Full Show Podcast: 09 September 2025

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from News Talk sed B.
Follow this and our wide range of podcast now on iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Hello and welcome to Matt and Tyler Full Show Podcast
number two zero one. And what a show it was today.
You know, we said we were going to talk about
what makes you a bad KEI we things you haven't done.
We didn't get around to that. I'm telling you right now,
we didn't get around to that waiting for that. We
won't because our chat on how not reading people's lack
of ability to read novels and long form books is

(00:39):
making us dumber and dumber and dumber and unable to
understand basic politics that blew up, went.

Speaker 3 (00:46):
Off, absolutely off. So it was a fantastic show. Tell
your friends, family, download, subscribe, all that good stuff.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
And I tell you what an intense discussion about the
whole Tom Phillips situation that you might enjoy as well.

Speaker 4 (00:59):
So yeah, good on you.

Speaker 3 (01:01):
We love you guys.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
Give me a taste to key we talk to see
you again. You seem busy, I'll let you listen to
the pod. All right then, Okay, I have lost my voice,
all right then bye.

Speaker 5 (01:08):
One of them big stories, the big issues, the big
trends and everything in between.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons News Talk said.

Speaker 3 (01:17):
Be afternoon to you. Welcome into Tuesday. So I hope
you're having a good day. Always appreciate you joining us
on the show. Welcome to all the new listeners as well.
Love having you here.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
Get a man, Get a Tyler. How are you today?

Speaker 3 (01:30):
I am good.

Speaker 6 (01:31):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
I'll tell you what, mate. I've got a new neighbor.
He arrived on Friday, and I didn't think I was
going to like this neighbor very much, but it turns
out he's actually making me a better person. So this
new neighbor is a rooster, and he's ride on the
back fence that he has to join the neighborhood.

Speaker 4 (01:48):
He's an actual rooster.

Speaker 3 (01:49):
He's an actual rooster.

Speaker 4 (01:50):
He's not a good rooster. He's an actual He's.

Speaker 3 (01:52):
An actual rooster. Feathers the old rocker.

Speaker 4 (01:57):
Everything cockadoodle do is cocker doodle doo.

Speaker 3 (01:59):
And the reason he's making me a better person is
because that sound at about five thirty, and he's not
always at five thirty. Sometimes he likes to go six.
Sometimes it might even be seven am. But the five
thirty am call from the rooster. The wake up call
is way more nicer than I thought it was going
to be. I thought when I saw this rooster come in,
I thought, here we go. The neighborhood's going to go downhill.

(02:22):
But it is such a nice thing to just listen
to that sound of nature. The rooster. He is happy
about the morning. It's my new little nature's alarm clock.

Speaker 7 (02:32):
I love it.

Speaker 4 (02:32):
See, Tyler, you're speaking to the converted here.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
Because I grew up on a farm and the rooster's
crowing in the morning.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
That was huge.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
That was how I grew up. It's very nostalgic for me.
But the thing is that you talk about the different times.
You know, they cock adoodle do all day. They just
just they start cockadoodle doing when the sun comes up.

Speaker 3 (02:51):
He's pretty loud. He doesn't shut up now.

Speaker 4 (02:53):
But my point is he's not doing it as your
alarm clock.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
As soon as the sun comes up, he'll do it
all day, right, So that's why it's different times. Yeah,
but you know, so it'll be this time and then
as the year goes continues, it'll change the rising of
the sun.

Speaker 3 (03:09):
Yeah, I do, which is fantastic. I like his style.
But can I just say, I think everybody should get
rooster in their neighborhood. On the convert on the rooster.

Speaker 4 (03:16):
Now you're not supposed to. I thought there was rules
around having roosters in your neighborhood.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
Nine two nine two. If you know about that is
my neighbor allowed a rooster. Don't take the rooster away now,
I really like it.

Speaker 4 (03:26):
I know you allowed hens, but I don't know if
you're allowed roosters.

Speaker 3 (03:29):
If you know, nine two nine two. But on to
today's show. It is a doozy as it always is
for you. So after three o'clock there was an article
an interview with Lord about her relationship with New Zealand,
and she said in this article she misses it all
the time, but she was making it a priority to
spend more time in New Zealand. I have a place
there now. I'm committed. But she was also questioned about
whether she liked Lord of the Rings and she admitted

(03:51):
that she'd never seen the movies or TV series or
read the books. And she said, that makes me a
bad kiwi.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
I know, yes, I mean that's just the one line there,
and I know she's being a bit silly and a bit
glib saying she's a bad kiwi. But what do you
have to experience to be a key week, to be
a good keiw that.

Speaker 4 (04:07):
You've experienced the New Zealand experience. Is it attending an
all Blacks game?

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Is it a game of backyard cricket as a hangy?
Is it a pie you know? Is it watching the
Lord of the Rings movies.

Speaker 3 (04:18):
Good pair of jandals.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
It's probably too much to usk people to watch the
Hobbit movies, but I think you've got to less see
the Fellowship.

Speaker 4 (04:24):
Definitely great movie.

Speaker 3 (04:25):
Not all in one go if you don't want to,
but great, great movie.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
I think you have to watch the entire extended edition
of all three of the movies and then listen to
the director's commentary and the additional material the extras on
the DVD, the making.

Speaker 3 (04:40):
Ofs That's a good week there, right. That is after
three o'clock. After two o'clock, reading is in trouble. Multiple
studies in multiple places show the same thing. People are
reading less across the board, whether that's adults, children, teenagers, whoever.

Speaker 8 (04:54):
So.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
In America, the share of people who read for pleasure
has fallen by two fifths in twenty years and in England,
a you gov poll found forty percent of those in
the UK had not read or listened to any books
last year.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yeah, that's because our attention span is play limitying. So
are you reading less of you finding it hard to read?
Are your kids reading? Are you worried that everyone's going
to get so dumb they're not going to be able
to get their hand around general politics if people don't
have the intention span to read a goddamn book.

Speaker 3 (05:22):
Yeah, looking forward to that after two o'clock and after actually,
right now, let's have a chat about this. So, as
we know, police are stitching together details on how Tom
Phillips three children have survived four years of isolation. So
the police Minister and the Commissioner Police, they are currently
in y Cautu. They will be having a stand up
at one point thirty which we will take live here.
But as we now know, Phillips was shot dead by

(05:43):
police and why Tomo yesterday after firing a high powered
rifle at a policeman, hitting him in the head. He
had broken into a farm store and pure po earlier
that injured officer. He has had a few rounds of
surgery and still not out of the woods yet. But
questions have now turned to the police operation over the
last four years.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
How comfortable are you with how all this has gone
down over the last four years, the police response, the vesttigation,
the search. Could they have done more defying Phillips earlier?
They were they too cautious in their in their search?

Speaker 4 (06:17):
Yeah? So, although I would say it's an incredibly complex
situation and perhaps the horrible end to it does show
why caution was needed over the past four years. But
your thoughts on that eight hundred and eighty ten eighty yep.

Speaker 3 (06:31):
Love to hear your thoughts on this. Nine two ninety
two is the text number. Mike obviously had the police
mister Mark Mitchell on his show this morning, and when
questioned about the overall police response, here was his reply.

Speaker 9 (06:44):
I've spoken with and visited several of the officers that
have been on prolonged operations, that have been investigating and
have been working hard to try and recover those children safely,
and they were confronted with almost an impossible situation where
you've got a very unpredictable father with high powered firearms
likely to use them, and they don't want to create
a tragedy, you know, losing those children. The focus was

(07:06):
always on the safe recovery of the children.

Speaker 10 (07:09):
Did you guys or did the police know ish where
he was? And if they'd worked a bit harder, they
could have found him sooner.

Speaker 9 (07:15):
You know, the police are very good, they're very efficient,
they've got lots of tools, they've got very deep capability.
They can find people. But it's a big complicating factor
when you've got young children in a situation with high
powered firearms and a very unpredictable father and not knowing
you know exactly how he's going to react and respond. Unfortunately,
mister Phillips has been killed. He's been killed because he

(07:37):
showed that he would use those firearms. And we now
have a police officer that's critically injured line in hospital
because you know, Phillips tried to kill him.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
So obviously the police minister, backing his staff and his
people in his ministry. Here's what Police Commiser Commissioner Richard
Chambers had to say.

Speaker 11 (07:53):
We knew that we were dealing with an armed, a
dangerous and a very motivated individual in mister Phillips, and
we had to be very very cautious about the approach
that we have taken. You know, that played out yesterday
morning in a way that we suspected it could, which
is not something that any of us wanted. But our
assessment of the situation over the last four years has

(08:15):
been spot on and that was shown yesterday morning when
we confronted mister Phillips. He shot one of my staff
and we had to return fire. And we have always
been concerned that that may be exactly what occurred, and
of course that may also involve the children.

Speaker 3 (08:34):
So that was Police Commissioner Richard Chambers and of course
Police Minister Mark Mitchell backing what the police did. But
can you hear from you Are you comfortable with how
police handled this whole situation.

Speaker 2 (08:46):
I don't always agree with the police, but there is
no question in my mind that they handled this the
way the only way they could from the beginnings. Is
this texter, this one disagrees should have left him alone.
He was trying to keep his children safe from a
terrible family situation. But I mean the armed robbery linked

(09:08):
to that May twenty twenty three armed robbery antiquity. Then
there was the superrette in November twenty twenty three.

Speaker 4 (09:17):
It's you know.

Speaker 3 (09:19):
It was brazen actions.

Speaker 2 (09:20):
Yeah, there, you couldn't expect police to leave that kind
of thing alone.

Speaker 4 (09:25):
Yeah, what do you I mean armed, Robbie? Could our
armed robberies cannot be go.

Speaker 2 (09:29):
Uninvestigated and the people that are suspected and it cannot
be left.

Speaker 4 (09:36):
And not hunted. You know that's just not The society
would break down pretty quickly if that was the case.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
The police of a job to do. Absolutely, But what
do you say, Oh, eight one hundred eighty ten eighty
from what we know now, are you comfortable with how
the police handled this situation over the last four years?
Nine two ninety two is the text number back in
a moment, it is quarter past one.

Speaker 5 (09:56):
The big stories, the big issues, the big trends and
everything in between.

Speaker 12 (10:01):
Matt Heath and Tyler Adams afternoons used talks they'd.

Speaker 3 (10:04):
Be It is eighteen past one, so we are told
talking about the Tom Phillips situation. Obviously, he was fatally
shot yesterday by police after shooting an officer with a
high powered rifle. The children have been found safe and
are now being offered wrap around service. But can you
hear your thoughts on the police operation? Are you comfortable

(10:26):
with how police handled this over the last four years.
Plenty of techs coming through on this one. On nine
two ninety two.

Speaker 2 (10:34):
This person responding to the person that texted and said
the police should have left him alone. The police did
leave him alone until he began violent robberies. That's what
they responded to. It was him that raised the level
of response. Yeah, I can't understand people saying that that,
you know, after May twenty three and the Philip's been
linked to the.

Speaker 4 (10:54):
Tiquity robbery of a bank.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
I don't understand how people could expect you to leave
him alone after that.

Speaker 3 (11:01):
That's a significant crime. Yeah, Peter, how are you this afternoon?

Speaker 13 (11:06):
Here you go? Police did an outstanding job on the
outcome was as they said it was expected. But I'll
be interested to see now when they cove through everything
on how many people will be charged for aiding and
betting that helped helped him over the four years in

(11:29):
the case, because there's just no way four years that
they weren't helped. And it got to the point you
just mentioned before when he made that first robbery, as
Win has probably helped drive out that he was really
on his own to start, you know, defense, You're not defending,

(11:50):
but you know, you start looking after his kids and yeah, yes,
you've got a feel for those kids.

Speaker 2 (11:57):
But yeah, yeah, I mean, and you could see if
you came across I mean, I'm not defending it, but
you could imagine a situation where you know that it's
incredibly bad what's going on, but then empathy kicks in
and you think, well, I'm going to help out here
for the sake of the kids. And you know, you
know what I mean, you can I'm not I'm not

(12:18):
condoning it, but you can see the sort of why
a local might respond in that way.

Speaker 13 (12:22):
Peter, Yeah, one hundred percent. And you know, if it
was my own blood, but at what point has his
help dried up? When I and I think you just
mentioned when it was that first arm robbery where he's
really on his own and things aren't probably right, And

(12:44):
you know, we could argue all day, but the kids
are going to be the key to this, right who
helped them? Where did they go? And unfortunately they're going
to be dragged through this for a while. And I
really hope that Ko and the mother do the right
things now, you know, And yeah, scary, but unfortunately we

(13:09):
got on the police for taking their time and making
sure that safety was paramount.

Speaker 4 (13:14):
Good on your Peter, thanks for you cure.

Speaker 3 (13:15):
Yeah, thank you very much. Oh, one hundred eighty ten
eighty is the number to call. We've got full lines
at the moment if you can't get through.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Yeah, I mean, Peter's absolutely right. May twenty twenty three
was when things definitely changed with the Philip's being a
warrant issued after that robbery of the antiquity bank. Right
before that, he was just you know, raiding the family
home for supplies. Yeah, that really escalated things and changed
the whole whole deal, didn't it.

Speaker 3 (13:38):
And as you say, an armed robbery with firearms and
breaking into a business and committing an armed robbery, it
doesn't matter what your motivation is at that point, that
is a significant crime. And for the police to say
we don't need to worry about that would be a
crazy thing. For our police to say. Of course, they
need to investigate and take that seriously. You can't have

(13:58):
people running around, no matter what they say is their motivation,
breaking into businesses armed with rifles. That is not a society.
We can we can have one.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
Hundred percent being sent the sex say one hundredercent agree
with the police approach and my full sympathy with the
officer who was shot. Those that say that he was
protecting his kids fail to see himself as the problem. Isolated.
These kids were isolated, cold, Hungary, on the run. No school,
That is not safety.

Speaker 3 (14:25):
Yep, keep those teachs coming in on nine two nine two.
It is twenty two past one. Are plenty of calls
coming up. You're listening to Matt and Tyler good afternoon, putting.

