Actually, Snapchat does delete your photos. Just not straight away.

Decipher Forensics didn’t tell the whole story when they claimed Snapchat doesn’t delete expired snaps. But they did overhype the impressiveness of their discovery.

It’s not surprising that people have wanted to verify Snapchat’s claim that expired snaps are “deleted forever”. So Decipher Forensics’ grab for attention is appreciable, with their press release claiming to research exposing that snaps are “actually saved on your phone”.

However, despite some credible work in understanding how Snapchat deals with metadata, their core finding is not that insightful. Anyone with more than basic knowledge about Android will know to look in the “/data/data/com.snapchat.android” directory to find the snaps. You need to have a rooted phone to access this, but that’s neither hard nor uncommon.

The key question is, are they deleted when Snapchat claims they’re deleted? On this, Decipher is wrong. But to be fair, so is Snapchat. In fact, some other commentators have got this wrong too. Snapchat doesn’t always delete photos once they’re viewed, but they’re not “saved” like Decipher claims, either.

The correct answer is this: Snapchat deletes all received snaps after you view your last unviewed snap.

So if you receive one snap, it gets deleted from your phone after you’ve viewed it. But if you receive two, they both stay on your phone until you’ve seen both, and then they both get deleted.

It’s this second situation that Decipher presented in their “preliminary findings”, except that they only opened one, then (correctly) found that both snaps (opened and unopened) were still in /data/data/com.snapchat.android. So their observation was fine, but their conclusion implying that all expired snaps are “indeed recoverable” is incorrect.

In theory, it is possible for the snaps to linger around forever. If you never viewed all your snaps—i.e., if you always left one unviewed in your inbox—then the condition to empty the received snaps folder would never be satisfied. This is indeed a flaw in Snapchat’s app—a more careful design would have deleted just the viewed photo straight away. But in fairness, this situation wouldn’t happen often. Keeping one unopened isn’t how most people use Snapchat.

The received_image_snaps directory before you view all snaps

The received_image_snaps directory after you view all snaps

Good work, little one?
I’m not bragging when I say that Decipher’s findings aren’t impressive: I know a little bit, but I’m no Android expert. Rather, it’s astonishing that Decipher was able to dramatise this as a huge discovery.

Where the snaps are stored on the phone is old news: at least one developer has used it to write an app, Snapgrab, allowing users to deliberately save received snaps. Once you can find them, it’s trivial to check when they’re deleted. Decipher has also done some work on understanding the metadata Snapchat uses, but it seems to be little more than poking around the application’s data files and seeing what’s there.

Similarly, it’s hardly “research” that shows the “.nomedia” extension was used. They’re also wrong about what it does. It’s not this that makes the image not viewable on the phone, but the fact that it’s stored in what Android calls “internal storage”, which users can’t access without rooting. The actual use of “.nomedia” is as a blank file in “external storage”, where files you can access ordinarily is stored. Why the “.nomedia” extension was added is beyond me.

Lastly, there is no “special forensics software” necessary to find everything I’ve described in this blog post. As Jordan Crook at TechCrunch observes, forensics software can be used to recover photos even after they’ve been (actually) deleted. This isn’t surprising: it’s no different to files emptied from the trash can, and is just as deleted as any app can do. But this isn’t what Decipher talked about in its blog post or press release.

I don’t know much about Decipher Forensics; I don’t follow the computer forensics industry. For all I know, their actual work might be excellent. But Decipher’s recent press release has all the hallmarks of a small firm trying to make a name for itself quickly by over-dramatising what is really quite amateur work.

The next step in marriage reform

Passing same-sex marriage into law should be a stepping stone, not the endgame. We’re still nowhere near marriage equality.

Celebrations, online and offline, erupted when New Zealand legalised gay marriage Wednesday night. Emotions clearly run high on this topic (though I’ve never understood why). The parties, tweets and parades all sing the same tune: we’re proud to live in a country, any two people, regardless of sexuality, can get married. That raises the question: Why only two?

In this sense at least, the conservatives were right. True marriage equality has still not been achieved. Equality demands that all people be treated the same. But we still deny marriage to people who to be romantically involved with multiple people or close relatives. If marriage is a “human right”, as proponents claim, why do we continue to refuse it to some?

