Forgetting To Remember New Zealand’s Racist Election.

By
Chris Trotter
-
60
1736

WHAT’S WRONG with our journalists? Why do so many reporters and columnists memories appear to fail them? Only this morning, the veteranNZ Herald columnist, Brian Rudman, contributed yet another lapse to the Fourth Estate’s growing tally of memory malfunctions. He’s one of theHerald’s best, of course, with years of intelligent and splendidly trenchant commentary behind him, but today’s memory fade is every bit as egregious as the historical deficiencies so apparent in the writing of much younger journalists.

The context for Rudman’s misrecollection was Shane Jones’s recent playing of the race card. This was not, as the columnist quite correctly pointed out, the first time NZ First has reached for its racially-loaded rhetorical shotgun. Rudman quotes from a 2003 pamphlet entitled “Who’s Country Is It?” – a document fairly dripping with anti-immigrant animosity. Fair call. It was only when he attempted to draw a moral from his tale that Rudman went astray.

Here’s what he said:

“To New Zealanders’ credit, this casual racism turned voters away from NZ First. The following election, its party vote nearly halved to just over the 5 per cent threshold needed to stay in Parliament, and Peters lost his Tauranga electorate seat. It’s a lesson Jones should be contemplating.”

To anyone who wasn’t here at the time – an immigrant perhaps? – Rudman’s observation offers a reassuringly happy ending to a rather unsavoury political story. If you knew absolutely nothing about New Zealand’s 2005 General Election, his account of NZ First’s electoral comeuppance would be heartening. Your confidence in New Zealanders’ tolerance and generosity reaffirmed, you could look forward to Jones’s insulting statements about Indian immigrants being answered with punishing force at the ballot-box.

- Sponsor Promotion -

Except, of course, the 2005 General Election was very far from being a triumph of New Zealanders’ tolerance and generosity. In reality, it was an election which saw the National Party come roaring back into political contention on the strength of one of the most racially-charged elections in New Zealand history. 2005 was the election best-remembered for National’s incendiary billboard campaign – most especially the billboard which pitted “Iwi” against “Kiwi”. Had National, led by the former Reserve Bank Governor, Dr Don Brash, won the election (and he came within 100,000 votes, out of 2.3 million votes cast, of doing so) then the Treaty of Waitangi would have been retired; all reference to “Treaty Principles” in New Zealand legislation removed; all “affirmative action” programmes for Maori discontinued; and the Maori Seats abolished.

Not quite so tolerant, then. Not entirely generous.

The Right’s race-driven comeback might have been even stronger if the NZ First Leader, Winston Peters, hadn’t been so roughly treated by the National Party in the late-1990s. Jenny Shipley’s plot against her coalition partner, which involved luring half NZ First’s parliamentary caucus away from their leader, fatally poisoned the relationship between the two parties. Had Shipley not betrayed Peters, then the electorate’s rightward swing in 2005 would, almost certainly, have been even more emphatic.

As an enthusiastic globalist, Brash was unwilling to lead National too far down the anti-immigrant road. As a consequence, there was plenty of space for NZ First to fill around the immigration issue. Had Shipley not torpedoed her party’s chances of ever again forming a coalition with NZ First, Brash could have quietly encouraged the Right’s more rabid supporters to treat the election as a “twofer”. Those who despised Maori more than immigrants could vote National. Those who despised immigrants more than Maori could vote NZ First.

Such a strategy would likely have boosted NZ First’s vote at Labour’s expense. As it was, however, Brash’s overall strategic goal of uniting the whole of the Right under National’s banner not only actively discouraged right-wing voters from splitting their support, but also, by turning National into a much bigger and scarier political monster, persuaded Labour’s more conservative supporters, who might otherwise have indulged their own, deeply ingrained, anti-immigrant sentiments by voting for Winston and NZ First, to stick with Helen Clark and her government for another three years.

