Further evidence of F&B’s capture by the woke Left is offered by an article in Kiwiblog on the 22nd of this month. Under the heading ‘Questions media didn’t ask’, Kiwiblog describes a ‘newly-launched ‘campaign’ involving a ‘coalition’ of ‘Climate Club Aotearoa’, the ‘Social Change Collective’ and ‘Forest and Bird Youth’. The coalition’s aim is ‘to increase youth voter turnout by 15% ...especially among rural, Maori and Pasifika rangatahi’.
None of us object, of course, to the enrolment of eligible voters ~ although I would be very surprised if that object is mentioned in the Forest and Bird constitution! But there is a very obvious political slant to this campaign. It is one thing for an interest group to review the policies of political parties, and to say to voters that this or that policy is good or bad for the interests which that interest group promotes. That is entirely legitimate, and in fact desirable. But this is something else. It is an outright attempt to change the government. The ‘Social Change Collective’ is obviously in favour of social change, and no prizes will be awarded for guessing in what direction their desired social changes will take us. A change of government is obviously the first step, and only the first. The ‘co-convenor’ of this coalition is one Ethan Reille, a Labour Party candidate at the last election and also an organiser for the PSA, which is running its own ‘Change the Government’ campaign. He and the other organisers clearly believe that it is parties of the ‘left’ ~ the Maori Party, the Greens, even Labour at a pinch ~ who will benefit from this voter enrolment campaign. Our own commonsense observations lead us to the same conclusion. It will not be difficult to guess for whom young ‘Maori and Pasifika rangatahi’ will be voting.
So it boils down to this ~ that, under an extremely flimsy and unconvincing disguise, ‘Forest and Bird Youth’ is actively participating in a campaign to defeat the current coalition at the election and have it replaced by a more left-wing one. With everything that that might involve...
It is impossible to believe, by the way, that their involvement has not been approved and supported by F&B central office. The F&B high command keeps a very tight rein on the activities of all its branches.
Many conservationists have spent a long time emphasising, quite correctly, that the environment is an issue beyond politics; that regardless of our politics we all need fresh air, clean water and refreshment in Nature for the spirit, and that the laws of Nature operate inexorably regardless of our political opinions. But here is Forest and Bird announcing, in effect, that ‘leftwing’ parties are conservation’s natural allies, and parties of the ‘right’ its natural enemies. This is nonsense. But by announcing this, F&B is creating the very situation it professes to deplore. If the centre-right wins this election ~ a surely possible outcome! ~ then why would our new government have any sympathy for an organisation which has already renounced political neutrality and declared itself the government’s enemy? Why would any centre-right politician support any conservation initiative? F&B has made it clear that it believes that there are no votes for the centre-right in such support. Why, for that matter, would any conservation-minded and conservatively-inclined citizen choose to belong to an organisation dedicated to left-wing political activism? F&B’s stupidity does a grave disservice to the very cause which F&B once existed to promote.
For Forest and Bird to claim that it is politically neutral is an outright lie. Poor old Captain Sanderson, who founded the organisation over a century ago, will be turning in his grave to see what his organisation has become. Perhaps it is time for someone to speak to the Charities Commission about the political activism of this ‘charity’. Given the disgraceful political activism of our judges, though ~ who will strike down Family First’s charitable status, but maintain that of Greenpeace ~ that may be an uphill job.
David Round, a sixth generation South Islander and committed conservationist, is an author, a constitutional and Treaty expert, and a former law lecturer at the University of Canterbury.
23 comments:
It's the same with the Federated Mountain Clubs. Most of their energy goes into "advocacy" which really means being a front for the Green Party. And while they claim to promote environmental causes, they have been completelysupportive of Tuhoe devastating the environment in the Ureweras and Ngai Tahu's exploitation in the South Island.
Communism has an appalling environmental track record. The Soviets committed 'ecocide' (thank you Google AI) on a grand scale with their grandiose engineering projects. Again to cite Google AI because I couldn't put it better myself, "Marxist ideology [views] nature primarily as a resource warehouse for human consumption and rapid industrial growth."
The environmental handwringing associated with the Western left is based more in naivete - it goes hand in hand with myths like the 'noble savage'. They tend to be spoilt upper middle-class children who live in a dreamland in which a return to their Garden of Eden is just a few policy enactments away.
F and B came out virulently against the TPB. Suddenly F and B are a Maorified organisation. I did not pay membership fees to F and B for them to advocate for race based politics I wrote and told them so I am no longer a member.Maori had zero concept of conservation even in regard to food suppy. There is no great spiritual mystery within Maori lore worth exploring. Storytellers and grifters.