One counter-argument is obvious: polygamists can still marry someone, just only one person; incestuous lovers can just find someone else. This misses the point. After all, gays, too, could just marry someone to whom they’re not attracted. “Equality” of a rudimentary sort did exist before same-sex marriage: everyone had the same rights, namely, to marry someone of the opposite sex. The real point is that we shouldn’t judge people, or deny them rights, based on whom they love. If it happens to be someone of the same sex, fine. If it happens to involve five people, that’s their marriage, not ours.

Equality for all, not just couples…
It would appear, then, that true marriage equality effectively demands open slather. Anyone (provided they can and do consent) should be able to marry anyone, when or as they please. Anything less than that would still be discriminating against some people. But this is, at face value, a rather absurd outcome. To have no legal restrictions at all probably renders it meaningless.

That raises the question conservatives have been rightly asking, but failing to answer satisfactorily: What is the meaning of marriage? I will not dive into such a deep question here. But as I’ve previously written, submitter Graeme Pirie had a worthy answer: the state needn’t care. It can issue “relationship certificates” without defining “marriage”. People can give marriage their own definition and rituals.

Mr Pirie’s submission didn’t touch on polygamy, but it would be easy enough to extend. Unfortunately, that takes us in a full circle. If there are no legal restrictions on state-recognised relationships, then why does the state recognise relationships?

The most obvious answer is in property law, especially in divorce or inheritance. We allow couples to adopt children jointly. When applying to immigrate, having a New Zealand-resident partner helps (though “partner” here is much looser than marriage-equivalents). We place some restrictions on partners too: in disclosure of interest provisions, your partner’s interests count as yours too. There are more: my search for the word “spouse” in public legislative acts got 129 hits.

…or better still, not just lovers?
Those rights feel nice, but it must be said that they too are a violation of equality. It’s true that anyone can enter a relationship, but that misses the point for the same reason that “they can marry someone appropriate” misses the point with gays, polygamy and incest. We shouldn’t be differentiating between people on whom they love—or don’t, as the case may be.

At this point, marriage advocates (gay-loving or otherwise) will say two things. The first is that marriage is important: it founds a basic social unit and provides a stable environment for kids. If that’s the case, people will do it anyway.

The second observation is that people want the rights and responsibilities of relationships. For rights granted by the state, such as immigration, it’s discriminatory to treat them favourably just because they have a partner. It’s similarly unclear why joint adoption should be restricted to romantically involved couples. As for obligations to others, like disclosure of interest, these simply reflect that partners have an interest in each other. Partners aren’t unique in that regard; the principle behind such rules (you’re interested if you have a close association with someone) should be used instead.

That leaves rights and obligations the parties have to each other, e.g. relating to property. There’s nothing stopping them getting them by private contract. The parties would then be free to choose how they want their relationship to be governed. The details need not be the business of the government.

As any marriage equality advocate must have pointed out when defending gay marriage, true equality isn’t just about people having the same legal rights on paper. It’s about respecting how different people achieve self-fulfilment. It’s about being blind to the identity of one’s partner. All I’m saying is that the law should also be blind to how many partners they have and whether they have a partner at all. The only way to do that is for the state not to recognise relationships at all.

When and only when that day comes, we’ll have true marriage equality. For now, marriage still discriminates. Marriage equality proponents should not rest now; there is much more to do. Either that, or they should pick a different label.

Image credit: Dominion Post

Would CPEng have helped Novopay?

There is probably something to be said for certifying software engineers.

Edit: After attending the talk at the IITP AGM I’ve changed my stance on this issue—Novopay probably doesn’t fit software engineering, per se, so much as IT. I’ll write a short post explaining when I get time.

I was at the Engineering Professions Forum last weekend, where in one session a student pointed out that part of IPENZ’s lack of relevance to those in electronics and computers was that being a chartered professional engineer (CPEng) doesn’t apply to them. To that, someone interjected, “One word: Novopay!”

The student’s observations were correct: almost all electronics and computer engineers couldn’t care less about CPEng. But the interjector’s point was valid. In civil engineering, disasters analogous to Novopay are exactly what the CPEng quality mark is supposed to help prevent. So I started to wonder: would it have helped?

