Despite holding to a somewhat contrary viewpoint and despite having had more than one clash of viewpoints it appears that our critics accord us some praise. I just now stumbled accross this thread on GayNZ.com's forum discussing Christian blogs and websites and was pleasantly surprised by the comments on our blog.

Kay writes: "The M & M blog is scarier because their posts almost make sense ... over the top hatred like www.godhatesfags.com is so extreme that its hard to take it seriously. M&M sound plausible & reasonable ..."

Kaiwai agrees: "... some of the things I agree with ... don't dismiss everything he [Matt] says."

Kind Kit adds: "Yes, Matt and Mads are certainly cogent, and even logical after a fashion. Dr Flannagan wears his philosophical training rather well. They are not frothing lunatics by any means... "

Cale concludes: "I do know what you mean though about them being persuasive, they managed to gather enough people together to block the Otago campus support for the CUB bill and Madeleine spoke dangerously well."

We would like to clear up a couple of things though:

1. The MandM blog is NOT "sponsored by the Elusive Brethren & Right Wing American Fundamentalists" but if either of the afore mentioned wish to sponsor us please send cheques to Private Bag 93119, Henderson, Waitakere City....


2. Kaiwai wrote of us: "I don't set out to impose my views by way of legislation - if I want to 'change the world', I'd sooner set an example by living the life I preach, then hope that it'll rub off on others."

Holding to classical liberal and libertarian political views respectively and being evangelical Christians means we believe in less State and in changing the world in precisely the manner Kaiwai expressed. For example we don't just oppose the Civil Unions Act but also the Marriage Act because both are outside the legitimate functions of the State.


3. Depraved claimed: "The problem with Matt - they're pro-life and yet, anti-sex education and anti-condom. They're against the very things which would drastically reduce unwanted pregnancies. An example, someone is in an accident, they're killed - the autopsy says that the individual could have survived had they worn a seat belt. Matt's solution is 'ban the car' when the common sense approach would be to make safety belts compulsory and improve driver training."

We are not Catholic, we have no problem with condoms beyond the fact that using them is like having a shower wearing a raincoat (we use other forms of contraception). Our children's knowledge of sex education is more than thorough and they could give a family planning sex educator a run for their money. But I suspect what Depraved is alluding to is our opposition to the State teaching sex education at all, and, in the amoral, relativistic manner they do.

Further, I am not in favour of banning cars but I do believe that it should be illegal for people to use cars to kill other people with. Nothing strikes me as more absurd as a pro-choice social policy that says let's legalise dangerous driving and allow people to freely and deliberately smash their cars into pedestrians on demand and when the body count for this practice (suprisingly) gets rather high, respond to this by increasing education on seatbelt use in schools.

Matt