Jo has been a patient, employee of Te Tari Pureke, The New Zealand Firearms Registry and unfortunately, I’m going to have to tell her to jog on.

Why? 

Well, I as a law-abiding citizen have been morally and legally wronged.

I have three excellent reasons as to why The Firearms Registry (TFR) should be axed.

Number One: The Firearms Registry (TFR) lists three reasons for its existence, and I will point out how each reason gets weaker than the last.

Number Two: Amidst a recession and yet political pay rises our country cannot afford the 9.5 MILLION dollars billed annually.

Number Three: TFR is another branch of more and more invasiveness tree violating our right to privacy. Requiring more and more from law abiding ‘private citizens’ and in doing so creating the opportunity for rifle merchandisers to grab that private information. (I explain under “Massive hole in TFR)

Number One: TFR doesn’t achieve its own self defined goals.

Brought up after the evil Christchurch Mosque attack, TFR claims its purpose is as stated by them; “The diversion of firearms to criminals”, “protect police” and “give buyers more confidence when buying a firearm.” (About the Firearms Registry | Firearms Safety Authority New Zealand, 2024)

Shall we start with the weakest claim?

“Give buyers more confidence when purchasing a firearm.” Suggesting you don’t want to buy a firearm from a random person not knowing where that firearm has been. Well for “buyer confidence” you have the option today to head to your local Hunting and Fishing and you will have absolute confidence you are buying a legitimate second hand or even better a brand new firearm. Zero Concern.

A point so weak it does nothing but undermine the entire Firearms Registry.

Let’s work our way through the rest: “Protect Police”

I’ve got no problem with the police; I think in large part the New Zealand Police could be argued to be one of the best police forces in the world. My experience has worsened over more recent years but over my mischievous teen years I had a few positive interactions with the police. I have no problem with the idea of making society safer for the police.

It just will have minimal effect. If the police suspect a firearm may be on a property or not, a registry may prove it, but it cannot provide certainity that a firearm is not on the premises. Suspects, usually criminals (Data Undermining Firearm Registry Was Not Disclosed to Parliament., 2024) often carrying illegal firearms (98% of the time) so the actions of the police will remain the same. They will treat any household or person suspected of having a firearm as high risk. As they should. The registry only gives proof of a possible firearm, it cannot rule out a negative in which case they will act in the same way with or without a firearms registry.

This makes the second point redundant.

That’s 2 from 2.

Finally, TFR argue that the registry will make it harder to sell firearms to criminals…

The strongest point I thought, but then I looked into it…

Since 2020 only 1.9% of all firearms seized by Police were legally imported (Data Undermining Firearm Registry Was Not Disclosed to Parliament., 2024).

Read that again.

Not even 2% of the firearms seized from criminals in the last three years would even be on TFR.

I can barely get my head around that.

First off. Obviously, criminals can get lots of illegal weapons into the country. Maybe we boost funding of 9.5 million dollars on targeting criminals illegally importing firearms and not asking more and more of the law abiding citizens.

Yet another example of look good politics with zero brains behind it.

I love to hate politicians because they continually let us down, but in this case maybe we cannot blame them. For this information about 2% of firearms being seized was known only to police. Information they chose not to disclosed to government. An immoral act that The Council of Licensed Firearm Owners (COLFO) believe is reason enough for the police commissioner to resign.

Not even 2%

Furthermore we have zero evidence to suggest that those legal firearms seized from police were even sold to criminals. For one, criminals clearly don’t have a need to purchase legal firearms. They can seemly get them freely, but these legal firearms seized could have belonged to a legitimate firearm licenced individual who either fooled police or ended up participating in illegal activities afterwards. Either way, it provides zip for what I thought was TFR strongest claim.

And that is 3 from 3.

Within 10 years our government will have spent a forecasted 95 MILLION dollars on a registry that offers no more buyer confidence than heading to hunting and fishing, offers little to no extra protection for police and there is no evidence that criminals are getting legal firearms.

The government absolutely wasting YOUR hard earned tax payer money.

leading me into my second reason to axe TFR

Number two: Continued Wasteful Government Spending.

The average salary of New Zealanders is $61,828. Average salary of those working for a government department is $84,800.