First, let’s be clear. The question is not, “could the problem have been avoided if Talent2’s engineers were chartered?” That wouldn’t work. While software is taught as a discipline of engineering in New Zealand’s universities, in practice it has virtually no place in IPENZ or CPEng. The question is much more abstract: “could the problem have been avoided if it was standard practice for software engineers to be chartered?”

When do people care?
Even in civil engineering, enthusiasm for CPEng is hardly universal, but computer engineering is particularly dismissive. In an acknowledgement of this IPENZ includes in its CPEng FAQs the question, “Is CPEng of value to the telecommunication and IT fields?”

I suspect the real distinction is not by discipline, but by the nature of work. Fundamentally, the need for professional quality marks arises because you wouldn’t know any other way whether to trust a practitioner. That is mainly the case when an engineer is hired by laypeople: that is, contracted to provide a service, rather than employed to produce a product.

When you contract someone to design a building, you can’t tell whether their practice is bad before it’s too late. But when you buy a phone, you’re perfectly capable of telling whether the phone works. Even if you can’t, for example with electric power leads, standard for products make more sense than standards for designers. You don’t need to know how good the engineer was; you just need to know that the thing you’re buying works.

This explains why registration matters for accountants, doctors, lawyers and teachers. It explains why enthusiasm for CPEng is greatest in engineering consultancies. It partly explains why in electronics and software, people don’t care.

Why Novopay is relevant
But here’s the thing. Novopay was a contracted job. It was a service, and it was hired by laypeople (the government). Talent2 is not a software company. It’s an HR company that sells software as part of its “payroll solution”. But Novopay, being an extremely large nationwide system, is understandably a contract of its own.

In some civil fields, government policies dictate that consulting engineers must be chartered. This isn’t the practice in software. Civil engineering is more consequential—when bridges fall, people die—but information technology is increasingly a core backbone of society, and even if they don’t always have potential to kill, they certainly impact people’s lives. (Not being paid isn’t fun.)

Furthermore, in reality, software services are often contracted by laypeople.  This isn’t always the case: when you buy or download software such as Microsoft Office or Angry Birds, it’s a product: lots of people have the same thing and you can tell whether it works. But businesses often require large-scale IT solutions, and contract companies such as Datacom (who ran the payroll before Talent2) or IBM to do it.

In a reflection of its grounding in civil engineering, IPENZ has not really been scratching its head about the IT disasters of the last year. The Institute of IT Professionals has—and indeed the talk at its AGM is about whether the IT profession should, too, move towards chartered accreditation. Whether CPEng or chartered IT professionals would better cover Novopay is a discussion in itself; I leave it aside but suffice to say that it is also debatable whether software engineering is legitimately “engineering”.

Before an inquiry into Novopay’s failings has been done, we won’t really know whether technical incompetence caused the problems (as opposed to, say, management or training of school payroll staff). So I admit it’s a little premature to speculate on whether CPEng (or chartering IT professionals) would actually have helped avoid Novopay. But I take the interjector’s point. It’s at least plausible to say that, if it was incompetence, then professional certification might have pushed standards high enough to avoid this, or at least helped the Ministry of Education discriminate between those who were up to the task and those who were not.

The oddities in Maori radio spectrum rights

The core arguments for Māori spectrum rights don’t reflect the benefits they bring today.

After the government confirmed last week that nothing will be reserved for Māori interests in the 700 MHz spectrum auction later this year, Māori claimants look set to go back to the Waitangi Tribunal. They will probably argue in claim Wai 2224 that radio spectrum is taonga and, as such, the Crown is obliged to set some of it aside.

The 700 MHz band is being freed up by the end of analogue television, and will be used for 4G mobile networks. It won’t surprise you, then, to know that this case is tied heavily to 2degrees—especially if you know that New Zealand’s third major mobile service provider was founded using spectrum (in the 2 GHz 3G band) reserved for Māori.

What makes the case intriguing is that there was no hint of this in the original claim.

The beginning
The issue was first heard by the Waitangi Tribunal in 1999 following claim Wai 776.* The Crown’s obligation under the Treaty of Waitangi to protect Māori language and culture was (and still is) uncontroversial. But the three-person tribunal split over its findings on radio spectrum, the majority finding for the claimants.

