s henchman Ray (played by Charlie Hunnam) smokes a joint while expressing his disgust for heroin users. While rolling it up he expounds upon his weed preferences, including his belief that the right mixture of cannabis and tobacco is 50:50. In this scene, we are invited to sympathise with the cannabis-smoking Ray, whose classy demeanour presents him in sharp contrast to the heroin users around him.

In yet another scene, the major antagonist is trying to bargain Mickey down on the selling price of Mickey’s business. The antagonist makes the point that cannabis will become legal soon and therefore his enterprise would have to compete with the legal market, which inspires Mickey to demonstrate that his business has been future-proofed already.

The point that cannabis will become legal soon, and therefore that the relative values of positions in the cannabis market will change soon, is made with certainty. Guy Ritchie has his finger on the pulse well enough to know which way things are going, and it’s obvious from the international trends that moves towards cannabis liberalisation will soon occur everywhere. People have thought through most possibilities already.

This means that the plot of The Gentlemen is realistic enough to suspend disbelief and enjoy the story. It’s a great film – and for cannabis users eager to see an end to the prejudice against them, it’s great to see cannabis use normalised in popular culture.

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