The first time I experienced racism that I can remember of any description was at primary school – from the teacher. It was clear from her reaction that identifying oneself as Maori was going to be a problem for her somehow. Not so much what she said, because I can’t remember what she said that made me feel that way, but it was her vibe – like being a Maori was disappointing and a hassle for her in that she would have to endure it. Like I had, personally, just made her life a difficulty. She was the one that had asked though, I think she had asked the class if anyone was Maori rather than kids introducing themselves in turn. 40 years later I can only recall with clarity the impression, the feeling I had made a mistake, I shouldn’t have said anything. What look she gave, was it scorn or pity – it was a form of displeasure. Being Maori was bad, being whatever everyone else was was good, was normal, was welcome and natural and right – being a Maori was wrong and would lead to trouble. That was my first lesson in uncritical race theory from a Pakeha teacher at a Devonport primary school in the early 1980s.
One of my Pakeha uncles taught at intermediate school in a Maori populated area. He was very racist. All for the Springbok tour, from what I understand, always had some tricky argument why it was OK. But he is a teacher and they do rather overrate themselves and become foolishly obdurate. I wondered just how many years of having a racist teacher that school endured, how many hundreds of non-white students had to endure his racism? What racist beliefs did that guy inflict on his students? How many Maori kids were disadvantaged by his actions? How many Pakeha students were encouraged into racism by his actions? What shitty takes did this guy put into those formative minds? I did a brief Google search and found it appears he made it to Deputy Principal for a few years and then falls off the radar so I guess he retired. Deputy Principal is the enforcement officer of student discipline for the most part in the hierarchy so what sort of judgment would this racist guy have been meting out?
And now ask yourself which Party(s) would he vote for? What would this guy think of David Seymour’s Treaty Principles Bill? In a wide sense this guy represents about half the Pakeha electorate of the 1980s. This guy represents all the shitty racist troll comments on every platform and there are multitudes of them. A ZB guy. Everyone has a classic liberal uncle and everyone also has a classic redneck uncle, and this guy was a classic bigot. There are a lot more than you suspect and they have their female counterparts.
It’s obsessive hate, like a paranoid persecution complex. Why would that be top of mind, all the time? Why would you be constantly comparing yourself to people you don’t like? Why would you choose to devote all that energy and time into genocidal white settler militancy? What about… crochet? Golf?
It’s futile, as a non-Polynesian person, to live in a Polynesian country and hate the Polynesians whose land the country is on. They are dooming themselves to this self-inflicted torment of hypothesising genocide but never being able to go full Van Diemen’s Land. Their objective of swamping the Maori population and vote and increasing their land value cannot happen unless they import more non-white settlers than white settlers to maintain their position at which point they might as well go to Aussie. This is what they are facing. In being so hyper-conscious of the existential condition of the white settlers they summon a Rhodesia sunset each time they complain they have lost ground to the barbarian Maori. They concede they are losing.
This isn’t a white country, it’s a Maori country under white settler occupation. That is why the rednecks rark up because they cannot maintain white control without rarking up. The occupation is not passive, it is being resisted and the militants are counter-resisting. Their mentality is on a war footing – every social interaction is a chance to say cut the tall trees. Some of them have the same ideology as when their ancestors came to fight in the Land Wars – must be where it originated.
What makes Maori the enemy? The existence of Maori is a threat to their idea of themselves and the security of their land investment, yes, but it’s undoubtedly social more than economic. Who would they be punching down on if they had been successful in their genocide? The rednecks are fanatically tribal – that’s the irony. This guy and the hundreds of thousands of Pakeha he represents do not hinge their racial hostility on the Treaty or any Principles, they will continue to be how they are irrespective of any politics. Take away the Treaty and the racism will remain. They will be bitching about Maori long after every law was expunged of reference to the Treaty – the Treaty cannot address their racism.
Some time ago my Dad (Maori) had mentioned once that this uncle had never liked him – but he couldn’t work out why. I told him the guy was extremely racist, and that was why, but he didn’t seem to believe it. I explained that I didn’t think he understood – the guy would have easily disliked him on that basis alone, there didn’t need to be a reason per se except for that. He didn’t seem to comprehend that racism might be actually just as stupid as that. Well, it actually is just as stupid as that.
The last family Christmas I attended, many years ago, the racist uncle was there, as usual. I can’t remember how many jugs of Black Russians we were into the conversation or how racist on a scale of Muriel to Newman he was being at the time, probably about Steven Franks, and he was starting on the “eating the cats and dogs eating the people’s pets” disparaging ethnic commentary part of his stand up performance when he either said “…. Maori” and then stopped abruptly, or he stopped abruptly and said something about me being Maori (I can’t remember how it happened precisely) and then said (to everyone else) “I’ll tell it [ie. the ‘joke’] after you’re [ie. me, is] gone.” Talk about gone – I’ve never been back! But naturally, one does then think – is forced to consider – whether the rest of the Pakeha family thinks the same way only it’s just that he is more Alabama about it than the polite North that does the same thing only with gloves on. Was I better off not knowing that?
