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I just sent out the following email to a great number of my friends, as well as those from Smile City whose emails I am familiar with. Seeing as I don't know many of your emails, I thought it would be best to post the email here:
If any of you recall, I sent this email to you at an earlier date, under a slightly different title. I don't know how much attention any of you paid to it then, so I'd like to resend it now at a more appropriate time, as I strongly believe you should read it. If you have not received this before, it is because I feel now, at last minute, that it might be in your interests to consider what I have to say. In the event that you find my argument particularly convincing, I would request you forward this to as many people as possible. Hopefully, just hopefully, the message might resonate a little wider.
Good evening friends. I know many of you will probably not want to read this, and I know it may seem like a petty excuse for me to fire up the flames of debate on an issue that I feel very strongly about. That is not what this is to me, however. I do feel very strongly about this, this is true, but I send you this email because I'd like to officially pitch for my position on the issue, in a very serious manner. If you're thinking about voting on this referendum; specifically, if you're thinking about voting "yes" because you agree with the amendment to Section 59 of the Crimes Act, then I ask you to please read this and consider what I have to say. I am not looking for a debate (though if you want to debate me on this, please feel free in a format outside of email, which I despise), but rather I'd just ask you to read what I have written below. I feel this is incredibly important, and while many of you may not want to read what I've written, or may feel you've already well made up your minds, I still urge you to do so. It may change how you see this, but then again, it very well may not; I simply ask that you read over this before you vote "yes". If you plan to vote "no", then the following does not concern you, and you can feel absolutely free to ignore me. For those of you completely out of the loop, the referendum question is "Should a smack as part of a good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"
The following is in the form of a post I made on Smile City forums to a member that was considering what to do about their support for the amendment in the upcoming referendum:
I'd like to make a plea to you, Wren, to join me in boycotting this referendum. This is a particularly hard thing to do for me, because this is actually the first time I am legally entitled to vote, and being an extremely opinionated person myself, I do not easily give up my chance to express my opinion. That said, I would not feel right voting on this referendum. I cannot answer the question, and nor can you!
It is sad that the question has been worded in such a way that it prevents people like you and I from having a say on such an important matter. I think a law change needs to be put in motion to prevent a question from having such bias built into it in future. However, while this stands, we cannot bow to a question which is just begging for us to answer it, one way or another. We cannot surrender to this deliberate attempt to corner the electorate. This referendum, my friends, is a trap.
If you answer no, then that's perfectly fine, but if you're like me, which you are, then you simply do not believe that. The most intuitive thing to do, then, is to vote yes. This, however, would be dishonest of you. If you vote yes, then you are answering the question as follows: "I, Wren, believe that that smacking as part of a good parental correction should be criminal offence in New Zealand". This is a bizarre and contradictary answer! You are saying it should be a criminal offence, while simultaneously acknowledging that smacking is part of "good, parental correction". You cannot answer yes. This would not be answering the question; it would be a lie.
I know what people will say in response to this. "Well, we all know the question is about the relevant amendment, and so we should take the question to mean "do we support the amendment?"". This is interpretative nonsense. When a referendum is put before the public, no matter how unfair a question, no matter how much we think it should not be allowed, we have a duty as citizens to not answer the question based on our interpretation of it, no matter how obvious the intentions of the question may be, but rather to answer the question as put forth in the referendum, to speak truthfully of our views on the issue. If we cannot answer the question truthfully and exactly as it is asked, then we should not answer it at all. Period.
It is lamentable that the question is unanswerable for us, but we should not give it credibility, we should not endorse it, by giving an answer based on an unrelated context we have given the question. We know that the question is in relation to Section 59 of the Crimes Act, but we should disregard that in an ideal democracy. In an ideal democracy, we should answer the question as written, and not imbue it with context which the question itself does not contain. If we begin to do that, then we are imbuing the question with as much bias, with as much unfair interpretation as those who have so disingenuously placed the word "good" in this atrocious plebiscite. We are therefore making it impossible for people to look back in 30 years time, even two years time, and say "the public thought this" because we have absolutely no idea why people voted the way they did; because the public, instead of answering the question literally, used their own interpretation of what the question was about (no matter how obvious it is what it is about), to determine their own individual answer based on that societal context. The referendum becomes a meaningless mishmash.
Whose fault would that be? Family First and the like, no doubt, but we don't have to give this question credibility. We don't have to give their question credibility. They can put a stupid question before the voting public, but we don't have to answer it. Voting is not the only way to have our say. In any referendum, turnout is important, and it will be recorded to be seen alongside the other results. No matter how people will disregard my advice, I'm going to stand for something and do what I believe to be the only right thing. I am going to turn down my first opportunity to have a direct say in the national arena so as not to give a misleading answer on a biased question; so as not to give a dishonest answer, something the authors of this question are trapping a great portion of New Zealand into doing.
I urge you to join me.
Some will point out that if everyone on my side of the isle were to follow my advice, if everyone were to boycott this referendum, then the consequence of that would be that 100% of respondents would have voiced their support for the repeal of the relevant amendment. This is untrue. The result, in actual fact, would be that 100% of respondents did not want smacking to be a criminal offence. The referendum says nothing about the amendment. I understand that this is how it will be taken, but we should not give thought to that; it is they who will have misused the system and misrepresented the electorate. Not we.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Yours Sincerely,
Ben Uffindell.
