I saw Mehpara Khan post her shocking twitter footage of a woman racially abusing her yesterday.
What was so concerning was the naked hatred being expressed at Mehpara by this woman.
The mere sight of the headscarf that identified them as Muslim was enough for this torrent of rage and fury to erupt at innocent people just going about their day. This wasn’t the deep South, this wasn’t the hinterlands of nowhere, it’s bloody Huntly, barely an hour outside of Auckland, our largest metropolitan and cosmopolitan city.
Hatred on display like this has to be challenged but I think punishment would be a mistake here. This is someone who needs to have the chance to sit down and talk through their terrible misconceptions they have about Muslims, because the the anger she displayed is fear generated, it’s not a rational response.
If we are going to resist this type of hatred in a post Trump world, we have to act with compassion to heal it. There’s already enough damage out there and racism like this breeds on that damage.
We are better than this and we should display that in how we deal with her fear and ignorance.
Hmmm… Perhaps this message of compassion, tolerance and forgiveness could also extend to our brothers and sisters on the left.
You know, not taking pot shots at fellow blog sites, all of us being a little less.strident in our views, even be kinder to each other?
Maybe it’s not simply fear and ignorance. Maybe it’s fear and ignorance lumped on top of powerlessness. When you want to strike back at the world you’ll find a target.
You got it Pete,
just have a read of the recent crimes in Huntly, its another forgotten town crying out for help. Bashings, stabbings, burgleries. FFS the Macdonalds drive through was held up at gunpoint last month!
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/huntly/search/results.cfm?type=all&kw1=huntly
Nailed it.
The best “punishment” would be for this woman to spend time with muslim people; get to know and understand them (that there’s not that much difference); and let the fear/resentment evaporate.
There may also be drug/alcohol dependency problems which require a medical response, not a punitive one.
Looks like miss Khan has just run into one of Nationals most successful pet incubated projects over the years…the Feral. Unfortunately, one facet of the feral is they will force you to live up to a very high standard of morality they themselves would never live by. Fortunately the other 99% of us do not act and think like this. Mountain from a molehill thanks to the media’s shallow level of analysis, and paymasters orders.
Which Muslim people should they spend time with? I presume they will have to be vetted to ensure they don’t have any unsavory ideas.
Muslim people who are Muslim. Perhaps you could do with meeting them too. Go on, strike up a conversation, ask one how their day is, or what they think of the weather. Try challenging your Trumpish prejudices about unsavory ideas.
Yes indeed,to walk a mile in their shoes !
In my day,working in the community,involved a beautiful day on the local Marae? ,patiently taught by the whanau. what a learning experience it was ..
there are so many tragic examples of privilege in here its nice to see something framed correctly
This lady being Maori can’t be racist as she isn’t in a position of power due to her gender and ethnicity. Only a privileged white heterosexual male like yourself Bomber can be. The very fact that you haven’t acknowledged this proves you are exceptionally privileged as you are unaware of it.
sorry to disappoint you but the racist is not Maori she is pakeha Megan Sarah Louise Walton is the drunken feuled nut jobs name.
Come on, this is nothing that unusual, there is a rather more widespread anti immigrant and anti Muslim sentiment among the already marginalised in places like for instance South Auckland and also in some rural and small town regions in New Zealand, than some of us would like to believe.
With the high numbers of immigrants, some locals turn against them, even if just looking like an immigrant may also expose local New Zealand Muslims to such nasty attacks.
I do not condone this conduct, it is despicable, but let us get honest, the outrage by some does fail to understand the reasons that may be behind such sentiment.
Add the booze, and things turn toxic, quickly, this was just a snap shot from a small town in the land, I dare say, it is just one of more incidents, that may never get reported.
Some do still not get it, what led to Trump winning in the US, and they still do not quite get it, why Brexit happened. New Zealand may have felt protected from this trend, but let us wait and see what the coming elections and coming years will bring. For instance watch for graffiti and social media harassment, and there is no shortage of it.
There is a huge divide between the educated urban professional liberal class and the common people with limited prospects down at the bottom of the social ladder. History tends to repeat itself, I wish it would not, but life has told me something different.
