SPCS

SOCIETY FOR PROMOTION OF COMMUNITY STANDARDS INC.

Kaikohe speaks out on sexual abuse of children

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[Northern Advocate 19/09/15] A Kaikohe group campaigning against sexual violence is holding a rally next week to highlight the long-term harm caused by child sexual abuse.

The group is also considering a protest to coincide with Auckland’s “Boobs on Bikes” in October, saying the parade normalises pornography and could lead to more behaviour like that of the infamous Roast Busters.

Organiser Mike Shaw, a Kaikohe pastor, said next Thursday’s rally aimed to raise public awareness of “the death of childhood caused by sexual abuse”.

Marchers would carry a coffin down Broadway to make their point. Fifty people took part in an earlier march in July but he expected more this time.

Mr Shaw said a march would not change anything on its own but it would give a voice to the pain of sexual abuse survivors.

“And if people are talking about it, solutions and actions will be generated,” he said.

Already work was under way to provide Kaikohe schools with information about intervention and prevention of abuse, as well arranging support when survivors had the courage to speak out.

People were getting better at speaking out against domestic violence, thanks in part to the It’s Not OK campaign, but sexual abuse remained a “no-go zone”.

The as yet un-named group grew out of MP Kelvin Davis’ Massive hikoi against sexual violence earlier this year. Some group members are also considering protesting at Auckland’s Boobs on Bikes parade organised by porn tycoon Steve Crow.

Mr Shaw said the group was concerned that normalising pornography, and its easy availability on the internet, could lead to sexual offences among youth and more behaviour like that of the infamous Roast Busters, who bragged online about their sexual exploits with underage girls.

He believed children were copying what they saw online and that watching hardcore pornography was warping the views of some youth as to what was acceptable behaviour. [Read more…]

Bylaw hopes to ban Steve Crow’s Boobs on Bikes – Sunlive

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Sunlive News: 21 March 2013: Tauranga City Council’s special bylaw aimed at banning topless women riding through town on motorbikes was passed this week.

The changes to Tauranga’s Street Use and Public Places Bylaw were called for after promoter Steve Crow rode over the previous one when he brought the Boobs on Bikes parade to Tauranga in August 2011.

Councillors attempted to stop the parade by denying a permit, but were unable to as under the old bylaw a parade could only be halted due to traffic management issues.

Claims that the parade is offensive are ineffectual because the New Zealand High Court has ruled that it is not an offence for a woman to bare her breasts in public.

The revamped section 19 of the bylaw still uses ‘offensive’ as a reason to ban a parade, but it has gone a step further.

Under the changes council can refuse permission if the parade gives rise to some form of public disorder, for example, whether viewed objectively it may have a reasonable likelihood of dissuading others from enjoying their right to use the public place by entering or remaining in it.

In other words, if the council staff think some people might want to stay away from the city while the parade goes past, or because of any other assembly in town, then that is a reason to ban it.

A parade can also now be banned if council reasonably believes the activity will unreasonably impede pedestrian or vehicular traffic access to or along any public place or to any shops or premises.

“We will probably end up in court anyway, but we will have some grounds,” says corporate solicitor Joanne Gread.

Source: Article by Andrew Campbell

Thursday 21st Mar, 2013

http://www.sunlive.co.nz/news/40678-bylaw-hopes-to-ban-boobs-on-bikes.html

Earlier story

Wednesday 13th June 2012

http://www.sunlive.co.nz/news/26803-antiboob-rule-passed.html

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On October 12th, 2008, former ACT Part MP Stephen Franks wrote on his blog on the Subject “Boobs on Bikes”

How will Morning Report reflect candidate comments on Steve Crow’s plan to run his Boobs on Bikes parade in Wellington on election day?

When Radio NZ called this evening I found myself resenting the attention to Crow’s stunt, and wanting to find some way to make the issue so boring that RNZ would drop the item. Before calling RNZ back I wondered whether my instinct was just envy, prompted by the lack of RNZ interest in what seem to me more important questions facing Wellington voters.

I felt my resentment was not prudery, because I could not imaging myself being offended by the parade, even if it seems tawdry. Pictures of the Auckland parade make the crowds seem curious but shortchanged more than anything else.

The Radio NZ interest shows that Crow will attract enough controversy to mix with titillation to get his crowds. I’d be very surprised if the Wellington City Council could stop the parade. I’m not sure that they should be free to stop it. 

So why would I prefer Crow to fail?

I think it is because exploitation of the power to cause offence is such a cheap tactic, and because it cheapens those whose reactions make it work, yet if they do not react their values are cheapened. 

Many things cause offense to some section of our community that do not offend others. For example some Christians are deeply offended by blasphemy. Some conscience stricken liberals are upset by ethnic stereotype jokes. Some Maori are put off by people sitting on tables where food is served. None of those behaviours would upset me, except in one circumstance – that is where there are people present who do find them offensive.

In that case I  feel embarrassed in anticipation of the rudeness shown by causing such offense, even where I can not feel the underlying offense.

I think we should feel vicarious offense on behalf of our fellows, where the offense is pointless, and able to be avoided with simple good manners. A civilised society has social pressures to sustain such manners. Causing pointless offence should have a cost that outweighs the benefits from challenging a taboo to gain notoriety for its own sake.