The 2005 General Election was, therefore, a “damned close-run thing”. Only 45,000 votes separated National’s vote-count from Labour’s, which suggests that if Peters’ nearly 6 percent of the Party Vote had been added to National’s column, then 2005 would have been an even closer-run thing. When offered the choice of an openly anti-Maori National Party and a strongly anti-immigrant NZ First, very close to half the NZ electorate voted for one or the other. Nor should it be forgotten (although Rudman somehow failed to recall the fact in his column) this was the same electorate that lifted National’s support from 28 percent in the polls one month before his in/famous “Nationhood” speech to the Orewa Rotary Club (27 January 2004) to 45 percent two weeks after it.

A much better example of New Zealand voters turning away from NZ First’s “casual racism” came three years after 2005, in the first general election contested by the National Party’s new leader, John Key. Under Key’s sunny tutelage, National got quite a lot bigger and a whole lot less scarier. He achieved this not only by reaching out to Labour’s more conservative voters, but also by making sure he wouldn’t have to deal with NZ First’s.

Key simply refused to play the race card in the same brutal way as Brash. It was clever politics, because, by ditching the Iwi/Kiwi rhetoric he expanded his coalition options well beyond Act’s hard-line neoliberalism. The resulting National-Act-Maori Party-United Future coalition government placed a floor under National’s support that has remained preternaturally solid for 12 years – and counting.

Though lacking Key’s sunny disposition, Simon Bridges could, nevertheless, learn a thing or two from his predecessor’s bland opportunism. One of the ways, Key convinced the electorate that he was the anti-Brash was by coming to Labour’s and the Greens’ rescue over their highly contentious anti-smacking legislation. To the bill’s opponents on the rabid Right, National’s leader was saying: “You’ll get nothing from me.” (Who else were they going to vote for!?) To the rest of New Zealand, Key’s bravura display of bi-partisanship, guaranteeing the success of a long-overdue social reform, signalled that his were a safe and compassionate pair of hands.

A similar display of bi-partisanship in relation to the current Covid-19 medical emergency could offer similar reassurance to an electorate which has yet to learn the knack of relaxing in the arms of the Leader of the Opposition.

Which is, finally, the lesson from our history which Rudman, along with an alarming number of his colleagues, has somehow managed to forget. That New Zealanders, as a people, are more than capable of rising – or sinking – to just about any political occasion.

Providing they have someone to show them how.

60 COMMENTS

  1. WHAT’S WRONG with our journalists?
    Its fairly obvious that if Rudman and fellow employees told it as it was, then it probably would not get to print and their employment tenure would come under warning.
    The money that owns and controls MSM is the problem.

  2. Funny how freedom seems to be declining for all, while the focus has shifted from democracy and freedom and has become a global shit fight focused on identity politics.

    Why Democracy Is on the Decline in the United States
    https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/why-democracy-is-on-the-decline-in-the-united-states

    Donald Trump, Peter Thiel and the death of democracy
    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jul/21/peter-thiel-republican-convention-speech

    Identity politics seems mostly focused on race in the age of globalism aka lets just get that worker into another country because it’s racist if you don’t agree, and go and strip mine other people’s countries for profit, and low and behold it’s nothing to do with cheaper labour and obtaining cheap materials, inequality and helping neoliberalism to prosper around the world.

    Identity politics turns the average person off politics who couldn’t care a damn about identity in general, but wants to just have a decent and fair life!

    In addition the constant racial focus of MSM creates more racism and the NZ woke are quite happy to use racism in everyday denigration aka “white men, white middle class” would they use the same language for “Asian men, Asian middle class?”. Very doubtful.

    The in/out/identity rules are getting too complicated for the average person who can’t remember their pronouns (which could get in trouble as a hate crime under woke thinking) and just wanting to have a well paid secure job or income, freedom of speech and a better life for their family.

    In addition when families are increasingly bi-racial the racial denigrations being thrown about throw up more conundrums, do you hate the parent whose white or that part of yourself, or hate the non white parent as the supremacists want?

    It’s confusing because what does white even mean? You could be a Pakeha, Brit, American, Polish, Russian, European and god knows how many other nationalities, yet the term “white” as a pretty broad and racist brush has become very common in NZ by the woke, blogs, government ministers and MSM…

    Shane Jones is just trying to get maximum publicity for NZ First by taking a controversial position as a male, Māori, of Te Aupōuri and Ngāi Takoto descent, English, Welsh and Croatian ancestry…. and seems be be working to gain maximum publicity!