The neoliberals have created a fertile ground for nationalism, fascism and racism to flourish, as a reaction to what was imposed on the weak and downtrodden. Dissent does not always favour the left.
The most important lesson of history is that the lessons of history are not learned and the same ‘mistakes’ are repeated ad infinitum, usually in a greater scale.
Humans are not driven by rational thought but by emotion, especially when subjected to any kind of stress.
Bomber, this should be about CLASS, not identity politics. Have you realised nothing? It’s about CLASS, mate.
Maybe if ‘The Empire of Lies’ didn’t keep telling lies about Muslims this sort of thing would not happen so much.
However, first the ‘Christian’ nations invaded Islamic nations and stole their resources, then they drew lines on maps that did not correspond with tribal divisions, then they set one Islamic nation against another, blamed Muslims for the inside job attack of 9/11 orchestrated and carried out by the Bush administration, and then they invaded Islamic nations again and caused utter mayhem and a massive refugee ‘problem’.
The fact is, all the ‘problems’ we now encounter have been carefully orchestrated by the shadow government of the world run by bankers and ‘old money’, for their own short-term financial gain. And the populaces of all western nations are still constantly manipulated by the same dark, we could even say satanic, forces that have been in control for well over a century. Only a very tiny minority of the extant populace have escaped ‘the matrix’ and see the game for what it is; the vast majority still blindly follow the idiotic narratives delivered to them by their controllers.
Another unmentionable fact is that all religions are essentially evil, and are forms of exploitation and mind-control which direct wealth into the hands of the same people at the top of the financial pyramid. You have to wear a hat; you’re not allowed to wear a hat; you have to grow a beard’ you are required to be shaven; eat this; don’t eat that; you have to bang you head against a wall; you are not allowed to bang your head against a wall.
The masses are constantly immersed in propaganda, delivered 24/7 by the ‘news’ media, and trained to be suspicious of anyone who looks different or dresses differently, exacerbating the xenophobia which is a component of natural human behaviour. This state of fear has been taken to new heights in America, and the plan is undoubtedly to introduce the same level of fear into all western nations, and provide ‘security’ via extension of the police surveillance state.
Thankfully we won’t have to endure much more of idiotic behavior of religious zealots and banking cartels because. between them, they are rapidly bringing the entire economic-political system to breaking point.
I Live between Huntly And Auckland, this is nothing unusual and just another day in that feral town. As a Pakeha male I’ve been abused several times by the locals, accosted for cash, begged for the food in my hand. More often than on Queen st or K’ Rd..
It’s a town with major social issues, not a Muslim problem.
The Muslim woman presented herself very well on RNZ this morning….Good on her for speaking out and refusing to be a silent victim…
This type of racist attack is what you get when the politicians through the MSM blame all ills on a single people.
Except that far as I can tell it had nothing to do with race and everything to do with religion. I think we’re being herded into thinking this is a “race issue” since that is far easier to sell as being abhorrent than “religious intolerance”.
“This wasn’t the deep South”
Plenty of head scarves on the streets of Dunedin, we’re used to them down here.
Not impressed though with Aucklanders assuming the worst of those of us who live in the “deep south”
It’s not Aucklanders, it’s Martyn. And I hate to be so cynical, but the tone of this piece would have been completely different if the perp had been white, male and heterosexual.
Sorry Off White, shouldn’t tar everyone with the same brush. Guess it’s trivial to object to the assumption that islamophobia is more likely in the ” deep south “, but such an assumption is kind of offensive.
One really inexplicable thing I’ve noticed in the MSM coverage of this story is calling it “racism” as opposed to what is actually is: “religious intolerance”. I watched Breakfast this morning with incredulity as EVERYONE at length continually referred to it as “racism” when the race of the victim had nothing whatsoever to do with it. I wonder if this was deliberate? I think it was because NZers are FAR more open to religious intolerance than they are to racism, and labelling this event as “racism” garners more outrage.
I heard all this reporting by the MSM about a “racist” assault or attack. So if I abuse someone for being a Christian, does that make me a “racist”?
I do not condone attacking people for any identity linked to religion, race, gender, sexual orientation or whatsoever, but do we not get some facts mixed up somehow???
Am I a “racist” when I object to foreign buyers buying NZ houses?
According to the media you are. That’s how they silence you.
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