We don’t have the salary data for TFR but last year the elected government introduced another 3 new government departments which we do have the data for; Ethics Communities, Childrens Monitor and the Ministry for Disabled People with an average salary of $116,533.

Almost double the New Zealand average. We can imagine the TFR average will be within this ballpark. How can you justify spending like this?

My mother works for a government agency, and I know she and her work do a lot of good, but she has a work colleague who takes advantage of their “unlimited sick days” taking one sick day almost every week.

An absolute joke. Not only is the woman wasting tax payer money and doing minimal work, she is having an untold effect on her work colleagues.

If “Susan” takes a day off every week, why should I show up everyday and work hard? A strong moral person can do that. However the people around us have a massive effect on us, and that only floats because it is in a government department. 

No functioning business could ever implement unlimited sick days because business can go bankrupt. Governments the world over just continue things as normal. Overspending, and stealing from our future.

TFR is another government department with more staff, more sick days, more work vehicles and more wasteful government spending. 

Info: Checklist to obtain a New Zealand Firearms License.

• Go through a stand down period
• Lengthy and thorough registration form
• Pay a registration fee
• Purchase a safe way to store your firearms
• Pass a medical and criminal check
• Two non family references
• Be interviewed by a police officer
• One non family reference must be interviewed
• Pass an in person certified Gun Safety Course

A lengthy and thorough process. Took me almost 10 months for the police to process my application.

The process does a good job in weeding out people who should not own a firearm.

Criminals, irresponsible individuals or psychopaths. Up until Christchurch New Zealand had little notable gun crime. Even still, the reasons today for TFR are weak. 2% of seized firearms are not enough to validate violating our privacy.

We don’t want any future terror attacks. Killing innocents under any circumstance must be rendered for what it is, absolutely evil. The responding knee jerk reaction to ban semi automatic weapons makes this impossible.

In theory anyway. By banning semi automatics and making them illegal a black market is created. I think this was a mistake. Are we to assume a planning mass murdering psychopath wouldn’t break the law to illegally purchase a firearm? I think a wiser approach is to have a special licence like we do for pistols that require further vetting. It is my understanding this was the idea pre 2019 but it had little actual enforcement. A non-special licenced individual could still buy extended magazines. This would have the added benefit of flagging individuals wanting a semi automatic putting them under additional scrutiny and in theory stop the terrorist in the planning stage.

The Christchurch Shooter was known to police prior to the attack. I am not calling for that interviewer’s head. The interviewer was human, but someone sat down with the Christchurch Shooter and let him get a firearms licence. Humans make mistakes, but I have to wonder how that individual got through.

But the ship has likely sailed. So, for now the major issue here, and the real reason for TFR: Firearms are scary.

I get it.

But independently a rifle, a bolt and a magazine are useless bits of metal. It is preciously why we firearms owners know to travel with our bolt, rounds and rifle hidden and in separate bags or boxes. A legal requirement that makes sense.

I have a question for you?

Is it fair that if you want tax payer money wasted on TFR that I ask you to go down to a legal local seller and ask to look through a firearm (Point it in a safe direction) another good gun safety rule: is to treat every firearm as loaded.

A fantastic rule, because of habits. We never want future mishaps. Point the rifle in a safe direction. Look through the scope with one eye. (get a full picture and stand an aim, again at say a picture on the wall) You will instantly understand what I am getting at.

With limited magazine of 5 rounds, hand cocking each new round via the bolt and replacing magazines becomes significantly time consuming. As opposed to a semi-automatic, automatically reloading…

That while aiming at multiple moving targets. Doubles your problems. Legal firearms such as a bolt action rifle simply put are not effective mass murdering tools and therefore, I propose rules out any current legal New Zealand’s firearms as a means to be exploited by a mass murdering psychopath.

Undermining the fear and main motivator of TFR.

It’s hard to hit a still target at close range. There is a saying amongst hunters. 10% of the hunters get 90% of the deer. Because hunting is hard. Deer are smart. If the target is running it is extremely difficult to hit with a bolt action rifle. In fact, I was taught that it is unethical to shoot at a moving animal.