    And what does that say about freedom in NZ if he does not have that entitlement to say what he thinks (and does he really think it, or is is just a way to get free, outraged publicity) just like Don Brash did with his Orewa comments, or Jacininda did with her Christchurch Mosque comments. They are all using specific race/religion to get publicity by identifying the group by race or religion (aka not the Christchurch massacre survivors but the Muslims when taking about the event).

    Privately there is plenty more horse trading in NZ, of a racial nature,

    “I mean, it’s like all these things, it’s bloody hard, you’ve only got so much space. Depends where we’re polling, you know? All that sort of thing. Two Chinese would be nice, but would it be one Chinese or one Filipino, or one – what do we do?”

    “Two Chinese would be more valuable than two Indians, I have to say.”

    • Every survivor and victim of the Christchurch white subpremacist shit stain shooter ,,,, WAS a Muslim.

      Only a ‘sleep’ would write otherwise.

      Anyone who is a ‘wake’ can see this.

      I’m a ‘wake’ ,,,,, your a ‘sleep’ ,,,,, and the term ‘woke’ is mostly a rebranding joke ,,,, from what was once derisively known as PC ,,,,

      • The point is that they are identified by their religion, not as survivors of a massacre. If the National government had bothered to keep the killer out of NZ, not given him gun licenses without proper references and investigated him properly when people complained about his behaviour at the gun club, and Labour were not so woke as to also not notice, the attack would never have been able to occur in NZ (apparently he deliberately came to NZ to train for the terrorist act).

        So if Tarrent had been refused entry at the border or at the very least proper monitoring done while he was here what he was up to, then all those people would still be alive.

        • Our Aussie white subpremacist came to New Zealand because we did not align our gun laws with theirs and ban mass murder military style weapons when they did.

          There were no complaints about the inbred Aussie FROM the gun club ,,, ” Vice-president of the Bruce Rifle Club, Scott Williams, says Tarrant had been a member of the Milton club since 2018 and seemed like “a normal person”…”[He] never gave anyone reason to suspect he would carry out an attack like he has,” he told Newshub.” ,,,,

          There WERE complaints about that bloody gun club.,,,,, ” While living in Dunedin, he (Pete Breidahl), said he went to the Bruce Rifle Club three times. The first two visits were to check the range out and zero a rifle. The third, in November, 2017, was a military shoot day.

          “The conversations I had and the people I met literally terrified me to my core and I left early.

          “The place just stunk of inadequacy compensated through use and ownership of semi automatic firearms. It was pretty f…ing disturbing.””
          https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2019/03/christchurch-terror-attack-rifle-club-was-perfect-breeding-place-for-murder.html
          https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/111336647/we-dont-breed-mass-killers-accused-christchurch-shooters-gun-club

          I agree all his red flags should have seen him picked up before his murder spree ,,, but he had no record or reasonable grounds to stop his moving to New Zealand when he first did.

          • Yes, but why have people coming from OZ and being able to live in NZ, claim housing, benefits, voting and contribute nothing to NZ but make things worse for others, including killing 51 people.

            There should be a check on new arrivals into NZ to check what they are up to every few months and make sure they are paying taxes etc, if not why are they here, our pro international bludging is getting ridiculous and dangerous.

            Another new resident apparently lived in a one bedroom city apartment and was stockpiling weapons. Then all the drugs lords and criminals enjoying operating here. These folks never even put in a NZ tax return after getting residency and now before the courts for importing in 40 million in meth for decades. Why were they allowed NZ residency and free movement here???? https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11842563

            People coming to NZ increasingly seem to be having major episodes such as crime, mental and ideological issues and should not be able to come to NZ and suck up resources while planning their next social destruction or ideological attacks on others living here. Or just plain bludging off the NZ state.

            Citizens should have the right to be protected from criminals, make others contribute significantly to come to NZ, and stop potential criminals coming to NZ with actually no real reason or social benefit for coming to the country.

            Kiwi’s can’t just turn up in OZ or Hong Kong or China and get a house, benefit and residency so not sure why our government allows it.

            You can get a temporary permit to come to NZ in 10 days if you don’t automatically get free access here! That is why so many are flooding in, and once here, we can’t get rid of them.