Speaker 1 (14:34):
The tough questions to the newspeakers, the make asking breakfast.

Speaker 10 (14:38):
So after virtually four years, the Tom Philip Sunker came
to a conclusion.

Speaker 4 (14:41):
Mark Mitchell's the police minister.

Speaker 9 (14:43):
Obviously an awful situation to everyone involved. When you've got
father with three children deep in the bush with firearms,
unpredictable and like to use them.

Speaker 10 (14:50):
Did you have a genuine knowledge based belief that he
was capable of harming his own children?

Speaker 12 (14:56):
I can't answer that.

Speaker 9 (14:57):
Also, the detail in terms of the risk analysis that
would have been done around him and whether or not
he was capable of harming his own children. I do
know this that he is the suspect for some serious
violent offending and he's included those children in that offending,
and no responsible father would ever put their children in
harms way, and he did that.

Speaker 10 (15:12):
Back tomorrow at six am the Mike Hosking Breakfast with
Rain Drover News Talks, they'd be very.

Speaker 3 (15:18):
Good afternoon to you. Are you comfortable with the way
the police handled the Tom Phillips situation, Julie, good afternoon.

Speaker 14 (15:24):
And a very good afternoon to you gentlemen too. The police,
they did a wonderful job, absolutely wonderful job. Put themselves
out there no matter what the situation, and they in
their careers they see some pretty terrible things. What I
felt for was the children. A young woman, she's twelve.

(15:48):
She needs hot showers, they need warm beds. That was
the thing that always crossed my mind. Are they sleeping rough?
How did he did he provide good beating for them?
Did he provide hot showers? Did they have hot meals?
That was what I was concerned about. But the police,
fabulous job. Couldn't have they couldn't have done any better.

(16:11):
And I feel for the officer that's hurt and for
his family. Just wish him a speedy, speedy recovery. Probably
never be the man who was but I just hope
he survives.

Speaker 3 (16:24):
Julie, thank you very much for giving us a bus.
And I think most if not all of New Zealand
they're wishing that officer is absolutely has the has a
speedy recovery as well. Right coming up, we are crying
across Live to the Commissioner of Police Richard Chambers, Deputy
Commissioner Jill Rodgers and Minister of Police Mark Mitchell. We

(16:44):
are just moments away from that stand up at one
thirty sistay tuned. It is twenty seven past one. Back
very shortly.

Speaker 4 (16:54):
JW's talks.

Speaker 15 (16:55):
They'd be headlines with blue bubble taxi. There's no trouble
with a blue bubble. Police are due to provide an
updates with the latest regarding the death of fugitive Tom Phillips.
We will take you live when it starts. Police are
trying to piece together who might have helped Tom Phillips
and his children evade police for almost four years, a

(17:15):
fugitive who was fatally shot by police after he opened
fire on an officer in rural Whitecuttle yesterday. One child
is found with Phillips. The other two were located at
a campsite near the shooting. Police Commissioner Richard Chambers says
they're now investigating how Phillips was able to accumulate firearms.

Speaker 11 (17:34):
There's a lot of work to do to try and
understand who, if anybody, may have been assisting mister Phillips,
and we will deal with that should that be the case.

Speaker 15 (17:42):
A teenager has been charged with murder in relation to
the death of fifteen year old Kaya Kararua in Napier
in May. Crown lawyers in the trial for accused murderer
Hak Yung Lee says Lee now accepts she caused her
young children's deaths, following an earlier denial. The bodies of
the children were found in suitcases in Auckland in twenty

(18:03):
twenty two, and Wellington City councilor is proposing to cut
dozens of jobs across and services. Our newsroom understands consultantly
firm Deloitte will conduct a review into operations. Plus one
more time, man with stage four cancer calls on the
council to grant his last wish to paddle hiszwaka. See

(18:23):
the full story at end zat Herald Premium. Now back
to Matt and Taylor.

Speaker 3 (18:28):
Thank you very much. Wendy, So we are standing by
for the media stand up, so that will be Commissioner
of Police Richard Chambers, Deputy Commissioner Jill Rogers and the
Minister of Police Mark Mitchell to give an update on
the Tom Phillips situation. So while we wait for that
to start and we will cross live as soon as
that begins, we will go back to our conversation we're
having about the police and how they handled the Tom

(18:49):
Phillips saga. Are you comfortable with the way that they
handled the last four years of one hundred and eighteen eighty.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
Hi, guys, another good show given the terrain and complexity
of the locations that the police have consulted with sas
as tracking and eliminating any threat.

Speaker 4 (19:02):
As their specialty. Thanks George. I think there's issues with
that's where.

Speaker 2 (19:06):
You have the police in the army and there's the
from the issues deploying the essays against citizens in the country.
That's a different remit that they have, So you know,
we've got to be really careful how that has used,
how those defense forces are used, and so it's just.

Speaker 4 (19:24):
Not legally and I'm pretty sure I'm right here. I'll
look this up.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
I think it's not legally possible to deploy the essays
on a citizen.

Speaker 3 (19:36):
I can understand the argument of that because if they
do it for someone like Tom Phillips, what's to stop
them from bringing in the army and essays for whatever
they wanted to do, which is very fair.

Speaker 4 (19:46):
Definitely lesson learned here.

Speaker 2 (19:47):
If someone commits kidnapped, robbery and burglary, every possible use
of manpower needed to be used till the fender is found,
not let up, or another horrific.

Speaker 4 (19:57):
Situation will occur.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
It's so complicated the terrain and you've got the other issues.
So you've got an armed person with children around, So
what kind of force could you use against them? You
have to just be The whole thing is just so
very very very complicated with the children involved.

Speaker 3 (20:19):
Yeah, and safety of that children was paramount, wasn't it?
And sadly Tom Phillips lost his life in that confrontation.
But thankfully the children are safe and have been looked
after and getting that wrap around service.

Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah. Absolutely, Pete. Welcome to the.

Speaker 7 (20:36):
Show, good guy. I'll keep it quick because I know
we're going to you going to this.

Speaker 3 (20:42):
Sorry, we've got to go right, We're going live to
the press conference now.

Speaker 11 (20:44):
Name is Richard Chambers, Commissioner of Police. I have with
me the Honorbabled Mark Mitchell, Minister of Police and Warwick
Morijue Regional Commissioner Tamariki. Thank you for coming along this afternoon.
I'd like to give you a bit of an overview
as to what the Minister and I have done today,
and then I will pass to work and following that

(21:05):
we will open it up for questions. The Minister and
I arrived back from Australia in the early hours of
this morning, where we both attended the funerals of the
lost Victoria Police officers when I got the phone call
at one seven am Melbourne time yesterday morning. From that

(21:31):
point on, our focus has been on the events here
in New Zealand and in particular the work of my
staff in dealing with the tragedy yesterday morning. Can I
acknowledge the incredible work of my police colleagues and how
proud I am of the work that they do day

(21:53):
and night across the country, but in particular dealing with
a very volatile situation. I also acknowledge the loss of
mister Phillips in that event yesterday morning, when the Minister
and I arrived back to New Zealand this morning. Our
priority was to travel here to the Waikatou and to

(22:13):
meet with the injured police officer we have just returned
from the hospital. We also took time to meet with
the family of our colleague who are here with him
supporting his recovery. The Minister and I have also taken
time to meet with the investigation team that includes not

(22:34):
only those that are dealing with the critical incident that
occurred yesterday morning, but also those that have been involved
in this investigation for four years. Can I say how
proud I am of all the police staff who have
worked tirelessly over four years on this investigation. We are very,
very fortunate that we are not dealing with the loss

(22:56):
of a New Zealand police officer. Can I comment to
also on the pride encourage of not only that police officer,
but his colleagues who there were We were there with
him dealing with the situation that unfolded yesterday morning. For
four years, we have known that mister Phillips has been armed,

(23:18):
he's been dangerous, and he has been motivated. We have
taken time over four years to consider how best to
deal with the situation. We were confident that, irrespective of
how hard we tried to bring it to a peaceful conclusion,
that with a motivated person, that was always going to

(23:38):
be a challenge, and that has informed the way that
we have dealt with this matter over the four years,
and including the way that we dealt with the recovery
of our children. Late yesterday when our colleague was shot. Yesterday,
we had the police Eagle helicopter down here from Auckland

(24:02):
and can I acknowledge their work supporting the incident. The
helicopter landed and the crew on board that which included
two of my police officers, are provided first aid to
the shot police officer. Likewise, the other police staff that
had come from across the Wycaddow district that were there
in support of that officer, and I honestly believe that

(24:26):
he is still with us today because of the work
that they did after he had been shot. We were
able to get the support of one of the children
yesterday morning to better understand where other children may be located.

(24:46):
That information allowed us to then locate the remaining children
about two kilometers away in dense Bush, and there are
some photos here that you are welcome to take pictures
off to help demonstrate the challenging environment in which we
were operating. We were also advised that we were likely

(25:09):
to find firearms at the campsite, and we did so.
Our approach throughout yesterday until such time as we recovered
the remaining children safe and will was cautious and that
was necessary. We must not forget that these children have

(25:29):
been living in the bush for four years. They are
skilled in that environment, and we need to approach the
scene very very cautiously to ensure that nobody was harmed
as we worked very very hard to recover them safely.
Warrick will talk soon too out of the care and

(25:49):
protection that has been wrapped around those children. I thank
my staff who have worked tirelessly for four years on
this investigation. We've got a lot of work to do
from this point on, but for over four years they've
put their heart and soul into trying to find mister

(26:13):
Phillips and the children. We've got to remember that as
police officers, we wear uniforms, but behind this uniform there
are also human beings, mums and dads, sons and daughters,
and it's not easy when you are so determined to
ensure that these children are safe and well. We face
so many other challenges and a motivated offender. It's a

(26:35):
challenge to bring us to a conclusion. The staff that
we have met with this morning, whilst very pleased that
we now have the children safe and well, the emotion
that the Minister and I have seen this morning is
very clear. We always knew this was going to be
a challenge, but I think the staff that have worked

(26:58):
on this investigation for such a long time from this
point on. We have obviously a police investigation into the
circumstances of the incident yesterday morning. We have another investigation
that will help puzzle put the puzzle together, that tells
us more about the last four years and in particular
anybody who may have been helping mister Phillips, and we

(27:20):
will deal with them accordingly. We also have an IPCA investigation,
which is entirely normal in this situation. That is all
from me and I'll open it up to questions shortly,
but uh closing and closing? Can I also acknowledge U

(27:42):
S acting to Deputy Commissioner Jill Rodgers whilst the Minister
and I were in Australia representing our country and our
organization is that on police. At the funerals of two
fallen Victoria offices, we were very conscious of the work
that was happening back here in New Zealand. I acknowledge
Acting Deputy Commissioner Rogers for her outstanding leadership yesterday and

(28:02):
providing as much information as we were able to in
the challenging events of yesterday, and now invite Winnister Mark
Mitchell to offer any further comment Tooh.

Speaker 9 (28:16):
Thanks very much everyone for being here with us. It's
obviously been a very tough twenty four hours for the
entire country. Here has been a high degree of public
interest in this case. He has been a high degree
of concern for the children, and unfortunately it came to
its conclusion yesterday with the father attempting to kill one

(28:38):
of our police officers who we have just visited in
the hospital and I'm pleased to say was able to
talk with us and certainly gave myself and the Commissioner
a sense that although he's got a tough pathway to recovery,
there is a pathway to recovery and we are very
thankful that we still have him with us.

Speaker 12 (28:58):
We spent time with his.

Speaker 9 (28:59):
Wife and his family, his father, his mother, sister and
brother in law, and you can all will only imagine
how they're feeling at this time. Extremely proud of him,
extremely proud of the police officers that took action yesterday.

(29:20):
Everyone can see, I hope the country can see that
the situation that the police were presented with and trying
to deal with the situation and to try and conclude
it without the loss of life, in particular those children.
You had a father of mister Phillips, who in my view,
had no regard for the safety of those children. He

(29:43):
seemed to be solely motivated in terms of what he
wanted to do and how things were impacting him. When
you have when he's a suspect of having taken his
children into violent and dangerous offending on several occasions prior
to being dealt with or found and detected and then

(30:04):
the police being reported in the last forty eight hours,
he has quite literally put his children in harm's way.
And the police, certainly since I've been police minister, have
been very clear with me that everything that they do
and the approach that they'd taken is quite simply put

(30:24):
those children's safety at the forefront of decisions that were made,
and their concerns were they were going to be presented
with a situation where we had a tragedy and we
lost those kids, and I think everyone can see with
what unfolded that that was a genuine and a real concern.
So I want to acknowledge the police. I want to

(30:45):
acknowledge the leadership here, the police leadership here, Acting Deputy
Commissioner Jill Rodgers, the Commissioner, who was very clear they
we were in Melbourne that it was important to get
information out to the public quickly because, like I said,
there was a very high level arm of public interest

(31:05):
in this and public concern, and of course the communities
that are impacted and effected, it was only fear that
they were kept informed and they understood what was going on.
As you'd understand, it's a highly sensitive matter and there'll
be more information that will come, but not all of it.
We can't speak to all of it right now. So

(31:27):
I'd like to acknowledge the fact that there's been a
big human cost to this, whether it be the fact
that we've had one of our officers up at the
White Cotta Hospital having to undergo surgeries for critical injuries
his family, whether it be our police officers, who, like
the Commissioner said, have been working on this for four

(31:48):
years and you could see the emotion in them because
they are human, they are heavily invested in this. And
of course the huge relief that although we've had a
tragedy in the loss of mister Phillips, the huge relief
that those children are back now safe and I rang
a tummery care and an extended family. I want to

(32:08):
acknowledge the oc of the police case and the investigations,
all those teams, the entire police family, who in my
view have quite simply been outstanding and have been on
display for us again as a country, to show that
we are served by a world class police service that

(32:29):
is fully dedicated to making sure they keep the communities
that they serve safe. I want to acknowledge the Phillips family.
I know that they have been through a lot as well,
and they will be going through a lot right now.
And like I said, there has been there's been no
winners in this. It has been extremely difficult situation but
has been brought to a conclusion now those children are

(32:51):
back in safe care. They've obviously got a long road
ahead of them in terms of recovery, but they're able
to start that road. They're able to start.