A sentiment I agree with. The fear being you can easily wound and lose an animal. Unethical. However, the fear around legal bolt action rifles and the want for a firearms registry is a sentiment I do not agree with.

Let’s not allow fear to give away more of our freedoms and rights. Let’s keep our privacy from the ever-growing list of intrusive companies and the ever more restricting government. Despite the way they insist doing so will makes us all safer.

Number three: Another step in violating our privacy.

We are by definition Private Citizens and we are served by our Public Servants. 

Does anyone feel like a private citizen? Does anyone feel like they are being served by our government? 

This is the state of many countries all around the world. Rights and information being sucked up at any opportunity. 

Where is the information being held? a cloud system stored by Amazon Web Services (AWS). The positive being AWS already has a strong cloud infrastructure, making it harder to hack but also more profitable to do so.

The negatives being amazon’s appalling moral standards…. (Amazon ethical issues | Ethical Consumer) A company that isn’t even bound here in New Zealand could create massive legal troubles in the future.

Not to mention data breaches here at home. Within a month of existing TFR leaked over 100 citizens name, and email address (New Firearms Safety Authority Criticised after gun owner data leak., 2023). (Software giant SAP apologises to New Zealand as details of gun buyback data breach unfold., 2019) where 66 dealers had access to all firearm owners private information.

TFR acknowledge they share our personal information with Te Tari Pūreke staff, the Police, AWS and authorised suppliers (About the Firearms Registry | Firearms Safety Authority New Zealand, 2024) but that doesn’t include Hunting and Fishing, or Gun City whom are legally obligated to enter our data into their system.

The forever growing list of people, from multiple different government agencies and profit chasing companies including a company from a whole different country. All forementioned agencies and companies all have staff with differing levels of integrity and as proven make genuine data leaking mistakes. All having access to my seriously private information. Noone has any right to know I have a firearm. It actually puts firearm holders like me in danger of theft or worse: imagine the death of loved one, a young child during a robbery gone wrong.

How my address was stolen by Gun City (Massive hole in TFR)

Last year I received a Christmas Voucher to spend at Gun city. It had my name on it and was delivered to my address.

I have never signed up for some vouchers, nor have I ever given my name and address to Gun City except when they require it by law when I purchase ammunition or a rifle. This is the first example of a clear and gaping hole in TFR.

Guncity is legally obligated to enter my data into a system and have used that to collected and stored my data. They effectively have a firearms registry on all purchases since June 2023. They know all our personal details and they use it to make more profit.

You might suggest I am being awfully cynical about a christmas voucher, but the point is they have stolen my address, stored it and used it to make profit. Vouchers are not charity. They are used because they entice us to visit the store and spend money.

Why hasn’t the government made this illegal? because our privacy is far too low on their list of concerns.

How secure do you imagine the Gun City system is? I bet I could prove my point. Learn a bit of coding and break into their system and steal all the information they have stored of New Zealand’s firearms citizens. It is outrageous.

Not to mention 3/5 of those gun city fellas scream in my opinion as slimy bastards. On one occasion I saw a staff member celebrate with a smug “6.8” after a customer left having purchased 6.8k worth of rifle equipment. Did he serve the customer well? or did he just sell the most expensive gear? Slimy and I have ZERO choice but to trust them with my private information.

Gun City is forced to pass on New Zealanders personal information when licence holders purchase a firearm or ammunition, and I don’t know what shady shit Gun City has done from there to store my address off that.

When did we lose our right to tell someone our address is none of their bloody business?

The reason we have licences is to prove we can get something. It’s like going to a liquor store and them requiring by law to enter your licence details into a system. Within no time you’d be getting deals on your favourite alcohol. A believable, yet morally wrong scenario. Each time underming the point of your licence and trusting yet another entity with your private information.

The only difference here is alcohol is far more deadly… Killing 4 times the number of those killed by firearms in 2021 (Report: Fatal Overdoses in Aotearoa 2017-2021, n.d.) from alcoholic overdoses alone. Not to mention death by liver damage, drink driving, or the untold chronic diseases and other damage done to our bodies by excessive drinking.