          • savenz: “Yes, but why have people coming from OZ and being able to live in NZ, claim housing, benefits, voting and contribute nothing to NZ but make things worse for others, including killing 51 people. ”

            1: CER, have you heard of it ?.
            2: I would bet you any money that Australian immigrants have a lower crime rate and percentage of them commiting criminal activity than New Zealand born citizens .
            3. The rate of New Zealanders who move to Australia to live and work far exceeds the number of Aussies coming here for the same reason ,,, So stopping this movement of people would hurt us far more than them.

            regarding the rest of your scatter-gun post, which sounds much like the Aussies who scapegoat New Zealanders over there.

            …. Aussies are not refugees here so I doubt it would be more than a hand-full , if any, who get given a house.

            However it is good to see your hype ridden xenophobia include some white English speaking immigrants for a change.

            Finally,I do agree the tax department and other regulatory bodies need more funding and resources to catch the law breaking regulation flouting people in NZ.

            Nationals answer is to cut the regulations ,,,,

          • Work out where the rental houses shortages are coming from – that have just happened in the last few years when more and more of the world came to NZ!

            Christchurch shooting accused Brenton Tarrant described as a ‘recluse’ by neighbours
            https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/111346747/christchurch-shooting-accused-brenton-tarrant-described-as-a-recluse-by-neighbours

            House rental hopes fade as prices soar
            https://www.odt.co.nz/business/house-rental-hopes-fade-prices-soar

            But hey, more important to have anybody able to come to NZ with no questions asked than actually prioritise the available housing to existing citizens rather than mass murderers from overseas!

            Our current immigration policy is letting the markets choose who should live in NZ based on competition, which must be right! sarcasm.

            The massive rental shortages in the provinces co inside with COL changing the immigration criteria to encourage more no questions asked visas for migrants to the provinces, on top of compulsory upgrades of rental properties costing probably $10,000 on average.

            The policies combine to create a storm of low priced housing shortages all round the country which is only getting worse as the politicians increase temporary NZ work visas (which you can get in as little as 10 days but now demand is so massive with nearly 20% increase of visas year on year, taking 4 months). The world is coming to NZ and NZ government is stamping the visas to let them come and reside here, like Tarrant.

        • Desteregg you previously said you were going to ignore and not respond to my posts ,,, has your haggard old brain forgotten that?

          You have previously stated that individuals can not be racist ,,, yet now you agree with savenz ,,,,, savenz:” In addition the constant racial focus of MSM creates more racism”.

          So which one is it you silly old Klux? ,,,

          I’m not surprised you would like the history and narrative of the Christchurch event rewritten,,,, Seeing as you have so many shared beliefs with the Christchurch white subpremacist shooter ,,,,
          Perhaps you and savenz ,,,, aka the Kluless and old Klux show, could you explain this howler to me ,,,,savenz : “when people complained about his behaviour at the gun club, and Labour were not so woke as to also not notice,”

          Aside from the Fact that Nobody at that wank gun club complained about his behavior ,,,, ignoring that fact ,,,what the fuck is savenz saying ,,, and your agreeing with ,,, about Labour ??????

          They had knowlege beforehand and chose to ignore it?.

          Sicko stuff IMO

          Dessteregg ,,, the NZ branch “How White Nationalism Became Normal Online” https://youtu.be/yprnIU29GYA

          • Wow.
            Your ageism is showing young fella.

            Wisdom comes with experience and years.
            Name calling is a shade of ad hominem attack that negates many arguments.
            Take it easy as we are all in this together.

          • John W: “Name calling is a shade of ad hominem attack that negates many arguments.
            Take it easy as we are all in this together.”

            Thanks. I agree with you completely. Except for very brief comments, I have mostly stopped responding to “reason”, precisely because of the issue that you raise here.

            I’d add that “reason” persistently and I assume deliberately misspells my nom de guerre (which is bizarre and offensive: it’s an old family name). Correct spelling of names – and noms – is something with which I take great care, because it matters to me.

            In addition, reason’s comments are frequently difficult to follow. That commenter isn’t big on logical argumentation, or on clarity of prose, but does a strong line in ad homs (as you note) and straw man arguments.