There exists a mass psychosis in left politics at the moment. Activist everything, do not argue with the preordained narrative, oppressor oppressed madness that does not accept any diverse view whatsoever.
It is 100% toxic. And repulsive.
If every generation believes the previous generation led a more blissful and ecologically sensitive life, the logical extension of that idea takes us back to the Stone Age as the best of all possible times.
A vote for the Green Party anyone?
I discontinued my membership a couple of years ago too David, after decades of feeling that of course I belong to this land and its place on this planet - a very humble insignificant atom in the scheme of things, but HERE. ( I too a sixth generation from the deep South)
Meanwhile, after examining eight months of data in the year so far, scientists forecast last night that 2026 would probably be the hottest year ever, with 2027 very likely to be even hotter.
Everything’s fine folks. Those leftist greenies just need to keep their traps shut on environmental topics.
Nicky Hager, the left’s greying political bloodhound, has spent years ‘tracking’ the scent of political influence. His latest book, Dirty Work, hobbles through a well worn method: follow the people, the money, the language, the campaigns and the causes. Look beyond the names on the doors. Join the dots.
So let’s put Hagers modus operandi into reverse sniff.
A handful of recent Breaking Views pieces provides a useful trail.
David Round, in “Forest and Bird Drift Left”, examines Forest & Bird’s move into youth voter mobilisation and argues that a conservation organisation has wandered into political campaigning. Rodney Hide, in “The model you can’t read”, follows DOC’s recruitment of staff to implement a “Treaty Operating Model” and asks what precisely this machinery is doing inside a government department when the public cannot readily examine it. Geoff Parker, in “Who Decided New Zealand Needs A Democracy Overhaul?”, examines Re:Shape and the wider constitutional-transformation movement, including Matike Mai Aotearoa, the constitutional working group established through the Iwi Chairs’ Forum. Don Brash, in “Yet another reason the Waitangi Tribunal must go”, examines the Tribunal’s expanding reach into contemporary policy and the argument over Treaty principles and constitutional authority.
Parker’s account of Re:Shape and Matike Mai’s constitutional ambitions is documented in the piece itself.
There are others. Many others. These are enough.
Put them together and, using Hager’s own method, you have environmental advocacy, political mobilisation, constitutional reform, intellectual development, public-service machinery and a statutory institution.
That’s quite a few tentacles.
Indeed, enough tentacles to produce a book considerably longer than a mere 155 pages.
Now reverse-engineer Hager’s thesis. Follow the people. Follow the language. Follow the campaigns. Follow the institutional links. Follow the ideas from academia into advocacy, from advocacy into politics and from politics into government machinery.
Call the connections a network. Call the extensions tentacles. Then stand back and admire the monster.
It proves nothing, of course. That is the point.
Hager’s method is sufficiently elastic to make almost any politically congenial ecosystem look like a conspiracy if you start with the conclusion and work backwards.
Which brings us to the NZ MSM.
The problem isn’t that Hager has a thesis. The problem is the apparent eagerness with which the mainstream media has adopted it.
One senior ‘award winning writer’ of more than 30 years’ standing, was handed the job of explaining Dirty Work during a podcast over the obvious question: what evidence does Hager have?
One might reasonably have expected some curiosity, some dissection their credentials insinuated.
Instead, they senior adopted Hager’s language of “tentacles reaching into many places”, accepted the “bigger picture” and described the connections as an ‘important story and an important marker’.
And there, rather neatly, is the problem. The bloodhound had found a scent; the job was to establish where it came from, not to assume that because the dog was excited there must be a fox.
Which people were connected? What money changed hands, and how much? Which campaigns were actually coordinated? What demonstrates influence rather than political agreement? And what did the people on the other side have to say?
Those are inconvenient questions because they involve checking, arithmetic and the possibility that a splendid theory of ‘far right’ networking may not stink as much as advertised.
Instead, the vocabulary does the heavy lifting.
The msm didn’t need to join Hager’s dots. It needed to test whether the dots belonged together in the first place.
Instead, the msm supplied the tame magnifying glass.
@9.39, "hottest" since when? 1979 is it? If you ignore 1932 etc? This "record - hottest - year" game has been so discredited over the years.
These "Scientists" who we know get cancelled and cease earning an income by the woke elites if they dare disagree with their narrative, tell us it's always one second to midnight from the apocalypse unless... We become communists, shift back living in the early mediaeval era and go insane like the ladies in the Green Party.
Then the earths temperature can be manipulated even more easily than the angry climate gods story, just like that. Yeah nah.