The real difference is that firearms are scary, but I hope I have soothed this fear. If you have read this far you hopefully will take me up on heading into hunting and fishing and aiming through a rifle at a still target (safe direction). I promise you will be overwhelmed by how difficult it is to hold the rifle steady. On a still target.

Privacy, when will you care?

Unfortunately, I find myself in a minority when it comes to privacy. People just don’t seem to care.

Let me try my best to get you on board.

Data is the new Oil. The newest and most profitable resource monetised in the 21st Century. We see the accumulation of data everywhere, weather patterns, scientific research, and sports are but a few examples. The more data accumulated the more predictability you can predict the outcome.

Data that is so forthrightly consumed by Google, or by Meta that I wonder if we have any right to that data and what happens to it. These companies’ actions are spurred by the motivation of profit. Time and time again and through their actions they have proven that they do not deserve the power that the data they’ve accumulated has given them.

How long you read an article, headline or Instagram post is all accrued information. The websites and videos we click on, the cookies we accept, even the people we follow. All of this information is piled into systems and the algorithms are activated. Showing you ads for products people like you bought. Individualised content and ads are used to keep us on the screens and spending money.

Often negative or pornographic content. Not maliciously done but because that is the content that keeps us watching and coming back. Being shown something you might like to buy is normal, but something specifically shown to you as an individual borders too close to manipulation for me. Mentioning puppies and then suddenly seeing adverts for dogs or kennels. It just doesn’t seem right.

It becomes scary when you hear that through this accumulation of data they can predict your behaviour (Argyle et al., 2023) discuss this ability to predict as does (Behnert et al., 2023) and then into manipulation itself. Immoral but profitable.

Here in New Zealand the McDonalds app was busted for showing a couple dating two different prices for combos while at their local McDonalds. The bloke saw 15% increase of two different combos from his misses’ phone at the exact same time inside the exact same store. (Newshub, 2023) A McDonald’s spokesperson said it was due to the “apps personalisation”. Or in other words manipulation. “Dynamic pricing” another thing that should be illegal.

In a profit driven world, we the people are the ones who lose. As inflation devalues our money, and as companies work to improve profit it is almost always our health, our environment or our pocket which takes the hit. She wasn’t getting a cheaper deal because they liked her. He was getting a more expensive one because that is what the app judged he would pay. All based off his previous purchases and the data collected off all other McDonalds app users history. Used then to “personalise” his experience and make McDonald’s more money.

In America an EV driver who saw his insurance premiums go up because his EV records that he speeds. An older car doesn’t have all the screens and technology, nor does it have any capacity to record your face, breath rate and speed. His EV effectively has the capacity to act as a policeman. In this case, the insurance company used his speeding as cause to increase his premium and increase their profit. Your data used against you.

On board yet? Your privacy is something to cherish. Giving our human data away benefits us little, less in a profit driven world. For we are the ones exploited. Is it too far fetch to worry that one day your electric car might not work because the government turns it off? Maybe you committed a crime, maybe you didn’t pay your taxes or maybe you didn’t get vaccinated.

We are the ones addicted to our phones through the tools proven to keep us engaged: bright lights, notifications, noises, vibrations, scrolling formats, are only some of the tools known through data accumulation to be effective in retaining our attention.

TFR is yet another Government entity that we are paying for, during a recession that requires our information. Wants to share it with their own staff, The Police, “authorised suppliers”, Hunting and Fishing, Gun City, Amazon Web Services. TFR offers little benefit to kiwis anywhere while being another arm of an octopus squirming its tentacles into our lives.

Foodstuffs NZ are another arm of an octopus readying itself to squiggle into your life.

“Trialling” facial recognition technology in 25 Pak n saves, and New Worlds around the country. (Jong, 2024) My preferred supermarkets are putting up facial recognition cameras throughout their stores. Originally stated to be there to catch and ban thieves, recently it has been added that the cameras can also be used to ban customers who assault staff.

Look I’ve spent a lot of time in supermarkets, and I have never seen anyone assault a staff member. I cannot say it doesn’t happen, nor am I excusing it. It is wrong and we need the people in the supermarket to stand up and keep the aggressive member of the public in check. Everyone makes mistakes including customer services staff. It can be scary confronting a large intimidating member of the public, but it is our duty. Especially those with the means, strength and the courage to do so. Humans are strong in numbers. All it takes is one person to speak the truth to power and that begins a cascade of truth. The same goes if we cower and do nothing.