Speaker 4 (33:00):
That journey now.

Speaker 9 (33:02):
And with that, I think it's appropriate to hand over
to Warwick Morrowho.

Speaker 16 (33:11):
Thank you, Commissioner.

Speaker 4 (33:13):
Minister.

Speaker 16 (33:15):
I'm Marc Mori, who Regional Commissioner on a tomodyke wakattur
Bay plenty. Firstly, I would like also to offer our
condolences to the Phillips Faro and their loss and acknowledge
the brave deeds of our police and those juli Els.
Essentially especially thinking all of the injured police officer at

(33:37):
this time and his fino, wishing him a speedy recovery
to good health. Through his efforts he is enabled to
say return all these Tomodiqi. I want to say I
am constrained in the amount of information I can share.
The family call directively managing this case and we will

(33:58):
comply with the directions thank of us. I want to
assure the community here in Waykattle and also the wide
Republic of New Zealand that my team in this region
have been planning and preparing for the return of these
Tominique from when they went missing. I can confirm that

(34:19):
the children are settled and were settled last night. They
are doing well under the circumstances and engaging with the
staff supporting them going forward. I have an experienced and
dedicated team of staff assigned to this. They are prepped
and ready to respond to whatever needs these tomidique might have.

(34:45):
We are joined up with our partner agencies across the
children's system to respond to those needs. We have clinical
professionals who put their hands up to assist if required.
I want to assure you will that these tomiichi will
be provided with whatever help or assistance they may need,

(35:07):
for however long they may need it.

Speaker 17 (35:11):
Now.

Speaker 16 (35:11):
I understand that there is huge public interest in these
tomaitiqui and their well being, but all I can ask
is that we please give them some privacy. These are young,
young tamaiki. This has been unprecedented these circumstances. Everyone is

(35:34):
doing their very best to ensure we can return them
to some form of normal daily life. We don't know
exactly what that looks like yet and how long that
may take. We will be guided by these tomatikui and
what they need. We would ask that you please keep

(35:56):
that in mind as we move forward. Kildown, thank you.

Speaker 3 (36:00):
News talk z B. It is eleven minutes to two.

Speaker 4 (36:04):
And just to recap.

Speaker 2 (36:05):
On the one thirty pm press conference from Western Wakado,
Police Commissioner Richard Chambers acknowledged the incredible work of his
colleagues in a very volatile environment and also the loss
of Tom Phillips's life. He and the Police Minister Mark
Mitchell met with the injured police officer and his family
in why Kator Hospital this morning and says we're very,
very fortunate that we are not dealing with the loss

(36:26):
of a New Zealand police officer. He says for four
years they've known Tom Phillips was armed, dangerous and motivated
and police took time over those four years on how
to deal with the situation. While police wanted a peaceful
conclusion with a motivated person, this was always going to
be a challenge. Chambers says they were lucky to have
the help of the child who was with Phillips to

(36:47):
find the other two indense bush. He released the first
images of the campsite where the family was staying, where
police also found multiple firearms. He says the approach to
finding the children was cautious and necessary, as they had
been living in the bush for four years and are
schooled in the environment. From now on, they will continue
to be a police investigation into what happened yesterday morning.

Speaker 3 (37:08):
And the recamp from the police. Minister Mark Mitchell, he
says after visiting the shop police officer in hospital this morning,
he's pleased to say that he was able to talk
and certainly gave himself and the commissioner a sense that
although he's got a tough pathway to recovery, there is
a pathway to recovery. He says, everyone can see the
situation the police were presented with yesterday morning and to
try and conclude it without loss of life. Mitchell says,

(37:30):
in his view, Tom Phillips had no regard for the
safety of his children and quite literally put them in
harm's way. Mitchell says police staff ensured they put the
children's safety at the forefront, and he says Phillips seemed
to be solely motivated in terms of what he wanted
to do and how things impacted him. And we just
heard from ordering a Tamadeki Regional Commissioner Warwick Mutahu, and

(37:51):
he says he's constrained in the amount of information he
can share with the family Court actively managing the case. However,
he says his team has been planning for the return
of these children since they went missing. He says the
children are settled and are doing well in the circumstance
as a prep team including clinical professionals, is ready to
support the children going forward, and they will receive whatever
help or assistance they may need for as long as

(38:14):
they might need it. He says, Please give them privacy
as they are young and the circumstances are unprecedented. So
keen on your thoughts nine two nine two. You just
heard what was said in that press conference at one
point thirty from the Police Commissioner, the Police Minister and
or Tamadiki. So nine two nine two, love to hear
your thoughts. It is eight minutes to two.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
Matt Heath, Tylor Adams taking your calls on eight hundred
and eighty ten eighty. It's Matt Heath and Tyler Adams
afternoons news talks.

Speaker 3 (38:45):
They'd be very good afternoon, Jill. It is six minutes
to two. We're getting a heap of text correspondence on this.
On nine two nine two.

Speaker 2 (38:52):
Chris says, a great show, fellows. My question is the
surrounding farmland and owners. How did they not know they
were on their land or moving around the sound of
the quad bark would go far. Must have been heard
driving around day or night. Cheers Chris Man. It's pretty romance,
remote and dense bush. But yeah, I mean.

Speaker 3 (39:11):
It's a possibility, and the investigation will be looking into that, I'm.

Speaker 4 (39:15):
Sure, Amandep says.

Speaker 2 (39:16):
I get that some people want to see Tom Phillips
as a dad who is just trying to love and
protect his kids, but I think it's important to step
back and look at the bigger picture. He didn't just
play a long game of hide and seek. He kept
his kids hidden from their mum, their wider family, school, friends,
and even basic health care for years. That is not
the same as protecting them, as actually taking away their
right to a safe and stable childhood. Teaching kids how

(39:38):
to live off the land might sound admirable, but it
does not replace education, medical care, and healthy social development.
We cannot romanticize survival skills. We're ignoring the harm of
growing up in secrecy and instability.

Speaker 3 (39:50):
Yeah, well thought out texts that one and this one. Briefly,
the police might have got it right. I'm not sure
I leaned towards the idea that a decision should have
been made early on to try at least to locate
Phillips and his children. At this point there needs to
be a wide ranging debate on whether the police should
have been more determined early on or to prevent Phillips
ruining the lives of the children and the way that
he did. Yeah, that is or we have time for

(40:12):
this hour, But thank you to everybody who phoned and
text on that. Really I appreciate you coming in on
that discussion. After two o'clock, we want to have a
chat about reading. It is in trouble. Multiple studies show
that adults are reading less, children are reading less, teenagers
are reading a lot less. A couple of figures for you.
In America the number of people who read for pleasure
that's fallen by two fifths and twenty years. And in

(40:33):
England found forty percent of Britain's had not read or
listened to any books in twenty twenty four.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
So you're worried that your brain is turning to Marshall
or your kids' brains are turning to Marshal. The attention
span of the average person has dropped from two point
five minutes in twenty four to just forty seven seconds. Now, yeah,
hard to read a novel with a forty seven cent
and attention span.

Speaker 3 (40:57):
Oh eight, one hundred eighty ten eighty is the number
to call. What is reading look like in your household?
Love to hear from you? Nine two nine two is
the text number if that's your thing. New sport and
where the fast approaching? Stay right here you're listening to
Matt and Tyler. We will be back very surely.

Speaker 1 (41:15):
Matt Heath Tylor Adams taking your calls on eight hundred
and eighty ten eighty. It's Matt Heathen, Tyler Adams Afternoons
News Talks.

Speaker 12 (41:23):
Av talking with you all afternoon.

Speaker 1 (41:32):
It's Matt Heathen Tyler Adams Afternoons News Talks.

Speaker 14 (41:35):
It be.

Speaker 3 (41:37):
For a good afternoon. Welcome back into the shelters. Seven
pass too now. Just to remind any breaking news or
updates and the investigation into the fatal shooting of Tom
Phillips and the safe retrieval of his children, you will
hear it here live and first, so we will bring
that to you. If we hear any breaking news or updates,
stay tuned, but in the meantime, let's have a chat
about reading. It is in trouble. Multiple studies and multiple

(42:00):
places seem to be showing the same thing. That is,
adults are reading a lot less, children are reading a
lot less, and teenagers are certainly reading very small. Children
are being read to less, and many are not being
read to at all. So the figures produced in this
report by the Economists show in America the share of
people who read for pleasure that's fallen by two fifths

(42:21):
in just twenty years, and the UK is even worth
I worse. I find this stat astonishing. Have found forty
percent of those in the UK had not read or
listened to any books any books in the whole of
twenty twenty four forty percent. That is a crazy stat here.

Speaker 4 (42:37):
I mean, I'm reading all the time. Reading is fantastic.
I love reading. But this.

Speaker 2 (42:44):
Article in The Economists suggests that this declining reading is
making our politics dumber, and it talks about politics coming
from TikTok, and what a problem that is, because if
people are getting things explained in sixty seconds or in
a tweet, then they're probably not getting the nuance or
both sides of the subject, and very easy for manipulation

(43:05):
emotional a motion norm manipulation in sixty per second clips
on YouTube? But mean I mean in YouTube's another one.
I mean people don't watch anything over eight minutes on YouTube.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
Well, the shorts they are taking off, aren't they in
terms of and I think the shorts are they designed
to be under a minute?

Speaker 4 (43:22):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (43:23):
I believe they are.

Speaker 2 (43:23):
Yeah, the shorts were designed to compete with TikTok as
well reels with Instagram, so addictive and as we've talked
about on the show before that, you know, spending time
on reels, TikTok or YouTube shorts.

Speaker 4 (43:34):
Is basically a raising your brain. Yeah, basically you're making yourself.

Speaker 2 (43:38):
Dumber and more miserable as you doom scroll through that
absolute rubbish. So are you finding it harder to sit
down and read a book or to sit down and
read long form articles that go through all the issues
on a given topic. There's a decades long research that
has found that the average person's attention span for a

(43:58):
single screen.

Speaker 4 (43:59):
So that's how they do it.

Speaker 2 (44:01):
There's a way that they test it and how long
people can do it they don't know they're being tested for.
It is down to forty seven seconds by the start
of twenty twenty three. That's down from two point five
minutes in two thousand and four. So you can only
assume between twenty twenty three and now that the average
attentions fan has slipped.

Speaker 4 (44:19):
So we've got to the point where.

Speaker 2 (44:22):
Doom scrolling through one minute videos is going to become
too much for people.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
I mean, you get to a point where TikTok is
too much.

Speaker 2 (44:29):
Well you see this when you you know, people can't
even watch a feature film anymore. People can't sit and
watch a feature film or without double screening it and
getting on their phones.

Speaker 4 (44:39):
So good luck trying to read a novel. And yet
some of the most.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
Meaningful experiences in your life come from reading novels or
long form nonfiction books. Absolutely life change in getting to
know a subject or know the characters in a book.
And one of the great reasons, one of the reasons
why reading is so good for your brain is because
you not only have to read, but you have to
imagine and comprehend everything that's happening in the book. So

(45:04):
it gauges your brain in a way that watching things
just does. I mean, you go into a vegetative state
where you've just got stuff coming in as opposed to
the way.

Speaker 4 (45:13):
That you have to process it with a book. So
it's a massive disaster for.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
The intelligence levels of our country if people do not
have the attention span to read anymore.

Speaker 3 (45:24):
The theater of the mind. Absolutely, But I've got to say, mate,
so when you go to bed, you've got your reading
time to you and your partner Tracy, you both have
dedicated reading time or do you set out space for
it or you just pick up a book whenever you
get a at a spare time and we'll read wherever.
I mean you have scared. Do you have scheduled times?
Will you say, right, this is my reading time because
I relect before bed.

Speaker 2 (45:45):
I read before bed, But I read if I wake
up in the middle of the night, and if I
get a second to read, I get so excited. I
grab my kindle and I sit down and read.

Speaker 4 (45:54):
I just love reading.

Speaker 2 (45:55):
I think I've got a learning problem where I'm I
just have an insatiable desire to read and ingest information.

Speaker 4 (46:02):
That's a good problem to have, Well maybe, oh, I
mean it just means that you repeat that boring information
to people constantly and bore the crap out of your kids.

Speaker 3 (46:09):
Do you ever get distracted though while you're reading, is there?
You know you might? You might read a couple of
chapters and you think, I wonder what's happening on social media?

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Or you're reading and then U realis you've been reading
for a chapter and you've been thinking about something else
at the same time. Yeah, and so you've been running
two parts of your brain. This is really interesting. I've
just gone back to relief teaching since this text in
New Zealand primary schools after ten years out of teaching.
Generally speaking, the difference in the attention spans of kids
is quite frankly astonishing. Attention spans seem much much shorter now,

(46:39):
and therefore literacy and math activities need to be short, sharper,
and completed in around half the time I was used
to teaching a decade ago. Physical activities are necessarily many
more times during the day to keep the kids on track. Also,
attention to detail edges, spelling, punctuation, et cetera is generally
much less important to the kids. It feels like something
very important has changed in the school environments regards a

(47:01):
returning teacher.

Speaker 3 (47:02):
That is frightening, and this article was so mentions a
professor and university professor Bate So he used to teach
their students will get them to read Bleak House ten
years ago, but he said to this article he would
not attempt it today, partly because of constant pressure from
university deans to assign less and less reading, and partly

(47:23):
because the university students simply won't read it. A multiple
surve as young people describe reading as boring and mature.
How sad is that?

Speaker 2 (47:32):
I mean it's probably been a subject as old as time.
I mean when I was doing English at university, the
amount of books we had to read was pretty punishing.

Speaker 18 (47:42):
You know.

Speaker 4 (47:42):
I often turn up tutories not having read the books.

Speaker 3 (47:45):
I bet it with authors.

Speaker 4 (47:46):
What are they call it? The cheap books?

Speaker 17 (47:48):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (47:48):
That's right?

Speaker 7 (47:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (47:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (47:50):
Oh.

