Winston Peters' "State of the Nation" Speech: The Incoherent Rant of a Demagogue

Winston Peters actively embodies a demagogical style in New Zealand politics, a portrayal far beyond mere ad hominem. He leads a minor party that regularly secures enough votes to hold a handful of parliamentary seats, positioning itself as a crucial kingmaker. In the latest turn of events, the National Party had to not only partner with Peters' party but also with ACT, a smaller party targeting a niche audience with conservative and economically focused principles. This coalition highlights the controversial yet pivotal role Peters plays within the nation's political framework.

Winston Peters often finds himself at the center of controversy, employing a strategy filled with perpetual complaints against other parties, personal attacks, and divisive rants. He accuses the media of misrepresentation, criticizes academics as "woke" and outdated, and stirs discontent among a segment of the population that is drawn to his rhetorical spectacles. His recent "state of the nation" speech was an incoherent rant, delivered more in the style of a demagogical campaign than from someone in a significant leadership position. My use of "incoherent" is deliberate, mirroring the nuanced discussion on logic as the "guardian of coherence" in Logic in the Wild. What’s particularly interesting about this example of an incoherent rant is that Peters did not overtly commit the ultimate sin of logical inconsistency. Rather, the incoherence arises from obfuscation, confusion, and the conflation of concepts and accusations.

In his speech, Peters recklessly compares the Labour Party's affirmative policies and co-governance principles with Māori to the atrocities and "philosophy" of Nazi Germany. This comparison is not only historically inaccurate but conceptually perverse. Affirmative action and policies aimed at addressing the disparities faced by the Māori population are rooted in social justice, not racial supremacy. Co-governance involves placing experts in leadership roles to make significant decisions in health, education, and other areas affecting Māori communities adversely. The Māori population, disproportionately underperforming in various success metrics such as health, education, substance abuse, and criminality, lives in a country recognizing the ongoing impacts of colonisation on these metrics. The government now seeks to honour the treaty signed between the Māori population and the Crown, understanding the need to appropriately redistribute powers to assist an oppressed community in rebuilding and thriving. Peters, echoing the racist claims of Seymour with inflammatory rhetoric, argues that such affirmative political action, based on race, privileges one race over another, likening it to the actions of Nazi Germany:

“Some people's DNA made them, sadly, according to these people and condoned by their cultural fellow travellers, their DNA made them somehow better than others. I've seen that sort of philosophy before. I saw it in Nazi Germany. We all did. We've seen it elsewhere around the world in the horrors of history. But here right in our country and tolerated, by people whose job was to keep the system honest, this happened.”

Peters misrepresents policies designed to address the effects of colonization and honor the Treaty between Māori and the Crown as racially biased, fundamentally misunderstanding the concept of race and identity by simplistically reducing them to genetics. This perspective overlooks the widely acknowledged fact that the folk understanding of race lacks a biological correlate, ignoring the complex nature of Māori identity which extends beyond mere biology. Peter's rhetoric serves no purpose other than to inflame and divide. Peters and his ally Seymour's approach to politics is not rooted in any coherent philosophy or logic but is instead a mix of racism and demagoguery. I maintain that this approach is not inconsistent because there is no logical contradiction between the policies of the Labour Party in New Zealand and Nazi philosophy. Similarly, no contradiction exists between these policies and the myths of Ancient Greece or the tenets of medieval philosophy, as Nazi ideology and affirmative policies operate within entirely different conceptual frameworks that lack sufficient overlap to warrant a contradiction. Peters’ superficial accusations suggest that affirmative policies are based on race, equating it with DNA, and are ignorant of the fact that traditional notions of race cannot be reduced to genetics and that Māori identity is not a biological concept. His attempt to equate efforts to achieve social justice for Māori with the Nazis' affirmation of white supremacy and their commitment to genocide against minorities necessitates a distortion of concepts and mental gymnastics that result in logical incoherence, serving only rhetorical purposes.

Peters, it must be clear that our political parties, including Labour, the Nationals, and even the most conservative factions led by Seymour within your alliance, are not influenced by Nazi philosophy. However, the rhetoric you and Seymour espouse is racist, incoherent, and inflammatory. Prime Minister Luxon, it's commonly understood that the company one keeps reflects upon their character. This principle extends to political leadership, where the alliances formed to secure power are telling. Embracing demagogical incoherence means abandoning logic, a choice that diminishes the integrity of governance and misleads the public.

Reference: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/511947/winston-peters-delivers-state-of-the-nation-speech