            So. On balance, I’ve decided that life is too short and all that….

          • You say the same about me and I get the same criticisms from others especially when I mention how things that work in the real world like Modern Monatary Theory and Māori rights. Yknow you and I have had huge blues over how I should perceive my Māori heritage and you’re climbing in again telling Māori what’s good and complaining that no one is listening and you don’t know why.

            Well let me tell you why. I don’t like you’re opinions about Māori. And I will not accept Māori as second class citizens no matter how eloquent and grammatically correct you think you are.

  3. Most of the resurgence in National’s 2005 vote seemed to come from the collapse of both the ACT vote and the United Future vote, neither of which would probably have had little to do with Brash’s racism.

  4. Oh yes, totally agree that the sinking of morals will be prevalent come this election. Natzi party supporters/voters despise the Labour party and HATE the Greens. Even with desperate Simon at the helm they are unswervingly loyal. I despise these people personally, for their selfish, greedy, ignorant, uncaring attitude to everything. Fuckwits. But there sure is a lot of them out there.

    • I do not support Greens as they are not responsible in their appoach to help running the county. As for years they were a voice in the wilderness I was interested to see how they handled power as Greens in Europe had been a disaster. I cannot see many positive moves they have made to improve the environment. Their answer to combat Corona down turn is to pay out $5 billion in benefits not help turn unemployed workers into cleaning up wilding pine or a thousand and one things that need fixing to help the environment.

      • When have the Greens ever held power in Europe Trev ??

        Never of course, although more people are voting for them due to all the disasters that your right wing politics have brought about …

        Go have a cup of Nactional river water ,,, and while your shitting your guts out think about ‘responsible’ Governing,,,, thats my suggestion for you.

        Your standard of ‘being right’ ,,, is probably best summed up by your own idiotic post about the stockmarket ‘climbing’ and recovering the other day.,,,, and thats with 1.5 Trillion dollars of corporate welfare thrown at it,,,, and wasted / vaporized within 24 hours.

        Your obviously a big fan of welfare and socialism ,,, but only when the rich get it.

      • Trevor rather than attack the greens and ignore the environmental disaster we are facing locally and globally, how about some comment on what changes are needed to address the disastrous path we are on.
        The Greens are the main protagonists for change to address global environmental calamity.
        Do you support addressing that.

        • lots of talk lots of promises not much action.Sage signed off more water bottling Genter achieved nothing of note in transport NZF allowed to stop Kermadec to a please their fishing mates public transport still hopeless no sign of making it free. If they had gone with National and worked hard I am sure much more would have been achieved than being a 3rd string to a very weak bow

          • The Greens are in coalition so green ministers are bound by cabinet rather than party policy, unless the break cabinet ranks.
            Fishing obviously has NZF ear and pocket.
            I am not up with what paths have been trodden by water export lobbyists but it smells of corruption within cabinet.

  5. Bernie torpedoed his own campaign by endorsing AOC and getting sucked into the race debate vortex. A lot of social issues intersect with ethnicity, but the left has a tendency to alienate the working class with that kind of rhetoric. Instead of accusing one another of thought crime, we should allow robust discussion. e.g. immigration, housing shenanigans, the influence of China, stronger borders. Especially at a critical time of global pandemic.

    • +1000 roblogic

      If should not be a thought crime to have a discussion with a range of voices across the spectrum we could have avoided a lot of problems.

      I even think the strategy of not allowing the white supremacists to speak is a bad move they should have the same public debates as blue dragons, and everyone else operating a pro race based propaganda group, in NZ.

      If you do not let them all have a voice it drives them underground to more extreme views. In addition if all the race based people debating how great and superior they all are, then it would become more obvious they are all wrong and hopefully give everyone else a few more clues!

      Likewise if news was actually being reported in terms of accuracy and independent research not the latest woke/right wing thought fart with anybody who disagrees is wrong based not on their argument but keyboard warrior style augments that they must be dismissed and not allowed to speak because of their ‘bad’ identity… aka ‘old, white, boomer, male, TERF, SWERF, middle class, working class, …Debate seems to now mean a radical from the right vs a radical from the left, both of whom are equally repellant to most people, is now a real debate.

