John McLean
Citizen typist patriot
On 18 August 2026, NZ Herald published an opinion piece by Alan Ringwood entitled Including religion in hate speech laws is a Trojan horse that protects those like Brian Tamaki.
The byline to Alan’s article states, “Alan Ringwood is a lawyer and former partner at Bell Gully. He was for many years the Herald’s editorial lawyer.” We were both at that law firm together, but I don’t remember Alan. It was a long, long time ago.
Ringwood’s article focuses on the crime of inciting racial disharmony, as contained in section 131 of New Zealand’s Human Rights Act. In broad terms, that section criminalizes the public use of threatening, abusive, or insulting words that are likely to excite hostility or ill-will against, or to bring into contempt or ridicule, any group on the ground of the group’s colour, race, or ethnic or national origin.
Ringwood’s central thesis, in his article, is that section 131 should not be extended to criminalise wordy barbs directed at religious groups because, unlike race, religious beliefs “are not innate or immutable”.
I agree with Ringwood’s thesis. But his framing is loopy. Ringwood’s article gives the impression that Destiny Church leader Brian Tamaki favours ‘hate speech’ criminal sanctions against criticizing religions. He implies that Tamaki would like criticism of religions to be criminalized, in order to shield Destiny Church from criticism. But nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the opposite is true.
Tamaki has been a strong and consistent opponent of expanding New Zealand’s so-called ‘hate speech’ laws. He characterizes stronger hate speech laws as an ideological power grab, designed by proponents to silence, punish and imprison political opponents.
The starkest recent examples of Western weaponization of ‘hate speech’ laws began in British Prime Minister Keir Sta(lin)’s Disunited Kingdom, where Labour politicians are abusing the police and courts to imprison political opponents for expressing dissenting views.
The latest Tamaki derangement and discombobulation resulted from Tamaki calling for a purge of Muslim, Sikh and Hindu communities from New Zealand, in response to Hindu nationalist targeting of Christians in India. In response, New Zealand’s parlous police pinched all of Tamaki’s guns.
Ringwood’s article correctly records that “there have been calls by the Federation of Islamic Associations of NZ, Hindu Council of NZ, Supreme Sikh Society NZ, and other interested parties such as Amnesty International Aotearoa, for gaps in our hate speech laws to be closed and for political parties to outline their policies on hate provocation”. And that’s entirely predictable from New Zealand’s Islamic Federation, Hindu Council and Sikh Society. They come from traditions that favour authoritarianism, censorship, religious prejudices and preciousness, and sectarianism, all in preference to Western freedoms of expression.
Sadly, Amnesty International has totally lost the plot over the last couple of decades. The once august Amnesty organisation has about-faced from dedication to freeing individuals incarcerated for expressing their views to promoting imprisonment of ‘dangerous’ free speakers who commit such ‘crimes’ as skepticism of gender identity. Amnesty Aotearoa (the clue is, of course, not calling New Zealand by its one and only name) has naturally opposed the legislative bill to define a woman and a man as inconsistent with Te Tiriti o Waitangi (that’s the Treaty of Waitangi). In short, Amnesty’s gone Woke.
And New Zealand’s National Party shows no sign of throwing off its Woke Cloak. Completely mental Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey is Woke on (sex change) steroids. Nicola Grigg, as Minister of Women’s Affairs, doesn’t know what a woman is. A prime minister who’s been chief executive of Sky Wakas Aotearoa (Air New Zealand) and who is a great mate of Doocey can’t not be a dyed-in-the-wool Wokester.
And now the Nats have gone and selected a United Nations-loving human rights lawyer as its Wellington Central candidate in the upcoming general election. Dr Scott Sheeran is a frightfully censorious Identitarian who, as recently as June 2026, put out this piece, in the Post.
In his piece, Sheeran opined that Tamaki’s remarks would be unlawful in countries such as the UK, Canada, and Australia, and lamented that New Zealand law currently does not criminalise incitement of antipathy against religious groups. He’d no doubt criminalize expressions of distaste for Islam… the “Islamophobia” invented and propagandized by the Islamic Brotherhood.
Sheeran is yet another unreal doctor. His legal ‘doctorate’ is in international law, from Essex University. He worked with Sir Geoffrey Palmer, at Chen & Palmer. Enough said.
The Nats failure to abolish the Broadcasting Standards Authority, a legislative initiative that would’ve enjoyed immediate support from coalition partners ACT and NZ First, says it all. Be under no illusions. The LuxNats are more leftie that the Labour Party of yore.
If inciting hostility or ill-will against a religious group were to be criminalized, then Red Radio NZ’s John Campbell could be prosecuted for his crazed hatred of, and attacks on, Tamaki’s Destiny Church. But as tempting as it is to want to see Campbell in the dock and then jailed, it’s no valid reason to enact such criminalization.
Unlike Christians and Muslims, Jews are an ethnic group. So inciting hostility or ill-will against Jews can be criminal, under the Human Rights Act. In September 2024, Labour Party MP Damien O’Connor reposted a video claiming, “Palestinians have every right to do whatever they did on October 7th”, and never apologized. Chlöe Swarbrick, Green Party co-leader, has repeatedly chanted, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”, a chant universally acknowledged to be a call for termination of Israel and its Jewish inhabitants.
Peter Davis, husband of former Labour Prime Minister Helen Clark, posted on social media about the 7 October atrocity perpetrated by Palestinians, “You reap what you sow”. Davis truly sucks.
Under New Zealand’s current laws, O’Connor, Swarbrick and Davis could each be criminally prosecuted for inciting hatred of Jews, as an ethnic group.
But I’m still with Alan Ringwood. Inciting hostility or ill-will against any religious group, or bringing contempt or ridicule on any such group, shouldn’t be criminalized.
Warren Zevon would never have wished for that, not even for the contemporary Jew-hating Mus Wolves of London. But we live in crazy times. Abdur Razzaq of New Zealand’s Islamic Federation would’ve imprisoned Warren Zevon just for the name of Zevon’s song, “Mohammed’s Radio”.
This article was originally published on the author’s Substack.
