Mike Hosking: What's wrong with Luxon's call for more responsibility?

I suspect part of the reaction we have seen of late to Chris Luxon and his stance on crime and the general depravation that passes for acceptable life in this country these days is it's coming from one of the two mainstream parties.

Smaller parties are the domain of the more radical thinking. The Māori Party and their desire to run the country under their interpretation of what was signed off a couple of hundred years ago. Or the Greens and their desire to destroy farming to save the world. The nutty stuff is at the fringes.

And in comes good old Chris Luxon with some straight up and down criticism of parents and, god forbid, principals. He is actually in a blameless country looking to lay a bit of blame and point out a few old fashioned rules around responsibility.

And dear lord, we can't cope with it. Apart from anything it’s a living experiment, which is what this country is these days, of just how easily peoples' attitudes and outlooks can shift.

It wasn’t so long ago that responsibility, whether it be that of a parent or any sort of community leader, teachers included, was something that was expected and aspired to. It was when we were a rock star economy. We were so proud of it, we kept repeating it.

We expected to do well, being successful was a habit, but in five short years, we have let ourselves go. We have dropped the diet, we have have given up on the exercise, we have become flabby, we are now fat and lazy, and we are now finding excuses as to why it is acceptable.

And Luxon has rolled in and pointed out what a mess we look. And dear oh dear, some of us aren't having it.

The simple truth is the statistics don't lie. Look at the statistics around crime or ram raids, imprisonment, violence, truancy, welfare. They are all there, they are all getting worse, and they are all embarrassing.

And the fact those who are most upset are the architects of the mess. And yet in being outraged at people like Luxon they fail to see that what they offer is no alternative. You can't shout him down, having created the problem he's pointing out.

Being a parent does actually involve you having work, getting your kids to school, and participating in the real world. This isn't a shock, it isn't news, it isn't new, and it's not anything radical.

Unless you’ve joined the opt out brigade, as promoted and paid for by this current government, it suits them to have you beholden, it suits them to do the thinking and instructing for you.

It speaks volumes as to how far we have sunk that a simple message of responsibility and demanding better has been met by so much outcry.

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