      My other bug bear is that the ones most invested in the identity argument are often the ‘bad identity’ that they apparently hate, and use that to speak for the other! (Sadly often getting it wrong, hence the ‘working, middle class, ordinary folks, beneficiaries, often can’t relate to Labour/unions who in their woke representations, “speak for them, while denigrating their identity or getting the solutions into the pie in the sky of never never gold plated standards (aka free broadband, UK Labour, Fan in kitchen, NZ Labour, more unemployed living in NZ to compete for jobs, unions, when it’s becoming clearer that big ticket items are being run down, aka people don’t even have a job that pays enough to afford electricity, or even a home to run the fan or broadband, or waiting beds in hospitals are the floor, but yay the broadband is a priority for spending and we are helping someone else’s nationals out by giving them NZ benefits!).

      The other thing that neoliberal’s can’t get their head around is that resources need to be allocated sustainably and practically, not a lolly scramble, or greedily destroying or taking public resources in in a community (water bottling) so that a few can make more profits.

      If we don’t have the jobs in NZ then don’t bring people to NZ to compete for jobs.

      If we don’t have the houses in NZ then don’t bring people to NZ to compete for housing.

      If we don’t have enough money for benefits in NZ, then don’t bring people to NZ who need benefits or realistically will require benefits in the next years.

      If we have a brain drain in NZ, then don’t run down NZ universities and make people compete with the world, for better opportunities in the workforce in NZ which also co incidentally give them and their family citizenship and free benefits in NZ as a sweetener.

      If we don’t have the new upgraded roads, sewers, wastewater pipes, newly built and appointed hospitals, schools, mental health facilities and so forth then do not make more people come to NZ to compete with others to use those facilities….

      Should be obvious, but funny enough, it doesn’t seem to be for the bean counters and ideological neoliberals.

      • SaveNZ: “If we don’t have the jobs in NZ then don’t bring people to NZ to compete for jobs.

        If we don’t have the houses in NZ then don’t bring people to NZ to compete for housing.”

        Exactly. And I heartily agree with all of the rest of your comment.

        SaveNZ for PM!

  6. Then there was the anti-communist election with dancing cossacks in ads. (It didn’t stop the launch of a successful NZ vodka company though. NZs are particular about what they are a’gin.) It seems that there has to be a strong thing to be agin to get the peeps off the couch on voting day – someone called us the passionless people after all. Otherwise we would all sit watching our tellies with our feet up, and just get flashes about the latest voting from clowns that bothered to go out, in the wind and rain – hey ho! And we should be able to join up for voting right till the last minute, and if our side aren’t winning, send out a twitter and get all the mates out swinging the vote to our side.

    • The dancing cossacks were a part of the Aniti Labour National party TV advertisement organised it turns out with CIA assistance.
      Kirk floated a superannuation fund where all wage earners contributed a small percentage of their wage that was invested in a NZ Govt fund in their name. Not like Kiwisaver invested in private funds that can crash.
      The CIA gem was to promote that as “Communist” hence the dancing cossacks.
      Investing in NZ was communist.

      If Kirk’s scheme had carried on NZ would never have had to borrow again saving billions in interest payments to overseas banks.
      How communist is that.
      And wage earner would have accrued modest interest in there govt guaranteed account.
      How communist is that.
      Kiwis are easily manipulated.

      • John W: “The CIA gem was to promote that as “Communist” hence the dancing cossacks.
        Investing in NZ was communist.”

        Yup: I remember that election. Voted in it, even. Uncle Sam has long had a bee in his bonnet about communism. And he’s managed successfully to propagandise the rest of the world about it.

      • John W: “If Kirk’s scheme had carried on NZ would never have had to borrow again saving billions in interest payments to overseas banks.
        How communist is that.
        And wage earner would have accrued modest interest in there govt guaranteed account.
        How communist is that.”

        Meant to add that to my previous comment. Exactly. We’d all have been a great deal better off.

        But the offshore banks would’ve missed out: and Uncle Sam couldn’t be having that, could he?

        • The same hands are on the steering wheel today but with a tighter grip.
          Another Kirk is unlikely to take the helm even briefly unless Kiwis get a better taste of what democracy is about and that is not just govt elections but on more systematic decisions in ongoing management of the workplace.