There were two “limbs”. The first was whether Māori have a right to spectrum. The majority found that the fact that radio waves “existed in nature—as light and sound— and could be captured by humans” was enough to make the entire electromagnetic spectrum taonga. The minority, Judge P J Savage, rejected that the principle of partnership grants Māori a right to all resources, calling it “peculiar in the extreme that [the right would be] left to be discerned as a principle within a principle”.

The second limb relates to the Crown’s obligation to protect Māori culture. The majority said that “where there is a will, there will be a way” to use some of the 2 GHz band to advance Māori culture, omitting what the “way” could be. Judge Savage disagreed that this made spectrum allocation a necessity, recommending instead that auction proceeds be used for that purpose.

This is not the place to dive into the findings, but I will say that I find the majority’s logic hard to follow and Judge Savage’s reasons more coherent. Putting aside the scientific transgression (sound isn’t a radio wave, you learn that in year 9!) the majority dealt mostly in undisputed generalities, saying that spectrum could help the Crown meet its obligations—not whether was a sensible way of doing so.

The aftermath, a.k.a. 2degrees
Cabinet didn’t accept the Tribunal’s recommendation. But in 2000, the incoming Labour government agreed to set aside one block of the 2 GHz spectrum for Māori economic development purposes (ref). This block would be given to Hautaki Limited, an incorporated company being trustee of the Hautaki Trust, a trust set up to hold Māori spectrum rights. Hautaki later leased its spectrum rights to Econet Wireless Limited, which became NZ Communications Limited and is now the well-known 2degrees Mobile, in return for a 20% stake in the company.

Unsurprisingly, 2degrees has been very supportive of proposals to grant further spectrum to Hautaki. In a 2007 submission, they wrote that “Maori should benefit as investors not just content providers or users.” But expectedly, most of the submission concerned how to promote market competition. Similarly, on the 700 MHz spectrum, Hautaki’s submission chose to emphasise the benefits of having a third player in the mobile market.

Where we came from
Pause for a moment and consider how we got here. A significant plank of the original claim was the Crown obligation to protect Māori culture. Now, our basis for supporting Māori spectrum rights is so they can profit as investors, with some overtones of encouraging competition in the mobile industry.

In a sense, the Māori spectrum allocation of 2000 turned out well for New Zealand. The addition of a third player, 2degrees, in the mobile market has undoubtedly been good.† But if promoting competition is the objective, then the Treaty of Waitangi is a roundabout if not improper way of achieving it.

Wai 776’s second limb, the protection of Māori culture, has not borne out from the 2 GHz reservation. Perhaps the Labour government foresaw this, and so tagged the spectrum for “economic development” rather than culture. The current National government’s new $30 million “ICT development fund” for Māori seems to have similar affirmative action goals (also undoubtedly good), as does the Hautaki Trust, whose purpose is “to increase the participation of Māori in the knowledge economy”.

What is fascinating is the divergence between the benefits that were argued and those that accrued. The affirmative action aim, which is laudable, was not touched on in the Tribunal’s 1999 report. Protecting language and culture was, but didn’t happen. Facilitating competition isn’t a Māori rights issue. That leaves Wai 776’s first limb, the right to “develop” the resource as taonga, which successive governments have rejected but ended up implementing a similar model anyway on the affirmative action basis—the outcome being 2degrees.

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* It actually goes back to the allocation of AM/FM broadcasting licences in the 1990, but that context isn’t really comparable because broadcasting, unlike mobile telephony, has an express purpose of promoting culture.

† The reason the new entrant can be attributed to the Māori allocation is because new entrants would have been unlikely to bid without other investments secured, let alone outbid the incumbents in an open auction. The purchase price for Hautaki in the Crown deed was set at 95% of the lowest successful bid for non-reserved spectrum. As an aside, it’s worth noting that the spectrum rights weren’t given to Hautaki for free.

What Prosser can do to redeem himself

Richard Prosser must convince the public that he’s changed his mind, not just that he “made a mistake”.

It’s comforting that Richard Prosser’s bigoted comments on Muslims in aeroplanes were met with ample vilification from virtually everyone. Predictably, many have also called for him to be sacked. It’s a tempting ritual, but I’m not sure that the demand should be absolute.

More generally, I disagree with the mentality that politicians should always resign over one cock-up, even if it’s a colossal one. It’s an easy way for opponents to draw blood, but what should really matter is their capacity, looking forward, for the job. So if he can—properly—rectify his errors, then he deserves another chance at showing he can still contribute as an MP.