Speaker 3 (47:50):
One hundred eighty eighty is the number to call. What
does reading look like in your house? Do you still
make it a priority to read to your children? Or
did you when they were growing up love to hear
from you? And do you think this decline in reading
is making us all a little bit stupid?

Speaker 2 (48:06):
But I will say Bleak House is a fantastic book.
I mean it may have been written in mid eighteen eighteen,
eighteen fifty three. I think it was written. But Bleak
House is just such a great look into just the
ridiculousness of bureaucracy that that is. So it makes sense today. Yeah,
when you read that block, it's like you're describing, you know,
the punishing red tape that exists today.

Speaker 3 (48:28):
I'll put it on my list. Oh eight hundred eighty
ten eighty is the number to call. It is fourteen
past two. You're listening to Matt and Tyler Beck very shortly.

Speaker 1 (48:35):
Wow your home of afternoon Talk, Mad Heathen Taylor Adams
afternoons call, Oh, eight hundred eighty ten eighty us.

Speaker 12 (48:43):
Talk said, be.

Speaker 3 (48:45):
For a good afternoon to you. We are talking about reading.
It's on the decline around the world and all ages,
all genders. So what does reading look like in your household? Oh,
eight hundred eighty ten eighty is the number to call.
Some good text coming from nine two ninety two as well.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
Since machines have stolen our attention spans, it's probably good
that they're going to take over driving as well.

Speaker 3 (49:06):
Yeah, very good care.

Speaker 2 (49:07):
This is why I listen to long form podcast direct
from the politicians or unbiased podcasts yeah, I mean, that's
that's true. That is an interesting pushback on it. So
we're talking about these shrinking attention spans and now it's
blow forty five seconds, and yet long form podcasts are.

Speaker 4 (49:24):
Exploding taking off.

Speaker 7 (49:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (49:25):
Yeah, So that is an interesting flip on that, isn't it.

Speaker 8 (49:28):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (49:29):
I mean Joe Rogan and The Diary of the CEO
number one around the world, millions and millions of listeners,
and they're about two hours long. Oh, one hundred and
eighty ten eighty is the number to call, Alwen? How
are you?

Speaker 7 (49:42):
Hey? Are you doing good? Thanks to you? Very good
but disconcerting to come on after a pool well end,
but I'll do my best.

Speaker 4 (49:50):
It's good stuff. Yeah, we'll send you that. Yeah, we'll
send you something.

Speaker 7 (49:54):
Now.

Speaker 3 (49:55):
You're a good man to chat to one because you've
been in education for some time and you she wrote
a book about reading to your kids, is that right?

Speaker 7 (50:02):
Well, it's a it's more a booklet. And you know,
when I when I was growing up, my family were
pretty poor and I cannot recall having more than one
or two books. And then I sort of as got
my late teens, I came across a family who were
real role models for me. And one of the things

(50:24):
that I learned from them was to sit on the
couch and read my kids every night. Now, that was
probably from when they were two to when they were fourteen,
and they've all done The three of them have done
extremely well academically, and I would have liked to have
thought that that was because of the genetics that I provided.

(50:47):
But they were sitting around one day and someone said
to them, how come you guys do well? And my daughter,
the youngest one has now got a really good PhD.
She said, well, you know, the only thing dad ever
did right when we were growing up was his head
on the couch and read to us. And you know,
it's got slightly, but it's true. And so there's some

(51:13):
of the things that you've talked about already. We tend
to think of reading as something as a skill, like
you learn to ride a bike, but the reason that
you learn to ride a bike is to go cycling.
And reading as a skill is a good thing to have,
but actually the only reason you should have it is

(51:33):
so that you read. Now, I would think that approximately
one hundred percent of parents in New Zealand want their
children to do well. It's school to sit and to
read to them, and even from an early age, you
read it their cognitive level, not their skill level, because
kids can understand the story long before they can access

(51:56):
it themselves. So I was a very young father and
well by modern standards. So that's probably about twenty five
where my first son was born. And when he was
just before three, we'd finished a book and I said,
don't use another one, and he came back with the
Lord of the Rings. And I really struggled. You know,

(52:22):
I'm not sure, but I'll tell you what. If you
can tell me what happened the day before, I'll keep
reading it. So eight months later we finished and no
sort of thing. And of course then two years later
his little brother wanted it read. Two years later sister
wanted it read. So I read it out thered three times.

(52:45):
The worst thing about that was when Peter Jackson did
the movie. My kids were evid fans and came back
to me and said, why did you pronounce all the
names wrong?

Speaker 3 (52:55):
Mistake?

Speaker 2 (52:56):
Well, I tell you the other thing that weren't reading
because I read heavily to my kids, read the Hobbit,
didn't do The Lord of the Rings, but read all
the Harry Potters.

Speaker 4 (53:05):
All the all the ral dows heaps.

Speaker 2 (53:08):
But but you know what would happen is I'd going
to read to my kids and then wake up four
hours later.

Speaker 4 (53:13):
And I'll be sleep on the side of the bed
and There'll be asleep. I was like, what happened? So
it was more not getting through.

Speaker 7 (53:24):
But you're sitting these te kids on accounts you talk
about stuff. It's just the most brilliant time. Yeah, And
I think you know, if if you choose to have
a child, and obviously it's something accidentally, but let's say
that's a choice, then you want to do the best.

(53:45):
And I think your topic is amazing because pretty much
the very best thing you can do academically for your
children and in terms of their brain development is to
read to them and then encourage them to read, and
they learn all sorts of things about characters. You know,
Tom Sawyer too, obviously, the Hobbits to whoever. And in

(54:07):
that little book that I well, i'll get it republished
this year, I think, but it has a list of
books that you can't go wrong with.

Speaker 2 (54:18):
Now, what do you say to people that are coming
through saying, well, you're reading on your phone and there's
lots of reading now, In fact that some people saying
I always have the subtitles on when I'm watching Netflix,
I'm reading as I watch. You know, what is it
about reading a book that is more important than just
reading off your phone or reading social media posts, etc.

Speaker 7 (54:40):
Yeah. I think one of the really big things is
is the idea of a genuine narrative. So great movies.

Speaker 17 (54:48):
Fit as well.

Speaker 7 (54:50):
You know. I love the Last of the Maicons and
my kids adoored it. But in all sorts of movies.
So it's that thing where you sit and maybe it
takes two hours to get through something and you have
to pay attention and you get used to sitting there
and that sort of thing. But sometimes you read a
book like I don't want to go kind of too far,

(55:10):
but I loved reading War and Peace. I haven't been
able to read it twice because it's it's heavy.

Speaker 4 (55:17):
Did you when I read War and Peace?

Speaker 2 (55:20):
I just got totally confused because the names change all
the way through the book.

Speaker 7 (55:23):
That's that's a huge part of it. Probably as so
many pages to kind of go who's that kind? I
have to keep going back with the court. But boy,
at the end of the book, you just go how,
the same with the same with Tolkien, you know, The
Lord of the Rings. How on earth does a human
being create a story like this? And your your view

(55:47):
of humanity is elevated, And that's that's really important. I
think Isabella Len, you know, writing out of South America,
some of her books, you just go, how on the
next one? Write knowledgeably and it makes you feel good
about being a human.

Speaker 3 (56:05):
Yeah. Well, just that excitement that you'd instilled in sure
ldren if you read to them on a regular basis.
But that excitement of going home to get back into
the book because you're right in the middle of it
and you're completely in that world and you cannot wait
to start the next chapter again, that's a phenomenal feeling.
It's a lovely feeling you get. I get far more
from that than I ever get from movies.

Speaker 4 (56:24):
And I love movies.

Speaker 3 (56:26):
But I wonder if some you know, some kids with
the decline of reading and missing out on that feeling.

Speaker 7 (56:31):
Yeah, and they don't need to look. I taught I
taught it tudo. I've always how much from boys Saint
Authbets and then I sort of started three schools. Even
though I was teaching economics, accounting, business. I were always
in science. I would always read to just ten minutes
and we read Hitchhiker's Guy the g We read Dogs

(56:52):
by an orth called George McDonald. Russias Lewis said was
his master, and they would get to class early to
get to that story. And I mean some authors are
really annoying. I mean Tolkien and The Lord of the
Rings were in you know, significant part of it. He
had three narratives going at once and you'd finished one chapter,

(57:15):
want to know what's going to happen next, and he
changed you to the other narrative and you go, no, no, no, no,
no no no. I know a couple who read Or
and Peace together because one like the warpart and the
other like the peace part, and they would separate them
update each other. I mean yeah, I mean, I look,

(57:37):
I would just encourage every every parent to read it,
because even if they're not great readers themselves.

Speaker 3 (57:45):
Yeah. Oh yeah, it's been great chatting with you. We're
going to play some messages, but let us know when
you redo the pamphlet. We'd love to get back in
touch and see where people can find there. But great
to chat with you. Oh one hundred and eighty ten
eighty is the number to call. What has reading look
like in your household? It is twenty five past.

Speaker 1 (58:01):
Two Matt Heath and Tyler Adams afternoons, Oh, eight hundred
eighty eighty on News Talk ZB.

Speaker 3 (58:11):
Twenty eight past two. We're talking about the decline of
reading across the board. So what does it look like
in your household of one hundred eighty ten Eightyes, and
I'm gonna go out.

Speaker 2 (58:18):
There's an article in The Economist saying that we are
getting dumber because we're not reading, and that's sus feedback loop,
because the dumber will get the harder we find it
to read.

Speaker 4 (58:28):
Rob, welcome the show.

Speaker 12 (58:30):
Yes, how are you very good?

Speaker 19 (58:33):
Yeah?

Speaker 8 (58:33):
I'm not so good. I've got a bit of a cold,
but at least I've got a first milking off of
the year, so it's a good time to relatively good
time to have a cold.

Speaker 3 (58:40):
Yep, yep. That is success, mate. So what's your take
about reading?

Speaker 19 (58:44):
About reading?

Speaker 8 (58:45):
I think it's been the emphasized unfortunately. I think the
obsession of technology, especially at primary school level and now
so we disparage there's no effort to me to get
young people to read newspapers, and yet it's very rewarding,
especially with memory retention. You know, I've just been for
the past that I've been reading sort of the weekend

(59:05):
here and a few of the rural publications, and you know,
it's and then there's often there were memory prase of
what you've read.

Speaker 4 (59:13):
Yeah, my dad used to read the newspaper from them,
from cover to cover.

Speaker 8 (59:19):
I used to do back sort of when there was
the hell was a bit more quality than it is now.
We're get in fat when it come in from the
in for lunchtime. It was a bit of a contest
to see who could who would read the Herald first.

Speaker 3 (59:32):
Yeah, Rob, we're just giving us some some echo from
your phone there, but hopefully that will come right. We
won't come back to you, but thank you very much, Rob.
And that is a big thing, you know, as you say,
your old man reading it cover to cover and he'd
have his time, right. It evers week coffee and say, kids,
leave me alone, I'm reading the newspaper and every single path.

Speaker 2 (59:50):
Well, I think it's telling that now when you go
to a you know, online, it tells you how long
the article is, like it's a warning, don't worry this
is only four minutes this article, and it's like, come on,
just read it doesn't matter how long it is. You
that Lane knew that you're not willing to embark on
an article if you noticed that it's too long.

Speaker 3 (01:00:08):
How long have I got? I've got three and a
half minutes. No, so I'm not reading that. One oh
How much reading are you doing in your household? Is
it still a priority to read to your kids? Love
to hear from you, And what are you reading?

Speaker 2 (01:00:21):
I have an intelligent, wealthy uncle, but he almost takes
pride in the saying he hasn't read a.

Speaker 4 (01:00:26):
Book since high school. I'm like, don't tell anyone that
that's embarrassing.

Speaker 3 (01:00:29):
That is embarrassing.

Speaker 4 (01:00:30):
I've quite a few people in my life that go,
never read a book, Never read a book.

Speaker 3 (01:00:34):
Is it something to be proud of? It's kind of
a weird flex.

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
Well, they are the kind of person where you go, yeah,
you never read a book.

Speaker 4 (01:00:42):
You never read a book, buddy love, Yeah, but you've
never read a book.

Speaker 3 (01:00:45):
Headlight's coming up.

Speaker 15 (01:00:48):
H's talk said the headlines with blue Bubble taxis it's
no trouble with a blue bubble ordering. A Tamariki says
they've been planning and preparing for the return of Tom
Phillips three children since they went missing almost four years ago.
They have plenty of Regional Commissioner Warrick Commodi, who says
they're settled and are doing well given the circumstance. Crown

(01:01:09):
prosecutors have revealed how Ka Kung Lee changed her identity
after allegedly murdering her two children, Minu and U Na.
Joe's bodies were found in suitcases. In twenty twenty two,
Transpower as applying for Commerce Commission approval to invest one
point one billion dollars in replacing aging electricity cables linking

(01:01:31):
the North and South Islands. The Commerce Commissioners filed charges
under the Fair Trading Act against Jim Jim Chain City
Fitness Group Limited. It alleges that Jim's advertised membership prices
were misleading as it didn't include a compulsory three percent fee,
and the fee was inaccurately labeled as a transaction fee.

(01:01:51):
Construction is continuing to be hit hard by falling sales
and job cuts. Stat Sanset has just released updated data
by the industry. Plus more Onner pacifica granted year long
break on three million public loan interest. Read more at
enzet Herald Premium down Back to mattin Tyler.

Speaker 3 (01:02:08):
Thank you very much, Wendy, And we are talking about reading.
An article in the Economist is the decline of reading
making us a dumber and politics dumber? And it appears
according to this article, absolutely it is.

Speaker 2 (01:02:18):
Yeah, and it refers to that article to bleak House,
the eighteen fifty three novel by Charles Dickens, and this
Texas says, I do way more audible when driving. Does
that count the same as reading? That's from Katrina in Southland.
That's an interesting one. I do a lot of listen
to audible as well, and it's a different experience, but
I think it is. It is great for you. But
you've got to remember with those Charles Dickens books that

(01:02:40):
they're referring, they were written to be read out in
pubs and bars. So when a new part, when a
new part of the book came out, it'd be advertised
all over town that they were going to be read
in this bar tonight. So Charles Dickens actually wrote those
books to be read out loud, perfect for audible, so
that'd be great.