    • Greywarbler: “…someone called us the passionless people…”

      Gordon McLauchlan. The title of his book, published 1976.

  7. I wasn’t living here at the time. Suffice to say I don’t think much has changed for the average Kiwi no matter their race, creed or religion. Its nasty neo liberalism voted in by blue or red die hard tribalists who don’t seem to have noticed they are essentially voting for the same thing.

    Which for the average struggling person means ever more tax, wages always falling behind inflation, under/unemployment, higher and higher housing costs/rents, dysfunctional social services and incessant toadying to big business.

  8. “….an election which saw the National Party come roaring back into political contention on the strength of one of the most racially-charged elections in New Zealand history.”

    I remember it very well, voted for Labour. I was opposed to the National plank, wrote at length to Don Brash after the Orewa speech.

    In the years since, I’ve done a lot of reflection on the issues; I’ve changed my mind, come around for the most part to Brash’s way of thinking.

    “…the Treaty of Waitangi would have been retired; all reference to “Treaty Principles” in New Zealand legislation removed; all “affirmative action” programmes for Maori discontinued; and the Maori Seats abolished.”

    I doubt that a Brash government would have managed such a large-scale reform. But if it had, I now think that would have been no bad thing.

    The so-called “principles” of the Treaty were a post facto attempt to freight meanings on to it that went far beyond what the text can bear or what the signatories could have imagined or intended. We have Geoff Palmer to thank for that: I am among the many people who listened to him at the time trying – and failing – to explain what those principles were. Winston Peters was one who called him out on that issue.

    The voting public isn’t stupid: the Orewa speech spoke to that public’s increasing uneasiness about what was happening in the name of the Treaty.

    Affirmative action programmes are well-intentioned, but evidence suggests that they are at best variably successful, at worst the thin end of the segregation wedge. People could see this for themselves.

    As for the Maori seats: they are racist in the proper meaning of the word. Their existence is mandated by legislation, and they privilege one sector of society.

    “The Right’s race-driven comeback…”

    And here’s the thing that increasingly bothers me, and has to a large extent driven my reassessment of my political views. Racism is in the purview of governments, not of individuals. We as a society cannot control what people think and say, and nor should we be attempting to do it.

    Racism is just an epithet, chucked around by people who don’t like what other people say. The more it’s used, I suspect, the more resistant people are to being so characterised. And it’s backfired spectacularly in a significant sector of our society.

    We have legislative arrangements which punish people for what they do. And that’s as it should be.

    “When offered the choice of an openly anti-Maori National Party and a strongly anti-immigrant NZ First, very close to half the NZ electorate voted for one or the other. ”

    I voted in that election. I remember the substance of the electioneering. I recall Brash denying that the Nats were anti-Maori; he said, rather, that they were opposed to privileged treatment of Maori. The Nats took issue with the financial settlements going to the iwi, and their rising power.

    Many of us are now asking much the same thing: a bucket load of taxpayer cash has gone to iwi in Treaty settlements, yet ordinary Maori are as poor as they ever were. Poorer, if anything. Where has all that money gone? It’s a legitimate question. Many of us also question the rising influence of unelected iwi representatives. Elizabeth Rata’s observations resonate with many of us.

    https://www.nzcpr.com/democracy-and-tribalism/

    As to NZ First: Peters has been at pains to point out that its stance has been anti the scale of recent immigration, not anti-immigrant. There’s a significant difference. Many of us agree with him.

    “New Zealanders, as a people, are more than capable of rising – or sinking – to just about any political occasion.”

    So: just like people everywhere then. And they’ll turn on politicians if they see their interests being threatened by said politicians. Also just like people everywhere.

    • All assuming we continue to run a system based on a form of capitalism the engages a small group of wealthy to accumulate massive excess wealth and leaves a large number poor and many homeless in increasing numbers.

      A system change is needed. The employment model can be changed along with business ownership starting on a smaller scale with state support and significant legislation adjustment.

      The race argument has some grounds but a class argument is more overwhelming.

      • John W: “All assuming we continue to run a system based on a form of capitalism the engages a small group of wealthy to accumulate massive excess wealth and leaves a large number poor and many homeless in increasing numbers.”

