Paul Thomas: Satire aplenty without need to attack NZ flag

John Oliver takes aim at new New Zealand flag proposals. Photo / HBO / screengrab

Opinion

Alingering effect of the not-quite-extinct cultural cringe is that we crave attention from an outside world which finds it all too easy to ignore us.

We should be careful what we wish for. For the second time in a matter of months, we've caught the attention of the host of the American comedy/satire show Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.

First, it was the National Party's apparently unauthorised adoption of an Eminem track as its election song. This week it was John Key's enthusiasm for a change of flag - or "fleg" as we call it.

Yes, much of the fun Oliver had at our expense was derived from the Kiwi accent. That may be a cheap way of getting a laugh, but it has to be acknowledged that the Kiwi accent at its most pronounced isn't easy on the ear and cries out for mimicry.

However, since he raised the subject, it's worth pointing out that the most jarring accent in the English-speaking world is that of Birmingham, which happens to be Oliver's home town. The Brummie accent is as much of an aural affront as the drone of a mosquito at three in the morning. All regional or small country accents suggest a lack of sophistication but Birmingham's makes the biggest drongo in West Auckland sound like George Clooney.

Oliver reckons New Zealand is "like a bad edible arrangement: full of f***ing Kiwis". Another way of looking at it is that New Zealand is a safe, stable, democratic, prosperous, integrated society and therefore unpromising material for a satirist who has only half an hour in which to cover the week's events in his adopted home country and the rest of the world. The fact that he's had two bites at the kiwifruit in quick succession suggests he's scratching around for subject matter.

Oliver's Wikipedia entry lists his subjects as mass media, US politics, current events, religion, race relations, human sexuality, civil rights and self-deprecation, although now that he has his own show that last one seems to have gone by the board. Given satire is a serious business, here are a few recent topics that might have warranted more attention than our accent and flag debate.

Mass media: Sections of the American media highlighted a basketball coach's condemnation of President Obama's handling of the campaign against the Islamic State. According to Team USA coach Mike Krzyzewski, a pledge not to use ground troops is like telling your opponent you're not going to use your best players.

US politics: The Republican gains in the midterm elections will give climate change deniers a major boost. James Inhofe, described as "the most ludicrously adamant climate change denier in the Senate", is almost certain to become chairman of the committee that controls the Environmental Protection Agency, the body charged with combating climate change.

Current events: A 90-year-old man in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, faces a $650 fine and 60 days in jail for handing out meals to homeless people in contravention of a new law apparently intended to keep the poor out of sight and out of mind.

A police officer told Arnold Abbott to "'Drop that plate right now' as if I was carrying a weapon". Actually, Abbott would have been within his rights if he had been carrying a weapon rather than a plate of food.

Religion: The Vatican described the suicide of a 29-year-old woman with terminal brain cancer who became an advocate for the death with dignity movement as "an absurdity".

Race relations: The visceral hatred of Obama, particularly among white southern males, proves America is far from being the post-racial society some detected when he was elected in 2008. A Louisiana poll showed respondents evenly split on who was more responsible for the botched federal government response to Hurricane Katrina: George W. Bush, who was embarking on his second term in the White House at the time, or Obama, who was a first-year senator.

Human sexuality: Conservative writers seized on writer-director Lena Dunham's autobiographical recollections of her childhood anatomical curiosity to accuse her of sexually molesting her sister. The sister was 1-year-old at the time.

Civil rights: As if gerrymandering, low voter turnout and the pervasive influence of money aren't enough, there's a new threat to American democracy. It's estimated that up to 600,000 mainly black or Hispanic Texans were prevented from voting by a new and draconian voter ID law whose sponsors could find only two cases of polling place impersonation since 2003, in which time 20 million votes have been cast.