Strings

I really don’t know why you are comparing me with killers of a little girl. I have never killed anyone, and I will never even kill animals to eat; even though the law allows me to, according to my own rules it would be wrong. If you require a law to tell you what is right and wrong, then it is you that needs to go off to an island. Presumably if there was rioting in the streets and the rule of law broke down you would then think you could do what you liked.

It is my view that the law is for rat bags. There are a significant number of them out there, so we still need laws. But decent people will behave decently even where there are no laws or threats of punishment.

I am not so closed minded as to stop reading material that I disagree with. So I will continue to read your correspondence, and to post disagreements on it if I want.

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kiore
War is a different kettle of albatross, and so your searching for a way to belittle me has, again, failed. As for your willingness to only abide by laws you yourself decide are appropriate, I would be grateful, and so would many others I am sure, if you would hie yourself off to an island where you can govern yourself to your hearts content.

Last week we had a family of people who thought the same way you do, they were shocked that the rest of us would send them to prison for killing a little girl, using tumble dryers and washing lines along the way! After all, there was nothing wrong with it in their view – I can only believe that you agree with their right to think that way!

No more shall I read you correspondence – it is, to use use words, unjust use of my time and intelligence.

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Sapient

Read my post again more carefully. I never said the pesticides were banned. I am saying that if they were to be banned through the influence of the review then such a ban would be illegal.

In any case I don’t have the same respect for the law as Strings. The only rules I will willingly obey are those I make myself, and then I am very law abiding.

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“shaking head in shame”

Have another read of this. The greens back DoC all the way, yet here you are going on and on about pesticides. Do any of you realize how much poison DoC apply to OUR country each year?

I’m unimpressed, make up your minds, ya or na. This is what makes the whole deal such a joke, “we are clean and green, we want it all”
Hey DoC, how many ton did you get out this week? I hope it wasn’t around my clean green patch….

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Kiore,
accually the pesticides are not banned and therefore it was perfectly legal, this is mearly a case of a judical review that thought the state should change your diaper and powder you if your too stupid to use the loo and wipe your own a*se.

Hey, those asians were victimising us maori! opps, i mean those jews were victimusing us germans

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Kiore,
accually the pesticides are not banned and therefore it was perfectly legal, this is mearly a case of a judical review that thought the state should change your diaper and powder you if your too stupid to use the loo and wipe your own arse.

Hey, those asians were victimising us maori! opps, i mean those jews were victimusing us germans

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Strings

If you read the posting you will see that the nun actually used the law to get a judicial review. In other words if pesticides are banned it is the law would make it ILLEGAL. So by your own logic she did the right thing, and anyone spraying pesticides would be doing something ILLEGAL and would therefore be in the wrong.

Incidentally, if you were living in Nazi controlled Amsterdam, would you hide a Jewish family in your attic. I hope not. That would be ILLEGAL. In fact under your own logic the only moral thing for you to do would be to turn them in to the authorities. Not to do so would be ILLEGAL.

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Owen,
Thanks, found it.
FYI:
Case Name: Northland Regional Council v Skywork Helicopters Ltd & Anor
Judge(s): Judge JP Doogue
Court Name: DC, Whangarei
File Number: CRN 3027005691, CRN 3027005692, CRN 3027005693, CRN 3027005684, CRN 3027005685, CRN 3027005686
Judgment Date: Jun 24, 2005

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Johan, I disagree with your position, but will fight to the death to allow you to hold and express it!

“One man’s JUSTice (death penalty) is anothe man’s UNJUST action” JFK/1963 speech to new graduates of Harvard Law School.

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Strings,
I agree, lets not get caught up in a tit-for -tat so lets not go there.

I accept your concern about any law not to my liking cannot merely be ignored. However, I do not subscribe to the view that because it is law it should be obeyed – in its extereme form this comes down to the old “I was only following orders” excuse. I think the crux of it is that where there are laws, you disobey them at your peril, even when you may feel they are not justified. I do not hold that because you feel they are unjust you can ignore them without consequences but that when you feel them unjust you are morally bound not to follow them AND face the consequences. Further, “unjust” something more serious than “dislike” or “don’t agree” – it has a moral imperative to it that places the individual in conflict with his or her conscience.

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Still have not found that one but have found a reference to a more recent one where action was taken under RMA. Go to pps 16, 17:

http://thegrower.co.nz/magazine_pdf/2005_2006/2005July.pdf

And if you email me I shall send you my evidence on buffer zones to the NRC.
Will keep looking.

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Johan, It was in Northland from memory.
I was hoping no one would ask because although I referred to it on a submission to the Northland Regional Council I suspect I lost it in a hard drive crash.

Give me a minute or 50.

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Johan
Having been there in the 60s, I can tell you that the extent of civil disobedience was not to break the law. The movement used the law to ensure that the Constitution was observed – when the Supreme Court declared that Negros were people too, and so covered by the phrase “all men are created equal” they broke the back of a number of laws that were judged to be unconstitutional.