The problem is that his apology’s been underwhelming. Stuff initially quoted Mr Prosser as saying, “I concede that some of the language that I used wasn’t appropriate”, though that’s now been removed from the article, perhaps because he didn’t actually say that.* His original statement says, “This issue requires positive solutions… I accept that I impugned many peaceful law-abiding Muslims”. The NZ Herald report on his apology carries a lot on the language he used, and also for causing “offence to those people unjustifiably and unnecessarily”.

In a nutshell, the bulk of his apology was for what he said, not what he thought.

It’s encouraging that Mr Prosser’s seen at least some of his errors. According to the Herald, Mr Prosser “said he’s failed to distinguish between the vast majority of Muslims… and the ‘tiny minority’ who were involved in terrorism” and conceded “I didn’t have balance in that article”.

But it’s hard to escape the feeling he’s backed down out of political pressure, rather than because he really has. For one thing, on the first day he retreated from the media and let Winston Peters, his party leader, front up for him. More importantly, his later comments have been more a softening of tone than an outright reversal.

It is not the way Mr Prosser expressed his ideas that constitutes his sin, but the ideas themselves. Reading between the lines, some subtleties are telling. He tries to draw a distinction between his role as a “shock jock” columnist and his role as an MP. But the opinion he expressed—that any young male who “looks Muslim” shouldn’t be allowed on a plane—is stupid no matter who you are. It’s concerning that he seems to think it would be a more acceptable opinion if held by a columnist. Also, while he talks a lot now about “positive change”, he’s scant on what “positive” means.

What he should do
So here’s what Mr Prosser can do to redeem himself: He can write another column for Investigate, explaining exactly why he was wrong, and what would be sensible civil aviation policy. His self-criticism must not focus on “language” and “terms like ‘Wogistan’” or just label his remarks “offensive”. They are ignorant and logically flawed. His column must show a 180-degree turnaround, not just an apology.

It should go in Investigate, the same magazine as his original column†, so that it hits the same audience. He needs to tell the same readers that virtually all Muslims despise terrorists, just like the rest of us, and that it would be unfair (and ineffective, imagine the false positives!) to subject them to “target profiling”. It would be a departure from his “shock jock” style—but just this once, that would be the whole point.

If Mr Prosser does publicly change his mind, that will probably do more for the campaign against bigotry than his resignation. There are, sadly, still a stubborn minority who think what Mr Prosser said. A genuine U-turn from Mr Prosser would carry much more weight in swinging them around. To that end, Anwar Ghani, president of the Federation of Islamist Associations of New Zealand deserves a lot of credit for inviting Mr Prosser to enter into dialogue and “get to know [the Muslim community] better. He needs to be better informed.” Michael Vukcevic, chairman of the NZ Middle East Business Council, gestured likewise.

I really hope they follow through. As disgusting as Mr Prosser’s comments were, the silver lining is an opportunity to extinguish whatever bigotry is still left. If Mr Prosser can lead this effort, he could go some way to saving his reputation.

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* I initially seized on this quote as evidence of a non-apology. Given that there is no trace of it on the internet any more, my best guess is that it’s a pre-written article that Fairfax shouldn’t have published.

† As I was writing this post, Investigate editor Ian Wishart published an apology on its website, pointing out the distinction between ordinary Muslims and extremists, but still emphasising what Mr Prosser said, not what he thought.

On relationship certificates and sarriage

Despite the ridicule, two of the “quirkier” submissions on marriage equality drive straight to the heart of the issue.

Whereas most submitters have argued for and against marriage equality, two have gained a small amount of attention for proposing new solutions altogether. Graeme Pirie advocates for the state just to issue “relationship certificates” instead of marriage licences, and Russell Morrison proposes a new term “sarriage” for same-sex unions. The solutions can seem outlandish at first, but should get credit for being honest attempts to reconcile the differences between the two sides of the debate.

What’s in a name?
What Messrs Pirie and Morrison implicitly observe is that the debate lies only over the use of a single word. The debate is not about tangible rights (such as property and dependants), other than the legislated right to use the term “marriage”. Their solutions seek to sidestep the issue completely, while upholding equality in the tangible rights.

