Stranded seals & politically incorrect parenting

Upon listening to a DOC officer on Radio New Zealand today, urging the general public to leave seals alone no matter how tired and disorientated they looked, I couldn't help but think about Nigel Latta and his Politically Incorrect Parenting Show.

Here are these well-meaning New Zealanders who, upon seeing a seal all on its own, think they're doing the right thing by wrapping the thing up and returning it home, even in their car boot across Cook Strait on a ferry.

Yet, the advice of DOC reported in today's Dominion Post is telling;

DOC staff were contacted the next day by Pet Vets in Silverstream after a member of the public brought a seal in from Picton, "apparently on the ferry". A vet nurse at the clinic said the young seal was skinny and emaciated, and its well-meaning captors thought it had been abandoned by its mother.

DOC biodiversity manager Peter Simpson said it was "definitely not" sensible to take a seal in the back of a car across Cook Strait.

"When you see a seal out on its own it's because its mother's kicked it out, told it to get a job."


Peter Simpson is not the only person in this country addressing the problem of New Zealand's hyperactive obsession with parenting. As I listened to this man being interviewed on the radio I couldn't help but notice he's dealing with the exact same problem as Nigel Latta of the Politically Incorrect Parenting Show.

The Herald's review of Latta states;

Latta's main thrust is to advocate a return to good old-fashioned common sense and a policy of non-interference: sit back, take a deep breath and don't feel guilty about shovelling the offspring up off the couch and outside to play. Stop taking it so seriously and have fun.


It is interesting to think about the seals in light of the smacking debate which has reared its head once more, and is likely to again thanks to John Key's refusal to tackle it at this opportune time.

While Nigel Latta has stated that he does not advocate hitting your kids, he also said that if he did, he would be struck off his professional body, the New Zealand Psychological Society. What is common to both DOC's seals and Latta's kids is a belief in the ability of the spirit of the creature to understand the rough crash of the wave, or the painful clap of the hand, and thereby learn its place in the world. A world which is more revered, not less, because it reminds the pup he is not at its centre.

The seals don't need rescuing. Neither do the majority of children who are smacked as part of good parental correction.