Speaker 4 (01:02:55):
Readers.

Speaker 2 (01:02:55):
People's job would be to read books and bars and
people would pack in to hear the latest few chapters
from Charles Dickens. They're back, so yeah, that's what they
were meant to be done, how they were meant to
be done.

Speaker 4 (01:03:06):
Jeremy, welcome to the show.

Speaker 19 (01:03:11):
Thanks sad. How are we?

Speaker 7 (01:03:12):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:03:12):
Very good?

Speaker 19 (01:03:14):
Good? Good? Are you? Good? Job? Great topic. You've guilted
me and going home and reading to the kids, So job,
well played, well played. I've been sucked in for the
last couple of years into the old social media doom
scrolling as you call it, and just recently I've had
to go back and do some study for work and man,
I say read probably in the last couple of years, Man,

(01:03:36):
I really struggled to getting back to study and reading,
you know, even sort of the lightest content. I'm concentrate.
I'd just found my attention spanner is so short, and
I put it down to literally just losing concentration because
of doom scrolling social media. I've not really had to
put my mind to anything for any long periods of time.

(01:03:59):
So that's what I've put it down. And I've really
struggled to get back into that study here now, but
man a hard work.

Speaker 2 (01:04:05):
Well, yeah, as they say, and you're one. Scientists say
that your brain is you know, like a muscle. So
any part of it that you don't use, you know,
the resources move away from it. So if you just
doom strolling for a long period of time, that's what
your brain puts us resources to and shuts down your
ability to do basic basic maths. I mean, you know
a lot of people are texting through about how they

(01:04:27):
don't remember.

Speaker 4 (01:04:27):
Any phone numbers anymore.

Speaker 2 (01:04:29):
I mean, so parts of our memory of being shut
down because we don't don't use them.

Speaker 19 (01:04:35):
Yeah. I used to read to our first kid. Unfortunately
that they can kids probably just put time and all that.

Speaker 7 (01:04:41):
Kind of stuff.

Speaker 19 (01:04:41):
He doesn't get anywhere near he has read to as much.
And I've noticed that, you know, just think there. I
remember when our first kid went to school, he was
doing all of his ABC's, you know, counting up to
forty or thirsty or whatever it was, and really switched
on our second kid, who has we've read nowhere near
as we're still read to him, but nowhere near as
much as what we did with the first kid, and

(01:05:02):
his level was nowhere near what our first wil was
when he went to school. So I definitely put it
down to just that extra bit of time you can
spend with your kids and reading so that it's going
to make such a wortle of difference.

Speaker 8 (01:05:14):
Yeah, school as well.

Speaker 3 (01:05:17):
Yeah it is a work in progress, though, wasn't a
Jeremy like you. I've tried to get back into reading
and trying to read a book at the moment. It's
a great book, but quite heavy. Man's Search for Meaning.
It's called by Victor Frankel. But I find myself reading
maybe half a page, and then I'll pick up my
phone and just see what's going on in the world,
and then look at myself with self loathing and say, what.

Speaker 4 (01:05:35):
Do you doing?

Speaker 3 (01:05:36):
Get back to reading, Tyler. But it's just a process.
I've got to just keep retraining the brain to say,
pay attention. You used to be good at reading.

Speaker 4 (01:05:44):
You can be on you on the analogue book or
you're on a kindle.

Speaker 3 (01:05:47):
On a kindle, so that probably doesn't help. I need
to get on the old analog.

Speaker 4 (01:05:50):
I don't think the kendle's good.

Speaker 2 (01:05:51):
I mean reading on your phone or your iPad's a
problem with notifications pop up and you get dragged away
from it. Yeah, Hey, thanks so much for call Jeremy.
You get back to reading to your kids.

Speaker 4 (01:06:00):
Good on you.

Speaker 3 (01:06:01):
Yeah, absolutely, job done on that one.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
Hey, of course we're getting dumber, says as Stiff with smartphones.
We don't remember numbers, We don't do maths in our
heads anymore. Our writing is poor because we type now
we use AI talk to text and don't even type much.
Skills going down the drain. We read to our kids
every night. Kids love it. Library is free. I don't
read much except for at work on news because I

(01:06:24):
get too antisocial and won't stop a good book.

Speaker 4 (01:06:27):
Lowell, that's good on you. But how about this from John?

Speaker 2 (01:06:29):
Hi John here, I just want to say, I'm a
wealthy tradesman taking risk in life. Never ever have I
read a book in my life. I'm now retired, I'm
a multi millionaire. Then you go, good on you, John.

Speaker 3 (01:06:43):
Is that down to the lack of yeah, reading books
or just your own determination.

Speaker 2 (01:06:47):
If you're a successful trader, you have to know a lot.
So there's different ways you're learning things and engaging your brain. Yeah,
so there's a lot of knowledge coming in. Yeah, you
know exactly. I mean, you're not just John's not just
sitting around doom stole, strolling political clips on TikTok, having
his brain erased and whatever message put into his head

(01:07:07):
that serves the algorithm.

Speaker 3 (01:07:08):
I'm sure there's a nuance there.

Speaker 8 (01:07:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:07:10):
Oh, e one hundred eighty ten eighty is the number
to call. What is reading look like in your household
at the moment? Are you making a concidered effort to
do more or read to your kids? Love to hear
from you? It is twenty to three your home.

Speaker 1 (01:07:21):
Of afternoon talk Mad Heathen Tyler Adams afternoons call, Oh,
eight hundred eighty ten eighty Youth Talk.

Speaker 3 (01:07:27):
ZEDB, News Talks EDB. We are talking about the love
of reading. It seems well, it actually is on the decline.
Multiple studies show adults, children, teenagers, genders across age groups
are reading less and less and less. Would love to
hear what happens in your household.

Speaker 2 (01:07:43):
I honestly think that every generation is slightly dumber and
softer than the one before. I'm middle aged and my
old man is a tougher bugger than me, But criky,
this young generation is soft and have no resilience. You
have to tiptoe around them. It is interesting though, in
this article and the economists that does talk about, you know,
people complaining about kids not reading right back, and it

(01:08:03):
goes right back to Charles seconds time.

Speaker 8 (01:08:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:08:05):
People, you know, right through history people have complaining about
the generation behind them being too soft and not knowing
enough reading.

Speaker 3 (01:08:11):
Yeah, tale as old as time. Oh, eight hundred and
eighty ten eighty is the number to call if you
want to send a tax Nine two nine two is
the number.

Speaker 4 (01:08:17):
So welcome to the show. You're an avid reader.

Speaker 20 (01:08:21):
I'm an absolute avid reader. I've actually created a business
out of reading. It came when I after a twenty
five year bookselling career, what else could I do? And
I've seen my fifth you know, in my mid fifties
at the time, and what else could I do? So
I have created and crafted a business out of reading.

Speaker 21 (01:08:39):
And I just love them.

Speaker 20 (01:08:40):
We're avid readers. We my husband and I read to
our children funnily enough, and they had the choice of
any book in the bookstore. But they got to teenageers
and they that was how they rebelled. They said, well,
mom and dad, we're not going to read anymore. So yeah,
but they've come back round to us.

Speaker 2 (01:09:00):
That what happens, doesn't they rebel, but then they come
background to it, come back.

Speaker 20 (01:09:03):
Ground to it exactly. That's right. And of course we
were always gifting books and things that. Interestingly, I think
male male readers prefer non fiction. So yeah, so that's
a different It tend to like fiction, and my specialty
is for books for book clubs.

Speaker 7 (01:09:25):
So I just love it.

Speaker 20 (01:09:27):
So it's great. In fact, if my husband says there's
something on Netflix and a bit, you know, you want
to binge it, binge watch it. So we don't even
wait for ads of these days or wait for the
next episode. It cuts across from reading time.

Speaker 7 (01:09:44):
So love that.

Speaker 3 (01:09:45):
So what are the big books for the book clubs now?
Is this still the old classics or is there some modern.

Speaker 20 (01:09:53):
No, we always there's wonderful, the new and the shiny
as they call them. We've got and we've got fabulous
authors within New Zealand, and we've got a growing crime
crime fiction genre. And one of the biggest books at
the moment is Place by Zoe Rankin. So and I
was reading the last few chapters on a plane coming

(01:10:14):
into land, and I couldn't turn the pages quick enough.
And I've read we landed here, that we landed yet,
So no, a real variety, a lot of historical fiction dramas.
You learn so much when you read. You learn about
you know, I learned recently about the guy Ford landier

(01:10:38):
in South America. I had no idea that Henry Ford
had a had a searched for rubber in South America,
and you know, to to have a more reliable source
for his for his cars and tires. And you learn
so much when you read. And so the book clubs
are are such a wide variety. Not so much for

(01:10:59):
classics these days, although we never dismissed them. And I
mix up my reading from the older the book the
better times. There's some really great thinkers out there. And
you know, I think the classics still have a place,
still have a place in curriculum as well.

Speaker 4 (01:11:18):
So yeah, I've good on your suit. I thanks you call.
This is interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:11:22):
I'm a seventeen year old currently in year thirteen, and
I've noticed such a difference in my cognitive abilities now
versus when I was reading heaps as a kid. I
hate the fact that I can't focus on a book
for long enough to read properly.

Speaker 4 (01:11:33):
And I really notice it in class. That is interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:11:35):
So that is a seventeen year old noticing their cognitive decline,
you know. And as my kids always say, you know,
they call the reels and TikTok brain rot And a
lot of young people, you know, people in their teens now,
are seeing it. They know what it's doing to them.
That's self awareness that they know it's rotting their brain.

Speaker 3 (01:11:56):
But I think, you know, certainly for my case, it's
quite hard to You've got to put the concerted effort
into not being distracted and keep that focus on whatever
you're watching or whatever you're reading. So it does a
work and a progress and that's where that howth loathing
comes from. Oh one hundred and eighty ten eighty is
a number to call, Paul.

Speaker 4 (01:12:16):
Are you there?

Speaker 8 (01:12:17):
There?

Speaker 6 (01:12:17):
You go?

Speaker 4 (01:12:18):
Very good? Thanks mate.

Speaker 6 (01:12:20):
Hey, my son had a real problem with reading when
he was little, and tried to get them interested in reading.
Finally I ended up picking up the Harry Potter stories
and in place, and then he'd want to know what
was going on, so he would rely on and then

(01:12:41):
come running out of the lounge and tell me what
happened or whatever. The case may be.

Speaker 4 (01:12:45):
That's awesome.

Speaker 6 (01:12:47):
He's twenty eight now, he's at a computer science and
mathematics degree and he's in Melbourne making a fortune.

Speaker 3 (01:12:53):
Yeah, yeah, how good?

Speaker 4 (01:12:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:12:55):
I mean those Harry Potter books, I know they get
a bit of stick for US millennials, but they are
a great read. They are a fantastic read.

Speaker 4 (01:13:01):
Well, well, that changed that that.

Speaker 2 (01:13:02):
I mean, we just need someone to write as good
a series as or as what's the word for it,
a series that is as well loved as Harry Potter again,
because that changed reading, because you know, before there was
problems with people reading before Harry Potter, but then you know,
your generation, the millennials just got feverish for Harry Potter
and everyone got back into reading.

Speaker 3 (01:13:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:13:22):
I mean, I remember when the last Harry Potter book
came out.

Speaker 2 (01:13:25):
I was in Canada and I was about to get
on to a flight to another country, and I knew
that the last Deathly Hallow's book was coming out, The
Deathly Hallows, the final one, and so I had to
time it to get to the airport to buy the
book before I got on the plane to read because
I was so excited. There's huge piles but because I
was in Montreal, I didn't check which one I bought,

(01:13:45):
and I bought the French version of it. So I
got on my plane for the longest flight incredibly excited
and opened up and realized, I've read the French.

Speaker 3 (01:13:52):
Try French. That's so good.

Speaker 2 (01:13:55):
But they were absolutely huge. So is that what's needed?
Just someone to write books that capture the imagination?

Speaker 3 (01:14:03):
Was it fair to say she stood on the shoulders
of absolute literary giants like Rod Dahe and Charles Dickens
very similar style of storytelling, wasn't it? I mean Charles
Dickens with Oliver Twist and then Rod Dahe with James
and the Giant Peach and all his beautiful writing.

Speaker 2 (01:14:18):
Well as interesting as have you ever listened to the
podcast The Rest Is History?

Speaker 4 (01:14:21):
Yes, that they go into that. And what influenced JK.

Speaker 2 (01:14:26):
Rowling and writing The Harry Potter Box and a lot
of it was the nineteen eighty the eighteen eighty seven
Thomas Hughes Tom Brown School Days box, right, so very
very heavily influenced by that. So she kind of basically
took this old British trope of going to a boarding
school and the bullies and all that kind of stuff
and added magic to it. Yeah, and that was that
was a brilliant approach.

Speaker 3 (01:14:46):
How good? Oh, eight hundred eighty, ten eighty is the
number to call? It is ten to three back in a.

Speaker 1 (01:14:51):
Month, the issues that affect you and a bit of
fun along the way, Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons
News Talk ZBB.

Speaker 3 (01:15:00):
News Talks THEREB it is seven to three. Few texts
coming through on nineteen ninety two?

Speaker 4 (01:15:05):
Did you refer to Roald Dahl as rod D?

Speaker 3 (01:15:08):
I might have exident that's the old Southern extent rolled dal.

Speaker 4 (01:15:14):
Roll though, yeah, rolled though, No, No, there's no D.

Speaker 3 (01:15:17):
I'm making it worse. I'm making it worse.

Speaker 4 (01:15:20):
Rolled R and there is rolled? Yes, are there was
a D? Sorry?

Speaker 2 (01:15:24):
Great, right, but you kind of run it on so
it's rolled because there's two d's. It goes R O
A L D D H L roll not rod Dale.

Speaker 3 (01:15:35):
Listen and I apologize to all the road dal.

Speaker 2 (01:15:37):
Hi, guys, I watched a short YouTube a doco a
few years ago, and it got me back into reading.
It was about how quickly you can read with only
a little time. Fifteen hundred words takes about eight eightish
minutes for most people. Average three hundred page book has
eight eighty thousand words. That works out to be seven
hours to read the book half an hour a day,
and you've read a book in fourteen days.