I am not prepared to give up our right to go shopping without being surveillanced, without facial recognition. 99% of kiwis are law abiding citizens, 99% of firearm owners are law abiding citizens, yet we are expected to give up our rights and freedoms because of the minorities. We deserve for our licences to mean something and enter a bloody supermarket without being under surveillance.

How much hunting ammunition I own is none of the governments business.

Supermarkets are making record profits and through this new technology do we win? What do we get?

No, we get Nothing. Besides that, odd unnatural feeling you get when you know someone is watching you.

We as people lose here. The privacy commission have voiced concerns. Yay they voiced concerns and have done what exactly? Voiced concerns. So, they haven’t done their job of protecting us. Step up. Please.

They, the massive cooperations will increase profit margins further. (No reference needed. They wouldn’t do it if it wouldn’t profit them long-term) but do we profit? How do you suppose thieves will respond to not being allowed into a supermarket? More ram raids?

Quite a commotion I imagine. A lot of F yous, and F’that’s. More fear and anxiety for the private citizen just trying to go about their business. I propose it will actually put us in danger.

If the thieves aren’t allowed into the supermarket and say need food. Will they turn their attention to the civilians themselves? Imagine granny getting robbed for her groceries while getting into her car? will small hard working diary owners become the target of even more thefts and attacks? I remind you we get nothing, they the massive cooperations increase profits. Yet another win for big cooperate. Meanwhile we as individuals and small business owners lose.

The only real trial happening is on our patience and level of outrage for this new technology.

I wager based off other countries attempts (data accumulated) they know it’s best to break the news into “trials” that get less public outrage. Reducing the size of the impact to more manageable chunks. Reducing our outrage. “All supermarkets getting facial recognition cameras” may have been too much for the New Zealand public. “Just 25 stores” almost sound reasonable. Like they’re doing us a favour. We will barely hear any more about it before the technology is in every supermarket.

Are you on board yet? is any part of you concerned?

What if there is another vaccine mandate? What if this time you think a choice to get vaccinated is the right decision? Too bad, the vaccine passport is linked to your face, and we have to line up like sheep to scan in before entering a supermarket.

Making compliance compulsory.

Ridiculous.

Finally, as I lead into my summary, I want to share with you a slice of paranoia. A little dose, I hope, might cause us to act.

These are current dictatorships around the world.

• Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
• Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan
• Turkmenistan
• State of Eritrea
• Syrian Arab Republic
• State of Eritrea^[6

Current.

Not to mention China and their social credit score and many would argue Russia. Our vaccine passports were the closest things I’ve experienced to that. Done everywhere all around the world.

The 19th century saw a similar ugly regimes in the Soviet Union, Italy, Germany, Spain, Romania, Japan, China and disastrous communist states seen in countries almost all south America, including Cuba, Venezuela, and until 1989 communism Polland!

Private citizens were sent to concentrations camps for opposing the government. 1989 is when communism fell in Polland. That not that long ago.

Governments thinking they knew best. Governments doing wrong.

Our governments and governing bodies are not lost, but they are certainly making many decisions that aren’t right for their citizens.

Very doom and gloom I know. I apologise, but a sprinkle of precaution can go a long way.

We need actions that keep us away from these futures.

Every new tool such as facial recognition cameras and firearms registries are examples of technologies that can make these futures one step closer.

They say you don’t fall into a dictatorship overnight. Your rights and privacy are taken slowly step by step in non-outrageously chunks. Or worse we are manipulated into wanting it ourselves or until compliance is the only choice.

Right now I have been threatened with a firearms suspension because I have not acted and signed up to the registry. I am at a moral crossroads.

Do I protect myself and register or do I stand firm to my moral obligations and refuse.

Vaccine passports, facial recognition software, electric cars and citizens data collection.

Are technologies or services today, but tomorrow they could be tools used to enforce our obedience.

Stand up with me and say no to this shit.

If not now, when?

If not you, who?