I knew someone who left F&B a third of a million dollars as a bequest.
F&B refused to use a photo of him, because it needed a minor Photoshop tweak.
I found their arrogance appalling in all my dealings with them as his executor.
He would be so angry at the tactics of F&B to destroy democracy , to place Maori in an elevated status way beyond the truth of their destruction of NZs ecology.
F&B are behaving like the turkey voting for Christmas. Once the Maori have control over the land, the forest will be logged and the birds eaten.
Anon 1101 assuming your questions are in good faith -
Hottest since 2024, spanning records back to 1850 although a more unified approach was only from 1880. 1932 is taken into account.
There is only a 35-65% chance of 2026 continuing the pattern of the first eight months of the year so it may not turn out to be the hottest.
I don’t understand the rest of your comment and it doesn’t appear to have any basis in science so best we just focus on the science here.
All the best!
How could 2025, as a non-El Nino year, crack the top three hottest years of all time? If I had more time left in this earth I’d be worried. Thankfully I’m an old bugger so it won’t affect me!
Anon 1101
Based on verified, empirical facts, there is no evidence supporting the claim that climate change is a hoax.An event can only be verified as a hoax if there is proof of deliberate fabrication, which does not exist here. The global warming trend is documented through direct physical measurements of ocean temperatures, atmospheric chemistry, and satellite observations. These findings are independently replicated by thousands of scientific institutions worldwide, leaving no factual basis to classify the phenomenon as a hoax.
The progressive real world is little interested in what goes on in a fast polynesioning , oil less land isolated at the bottom of the world. But for students of history observing the NZ decline ,the truly artful manner in which a stone age language and culture , and a shrewd partnership interpreation of a casual Treaty, was harnessed as Trojan horse for takeover will prove astonishing. The artful penetration of all institutions from Parliament to a wild life hobby club is truly masterful and confirms the opinion of early explorers that maori were the smartest of primitive races...
Climate changes, it does that, always has,. You adapt and get on with life. But trying to sell us in NZ especially the Greens solution of socialism as some kind of remedy to our 0.0017% theoretical carbon output simultaneously making us poorer is just insane.
As is adherence to the Treaty of Waitangi. I mean, FFS, Governor Hobson and the signatory Chiefs were thinking of this madness?
This is when "Climate Change", the rebrand from the failed "Global Warming" really exposes the dishonest political manipulation this subject really is about.
I left F&B several years ago when Maorification became the fad and F&B an enthusiastic supporter of it. Prior to that I had been a keen planter, student of our flora, eradicator of predators and had enjoyed many of their outdoor activities. The tone of the journal raised doubts to begin with for its increasing mangling of English, evangelising attitude towards a Maori viewpoint and failure to see the context in which clearing forest was necessary in most areas. It has narrowed its agenda and lost sight of the broad picture.
Anon 418 says the most common strawman used by those who want the world to flood and burn
“Climate changes, it does that, always has”
No one is arguing that, my man, and you know it. Why not enter into the debate in good faith? Hmm, we wonder.
For many years I was a $25/month F&B supporter, but left several years ago when they were obviously becoming more interested in political correctness than actual conservation.
I say this as a rural-based QEII trust landowner, who does the hands-on work of conservation on my own land, and find F&B regularly submitting on initiatives in opposition to what I see as common sense views.
I no longer want anything to do with them, although they still contact me begging for money for their latest fantasy. No chance!
The world goes through cycles if heating up and cooling down. Fact. Those who claim they have data don't have reliable, accurate or enough data. On eather side ( but the left are far too egotistical and arrogant to admit that ) Until we gave at least a sequence which could take 200+ more years, i just dont buy these arguments. Never trust a leftie scientist. Very little is factual. The left are liars. Want to annoy a conservative, lie to him, want to annoy a leftie progressive, tell them the truth.
@ 6:03 PM. Hows socialism going to adjust the global thermostat, or ToW? We don't want to debate that nonsense?
There's always been people who think the world is about to end over the centuries, "flood and burn". A good bit of self whipping perhaps? I think we were supposed to have been burnt and wishing for Noah's Ark a decade or so ago. Isn't that what woke pin up girl Greta Thunberg lectured us with?
But you know, keep wishing and a hoping. Anyway, Ai is going to kill us all now. There's another cause!
Anon 750 yet another reliant on technology, the output of science, while denying science. Truly a sign of how far man has come, to turn his back on progress and facts. Wonderful!
What has F&B got to say about the Ngai Tahu plans for the Yellow Eyed penguin? Crickets I imagine.
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