Speaker 4 (01:16:01):
Lots of in there.

Speaker 3 (01:16:03):
Sorry, that's right, I see, we don't mind it. We
don't mind some isshes in there.

Speaker 4 (01:16:06):
It's just good.

Speaker 3 (01:16:06):
Yeah, seven half hours year, right, Roddy, you're a big reader.

Speaker 17 (01:16:11):
Good good, he yeah, yeah, Look, I'm an avid reader.
I've read since I was a kid, and I couldn't
live without books and boys reading when I was in
the second hand collectible book trade for years, and so
that was really great. Yet DIBs on lots of stuff,
and I think it's it's a shame. Yeah. And I
noticed it regarding this sort of kids that aren't reading,

(01:16:35):
that their imaginations aren't being developed and they're not seeing
concepts and learning things. And I say it were like
my daughter, like the old the boy he's in his
teens now, but he doesn't read, whereas his sister who
is now free, and she's already I mean, right from

(01:16:56):
the get go, they've encouraged they read to her and
get her books, and so do I and it's a
different thing because it's very important, you know. And yeah,
I've always got I preferred reading to watching you know,
Netflix or anything like that. Really, you know, it's and
I've read just you know, vast variety of books, you know,

(01:17:18):
whether it's fiction or non fiction, even yours many crazy
yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, but you know what I mean,
it's it's a real joy to read.

Speaker 2 (01:17:31):
Do you find with all the social media and and
you know the device in your product that you're finding
out the devices that you have in your product.

Speaker 4 (01:17:40):
God, I can't even speak.

Speaker 2 (01:17:42):
I can't believe I could write a book the access
to digital content and devices and such as lowering your
ability to read, because I was interviewing in neuroscientists actually
for my book, and he struggled to read.

Speaker 4 (01:17:54):
Now.

Speaker 17 (01:17:55):
I was even at Unity Books in do the Old
Town today to pick up a book you know it's yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'd ordered it Energy Follows. It's Willie Nelson's Behind the Side.
And you know, I've always dealt with the bricks and
mortar shop because I know some of the staff there
for years from working at book festivals and things like that.

(01:18:17):
So I like to take a journey in and have
a look on you and I'll tell you what the.

Speaker 7 (01:18:21):
Shop was full.

Speaker 17 (01:18:22):
Yeah, well look at you all different shapes and sizes
and ages.

Speaker 3 (01:18:26):
Love that right?

Speaker 17 (01:18:27):
I think it's a great, great subject.

Speaker 3 (01:18:29):
Certainly as Yes, thank you mate, thank you, you're a
good man. All right, We're going to carry this on
after three o'clock because so many people want to have
a chat about it reading. What does it look like
in your household? Are you still reading to your kids?
Love to hear from you. Oh, eight, one hundred and
eighty ten eighty is the number to call if you
want to send a tea. You're more than welcome. Nineteen
ninety two.

Speaker 4 (01:18:47):
Are you getting dumber because you've stopped reading?

Speaker 1 (01:18:56):
Your new homes are instateful and entertaining talk It's Mattie
and Taylor Adams afternoons on News Talk sebby.

Speaker 3 (01:19:05):
Very good afternoons. Yeah, welcome back into the show. Loving
this discussion of seven past three and we have been
talking about reading. A great article and the economists and
it asks the question is the decline of reading making
politics done? And the answer is yes, is people read less,
they think less clearly. But it goes on to give
some pretty disturbing numbers in terms of the number of

(01:19:27):
people reading less and less. So in America the share
of people who read for pleasure that's fallen by two
fifths and twenty years. And in England the uk A
poll found that forty percent of Britain's had not read
or listened to any book in the last year.

Speaker 2 (01:19:41):
What I like about this article and the economists is
it's talking about reading and shortened attention spans and stuff,
and it's a very long and detailed article, so they
you know, they're true to what they believe that it's
a very deep and long article. It's fantastic. It goes
into Charles Dickens and such. But as are saying before,
research has shown the average person's attention span has gone

(01:20:04):
from two point five minutes in twenty in two thousand
and four down to this is twenty twenty three forty
seven seconds.

Speaker 4 (01:20:13):
So I can only imagine.

Speaker 2 (01:20:14):
It's fallen off a cliff more since then with all
the doom scrolling that goes on.

Speaker 3 (01:20:20):
Yeah, so we're taking your calls O eight one hundred
and eighty ten eighty and if you want to send
a teach more than welcome. Nine to ninety two, what
does reading look like in your household? Are you trying
to make you concerted if it as an adult or
with your kids in your household to read more physical books.

Speaker 2 (01:20:33):
And it has consequences people reading less. According to this article,
it's saying that declining reading is making politics dumber, and
people getting their politics from TikTok and reels and YouTube
shorts is making people dumber because you only get a
very small it's like a nut McNugget of information as

(01:20:54):
opposed to the banquet you can get if you read
a long form article or a book on it and
actually might have an informed opinion. You know, if you
all your friends that have the craziest political views and
they're the most emotional and loud about them, guarantee.

Speaker 4 (01:21:08):
If you scratch the surface, they're getting them from TikTok.

Speaker 3 (01:21:10):
Oh, I've seen them. I've got a few friends like that. Yeah,
and it is you know, they've gone deep down the
rabbit hole into this little TikTok world of forty second
soundbites focused on a specific small part of whatever politics
they kind of leaned to it.

Speaker 4 (01:21:24):
And it gets worse and worse because every.

Speaker 2 (01:21:26):
Single article, every single issue has gray area and nuance,
But you don't see that. You just the algorithm will
just feed you what you want and you just get
absolutely water boarded with the same opinion until you go
absolutely mental. And at the same time, it's lowering your
attention span, so you have the inability to read longer

(01:21:46):
form articles.

Speaker 3 (01:21:47):
Yeah, to go searching for other sources.

Speaker 2 (01:21:49):
So the very people that need to read this article
in the economists would see that it's going to take
you about twelve minutes to read, and they'd run for
the absolutely, run for the hills.

Speaker 3 (01:21:56):
High level trolling. Oh, one hundred and eighty ten eighty
is the number to cool.

Speaker 2 (01:22:01):
Hi, guys, I'm an avid reader, and so are my teenagers.
We turn the Wi Fi off in the evening so
that reading art, et cetera are the most interesting activities
on I remember a teacher telling me that if your
child reads, they will passively and effortlessly learn spelling, punctuation, grammar,
and easy say construction. These skills aren't necessarily taught anymore,
but a student will struggle without them.

Speaker 3 (01:22:22):
Yeah, good text, Emma, how are you this afternoon?

Speaker 21 (01:22:26):
Hi?

Speaker 17 (01:22:27):
Good?

Speaker 21 (01:22:27):
Thanks? How are you going?

Speaker 4 (01:22:28):
Very good?

Speaker 3 (01:22:29):
So you've got a son in year eight. Is that correct, No,
he's in the nine.

Speaker 7 (01:22:33):
Oh yeah, but he yeah.

Speaker 21 (01:22:34):
And when he was in the year seven and eight,
he was at a school here in Wellington called Wellesley College,
which is a boys' school, and they really encourage boys
to be boys, right, So they'd go up before school,
they'd be playing football, and they'd be playing tennis and
rugby and morning tea and afternoon tea and they'd be
covered in mud. And then then that his teacher, who

(01:22:55):
was a male, would get them into the classroom and say, okay, boys,
settle down, get out your book and read for ten minutes.
And he'd get his chair out at the front of
the classroom and he would role model a New Zealand
male sorry, reading his fiction book or nonfiction book, so
the boys could see a New Zealand male reading and

(01:23:16):
normalize it. And you know, these boys turned through so
many books think here, and I just thought it was
a really unique and very cool approach to get boys
into reading.

Speaker 2 (01:23:26):
I think once you get over that initial hurdle and
it sounds like this is what this teacher was doing.
Once you get over and you get into reading, it's
not a chore, it's an absolute joy. But you just
have to get over that hurdle. So what a great
New Zealand that man was for doing that.

Speaker 21 (01:23:42):
I was very calming, very calming for them, right.

Speaker 22 (01:23:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:23:46):
I remember when I wasn's at school and we had
this reading session and I was reading Spike Milligan's William
McGonagall The Truth at Last and it was so funny
that I couldn't stop laughing. And then I got kicked
out of the class.

Speaker 3 (01:24:03):
Having too much reading.

Speaker 2 (01:24:04):
Yeah, and then the teacher kept going laugh again, Matthew,
and you're out, as she said, he yeah, you're out, and.

Speaker 3 (01:24:12):
Quite look at himself would have loved that, mate.

Speaker 4 (01:24:14):
I tried to read it without laughing. I couldn't.

Speaker 2 (01:24:15):
I think I spat on the on the book. Anyway,
it's a fantastic thing. Good, good, good on that teacher, Emma.

Speaker 3 (01:24:22):
Yeah, or just quickly before you shoot off, What what
sort of books he is your boy into?

Speaker 7 (01:24:27):
Now?

Speaker 23 (01:24:28):
Is he?

Speaker 3 (01:24:28):
Is he sort of a cross non fiction fiction?

Speaker 21 (01:24:31):
Yeah, he's actually really into nonfiction. So he's read sort
of all the Sportshang biographies and autobiographies. He's reading a
book about Apple at the moment called Apple and China.
So yeah, no, he's really into nonfiction. He didn't get
into the fantasy that a lot of the boys get into.
So in my Middle one he he seems to like

(01:24:52):
nonfiction as well. So you've just got to find whatever,
you know, whatever they're into, and just keep feeding.

Speaker 8 (01:24:58):
It to them.

Speaker 4 (01:24:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:24:59):
Good, what a great teacher, I'll tell you.

Speaker 2 (01:25:02):
I was talking about how Harry Potter blew up and
everyone was reading. But there's been other things that What
about the Fifty Shades of Gray.

Speaker 4 (01:25:09):
Yep, that was situation.

Speaker 3 (01:25:10):
Now Twilight that went people in gaga for Twilight Boys.

Speaker 4 (01:25:13):
Harry Potter.

Speaker 2 (01:25:14):
I was talking as I said, Harry Potter, and Howard
got a millennials reading like yourself, Tyler love it absolutely
blew up boys. Harry Potter is based on Star Wars,
often sent to his aunt and uncle. Father like father
figure rescues him who actually dropped him there as a baby.
A scruffy best friend has a love interest with a
leading lady, all happening in a strange world of magic.

Speaker 4 (01:25:36):
Blair Well, it's.

Speaker 2 (01:25:37):
Interesting people would argue that they're all There's a fantastic
book written in about nineteen fifty called The Hero with
a Thousand Faces. It's written by Joseph Campbell, and it
points out that we have the same stories over and
again that we love. And Star Wars is kind of
the same story as Harry Potter, but so is the
Odyssey the Iliad. Then there's even if you look at

(01:25:59):
the Life of Buddha yep and the story of Moses,
the Life of Jesus, they're all kind of very similar stories.

Speaker 4 (01:26:05):
King Arthur and the Quest for the Holy Grail, BeO Wolf, Moby,
the Lord of the Rings.

Speaker 3 (01:26:09):
Yeah, the hero's journey is a very famous literary trope,
isn't it.

Speaker 8 (01:26:14):
So?

Speaker 2 (01:26:14):
Star Wars, Harry Potter, The Matrix, the Hunger Games, Moana,
the Lion Came, just to name a few, are kind
of that same story.

Speaker 4 (01:26:22):
Because we love that story.

Speaker 3 (01:26:23):
Yeah, because it starts off what they call for adventure,
and you usually get a character that doesn't have any
parents anymore. Then they find some supernatural help along the way.

Speaker 2 (01:26:32):
They find out that they're special and important. Yes, when
they have nothing at the start and the start of
Act one, they're downtrodden, and then they find out they're
special and important as they're called into into you know,
the call to adventure comes.

Speaker 3 (01:26:47):
There's something that speaks to me about the hero's journey.
Oh eight, one hundred eighty ten eighty is the number
to call if you can't get through. Keep trying. We've
got full boards at the moment, and we've got plenty
of texts to get to as well.

Speaker 2 (01:26:57):
Michelle say, sometimes I wish I had a shorter attention span,
especially at three in the morning when I can't put
the book down. So Michelle is at a different end
of the spectrum than a lot of people.

Speaker 3 (01:27:06):
Yeah, caught pass three back in the moth seventeen past three.
We are talking about an article in the Economists which
speaks on the decline of reading, and it is happening
across the board and across ages, so we can hear
from you. Do you still have a love of reading
or are you getting back into it? At one hundred
and eighty ten eighty.

Speaker 2 (01:27:23):
Just on the topic of the hero with a thousand faces,
you've got to say the Dune story is also very
similar to Harry Potter and Star Wars. Yeah, very satisfying. Yes,
very satisfying. My sons go to Parme North Boys High School.
The whole school has to do SSR Sustain Silent Reading
every day after lunch for fifteen minutes, eighteen hundred boys
go to the school rector as an English teacher and
fosters the boys to enjoy reading. That is a great thing,

(01:27:45):
How bloody good from Parme North Boys High School.

Speaker 3 (01:27:48):
Yeah, shout out to you guys.

Speaker 4 (01:27:49):
Yes, Esa, Hi, guys, I've been concerned for a while,
quite a while, how much time my teenage daughter fourteen
spins on screen time. However, she's top of the class
in English, spelling, etc. Put on the girl.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
And here's a bit of pushback on this. I hate reading.
I never read for pleasure and I don't plan to.
But I don't think reading is everything. I've completed to agree,
and we'll read for information when I have to. But
there are lots of other ways of learning nowadays, such
as listening to podcasts, watching interviews, listening to Newstalks, z'b
loll and learning through doing. Some people learn and take
lots from reading, others get nothing out of it. So

(01:28:22):
I think it's great we have so many different ways
of taking an information right now.

Speaker 4 (01:28:26):
Yeah, and a lot of this is in this article.

