At long last, it will shortly become illegal to hit children under the pretence of 'reasonable force,' as Sue Bradford has the numbers to pass the third reading of her anti-belting private members bill. I must confess, though, that I've never seen the Christian Right quite as rabid as this since the bad old days oftheir campaigns against homosexuallaw reform and abortion clinic invasions during the lateeighties. In itself, that isn't surprising, as it has mostly been the Christian Right Old Guard that have been the chief protagonists in this case, but their own extremism may have undone them in the end. For those community members who weren't around back then, death threats, arson and assault of lesbian and gay community activists were a common response to the anti-gay hysteria whipped up against homosexual law reform. I'm not only talking about the CYFSWatch death and assault threats against Sue Bradford. I am talking about the disgraceful, manipulative attempt to convince the Maori Party to accept Chester Borrows' wrecking amendment, which will now be unable to succeed. Why do I call this manipulative and hypocritical? Cue one Michael Drake, of the fundamentalist Tyndale Park Christian School, currently under Ministry of Education investigation for using fundamentalist parents to deliver corporal punishment within his school, in violation of the abolition of corporal punishment in educational contexts in 1990. It will be remembered that Drake wrote an abhorrent little pamphlet on the "Biblical Approach to Spanking" (which in itself suggests an escalation of physical force). He also wrote an unpleasant little racist tract entitled "The New Maori Myth." To say nothing of Garnet Milne'svitriol about "Maori witch-doctors" (tohunga)- a ghastly remark, which leads one to ponder how they'll respond to the Maori Party's decision. I shudder to think. Exactly how did they hope to convince the Maori Party, given this history of racist diatribe? And now, we even have a pro-belting 'petition' in the service of the Christian Right, uncannily like the bogus alleged eight hundred thousand signatures garnered against homosexual law reform in the mid-eighties. And they want to waste taxpayers money on a citizens initiated referendum, as they did against civil unions! The fact is, that the pakeha Christian Right is just that, with the sole exception of Brian Tamaki and his Destiny Church followers. Most major iwi health and social service agencies would agree with counterpart pakeha child health and welfare agencies that children should not be physically assaulted under the cover of 'discipline.' And let me acknowledge, institutional racism and inequality, in their specific contexts. Once more, the Christian Right has been defeated, although - as with prostitution law reform and civil unions - the final margin was far closer than it should have been. As a barometer of social liberalism and conservatism, the following conclusions may be relevant to any forthcoming adoption reform initiative. The National Party has once again pandered to the worst sort of militant fundamentalism, as it habitually does on these issues, ignoring professional opinion otherwise. Peter Dunne will reap the whirlwind for his defiance of fundamentalist stakeholders within United Future, but I am glad that he had the decency to do so. As for his erstwhile colleagues, one hopes for a final end to that strange beast that tries to pretend that it is what it is not. Labour, the Greens, the Maori Party , Jim Anderton and those brave New Zealand FirstMPswho did the decent thing deserve our thanks and congratulations for a long and arduous struggle to protect our nation's children. One hopes that this will convince the Christian Right that it cannot fight strong evidence-backed social reform, but I am not at all hopeful about that. The Old Guard has a record of unvarnished and futile battles against such necessary reforms- including, probably, any forthcoming adoption reform developments in our own context. Not Recommended: http://www.familyfirst.org.nz Family First Lobby http://www.familyintegrity.org.nz Family Integrity http://www.reformationtestimony.org.nz Reformation Testimony (Garnet Milne, Wanganui) http://www.spcs.org.nz Society for Promotion of Community Standards http://www.tyndalepark.school.nz Tyndale Park School www.alor.org/Volume25/Vol25No35.htm See Ref: "Race Violence in New Zealand" in On Target article, c1989. Craig Young - 14th March 2007