C.C. McDOWALL
Rotorua
Netball v skateboards
Dear Mr Packham (Letters, March 30).
Your city footpaths are not a priority.
Buy yourself a skateboard and the council will put $4 million into your cause.
Netball brings thousands of dollars into Rotorua. They can upgrade so far until they can raise enough money to finish the courts. Skateboarders bring nothing but graffiti and hassles.
A lot of Rotorua residents (ratepayers) voted for the wrong people.
R.E ADOLPH
Rotorua
Balanced reporting
Security camera show young thugs beating up a bottle store manager. It is shown over and over on TV, brainwashing vulnerable young people, seeing violence as the norm. Hence another copycat event for the police to attend.
I criticise the media, and then hear screams of right of free speech, free press, censorship etc.
Free speech to publish violence over and over, must, then, apply to free speech for good. Good Christians, good Muslims, good Islam, good ordinary people, good grandparents, good Maori, good Pakeha, good policemen, good teachers and principals, good students too, even good MPs, play them repeatedly over and over. Good Catholics, good Destiny Church people.
Reporters and editors, it is time to balance reporting. Less violence on the front pages and TV, more good, over and over.
Quote: "There is nothing as strong as gentleness. Nothing as gentle as real strength."
JH MAYHEW
Ngongotaha
Opposing views
In his letter of February 4 correspondent Jim Adams states that Te Reo - the Maori language - is dead.
When his views are opposed, he changes his mind (Letters, March 31) stating that "if one attacks something, it usually creates a strong defence".
Is this an admirable ploy for a (self-declared) 84-year-old journalist?
In his latest letter he says Maori is not a dying language. I find his letters cynical and arrogant.
JOCELYN TOWERS
Rotorua
Saved by uncle, and Jesus
A couple of weeks to Easter!
I love Easter: when I lived in Wellington the kingfish used to appear in the sea in December and then disappear north at about Easter.
During the Easter weekend I often caught a kingfish from the shore, usually in the harbour but sometimes from Boom Rock, as they seemed to make a last shoreline sweep before migrating (kingfish in Wellington typically weigh 20lb or more).
That was back in the 70s, before I knew anything about Easter, except that it was good for fishing.
Then in 1979 I was fishing one day, looking into the water, when I realised that there must be an all-knowing God out there, otherwise the universe made no sense. A few weeks later, after giving up LSD and marijuana due to constant hallucinations, I shifted to AK where I met my uncle, who said I could ask Jesus, the all-knowing Son of God, to forgive me for all the bad things I had done (quite a list) and give my life to Him.
Taking my uncle's advice was the best thing I ever did, as Jesus did forgive me and what's more completely fixed all (well, nearly all, haha) of my drug-related delusions and spiritual problems.
If people don't love Jesus like I do, that's their problem, but seeing as we have a national holiday about his death, surely we can tell our stories about what He has done for us, without getting told we are nutters?
GJ PHILIP
Rotorua