Too long and too often we the people of the world are victims to the dominating force of immoral capitalism and data accumulation. We are private citizens, and THEY are public servants.

Summary

So Jo, although I have nothing against you personally. You are simply an employee for TFR and you are only doing your job but we the people have been wronged time and time again. Even though I have anything new to register that the registry wouldn’t know about. I’m going to have to tell you as a matter of principle. To jog on.

95 million dollars is what the government will spent on The Firearms Registry within ten years. 95 million dollars is an absolute waste of our tax payer money. When the registry doesn’t even live up to its own self defined goals.

Let’s see a registry set up to track government spending. Keep government spending public would surely reduce wasted money and call into question things such as “unlimited sickdays”.

This country needs to start serving its citizens better. A hard job. Currently made harder by dumb decisions.

How much better could New Zealand be without wasteful spending? how many less suicidal depressed people on medication will even seek a firearm to get back at the world then?

If we focus on our problems in our life maybe we can change the world for the better.

Let us stand up and say no to The Firearms Registry. Put that money into chasing criminals and reducing the thousands of illegal firearms imported into this country. Target the criminals, not the law abiding citizens.

Either choice helps New Zealanders during a tough and trying time without violating law abiding citizens right to privacy or getting us any closer to a tyrannical government.

References

About the firearms registry | Firearms Safety Authority New Zealand. (n.d.). https://www.firearmssafetyauthority.govt.nz/firearms-registry/about-firearms-registry

Annual Update of key results 2022/23: New Zealand Health Survey. (n.d.). Ministry of Health NZ. https://www.health.govt.nz/publication/annual-update-key-results-2022-23-new-zealand-health-survey

Argyle, L. P., Busby, E. C., Fulda, N., Gubler, J. R., Rytting, C., & Wingate, D. (2023). Out of one, many: Using language models to simulate human samples. Political Analysis, 31(3), 337–351. https://doi.org/10.1017/pan.2023.2

Behnert, J., Lajic, D., & Bauer, P. C. (2023). Can We Predict Multi-Party Elections with Google Trends Data? Evidence across Elections, Data Windows, and Model Classes. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/6duw2

Data undermining Firearm Registry was not disclosed to Parliament. (2024, January 26). COLFO NZ. https://www.colfo.org/post/data-undermining-firearm-registry-was-not-disclosed-to-parliament

New Firearms Safety Authority criticised after gun owner data leak / New Zealand Herald (2023 September) George Block. Firearm owner caught up in police data breach fears home invasion (msn.com)

How ethical is Amazon.com Inc? | Ethical Consumer. (2024, March 27). Ethical Consumer. https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/company-profile/amazoncom-inc

Jong, L. de. (2024, February 7). Foodstuffs trialling use of Facial Recognition Tech. 1News. https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/02/07/foodstuffs-trialling-use-of-facial-recognition-tech/#:~:text=Foodstuffs%20is%20trialling%20the%20technology%20to%20test%20its,a%20move%20that%20has%20the%20Privacy%20Commissioner%20concerned.

Newshub. (2023, August 9). McDonald’s under fire amid accusations of “price-gouging” meals on app. https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2023/08/mcdonald-s-under-fire-amid-accusations-of-price-gouging-meals-on-app.html

Newshub. (2019, December 2). Software giant SAP apologises to New Zealand as details of gun buyback data breach unfold. https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2019/12/software-giant-sap-apologises-to-new-zealand-as-details-of-gun-buyback-data-breach-unfold.html

Report: Fatal overdoses in Aotearoa 2017-2021. (n.d.). NZ Drug Foundation. https://drugfoundation.org.nz/articles/overdose-report-2017-2022

Salary Guide | Salaries and Wages in New Zealand (2024). (n.d.). https://www.jobted.co.nz/salary#:~:text=Average%20Salary%20in%20New%20Zealand%20%282024%29%20NZ%2461%2C828%20per,%28Data%20from%20Stats%20NZ%20-%20Labour%20market%20statistics%29

Workforce Data – Wage trends | Te Kawa Mataaho Public Service Commission. (n.d.). Te Kawa Mataaho Public Service Commission. https://www.publicservice.govt.nz/research-and-data/workforce-data-remunerationpay/wage-trends