what makes a good political speech in new zealand?
TRANSCRIPT
Do’s
• ‘fess up’ as Helen Clark memorably put it.
• Tell it as it is as the public keep telling us. New Zealanders are s;ll late Victorian posi;vists in their tests for the truth.
Don’ts • Don’t pretend to superiority.
You will affirm your authority by disloca;ng it, and by not making yourself the issue.
• Don’t be moralis6c. Don’t make yourself out to be poli;cally or ideologically correct in terms of disciplines that are not epistemologically verifiable.
• Don’t whip yourself up into zeal. People hate dogma;sts.
• Don’t be a prig. People hate PC.
• Don’t be gnos6c, as if you alone have access to special insight and knowledge. People hate sorcerers, witches and wizards.
• Don’t be a personalist. It’s not a poetry reading. You’re not reading out diary excerpts of your extra special wannabe celebrity life.
• Mislay the self, and don’t worry about it.
Two threefold structures for rhetorical architectonics
• The first threesome is Mimesis1, Mimesis2, and Mimesis3. • The second triune structure relates to Poli;cal Philosophy itself. It consists of technique, cri6que and mys6que.
More don’ts
• Don’t say you are passionate. Be passionate by doing. Passion like Love, is something you do, nothing you say.
• Don’t say you are thrilled or excited. The audience wants to see that you enjoy being with them and that you like your job.
• Don’t be horrible. Don’t do anything to put a bullet through the pressurised hull of reasoned New Zealand civil discourse.
• Don’t preach. Don’t be moralis6c. Don’t let the spiMle of zeal fly. Don’t pretend to moral advantage.
• Don’t pretend to superiority. You will affirm your authority by disloca;ng it, and by not making yourself the issue.
• Don’t be moralis6c. Don’t make yourself out to be poli;cally or ideologically correct in terms of disciplines that are not epistemologically verifiable.
• Don’t whip yourself up into zeal. People hate dogma;sts.
• Don’t be a prig. People hate PC.
• Don’t be gnos6c, as if you alone have access to special insight and knowledge. People hate sorcerers, witches and wizards.
• Don’t be personalist. It’s not a poetry reading. You’re not reading out diary excerpts of your special extra special wannabe celebrity life.
• Mislay the self, and don’t worry about it.
List of Speeches Copies of these speeches can be found at www.na;onvoicesnz.org
• Sir George Grey ‘Millions Yet Unborn’ (8 March 1878)
• Sir Apirana Ngata ‘The Gospel of Equality’ (25 July 1939)
• Rt Hon. Simon Upton ‘Too Young – Too Old’ (13 December 2000)
• Rt Hon. Helen Clark A series of comments (2002, 2003 and 2004)
• Dr Don Brash ‘Na;onhood' (27 January 2004)