Mr Morrison’s solution is to use a new name, “sarriage”, for same-sex unions. Mr Pirie’s solution is to have the state duck out of the celebratory side, and just issue certificates to couples who want their relationships recognised.

Mr Morrison makes an admirable attempt to satisfy everyone, but he misses the liberals’ main point: that the existence of a different term sanctioned by the state constitutes discrimination. His idea would have made sense if his new word had instead applied to everyone, with “marriage” removed from the statute books. Then he reaches his objective: the proponents get their use of a single term, and opponents get their definition left untouched.

That is, in effect, what Mr Pirie proposed, but his new word is just an existing one: “relationship”. Mr Pirie says that all of the associated religious and cultural rituals “need not be any business of the state”. The state has a “legitimate interest in recording these contracts” (to manage those tangible rights), but this can be achieved without defining words like “marriage”.

So why not?
It appears that select committee members were not so keen. The NZ Herald reports that “committee members said [Mr Pirie’s submission] was an interesting idea, but would not resolve the argument that marriage was a union between a man and woman.”  This misses the point: Mr Pirie’s solution is that the state need not, and should not, concern itself with this argument in the first place.

The most passionate advocates on either side would probably balk at this, feeling that it renders their cause irrelevant. Yet it need not. Other people can engage in discussion on the definition of “marriage” without state attention; the issues involved are fascinating. But there’s no administrative reason why the state should care about what is really just semantics.

The question Mr Pirie’s solution raises is: When groups differ over the most correct use of a word, is it for the state to legislate an answer? Phrased like that, the instinctive response is obviously “no”. But both sides would probably argue that the state must intervene in order to protect the welfare of its citizens, and if that means legislating the meaning of a word, so be it.

Who would win?
To bear out that claim, it’s worth imagining what would happen if the state kept out of marriage and only issued relationship certificates.

Organisations would pretty much be free to, or not to, marry any couple they wanted. (We assume polygamy would remain criminal.) Churches opposed to same-sex marriage would be free not to solemnise them, and individuals would be free to refuse to call them “marriage”. Organisations and people who support gay “marriage” would be free to carry them out. Just like straight couples, it would all be without state backing. All couples, though, would have their “relationship” recognised by the state.

In a nutshell, just like how proponents envisage the situation with state-enforced marriage equality. Most advocates say they wouldn’t force churches to perform same-sex marriages. The desire to defend the theoretical ban on denying the validity of a marriage has been lukewarm at best. All they want is the right for same-sex couples to call themselves “married”. In practice, a Relationships Act would look like a victory for the liberals.

The difference is that gay spouses would not be able to point to statute books to show sceptics that they are “married”. This might diminish rhetorical force a little. Straight couples lose that privilege too, but being uncontested, that’s of little practical effect. A key liberal concern of the status quo is that, by using different terms, the state implies homosexual inferiority. The state can hardly be accused of this when it avoids the topic. It could be accused of not proactively combatting it, but a few words in the statute books aren’t about to sway someone from their religious convictions.

It seems more a loss for conservatives, who have to put up with others calling “married” whomever they want. Conservatives want the state not to redefine marriage. They get that: if the state doesn’t define “marriage”, it certainly doesn’t redefine it. But if the conservative reasoning is that marriage, as the foundation of the family, needs to be “protected” for all, then even allowing other uses of the term would tread on the same concerns.

That seems paternalistic. If the state redefined marriage, conservatives could say it is meddling with an institution that they conceive of in a certain way. The claim becomes toothless with Mr Pirie’s proposal. Their concern for others is kind, but in reality, the welfare-maximising “family” is different for different people. Those in non-traditional structures are, again, unlikely to have their practices swayed by the statute books. Meanwhile, conservatives could continue with their own definition, uphold and even promote the family in their own ways, and rest assured that the state won’t get in the way. A victory as good as one could expect.

It wouldn’t end the debate, of course. In the short term, without reference to an arbiter (the legislature), people would have to become more accepting of others’ opinions on marriage and family. That’s probably a good thing. In the long term, the semantics of that single word would evolve organically. For us to legislatively define the word, it needs somehow to protect citizens’ welfare. Compared to defining it wrong, this is obvious, but compared to not defining it, it rests on the question: would a statutory definition change minds? It is unclear how. Mr Pirie’s proposal deserves more attention.

