Dominic 'Furious' George: Gypsy Day here to stay

'Gypsy Day' is the common term used to describe the day when thousands of dairy farmers take up new season contracts on different farms. Photo / File

For many people working in the dairy industry, today - June 1 - means one thing: moving.

Thousands of sharemilkers will have already begun the arduous task of loading their cows into stock trucks, packing up all their equipment and belongings and shifting the family to, hopefully, greener pastures.

While it's a fairly entrenched system in New Zealand, there are concerns around the disruption it can have on families, not to mention small rural communities. Then there are issues around continuity between contractors and the farms they're working on. These are all valid concerns but the one that has reared its head this year has nothing to do with farms or family - it has to do with semantics.

Not surprisingly the semantics are emanating from the less than hallowed halls of local government. From my experience working many years covering local news, local body politicians are a distinctly odd breed and, as I've said before, most local councillors are an annoying mix of ego, hubris and lunacy.

The Otago Regional Council recently issued a media release referring to 'Gypsy Day', the common term used to describe the aforementioned day when thousands of dairy farmers take up new season contracts on different farms. You can see from the definition above how the term came into the common vernacular; travelling, itinerant, trade, nomadic, etc.

I don't think the Romany language is very common in New Zealand but I wouldn't like to presuppose. Gypsy is actually a legal term under English law and, despite tainting by its use as a racial slur, some Romani organisations use it in their own organisational names.

However, while its use in a New Zealand context has absolutely nothing to do with race, it has prompted a local city councillor to object to its use, saying the word was often used as a slur against Roma people. While I was not in the least bit surprised with this apparently holier-than-thou, I-know-better-than-everyone mentality, I couldn't help but think this decision-maker should stick to his knitting.

Sure, he's entitled to an opinion, but to use his office as an elected representative to draw attention to a group of people on the other side of the world who themselves have raised no concern with the use of the term 'gypsy' in New Zealand and to raise it in relation to a media release from an organisation he's not even a part of provides nothing but total vindication of my opinion of most local body politicians. It's safe to say I'm not the only one who thinks this blatherer should crawl back into his hole and concentrate on rubbish collection and rates reduction.

The Country online editor Hanoi Jane ran a poll on our website asking whether said blatherer should indeed crawl back into his hole, although not in so many words, or whether he had a point. More than 300 people gave their opinion with an overwhelming 84per cent believing he should give himself an uppercut and stop using his position to incite stupidity.

As usual social media has provided a platform for ridicule and our Facebook page was fairly well populated with opinion. I can't reproduce them here as I may get in trouble but it's safe to say there's not a lot of support out there for the uppity councillor.

However, he may have had the last laugh; the Otago Regional Council has gone the way of many an organisation in recent times and bowed to the wishes of a lone offendee. They've dropped the term 'Gypsy Day' from their literature, not because they necessarily agree but because they know it's not worth the hassle going up against an evangelical crusader who simply can't help speaking on behalf of others.