Te Tari Taiwhenua — the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs — won’t let bygones be bygones. To quote the Grateful Dead, “it gets to wearing thin/They just won’t let you be.”

Te Tari Taiwhenua began their work week by sending me a notice of my non-compliance with their earlier demand that I take down Brenton Tarrant’s manifesto (see my most recent post on the New Zeal of the New Zealand government). Here’s what the email said:

Dear Mr May

Re: Non-Compliance Warning — 2022/10 Gates of Vienna — The Great Replacement Manifesto

Thank you for your email dated 20 June 2023 in response to the Take Down Notice ‘2022/10 Gates of Vienna
— The Great Replacement Manifesto’.

We acknowledge your views about publications that are not considered illegal in the US and observations on focusing internally. The Notice does provide the opportunity to geo-block the objectionable content from New Zealand as an alternative.

We are obligated to serve a Non-Compliance Warning as the final stage of our Notice issuing process, and as such, attach the same. This now closes our file.

For your ease of reference, here is a link to the Department’s Take-Down Notice guidance.

Please contact us if you:

• require any additional information or if you reasonably believe you will not be able to comply within the required period;
• have removed or prevented New Zealand public access to the objectionable online publication from your platform;
• would like to provide us with additional or updated contact information, such as group emails, for your company.

Regards.

Inspector of Publications
Warrant Card [redacted]
Digital Violent Extremism, Digital Safety
Toi Hiranga | Regulation & Policy
Te Tari Taiwhenua | The Department of Internal Affairs

Notice that they are “provid[ing] the opportunity to geo-block the objectionable content from New Zealand”. That is, they expect me to use my precious time to enforce their tomfool laws against their own citizens! The chutzpa is astonishing.

Below is the email I sent them in reply:

To whom it may concern:

Thank you for your considered response to my most recent email.

Your note that your office will “provide the opportunity to geo-block the objectionable content from New Zealand” means, I assume, that you would expect Gates of Vienna itself to do the geo-blocking on behalf of the New Zealand government. Unfortunately, I have neither the time nor the resources to take such an action, even if I thought that doing so would be a good idea.

Therefore, pursuant to the first item in your bulleted list, I am required to notify you that I reasonably believe that I will not be able to comply within the required period, or indeed within any time period.

Please feel free to contact me again if you deem it necessary.

Cordially,

Ned May
a.k.a. “Baron Bodissey”
https://gatesofvienna.net

The fact that they’ve closed their file on me may indicate an end to their harassment of me, but I wouldn’t count on it. The worst thing they could do would be to contact the State Department and demand that the U.S. government do something about my heinous offense — have my whole site taken down, for example. I consider that very unlikely, though.

In any case, I recommend that anyone who has their own website upload the manifesto, if you haven’t already. Anything a government wants taken down that badly is something that we should make available. You can’t stop the signal!

As I’ve often said in the past, this sort of behavior by a government brings out the Scot in me. At my core is an atavistic kilt-wearing claymore-waving red-bearded brigand who screams in defiance against any so-called government that would coerce him into doing something that goes against his nature.

For those who are interested, I’ve extracted the first two pages from the PDF file attached to the email and formatted the text in HTML:

NON-COMPLIANCE WARNING

Monday, June 26, 2023

TO:

Gatesofvienna.net the Online Content Host

Gates of Vienna
Gatesofvienna.net
gatesofvienna@chromastism.net

Re: 2022/10 Gates of Vienna — The Great Replacement Manifesto

You have not complied with the take-down notice issued Monday, June 19, 2023 NZST. Under section 119C of the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act 1993, you are required to remove an online publication from your platform.

Details on the material are provided in Schedule A.

You must remove, or prevent access by the New Zealand public to, the online publication as soon as is reasonably practicable after receipt of the notice, even if you have chosen to preserve a copy. This must be done no later than Wednesday, June 28, 2023 5:00 PM NZST.

The Department does not require you to preserve a copy of the online publication.

Failure to comply

Failure to comply may result in enforcement proceedings, outlined under Section 119H of the Act.

Enforcement of take-down notices

(1)		An Inspector may take enforcement proceedings in the District Court if an online content host fails or refuses to comply with a take-down notice within the required period.
(2)		In proceedings under this section, the court:
		(a)		must not examine or make a determination about the issuing or merits of a take-down notice:
		(b)		may determine whether the online content host had a reasonable justification for failing or refusing to comply with the notice within the required period or for any further delay after that period:
		(c)		may permit the Inspector, by order of the court, to obtain discovery and administer interrogatories:
		(d)		may order a remedy or costs under section 119I.

Right of review or reconsideration

Pursuant to section 119J of the Act, a take-down notice may be reviewed only as part of a review under Part 4 of the classification decision relating to the relevant online publication.

Refer to the take-down notice, or see the Classification Office website for more information on the review or reconsideration process.

If you have any questions, please refer to our guidance material, or contact: DVEInvestigators@dia.govt.nz

Warranted Inspector of Publications
Employee Number: [redacted]

The third page consisted of some legal gobbledygook in tabular format, and was too much trouble to extract and format. You can just assume it’s more of the same.