Kiwis increasingly don't buy into gender ideology, say five poll results in the last year.
New Zealand’s National Party leader, Chris Luxon (now the Prime Minister-elect), when asked a question in August this year about NZ First’s policy of retaining single-sex toilets for women, openly scoffed at the notion that it was even an issue for New Zealanders. He opined that the NZ First Party were on a different planet if they thought that bathrooms were something we cared much about. Then just when Mr Luxon thought he’d successfully put that one to bed with a good dose of mockery to boot, and proved it even further by going on to win NZ’s general election in October, Talbot Mills popped out a poll which showed quite clearly that most New Zealanders do care about this issue.
So, which planet has Mr Luxon been on?
This is the fifth poll in the last year which shows New Zealanders do not like gender ideology being forced onto us in women’s sports, women’s spaces, and our children’s education¹. How many polls will it take before our politicians and Members of Parliament deign, or have the wits, to take notice? So far, NZ First appears to be the only political party who’ve had the smarts to get their fingers on the pulse of something that other parties appear deaf and blind to, due in no small part by listening to Mana Wāhine Kōrero. NZ First are likely to be in government as a coalition partner with National and ACT, so there’s hope they’ll bring those two parties back to planet Earth, but nothing can be guaranteed about what the final agreements between the parties will be, so at the moment we wait with fingers crossed.
It’s very interesting that both Chris Luxon and Erica Stanford, the National Party’s Education spokesperson (and likely to be the new Education Minister), have both said in almost the same word for word format that they’re not hearing about “bathroom issues” when they’re out and about. Everyone’s more concerned about bigger issues, they claim, like the cost of living. “Bathroom issues” simply do not arise, they say. I don’t doubt that the cost of living is on many people’s minds, because it always is to some degree or other and can be made something of, but do the National Party really think that people are only ever concerned about what are deemed to be the big issues?
It's simplistic to think that all people will feel free to talk about everything on their minds to a politician in a public setting. That’s if they even know how to find the words for a matter which they’ve never previously had to find the words for, and somehow turn their troubling thoughts into a coherent and adequate verbal explanation. Even if they manage to formulate their worries into words, in order to verbally express what they instinctively know is wrong about men being allowed into women’s and girls’ spaces and sports just upon their own say-so that they’re women, not everyone has the confidence to bring up a controversial subject in public. Especially not one for which they know they may get a hostile reception, possibly accompanied by loud and derogatory slurs of ‘transphobe’ and bigot’ from either or both the politician and other attendees - who are not admonished for doing so - under the guise of moral righteousness.
Neither have many politicians been particularly welcoming to those who want to talk away from the public space about the negative impacts of gender ideology on women and girls. I’ve heard enough stories of hostility and/or rude dismissiveness from politicians towards those who’ve braved raising this matter privately with them to be reluctant to do it myself. Others, thank goodness, are made of sterner stuff, but I can fully understand staying quiet, even whilst desperately wanting to say something.
Whatever excuse politicians come up with for not addressing the matter of allowing men who identify as women into women’s and girls’ spaces and sports, they should never, ever assume that it doesn’t exist just because they’re not hearing about it. It has to be noted, too, that the language used around that excuse is very clever. They may not be hearing about it when they out and about talking to people in what may be carefully engineered and controlled public settings, but many politicians and MPs have been emailed about the concerns we have with gender ideology being inserted into legislation and policies, and have been spoken to – or attempted to – in non-public settings.
Five poll results in the last year all depicting the same trend of concerns shows that those concerns definitely exist, and if politicians and MPs are adamant they’re not hearing about them, they should be asking why. If people aren’t bringing this matter to them, then they’d better start bringing this matter to the people.
¹ Links below which report on a variety of poll results over the last year which show that most New Zealanders consistently oppose gender ideology being forced onto us in our sports, single-sex spaces, and education
**CALL TO ACTION FOR KIWI'S WHO... - Save Women's Sports Australasia | Facebook
Majority of New Zealanders do not support Sex Self-ID (speakupforwomen.nz)
Family First poll results about sexuality education in schools
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