Can you be simultaneously dismissive and respectful?

Green MP Kevin Hague says all submitters were treated with respect, but admitted that his “feelings” about a teenager’s anti-gay views “would have been obvious”. Do the two statements contradict?

A teenage submitter opposed to gay marriage wrote in a “personal account” that select committee members did not even given her “common courtesy”, accusing Green MP Kevin Hague of being “menacing” to submitters opposed to gay marriage and Labour MP Moana Mackey of “pulling faces”. Grace Carroll’s account seems exaggerated to me, and understandably so—presenting to a select committee is daunting, and it must have felt worse than it really was.

What is fascinating, though, is Mr Hague’s response. Mr Hague doesn’t say he was dismissive of Miss Carroll’s ideas, but it’s obvious that he didn’t even try to understand her perspective. An article on Stuff says he admitted expressing “exasperation”: “I find it offensive. Even more outrageous is her quoting Martin Luther King… I am certain that my feelings would have been made obvious at the time.” Mr Hague clearly saw the submission (which he would have read before the oral presentation) as a foregone conclusion.

Given what she said, it’s easy to see why Mr Hague was dismissive of Miss Carroll. Some may even feel he was justified in being so. But he also says that he “felt all submitters had been treated with respect”. This raises two questions:

1. Can you still be treating someone with respect if you don’t attempt to understand their perspective?

2. Should select committee members put aside their own biases while hearing submissions from the public?

What is respect?
These questions are not simple. As individuals we are all frequently dismissive of others’ opinions and have others be dismissive of ours—but that doesn’t constitute respect. In some cases, disrespect might be justified, particularly if someone is being especially difficult and intolerant. But justified disrespect is still disrespect.

So we take a step back. What does it mean to treat someone with respect?

Respect is one of those concepts we drum into children, but can’t really be explained. Dictionary definitions are approximations at best. One aspect, though, is to treat others how you would want to be treated.

We obviously want our opinions to be taken seriously. Or do we? Is it still a valid thought experiment if the person in question has opinions that are the polar opposite of yours? Even if it is, if you know that your audience strongly disagrees with you, you may not expect to be understood at all—just listened to.

A much lower bar is just not to humiliate them. (Miss Carroll says she was humiliated, but it’s hard to tell without having been there.) This means at least feigning a straight face, and refraining from rolling eyes. Most people would agree that refusing someone a chance to explain themselves by interrupting them mid-sentence (as Miss Carroll accuses Mr Hague of doing) constitutes disrespect. But what if you let them talk, and don’t listen?

The weight of public office
The select committee members are not merely individuals. They are holders of public office, charged with the task of making national legislative decisions. In theory, one might argue, they should approach this task with an open mind to the many views and information available, putting aside their personal biases to make a decision in the national interest, as objectively as they can.

But when we elect our legislators, we elect them exactly because of the opinions they express in their election campaigns. This puts a dagger through Miss Carroll’s argument that the committee “are supposed to represent the whole public”. The Greens (of which Mr Hague is one) were elected to represent those who voted for the Greens, many of whom would eagerly tear apart Miss Carroll without hesitation given the opportunity.

That idea, at its extreme, effectively renders public submissions redundant. If we elect legislators on their opinions, then expect their opinions to rule, what is the point of allowing members of the public to try and change them? The real answer must lie somewhere in the middle. MPs were elected for their core values, so shouldn’t be afraid to stick to them. But they should also lend an ear to what the public has to say. Perhaps the answer is more nuanced: MPs should hear out arguments on the specifics of a policy, but can stop listening if it contradicts their core values.

Just listen
Personally, I think we should always hear out and try to understand contrary opinions even if we find them offensive or outrageous, but more because I think it leads to more informed opinions than because of respect.

The thing about respect is that its meaning depends on who you ask. So any attempt to discuss whether or not Mr Hague was treating “all submitters with respect”, as he claims, collapses to an argument of definition. He is allowed, of course, to find things offensive and to question sharply to tease things out when he thinks the logic doesn’t stack up. What is more questionable is whether he is still showing the respect he claims to be showing when, as a select committee member, as opposed to just disagreeing, he seems uninterested in trying to understand a submitter’s perspective.