Speaker 2 (01:28:30):
Is about reading to your kids as and you know,
I think listening to an audiobook or listening to a
long form podcast or listening to mattin t afternoons on Newstalks.

Speaker 4 (01:28:42):
They'd be a great for your brain.

Speaker 3 (01:28:43):
Absolutely brain listening to this show. Yeah, one hundred percent.

Speaker 4 (01:28:47):
Yeah, just your brain is growing right now just by
listening to us.

Speaker 3 (01:28:50):
Yeah, you're lucky. Things right. We've got the phone calls
backed up if you can't get through. Oh, eight hundred
and eighty ten eighty is the number to call, Andrea.

Speaker 4 (01:28:58):
You read to your children every night?

Speaker 7 (01:29:01):
Oh?

Speaker 22 (01:29:01):
I did.

Speaker 18 (01:29:02):
They're a bit older mouse. But I just had this
great story because I read to both my kids every night,
my husband and I did. And my daughter recently had
her topes out at twenty and she was really really
sick in recovery, and I just laid down my herd
for this for the two or three nights and reread
all the.

Speaker 6 (01:29:20):
Books that we read the kids.

Speaker 18 (01:29:21):
And it was just so cool because there was three
memories and it was really it was just really soothing
for her.

Speaker 6 (01:29:27):
And I just think there's just so.

Speaker 18 (01:29:29):
Much in those kids books, so many messages, and there's
so many great memories that you can make.

Speaker 4 (01:29:33):
So what are the highlights? What are her favorites and
your favorites?

Speaker 7 (01:29:37):
Andrea, well, we love the Giraffe counts.

Speaker 18 (01:29:41):
And I don't know if the Gruffalo like some of
the book stories.

Speaker 4 (01:29:46):
I like that you read the Gruffalo. It's a very
simple story, I.

Speaker 18 (01:29:51):
Know, but there's so good there's such good messages. But
for us it was just really powerful.

Speaker 6 (01:29:56):
And both my kids are.

Speaker 18 (01:29:57):
Readers and both at university that just managed to I
think it helps them just to be able to retain information.
I just think it's just so vital and it's such
a great connection as the care of Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:30:09):
Absolutely, And are they all avid readers now, not just
with the Gruffalo but other books?

Speaker 6 (01:30:14):
Now?

Speaker 3 (01:30:14):
Is that carried on for them into edelhood Yep?

Speaker 6 (01:30:17):
They both don't.

Speaker 3 (01:30:19):
Yeah, Yeah, love it. Andrea, thank you so much for
giving us a call. Have a good afternoon. I eight
hundred eighty ten eighty is a number to call.

Speaker 4 (01:30:28):
Is nobby knees and turned out toes and a poisonous
wart on the end of his nose.

Speaker 3 (01:30:33):
That brings me some memories? Right it is twenty one
past three oh eight one hundred and eighty ten. Acy,
what does reading look like? And your household? He is
still reading to your kids? Love to hear from you.

Speaker 1 (01:30:48):
Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons. Call Oh eight hundred
eighty ten eighty on News Talk ZB Very.

Speaker 3 (01:30:54):
Good afternoon to you. It is twenty four past three.
Some great texts coming through. This one's a nice one,
ghetto fellers. I haven't finished a book since fifth form.
I hate reading, but I did pick up a wee
book last year for me Fiji holiday called A Life
Is Punishing. Even kept reading it after I got back
from holiday. Cheers from making Spokey Doki Spokey dokey.

Speaker 4 (01:31:15):
So that's a listening to an old podcasts to do
called the bespoke Daily Podcast. Yeah, but it makes it
and then the listeners were called Bespokey dokey, So it's
great to have a bespokey dokey coming over to the
mattin Tyler Afternoon Show. My son fifteen bought War and
Peace last week at a second hand book store. Wow,
fifteen year old reading War and Peace. I'll tell you

(01:31:35):
with that book, get out of pen and paper because
the names change all the way through it. That was
right at the edge of my abilities to comprehend a
book where we go.

Speaker 2 (01:31:47):
I totally with us, Hey, guys, there's one book which
I believe should be compulsory reading for every young person,
Shackleton's Journey, or one of several variants of the story.
It is surely one of the greatest stories, truly of courage,
survival and so inspirational. That's Colin and Nelson. I totally
agree everyone should read Shackleton's story. And you know, as
I said a few months ago, I'm building Shackleton's Boat

(01:32:09):
the endurance at the moment, but just that story, the
Shackleton story, anyway that you can digest it. I think
it might be the greatest story of all time.

Speaker 3 (01:32:20):
In terms of a survival story.

Speaker 4 (01:32:22):
It's just incredible.

Speaker 3 (01:32:23):
Yeah, I need to actually read that book book. From
what I know of the story, it is amazing. Those
guys made it out alive. What absolute great human beings.

Speaker 2 (01:32:30):
I've just started reading a book called Stolen Focus, Why
you Can't Pay Attention. It's the first book I've read
in the number of years, but thought social media and
TV is taking over, and it is a great read.
As to the reasons why we are struggling to focus
and pay attention. That's an interesting one that you will
you need the attention to read the book to tell
you that you don't have the attention to read a book.

Speaker 3 (01:32:50):
Yeah, that's some attention inception right there.

Speaker 4 (01:32:53):
We love reading in our household.

Speaker 2 (01:32:54):
My husband and I both enjoy reading and made it
a part of our normal life with our four kids.
Always a book before bed or a snuggle on the
couch while we read.

Speaker 4 (01:33:02):
A story together.

Speaker 2 (01:33:03):
They've grown their own love for books, and it's absolutely
awesome how much they learn through reading, as well as
allowing the imagination to grow through reading stories. We love
movies and programs as well, but there was nothing quite
like a book that's from Lydia.

Speaker 3 (01:33:15):
Nice nicely said Lydia, Mike, here were you this afternoon?

Speaker 22 (01:33:20):
Yes, cure guys, I'm a dyslexia consultant and I just
wanted to put the case on it. Reading is an
amazing thing and we should all be encouraged to do it.
But there is a group of New Zealanders, about half
a million of them maybe more, for whom the act
of reading is incredibly difficult, and they often have to

(01:33:43):
read the same passage three or four times to understand it,
and then maybe another three or four times to remember it,
and by that time they've often tired of the task.
It uses a lot more bandwidth for reading for those
people than it does for normal folk. And I just

(01:34:04):
really wanted to make the case for those people because
they're getting a very hard time in.

Speaker 6 (01:34:09):
New Zealand right now.

Speaker 4 (01:34:10):
I am well, good on you, Mike. A lot of
dyslexics have gone on to be great authors, though, haven't
They might like the IGUTHA. Christie was one of them,
I believe.

Speaker 22 (01:34:20):
And Winston Churchill was another one, Jane Austen. These people
have got great imaginations and great minds, but oftentimes they
get other people to correct their spelling mistakes and.

Speaker 6 (01:34:40):
Sort of finish off the script.

Speaker 22 (01:34:43):
Mark Twain is another one was known to be dyslexic, so,
and you're one hundred percent right about that. But some
people find reading very easy and relaxing to do. Other
people find it incredibly difficult and tiring to do. And
those are the kind of people that aren't even likely
to pick up a novel and read it. And certainly

(01:35:06):
the idea of reading war Piece to those people when
they're complete that another hathema. Although they may enjoy it
if somebody else will read it to them.

Speaker 4 (01:35:17):
Well, what do you think it is?

Speaker 2 (01:35:18):
About the dyslexic brain, if that's the best way to
describe it, that leads to such creative outcomes, you know,
despite the obstacles, because you know, famously Stephen Spielberg, one
of the most creative people ever is dyslexic. So is
there there's some part of how the brain works when
you're dyslexic that leads to creativity.

Speaker 22 (01:35:40):
Yes, yes, there is. There is a definite link between
dyslexia and creativity. And brain that causes difficulties with reading, writing,
and spelling often bestows on those other people the creative
talents they have. So they're often often have powerful three
D skills and visual and spatial skills. They're often creative

(01:36:04):
and innovative. They're often people that see pattern and connections
that others don't see. And here's the thing that I
think is quite.

Speaker 24 (01:36:14):
The funniest thing about it. We know that many dyslexic
people have a great bullshit detection beata, telling of people lie.

Speaker 3 (01:36:23):
Or not interesting. It's like a superpower, Mike sounds like.

Speaker 24 (01:36:28):
So that's that's I thought. Since you're talking about literacy
and it is an important issue that you should keep
that in mind as well.

Speaker 2 (01:36:38):
That's great and Guy Ritchie's another one that the movie
director who's dyslexic but has been incredibly successful.

Speaker 4 (01:36:46):
I wonder if part of it as well is.

Speaker 2 (01:36:48):
That you you know, you have these struggles, so you
know you're drawn to it in a way, but also
you have to use your imagination to get round things.
I can kind of see how how that that? Yeah,
that what's the way to say, dyslexia that challenge can
actually grow other parts of your brain not very much.

Speaker 22 (01:37:09):
So, And we don't fully understand all of all of
the explanation as to why the creative the dyslexic brain
is so creative that it is it often is.

Speaker 4 (01:37:19):
Yeah, thank you so much for your call, Mike.

Speaker 3 (01:37:21):
Yeah, you do great work, Thank you very much. Just seven.
Look at another couple of writers, very famous writers with
disex year as well. If Scott Fitzgerald, the great Gadsby, Yeah,
great book, Editha Christie several of her very fantastic and
famous books rolled though he was another one, Octavia Butler.
The list goes on so clearly.

Speaker 2 (01:37:40):
Yeah, yeah, what about reading the comments on Instagram?

Speaker 4 (01:37:43):
Does that count as reading? I don't know. I think
I think the comments on Instagram probably less.

Speaker 12 (01:37:49):
So.

Speaker 2 (01:37:49):
I mean, the comments on Reddit are full brain rot,
So if you're doing your reading on Reddit, then you
are clearly becoming dumber. Yeah, but I think reading in
general is better than just watching. TikTok is the worst.
I think we can all agree that TikTok is basically erasing.

Speaker 4 (01:38:05):
Your brain at a time you're not even reading.

Speaker 2 (01:38:10):
So the comments on Instagram, although you know, sometimes you're
reading comments on Instagram and they're just so smart and
clever and read it used to be amazing. Read it
used to be the best of social media. But as
things tend when it comes to technology and these platforms,
the one that starts off the best always becomes the worst.
I think Reader is now descended into.

Speaker 3 (01:38:30):
Just the pits of absolute brain rot in shitification. Yeah,
and as pure as form. We are going to carry
this on because we've got full phone lines and so
many ticks to get through. But if you can't get through,
keep trying. Oh eight hundred and eighty ten eighty is
the number to call headlines with Wendy coming up, then
we will take more of your calls.

Speaker 12 (01:38:50):
Jus talk said.

Speaker 15 (01:38:51):
The headlines with Blue Bubble taxis it's no trouble with
the Blue Bubble ordering. A Tamadiki says circumstances are unprecedented
as they care for fugitive Tom Phillips's three children. Our
teenagers being charged with murder after the death of a
fifteen year old earlier this year. Ya Carrodia was fatally
stamped in Napier in May. Police aren't ruling out of

(01:39:13):
further charges. Duned And police are appealing for the public's
help after a person died when a motorcycle and car
collided on State Highway I near Mosgill last Thursday. They
want to hear from motorists traveling on the road around
one thirty pm that day and anyone who saw at
orange Suzuki Swift or a white and black motorcycle around
that time. Democrats in Congress have released a lude note

(01:39:37):
alleging signed by US President Donald Trump and sent to
Jeffrey Epstein for his fiftieth birthday. Work is underway to
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due to snow and avalanche risk and the whole ad

(01:39:58):
is a disgrace. Key complaints upheld over burnt out in
Tina from Turner's ad. Find out more at enzt Herald Premium.
Now back to Mattin Tyler.

Speaker 3 (01:40:07):
Thank you very much, Wendy, and we're talking about reading.
Great article in the Economist highlights the decline of reading
across the board, all ages and all genders and all demographics,
and highlights how concerning that is. The headline is, is
the decline of reading making politics dumber? Their answer to that,
according to multiple surveys and experts, is yes. As people

(01:40:28):
read less, they think less, clearly. So what are you
doing in your household when it comes to reading? Oh eight,
one hundred and eighty ten eighty, Well, well we've got
just Cinder on the line with the.

Speaker 4 (01:40:39):
Owners and working again. There it goes get age Cinder, Hi,
how are you?

Speaker 24 (01:40:46):
I'm good? Thank you. I was just listening to your
talk show. It's brilliant. And when it comes to reading,
we have a family that's a book lover. So everywhere
in the house all I'm creating is bookshelves.

Speaker 3 (01:41:01):
Fantastic. So has it been a renewed love of reading
in the house in recent times for you just in it.

Speaker 24 (01:41:08):
Yes, it's I have always been a reader. I got
it from my mom. She used to read a lot
when we were kids, and then but recently my partner also,
he started reading when he saw me and my daughter
reading all the time. But for me it has come
it has become a bit of a challenge. Now, what
happened is five years back, I had a I went
for a morning walk and I fell down. And I

(01:41:30):
wonder if you aware of something called as scripts. It's
called a CRPS. It's called a conflict regional pain syndrome. Right,
it is something Third November is a day to watch out.
We support CRIPS on third November around the world. And
it's a very rare kind of a thing that happens.

(01:41:51):
And I can't read anymore because my nerve plays up
and my eye twitches. I have now moved to audiobooks.

Speaker 4 (01:42:00):
Oh yes, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 24 (01:42:01):
So this is something which is actually keeping me saying
I should say, because I have always read so many
bookooks and then all of a sudden life change where
I can't even read a paragraph with concentration.

Speaker 4 (01:42:14):
Wow. Yeah, Because when we were talking about decreased attention span,
but this has been forced upon you. It's it's a
very different, different thing, isn't it.

Speaker 24 (01:42:23):
Yeah, it's due to our injury.

Speaker 4 (01:42:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 24 (01:42:26):
But then thankfully with we say technology comes with goods
and bad. This is something positive that has happened, that
there are audiobooks that are available and recently I am reading,
I'm listening. I should say I still use the word reading,
because that's how a book is supposed to be read.
I'm listening to Shoe Dog, Shoot Dog.