Let’s not get too caught up in tit-for-tat though. There were many people who broke many laws as the civil rights movement progressed, and there were many people who ‘stole’ ‘property’ by taking slaves out of the South well before Dr. King’s initiatives took hold. However, just like Gandhi, Dr. King did NOT encourage law breaking, he encouraged use of the law to right wrongs, which I don’t count as civil disobedience.

The comment you made that I believe is totally wrong is in your statement . . . . . . . .
>you seem to imply that individuals do not have the right to disobey the law at all. If not, when will individuals according to you have the right to disobey the law? And who decides if the laws are unjust if not the individual him/herself?
>

My point is that when an individual decides that a law is not just, and take to themselves the right to disobey the law, you have anarchy – just as we are starting to see today!

There are people who think our drug laws are unjust, so they make and sell “P”. There are people who think our drink-driving laws are unjust, so they drive drunk. There are people who think our property rights laws are unjust, so they daub pain on walls and claim it as an art form. There are people who think our vehicle testing laws are unjust, and so they drive vehicles that are unsafe on our roads. There are people who think our taxation laws are unjust, and so they work for cash and never pay taxes. There are people who believe our rape laws are unjust, and so they take advantage of drunk girls. ALL OF THESE, according to your theory, as quoted above, ARE RIGHT. However, I don’t want to live in your world, so I believe in the rule of law and the enforcement of that rule.

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Strings,
I follow your argument, however, please note that the statement was made by Henry Thoreau in the United States and his thoughts later found their way into the civil rights movement of Martin Luther King.

Surely you will agree that your statement “… that we elect, in our free society, a parliament to govern the country, which includes us. They pass laws to do that.” applies in the USA as well?

Will you therefore say that civil disobedience had no place in the civil rights movement in the 60′s?

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Johan

My reality is that we elect, in our free society, a parliament to govern the country, which includes us. They pass laws to do that. If I feel the law is unjust that is my opinion, if a significant number of people (10% of registered voters) feel the same way they can force a plebiscite through petition. If the law is still not changed then they can change the Government at the next scheduled election. This, to me, is what living in a land under the rule of law is about.

On this basis all theories of civil disobedience have no relevance in this my country and anyone attempting it should be dealt with by the full force of the law!

QED

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Owen
Could you please provide a reference of some sort for the case you are refering to, I would like to read the law report of it.

I have checked the law reports on the information you have provided but could only find the old case (2006) of Hamilton vs Papakura District Council. This was decided against the plaintiff who relied on common law and who had suffered the loss of his cherry tamato crop grown in hothouses as a result of the use of water, supplied by the defendant, that had been contaminated by herbicide. The high court, court of appeal and the privy council all turned the claim down.

Thanks

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We are arguing about a UK decision while we are actually living in NZ.
Most if not all District Plans quite properly have rules about the use of agricultural sprays which refer to national or industrial standards.
More importantly we have had a recent case brought under common law where a farmer recklessly sprayed a herbicide which drifted into his neighbours commercial greenhouse and wiped out a whole crop of tomatoes.
He sued for damages and was awarded over a million dollars (from memory).
He could prove the damage and the common law worked a treat. Had he used the RMA the fine would have been limited to $200,000.
Since then farmers have been more careful.

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Strings
Your comments on the following please:

…”people often think that the proper response to an unjust law is to try to use the political process to change the law, but to obey and respect the law until it is changed. But if the law is itself clearly unjust, and the lawmaking process is not designed to quickly obliterate such unjust laws, then Thoreau says the law deserves no respect and it should be broken.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Disobedience_(Thoreau)

I accept that the issue of the nun and pesticides does not relate to “just or unjust laws” but on your PS statement of 8.48 am you seem to imply that individuals do not have the right to disobey the law at all. If not, when will individuals according to you have the right to disobey the law? And who decides if the laws are unjust if not the individual him/herself?

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PS
When individuals abandon law as the arbiter of A standard of what is wrong and what is right, it is known as anarchy, which is not a condition I want to live in, though I cold hire a few big bruisers and take what I want I suppose!

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What is right in some regimes (e.g. taking an apple from a fruit vendor’s pile and eating it (to see if the taste is acceptable) is theft here and normal behaviour in Saudi Arabia.

Beating a naughty child with a piece of bamboo cane was normal in the 1950s and is illegal here.

Driving a car on a motorway at 150 Kph is legal in Germany and illegal here.

Sexual intercourse between two men is legal here and illegal in Paraguay.

Would you like any more examples? The reality is that laws are made by me and for men, and that’s OK by me. I accept the definition of legal right and wrong as constructed by the Government of New Zealand, and abide by it as long as I am here. In Germany I break New Zealand law – so what!

My point is that we have to accept the consequences of our form of government., and individuals and groups can lobby for what they think it wrong to be made illegal (I think it’s called an election in broad terms!).

So, to come back to your question of, “why do you think stealing is wrong”, I have to say that stealing is a definition not an absolute! When the last Labour-led government put up taxes on top earners to 39% there are people who claimed it was theft – I am not one of them, so you define the circumstance of ‘stealing’ and I’ll tell you if I think it is right or wrong.

Sorry to give the appearance of being evasive – I just believe in the rule of law and it’s not easy!

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