        Certainly that’s what we now have. And Elizabeth Rata makes the point that the neo-tribalists in the iwi work in exactly the same way. She observes that these people have behaved exactly like capitalists everywhere; they have sequestered the wealth and the assets for themselves, while ordinary Maori are as poor as they ever were. Poorer, if anything. We see every day the poverty and the homelessness in that part of society.

        “A system change is needed.”

        Agreed. As a society, we could do worse than return to the more redistributive model which we used to have when I was growing up. Not perfect, but no system is. And this society has been almost wrecked (hopefully not irreversibly) by neoliberalism; going back to our socialist past would be a long and difficult road. But it seems to me to be the best hope, really.

        “The race argument has some grounds but a class argument is more overwhelming.”

        I agree: it is class which is of moment regarding the current inequalities in NZ society. Aside from the fact that biologically, race is a meaningless concept (it’s culture which is the marker of difference), Maori and pakeha, along with other immigrants, have spent the last almost 200 years intermarrying, such that Maori are no longer the people that they were when Abel Tasman and James Cook visited. I doubt that there are many pakeha and other immigrant families – certainly those whose ancestors arrived in the 19th century – where there aren’t Maori relatives. It’s certainly true of my family, along with many others that I know.

  9. Desstereggs long spree can be countered with two simple examples ,,,,

    1, She believes and has stated the christchurch white subpremacist was NOT a racist ,,, which sound unbelievable but thats what the old klux has made a fool of herself over ,,, repeatedly.

    2, She has stated Nicky Hager was wrong ,,, for pointing out the obvious Racisim in Nationals election campaign under Don the racist Brash.

    Old Klux: “So: just like people everywhere then. And they’ll turn on politicians if they see their interests being threatened by said politicians. Also just like people everywhere.”

    16 mins 30 secs for a example of what Dessteregg is talking about https://youtu.be/yprnIU29GYA

      • John W: “Link now blocked unfortunately.”

        I opened it this morning. Reason has, as usual, got hold of the wrong end of the stick. I’ve read only that part of reason’s comment which misspells my nom de guerre and asserts that this is what I’m talking about. And of course I’m sure you realise that it isn’t in any way what I’m talking about.

        I note that it’s produced by the Intercept. With pieces of this sort, it’s necessary to be very sceptical about who is doing the reporting and what their agenda is.

        The Charlottesville incident, for instance: I’ve seen considerable without-commentary footage of what happened there. Said footage gives a picture considerably at odds with what’s in the Intercept video and what was reported at the time by the msm, which put its own spin on events.

        The rally was held to protest the proposed removal of a statue of Robert E Lee from a Charlottesville park. There was no violence until Antifa showed up and started attacking marchers.

        The incident in which that woman was run over and killed looked very different in that footage from how it was represented. The motorist was trapped in a street which was blocked by Antifa protestors both ahead of and behind him. His actions looked like a panicked reaction to what he perceived to be a dangerous situation: he drove forward, hit and killed that woman, then reversed at speed. Awful as it was, it didn’t look deliberate on his part. In any event, he’s been convicted and sentenced.

        As I said earlier, this Intercept piece has nothing whatsoever to do with the points I’ve been making on this comment thread. However: having a bee in his/her bonnet about this whole white supremacy business, reason has Form for misinterpretation, not just of my comments, of course, but of those of other people who dare to disagree.

      • Sorry John W ,,, if the link comes up as blocked it must be because youtube has age restricted it ,,,, ie R18.,,, which means you must have an account and be logged in to watch it.
        ——————————————–

        D’Esterre ” reason has Form for misinterpretation, not just of my comments, of course, but of those of other people who dare to disagree.”

        So say you ,,,, while deflecting from the fact I’m I00% accurate about your ‘individuals can not be racist’ gibberish … and specifically the Christchurch white subpremacist.

        For the record ,,, is a white supremacist racist ?, D’Esterre.

        Yes or No ,,,, D’Esterre

        and heres a list of the ‘other’ people your talking about, that Im rude to ,,, or misunderstand.

        andrew ,,,,, gaby ,,, ImRight ,,, and Trevor.
        Right wing trolls of various stripes ,,,,

Comments are closed.