Speaker 4 (01:42:48):
Oh, shoe Dog. Okay, yeah, I think I've heard about.

Speaker 3 (01:42:51):
Shoe Dog, the shoes we know, the man the book
about Noisy Nike.

Speaker 24 (01:42:58):
Yeah, it's amazing and more the way it has been narrated,
Because I thought reading is one thing, but when someone
is narrating on the audiobooks, people who are reading there,
they have art of reading. And who the way they
read the books?

Speaker 3 (01:43:16):
Who narrates it?

Speaker 7 (01:43:17):
Do you know?

Speaker 3 (01:43:18):
Is it Phil Knight himself.

Speaker 24 (01:43:19):
Or is it no, not him? I guess, but I
haven't because I can't read. You see, I I didn't
know homework on it. But the way it has been narrated.
I have fallen in love with word and I would
like to travel more and see the things. Yeah, so
it's just changing my life. I am more focused on
it and it's amazing thing to read. But over the years,

(01:43:44):
I wonder if this is something that people should You know,
how we have lost the art of writing when the
letters are going, emails and phone calls have taken place
in the people are losing that. But it's at home.
We need to encourage your kids. So every time we
go out, I still buy books which I am not
able to read, and then I put them on the

(01:44:05):
table and leave it for my family to pick them
up and decide what they want to read next from there.

Speaker 3 (01:44:11):
Yeah, how lovely. Yeah, good on you. And you're right.
I mean the world of audio books for you know,
someone like yourself that needs them to stall. You've got
that love of reading, but sadly you can't read anymore.
But I love audio books, I mean because I so accessible.
When I'm driving in the car, it stuck in traffic,
if I'm going for a week walk with the dog,
it is. Yeah, just make some way more excitible.

Speaker 4 (01:44:31):
I'll tell you what.

Speaker 2 (01:44:32):
There's this if you if you like Stephen king Box,
with which I happen to like, there's most of the
books recently been read by this actor called Will Patton.
So he read The Outsider that I've just listened to,
and if it bleeds as well. And he's just he's
an actor. You'll have seen him in so many movies
over the years. But he also reads Stephen King's books

(01:44:52):
and his reading is just so good of the books
that that that draws you in just getting this really
great actor to read these Stephen King box It's it's
mind blowing how good he is and it's fantastic. So
if you like Stephen King, I totally recommend The Outside
which is one I just listened to.

Speaker 3 (01:45:11):
Thank you, thank you very much, just and I've just
looked up there act as you say, he's in so
many things gone in sixty seconds, and I remember his voice.

Speaker 4 (01:45:19):
He's got a hell of a voice there. It does.

Speaker 2 (01:45:21):
Hi, guys, my son is special needs and nonverbal. I
read to him in the evening when he has a child,
when he was a child. He still is pretty much nonverbal,
but gosh can he write and is a good speller,
probably better than his mom.

Speaker 3 (01:45:33):
Yeah, love that. Oh, one hundred eighty ten eighty is
the number to call. What is reading look like for you?
Or in your household at the moment, have you made
a considered effort to get back into it.

Speaker 2 (01:45:42):
I'll tell you what not a lot of people are.
Because initially I said, put out the call, do you
feel yourself getting dumber? Because I interviewed the neuroscientist Sam Harris,
and he was saying that he struggles to read a book, right,
even though he's a neuroscientist, does this and read so
much in his life, written a bunch of books. But
very smart man, but he thinks that his attention span
has been diminished so much by you know, digital device

(01:46:08):
and stuff that he now, even this incredibly smart man
finds it really hard to sit down and read.

Speaker 3 (01:46:14):
That makes me feel slightly better off. Sam Harris is
having problems with it, then that is good for me. Right, Oh,
We'll take a few more calls on this. It is
eighteen to four.

Speaker 1 (01:46:26):
The issues that affect you and if it have fun
along the way. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams afternoons news talks,
they'd be.

Speaker 3 (01:46:34):
It is sixteen to four. Chris, very good afternoon to you.
How you doing very good reading? Are you getting back
into it. Have you always loved it?

Speaker 23 (01:46:44):
Well, it's a funny story. When I started school at
the end of the first day. I only found this
out when the teacher left. But at the end of
the first day I went up to her balling the
eyes out, and she said, what's wrong? And I said,
you haven't taught me to read. So that was on
day one. And yeah, by the time I was sort
of keen, I was reading Robinson Crusoe and Robert Louis

(01:47:07):
Stephenson and Mark Twain and the likes.

Speaker 3 (01:47:11):
So how did you transition so on day one? And
yet you've got a bit upset with the teacher because
you didn't taught you to read. Did you just take
it upon yourself to figure it out?

Speaker 4 (01:47:24):
I don't know. I'm not sure.

Speaker 23 (01:47:25):
I can't remember. I mean, I guess I was taughtive here.
But yeah, I was an avid reader from as long
as I can remember, so I was always reading books
at night when I was supposed to be asleep. So yeah,
I don't I don't read so much these days though, And.

Speaker 3 (01:47:41):
Why don't you read so much these days?

Speaker 17 (01:47:43):
Chris?

Speaker 23 (01:47:45):
Probably just I don't know, lazy.

Speaker 7 (01:47:47):
I guess you.

Speaker 4 (01:47:49):
Don't think that your attention attention span has been decreased
by technology, as this Economist article.

Speaker 23 (01:47:57):
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I didn't write a book a couple
of years ago, but yeah, that was sort of as
much as I've done on the way reading and.

Speaker 4 (01:48:08):
Lately called and what was it on? Chris?

Speaker 23 (01:48:13):
Uh, it's called Screeching Possums and Sleepy Sticks, and.

Speaker 4 (01:48:17):
It's basically great name.

Speaker 23 (01:48:20):
Yeah, it's I spend a lot of time in the
bush trapping possums and I have I have a dog,
and it's basically the story is written through her eyes.
That's it's not it's everything. Everything in the book happened.
It's back to I just tried to put a sort
of amusing spin on it.

Speaker 4 (01:48:40):
So love it.

Speaker 3 (01:48:41):
I've just had a look at it and you can
still get it from Rod and Rifle.

Speaker 17 (01:48:45):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (01:48:46):
Screeching Possums and Sleepy Sticks, The Adventures of Rose Riddle,
a Harry bush Dog.

Speaker 23 (01:48:51):
That's the one.

Speaker 4 (01:48:52):
I love it. And so what's what's your full name?
What's Chris who Riddle?

Speaker 19 (01:48:58):
All right?

Speaker 4 (01:48:58):
Double look that book up. Well, Yeah, thank you so
much for you called Chris good Man.

Speaker 2 (01:49:03):
One of my sons hated reading and his high school
English teacher wrote in his he acts as those reading.

Speaker 4 (01:49:10):
Causes some physical pain. I've seen this.

Speaker 2 (01:49:12):
And as as an adult, he discovered Andy McNair books
about the essays and he started reading. He just needed
to find a subject that interested him. He now reads
to his own kids every day. My primary school teacher
used to read a chapter of the line Watching the
Wardrobe to us every day and we absolutely loved it.

Speaker 4 (01:49:28):
It's a fantastic book, that cs Lewis book.

Speaker 8 (01:49:31):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (01:49:31):
Certainly he is re witty. If I said that quickly, yes, hey,
how are you.

Speaker 25 (01:49:40):
Hi, I'm good, thank you, And this is about reading
the book. I'm not a very good book addict.

Speaker 10 (01:49:48):
You know.

Speaker 25 (01:49:49):
We have a three year old granddaughter yep, and she
played if she comes to our house place for ten minutes,
and then immediately she looks at my husband she calls
him Tata, Tata, can we read a book now? And
we thought, you know, once in a while she'll do this. No,

(01:50:12):
every time she comes, she wants books to be read.
She's just three years old. You see, she can't read yet,
but she recognizes upper case, lower casey you know, alphabets, everything,
and it's it's amazing. One day when I went to
their house. There is a book about a labin, ninety

(01:50:34):
five pages, one book somebody had gifted her, and she said, Grandma,
can you read this Nanama to me? I said, yes,
I'll read it. And I said, Michia, this is ninety
five pages. Yes, you read it.

Speaker 24 (01:50:48):
You won't believe.

Speaker 21 (01:50:49):
She sat in my lap in the.

Speaker 25 (01:50:51):
Sixty fifty page and I said, I lost patience, Misha,
can we do something else?

Speaker 7 (01:51:00):
Yeah? Wow, beautiful, it's amazing.

Speaker 25 (01:51:03):
Is that how she loves books?

Speaker 4 (01:51:06):
Yeah, that's really cool. A smart gran sixty five pages
is pretty good.

Speaker 2 (01:51:11):
So we've been talking about books and how people are
struggling to read them now and they're the plummeting attention
span and what this means for the dumbing down of
society and people's ability to understand complex political situations. And
Tony here says, it's because the visual presentation does the
work for you, whereas in reading, your mind does the visualizing.

(01:51:32):
It's doing its own creative work. I mean, that's been
showing over and again in studies that reading is so
good for your brain because there's so much more involved.

Speaker 4 (01:51:39):
Yep, you have to read it.

Speaker 2 (01:51:40):
Comprehend it, imagine it as opposed is to sitting like
an absolute vegetable loser, slumped over with your head shoulders hunched,
just doom, scrolling through tiptop brain rot.

Speaker 4 (01:51:53):
I mean, of course reading a book is better than that.

Speaker 3 (01:51:56):
Yeah, absolutely right. We've got to play some messages, but
we'll get to a few more of your takes on
nine two nine two. It is ten to four.

Speaker 4 (01:52:05):
Boys.

Speaker 2 (01:52:05):
If you think digital devices are dumbing us down, just
imagine what AI is doing to us. I mean, that
is a whole level of concern that people aren't even
doing the basics. I mean, we were talking the other
day about how the loss of cash has badly decreased
people's ability to calculate simple, simple equations because they don't
even put out change anymore. AI is araising people's ability

(01:52:30):
to think, even even a little bit.

Speaker 3 (01:52:32):
It is terrifying. Right, it is ten to four beg
Very shortly, you're listening to Matt and Tyler the.

Speaker 1 (01:52:37):
Big stories, the big issues, the big trends, and everything
in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams afternoons used talks that'd.

Speaker 3 (01:52:45):
Be it's seven and four, Viv. We're pretty short on time,
but we wanted to hear your story. Good afternoon, Good afternoon, guys.

Speaker 26 (01:52:53):
Hey listen, I'm a teacher in a secondary school English
and I have got year nine and ten and eleven
year old eleven students and they love listening to me
actually read the novel. Are we doing all these novel studies?
And they will actually say, oh can we can we
have you reach withsmaths please and they just put the

(01:53:15):
heads on the decks and they just love it.

Speaker 4 (01:53:18):
So what kind of box a you're reading to them,
viv Oh.

Speaker 22 (01:53:22):
We're doing things like reading things like.

Speaker 26 (01:53:27):
Murduh, the play Murder, but also things like Trash, a
novel which is set in the Philippines, and also a
really cool short story called Sniper, which was about the
troubles in Ireland, and really really amazing stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:53:47):
It sounds like you're surcing some quite you know, you're
not going for the obvious ones. You're sourcing some pretty
interesting stuff there.

Speaker 26 (01:53:53):
Oh No, absolutely another novel called Kurda Tower which is
really fantastic, which is a New Zealand novel and these
kids just adore it.

Speaker 4 (01:54:02):
Good on, how awesome?

Speaker 3 (01:54:04):
Yeah, what a great teacher are you are? And that's
fantastic to hear that. They they still love to be
read too at high school.

Speaker 2 (01:54:11):
Well, after all that, there are a lot of people
that seems to be reading. But this article and the
economists points out, if you stop reading, you get dumber,
and the more people that stop reading, the dumber and
dumber we're going to get as a society. And then
it's getting to the point where people can't understand politics
at all. And as I've been saying for the last

(01:54:33):
two hours, if you're getting your politics off TikTok or
by doom scrolling, you're not actually getting any politics at all.

Speaker 4 (01:54:37):
You're being manipulated.

Speaker 8 (01:54:38):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (01:54:39):
Stop there, get a book, go down to the library,
turn this around.

Speaker 4 (01:54:42):
Read all sides of the issue if you possibly can,
even though it's painful, once you get over that threshold
of trying to read a bit more and a bit
longer than it becomes enjoyable.

Speaker 24 (01:54:51):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (01:54:52):
Otherwise you just doom to slowly erase your brain over time.

Speaker 3 (01:54:56):
Exactly.

Speaker 4 (01:54:57):
All right, Thank you so much for listening over the
last three to four hours of Matt and Tyler Afternoons.

Speaker 2 (01:55:03):
The full show podcast will be up any minute now
if you miss anything. Their powerful Heather dupless Ellen is
up next, but right now, Tyler, Why am I playing
this song my good friend grambling on.

Speaker 3 (01:55:17):
I actually have no idea. You're making this harder and harder?

Speaker 8 (01:55:19):
Is it?

Speaker 3 (01:55:20):
Because and I had to look at the lyrics because
they mentioned Mordor and Gollum.

Speaker 2 (01:55:24):
Yeah, I'm not sure if rock Plant had even read
the box, but because he says, twas in the darkest
depths of Mortar, I met a girl so fair, but Gollum,
the evil one, crept up and slipped away with her.

Speaker 4 (01:55:35):
It didn't really happen in the books, but Lord of
the Rings fantastic books. If you want to read something great,
read those.

Speaker 3 (01:55:40):
Yeap, love it nicely done.

Speaker 4 (01:55:43):
That is us for today. Yeah, until tomorrow, where you
are and whatever you're doing, give him a taste of
key we from asked Love you is See you tomorrow
for another edition of Matt and Tyler Afternoon's.

Speaker 17 (01:55:53):
On CP.

Speaker 22 (01:56:05):
Matt Tyler.

Speaker 1 (01:56:07):
For more from News Talks at b listen live on
air or online, and keep our shows with you wherever
you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio.

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