Bob Jones is a living treasure, and his columns are rippers. Presumably NBR used to think that way which is why they ran his columns.
Well, they did until they showed abject cowardice in the face of outraged snowflakes who don’t like other people’s opinions.
A column calling for a day in which Māori serve the British has been deleted from the National Business Review‘s (NBR) website.
The Sir Bob Jones column argues that instead of a day in which Māoritanga comes to the centre, we should have a day in “appreciation” of the Brits.
Why? Because Sir Bob believes there are “no full-blooded Māoris in existence”, ergo, he argues, Māori should thank the British for their existence on Waitangi Day.
Sir Bob Jones is a property investor, avid opinion piece writer and former politician.
When contacted by Newshub about the removal of the column, NBR had “no comment”, but a statement on Twitter said the column was pulled due to “inappropriate content”.
Why did they publish it then? Obviously, an editor didn’t think it was “inappropriate” when deciding to publish it. It seems it only became “inappropriate” after some snowflakes melted.
I asked about this censorship well before media picked it up.
Hey @TheNBR why have you hidden Bob Jones’ latest column? Censorship? His other columns are still there. Was it because some snowflakes were offended? If it was ok to publish why take it down? Is NBR caving to Twitter bullies?
Cam Slater@Whaleoil
That “inappropriate content” was signalled by Sir Bob himself, with the subheading “Time for a Troll”.
“As there are no full-blooded Māoris in existence it indisputably follows that had it not been for migrants, mainly Brits, not a single Māori alive today, including Professor Temaru, would have existed,” he wrote.
“I have in mind a public holiday where Māori bring us breakfast in bed or weed our gardens, wash and polish our cars and so on, out of gratitude for existing.”
On Twitter, the column was called “incredibly racist” and “hate speech”.
Sir Bob was called a “fossil” and a “blatant white supremacist”.
Others dug up NBR‘s sponsors, calling on them to stop advertising with the publication.
In response, NBR pulled the article, saying “Sir Bob Jones’ latest column has been removed from NBR‘s website, due to inappropriate content.”
The Press Council says it has not received any complaints about the article, “but since our complaints procedure requires that complaints are taken to the editor in the first instance it may be that complaints are simply at that stage”, a spokesperson said.
The NBR are gutless. They chose to publish the article – an editor had to decide that –and then, when the perpetually outraged got hurty feelings, they pulled it down.
Bob Jones is only bringing a bit of balance to the market of ideas, after all. It seems that there are no conservative voices left in media these days except us. All the rest are slowly being silenced by virtue-signalling weirdos who seem to be outraged over almost anything.
The answer to inappropriate speech isn’t banning, blocking, withdrawing or censoring it, it is reasoned debate or mocking.
Why can’t the “outraged” debate with Bob Jones on the issue? Instead they want him shut down.