In response to disapproval from some New Zealanders around his NZ 'Bird of the Century' campaign, John Oliver has clarified that he did it because he "loves" our country.
Erin Reilly, part of the ‘Save The Kiwi’ group pushing for our national bird to win, is one of the NZers peeved at the talk show host. She told Newshub Oliver “doesn’t even like NZ” since he always makes us the “butt of his jokes” and this current bird campaign is another example.
On the latest episode of his show, Oliver said this was not true and passionately talked about how much he loves Aotearoa.
“I am doing it again,” he said, “but it is not because I don’t like you, it’s because I f*cking love you.”
“New Zealand, you are so good at not just talking sh*t but taking it with remarkable good humour.”
“I talk about you so much because you're the most fascinating country on Earth. You hold bird contests, you sometimes throw dildos at your politicians, you let your people submit images like this (the laser kiwi) for your national flag. You're an endless well of joy.”
“Honestly I'd talk about you every week if it weren't for all the other crazy sh*t going on in the world. I would rename this show 'New Zealand Tonight with John Oliver' and it would be an immediate improvement."
Wow, what kind words!
ICYMI: The British host of the American talk show ‘Last Week Tonight’ has pushed a huge global campaign for the Pūteketeke to win this year’s NZ ‘Bird of the Century’ competition.
It's been incredibly successful, too. In 2022, around 55,000 voted in Bird of the Year, but this year's competition saw votes in the hundreds of thousands. All the extra traffic from around the globe crashed the website which meant the winning bird announcement had to be pushed back.
‘Bird of the Century’ results come out on Wednesday the 15th of November. Oliver’s bird of choice is probably going to win and honestly, good on him, this has all been a bit of fun.