If any of you recall, I sent this email to you at an earlier date, under a slightly different title. I don't know how much attention any of you paid to it then, so I'd like to resend it now at a more appropriate time, as I strongly believe you should read it. If you have not received this before, it is because I feel now, at last minute, that it might be in your interests to consider what I have to say. In the event that you find my argument particularly convincing, I would request you forward this to as many people as possible. Hopefully, just hopefully, the message might resonate a little wider.
Good evening friends. I know many of you will probably not want to read this, and I know it may seem like a petty excuse for me to fire up the flames of debate on an issue that I feel very strongly about. That is not what this is to me, however. I do feel very strongly about this, this is true, but I send you this email because I'd like to officially pitch for my position on the issue, in a very serious manner. If you're thinking about voting on this referendum; specifically, if you're thinking about voting "yes" because you agree with the amendment to Section 59 of the Crimes Act, then I ask you to please read this and consider what I have to say. I am not looking for a debate (though if you want to debate me on this, please feel free in a format outside of email, which I despise), but rather I'd just ask you to read what I have written below. I feel this is incredibly important, and while many of you may not want to read what I've written, or may feel you've already well made up your minds, I still urge you to do so. It may change how you see this, but then again, it very well may not; I simply ask that you read over this before you vote "yes". If you plan to vote "no", then the following does not concern you, and you can feel absolutely free to ignore me. For those of you completely out of the loop, the referendum question is "Should a smack as part of a good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"
The following is in the form of a post I made on Smile City forums to a member that was considering what to do about their support for the amendment in the upcoming referendum:
I'd like to make a plea to you, Wren, to join me in boycotting this referendum. This is a particularly hard thing to do for me, because this is actually the first time I am legally entitled to vote, and being an extremely opinionated person myself, I do not easily give up my chance to express my opinion. That said, I would not feel right voting on this referendum. I cannot answer the question, and nor can you!
It is sad that the question has been worded in such a way that it prevents people like you and I from having a say on such an important matter. I think a law change needs to be put in motion to prevent a question from having such bias built into it in future. However, while this stands, we cannot bow to a question which is just begging for us to answer it, one way or another. We cannot surrender to this deliberate attempt to corner the electorate. This referendum, my friends, is a trap.
If you answer no, then that's perfectly fine, but if you're like me, which you are, then you simply do not believe that. The most intuitive thing to do, then, is to vote yes. This, however, would be dishonest of you. If you vote yes, then you are answering the question as follows: "I, Wren, believe that that smacking as part of a good parental correction should be criminal offence in New Zealand". This is a bizarre and contradictary answer! You are saying it should be a criminal offence, while simultaneously acknowledging that smacking is part of "good, parental correction". You cannot answer yes. This would not be answering the question; it would be a lie.
I know what people will say in response to this. "Well, we all know the question is about the relevant amendment, and so we should take the question to mean "do we support the amendment?"". This is interpretative nonsense. When a referendum is put before the public, no matter how unfair a question, no matter how much we think it should not be allowed, we have a duty as citizens to not answer the question based on our interpretation of it, no matter how obvious the intentions of the question may be, but rather to answer the question as put forth in the referendum, to speak truthfully of our views on the issue. If we cannot answer the question truthfully and exactly as it is asked, then we should not answer it at all. Period.
It is lamentable that the question is unanswerable for us, but we should not give it credibility, we should not endorse it, by giving an answer based on an unrelated context we have given the question. We know that the question is in relation to Section 59 of the Crimes Act, but we should disregard that in an ideal democracy. In an ideal democracy, we should answer the question as written, and not imbue it with context which the question itself does not contain. If we begin to do that, then we are imbuing the question with as much bias, with as much unfair interpretation as those who have so disingenuously placed the word "good" in this atrocious plebiscite. We are therefore making it impossible for people to look back in 30 years time, even two years time, and say "the public thought this" because we have absolutely no idea why people voted the way they did; because the public, instead of answering the question literally, used their own interpretation of what the question was about (no matter how obvious it is what it is about), to determine their own individual answer based on that societal context. The referendum becomes a meaningless mishmash.
Whose fault would that be? Family First and the like, no doubt, but we don't have to give this question credibility. We don't have to give their question credibility. They can put a stupid question before the voting public, but we don't have to answer it. Voting is not the only way to have our say. In any referendum, turnout is important, and it will be recorded to be seen alongside the other results. No matter how people will disregard my advice, I'm going to stand for something and do what I believe to be the only right thing. I am going to turn down my first opportunity to have a direct say in the national arena so as not to give a misleading answer on a biased question; so as not to give a dishonest answer, something the authors of this question are trapping a great portion of New Zealand into doing.
I urge you to join me.
Some will point out that if everyone on my side of the isle were to follow my advice, if everyone were to boycott this referendum, then the consequence of that would be that 100% of respondents would have voiced their support for the repeal of the relevant amendment. This is untrue. The result, in actual fact, would be that 100% of respondents did not want smacking to be a criminal offence. The referendum says nothing about the amendment. I understand that this is how it will be taken, but we should not give thought to that; it is they who will have misused the system and misrepresented the electorate. Not we.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Yours Sincerely,
Ben Uffindell.
