Why Phil Goff is a Hero

By Andrew Atkin:

Phil Goff is an intelligent and experienced man. He doesn't do something without having a commonsense idea of what the effects of his actions will be. So let's ask the question...If Mr Goff had simply let Stefan Molyneux and Lauren Southern give their talks in Auckland, in council-owned venues, or at least stayed out of the controversy altogether, what then would the effect have been?

For the most part, Molyneux and Southern would have preached to their choir, made a little cash, and then moved on to Australia to repeat the profitable but politically-impotent exercise. They would have achieved nothing much at all, and New Zealand would have been none the wiser for having had them here.

But Goff did not do that. He publicly grandstanded in opposition to the speakers, and declared that Molyneux and Southern would never set foot on any council-owned venue. A blatant position of ideological interference, and technically speaking an abuse of power. 

The result? The public went mental - of course. Freedom of speech is holy ground, so stopping people from even expressing their "naughty" views is generally seen as both appalling and dangerous. People do understand that when it's the governments place to tell them what views are and are not deplorable, and then suppressible, then you're asking for trouble. Because when freedom of speech goes eventually everything goes. 

But Goff is no fool. He achieved what he wanted. He wanted the issue of free speech to be thrown out to the public arena, and to that end he has been tremendously successful. 

Freedom of speech is being aggressively attacked throughout the western world via so-called hate speech laws, promoted by the extremist political left. But now New Zealand, critically, is having this all-important conversation. 

It's a conversation that will ultimately make it a lot harder for any future government to drive laws through that could slow-burn New Zealand into some kind of smiling totalitarian state. A creeping threat that is ultimately real.

Phil Goff has also brought mass-attention to Southern and Molyneux's personal messages. Once only known to a tiny minority of New Zealander's, Southern and Molyneux are now seemingly becoming household names. And when we have people (er, who usually don't know much better) describing Southern and Molyneux as having horns on their heads, it of course only makes them even more fascinating...

I mean really, if you don't want to promote someone in the age of the Internet then you don't do it by making them dramatic. Remember Molyneux and Southern are only a point-and-click away, no matter what Mr Goff appears to want to achieve.

When put on the spot in a radio interview, Goff also brought attention to one of the most controversial things Molyneux has talked about: The IQ gap between Blacks and Whites. Goff, like all politically educated people, knows full well that Blacks have IQ's lower than Whites on average. And if you're talking about sub-Saharan Blacks, they are lower by about 30 points on the scale. That's not a mere 'view' or racist interpretation - it's a (difficult) empirical fact. And it's a fact that has been understood for over 100 years. [Note. The debate is in whether or not an IQ test measures overall intelligence, or merely your ability to hold down an abstract paper-work job].

So what was Goff doing, really? He was allowing something to be said that he himself is not allowed to say. He was telling us--or should I say letting us discover--that if New Zealand brings in masses of African migrants then we might be asking for trouble. This is the ultimate (and predictable) effect of his actions.



He was also indirectly signalling the threat of Islamic extremism, as both Southern and Molyneux talk frequently about the radicalisation threat. Another important (albeit sensitive) conversation for New Zealand, as evidenced by the major problems Europe has now developed.

What Phil Goff saw in Lauren Southern and Stefan Molyneux was people who could say what needs to be said, but what no New Zealand politician today will dare say for themselves out of a fear of a backlash from the bullies and slanderers. 

So Phil Goff is a hero. He gave Molyneux and Southern the New Zealand stage, on a mass scale, so finally New Zealand could be exposed to some difficult conversations that we do in fact need to have.

God bless you and thanks, Mr Phil Goff! You are indeed a clever and wise man.

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Update: 14th August, 2018:

The main "suppressed" speech.