Succcess for Steve Crow’s stunt weakens those social sanctions. His parade will be offensive to some sincere people. Crow’s cause is Crow’s mercenary interest. And so, because he is likely to benefit from the media interest, and the portrayal of at least some of those who will be offended as fuddy-duddy, I hope that he falls on his face, without much expectation that it will happen.

I covered this briefly with Radio NZ. I wonder how much of this angle will be in their item in the morning?

Source:

http://www.stephenfranks.co.nz/boobs-on-bikes/

Former sex expo firm – Eden Digital Ltd – owes $350,000 – NZ Herald 16 June 2012

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The company that held the licence for a sex expo allegedly still owes creditors more than $350,000, according to its liquidator’s latest report.

In 2008 Auckland-based Eden Digital was given the licence to run the Erotica Lifestyle Expo – an event “targeted at adult consumers” which has been held in Auckland and some other North Island centres for more than a decade.

The event was often preceded by the Boobs on Bikes parade, which featured topless women riding on motorcycles.

But in November last year Eden Digital was placed into liquidation after its licence for the expo was cancelled by its shareholder CVC Group.

CVC is also the sole shareholder of Esprit Events, the new licence-holder for the expo.

After the cancellation, Eden Digital’s income was “decimated”, liquidator Grant Reynolds said.

According to a report Reynolds filed with the Companies Office this week, Eden Digital allegedly still owes creditors more than $350,000.

One preferential creditor had filed a claim for $171,792 and seven non-preferential unsecured creditors had filed claims totalling $183,901, the report said.

At the time of liquidation it was estimated the company owed $434,000.

A list of creditors when the company was first liquidated included Inland Revenue, ACC, ASB Showgrounds and Marquis Condoms.

According to Reynolds, Eden Digital was sold to a related party shortly before he was appointed and he is investigating this sale, as well as any possible voidable preferences.

A voidable preference is a payment of debt made before liquidation which a liquidator can apply to call back on the grounds it unfairly privileged some creditors over others.

Reynolds is also investigating any possible Companies Act breaches.

Pornography industry heavyweight Steve Crow is a former director of Eden Digital, according to Companies Office records. In 2010, Crow was banned from acting as a director for four years after the collapse of companies linked to him.

Source. Story by Hamish Fletcher. 16 June 2012

See: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10813330

Registered charities & “political advocacy” – protests to highlight porn & sexual violence link

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“Demonstrators have marched down Queen Street [Auckland] in front of the controversial Boobs on Bikes parade in an effort to raise awareness of the links between pornography and violence against women and children,” reported The NZ Herald on 20 August 2008.

“Around 60 protesters carried a banner saying “Pornography fuels sexual violence against women and children” as well as signs bearing slogans such as “porn fuels rape“….”

The Society for Promotion of Community Standards Inc. (SPCS) which played no part in the protest, only learnt after the event, via the media, that two charities registered with the Charities Commission – The Auckland Women’s Centre Inc. and Stop Demand Foundation – had organised the demonstration against the Boobs on Bikes event. Both charities had applied for and received a permit from the Auckland City Council for their protest march. Both had been registered as charities with the approval of Mr Trevor Garrett and the Charities Commission Registration Team, on 30 June 2008, two months prior to taking to the streets to target the porn promotion parade and its organiser. A third charity Family First New Zealand (Reg. No. CC10094), registered as a charity on 21 March 2007, issued media releases attacking the porn promotion activities of the Boobs on Bikes Parade promoter. [Read more…]

Boobs on Bikes returning: Porn King – Bay of Plenty Times

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Defiant pornographer Steve Crow has vowed to bring Boobs on Bikes back to Tauranga despite council moves aimed at blocking the topless parade.

http://www.bayofplentytimes.co.nz/news/boobs-bikes-returning-porn-king/1321643/

Note:

CVC Group Ltd, directed by John Malcolm Carr, owns the trademark for “Boobs on Bikes” and Stephen (Steve) Peter Crow, a banned company director who was fined $5000 in the North Shore District Court last year for breaching his four-year ban, is Carr’s “business partner”. Crow was fined plus ordered to pay court costs for being involved in the management of a porn company – Eden Digital Ltd (In Liq), wholly owned by CVC Group – while being a person prohibited from being a director.

Eden Digital Ltd (In Liq) which was incorporated in April 2008 to hold the license for Erotica Lifestyles Expo, an event promoted by the Boobs on Bikes event, was put into liquidation on 22 November 2011, with an estimated deficit (subject to the cost of liquidation) of $434,000.

Mr John M Carr, who directed the failed company until just two months before it was put into liquidation, is now sole director of Esprit Events Limited (a recently incorporated daughter company of CVC Group Ltd) which now holds the license for the Erotica Lifestyles Expo.

The Bay of Plenty Times reports

Tauranga City Council is proposing to make offensiveness one of the grounds for requiring permission to hold a street parade. But Mr Crow said he would fight the council.

“It won’t make any difference to me whatsoever,” he told the Bay of Plenty Times.

“I will take zero notice of any bylaw they bring in. I’m not vaguely interested in what the Tauranga City Council considers offensive. If they want to waste Tauranga ratepayers’ money, let them. I have plenty of money, I’m happy to fight them.” [Read more…]