Why voluntarily communicate with idiots about idiotic ideas is what it comes down to – racist uncles, racist Act party leaders, the select committee. Is it worth knowing what other people really think, what they think of you? Is that process of airing contempt for one another going to be healing and cathartic or hellish and cancerous? The winner of the debate is the winner of a referendum which almost certainly wouldn’t get a supermajority – so what validity would that have to the ‘losing’ side? It doesn’t settle an argument it creates a fresh one.
Protest yes, but communicate, “debate,” submit – take it… seriously? Pretend it has some sort of credible foundation worthy of discussion? It is a slimy slogan hoping to tap hate to roll back the RMA so Rimmer’s parasitic mates can make more money – that’s Act’s bottom line, I think everything else they supposedly care so much about is probably expendable.
Seymour’s Bill is just racism of the most cynical type and it is designed to motivate the worst type of person in an ultimately hopeless emotional rear guard action to save a colony built on white supremacy. We have to see the Bill for what it is – an Act 2026 election campaign – a graceless stunt too idiotic to analyse seriously.
When is David going to sit down with Maori and talk about why he wants to wipe out their rights .Also why does he think he is the person representing the King who really is the other party to the treaty not David or luxon.The government is not the crown that is why we have a Governor General who represents the king here in NZ .
So first the conversation should be between the King and Maori .When they have had their conversation and come to an agreement the King should instruct the Governor General on how to instruct the government in how to move in the future .As a party to the treaty Maori should have a major input as they were by far the biggest population at the time .There were only a few thousand English here at that time .
The way to think about what is going is that David is not acting in good faith – the Treaty Bill is a slight of hand. It’s intention is not to initiate a genuine discussion about Māori rights and the Treaty – the intention is create noise and disruption that will polarize the electorate. That polarization around the Treaty Bill – even when it’s voted down – will be milked and leveraged all the way up to the 2026 election. And not just by Act – the Treaty Bill is the first shot in what is going to be ongoing war.
We will need resilience and the ability to almost ignore Seymour because he is taunting and goading for a reaction. Reacting implies that Seymour sets the agenda (as the right so often do) and we respond to his agenda and not our own.
The best outcome for Seymour would be a relentless 6 month culture war played out on all media platforms across NZ. Somehow we have to avoid that because David Seymour made the sandpit and we don’t have to play in it – it’s fall of shit.
Seymour doesnt need a majority. Fascists work with a minority organised into storm troops. The Maaori minority will need to prepare for this assault.
We have a huge problem with this clown . Māori can see it sadly the racists can’t. These racists would have been very disappointed with the massive peaceful protest unfortunately we may not be so lucky next time . David Seymour is causing a divide we may never truly recover from .
People live in a world of constant anxiety and crave simple solutions..
People are told that their problems are caused by “them” the bad people.
The answer is to destroy “them” and you will be happy.
Every society has the “them” minority who are to blame for everything.
In this country the “Them” have always been us the Maori”
The alternative is for White people to blame themselves for their problems.
But the White majority are having none of that.
No White Political party and no White media outlet has the guts
to blame White people for White problems.
Political suicide and death to the business would follow.
So the Whites need a convenient minority to blame.
And we the Maori fit the bill perfectly for the Whites.
As long as Maori blaming keeps National NZF and ACT in power
and keeps White media alive nothing will ever change.
Excellent article combining the personal and social with such clarity. My strongest reaction to anything to do with Seymour and the Treaty Bill is to avoid it – not read the article and not listen to the discussion. Like the articles author realizing there is no point in spending energy on people in his family who are bad faith. Just like Seymour and Luxon – I don’t believe there intentions align with what they are saying.
In some ways a complete boycott of the Treaty Bill might be a good approach – the opposition should vacate parliament in protest any time the bill is discussed in the house. And all submission should be protest submissions of some sort.
Racism works both ways.Colour never interested me as to how I reacted to someone. Those whi talk for the TPM do not upset me by their colour but their feeling of superiority does.
Their feeling of superiority?
Look in the mirror and you will see the smug arrogance of National, ACT and NZ First and how they ram road through policy that is in the best interests of their donors. That’s superiority.
The English feel they are superior as per their version of the treaty. NACT and NZ First, like you feel they are vastly superior to those natives.
Read and learn.
Back in 60 / 70s Chch there were no Maoris, they were only in casual racist jokes and casual racist attitudes. I’m sad to report from a provincial north town that that attitude is alive and well. I judge that on comments made to me about the hikoi by people I know or heard during it’s passage through my town. It’s so freaking depressing.
The ToW ‘principles’ I grew to know – more accurately became part of my worldview – were quite straightforward and seemed to me not to be controversial: partnership, participation and protection. Partnership meant working together to achieve appropriate outcomes; participation meant acting in good faith; protection referred to responsibility and safeguarding relationships. I was of the opinion they were a sound / fair / equitable way of doing things – even if it took a few extra steps along the way. For sure, they are rather broad principles – but IMV do a pretty good job of underpinning the relationship between the Government and Māori under the ToW, and provide a guideline in working not only with iwi and hapu but other parties that may be adversely affected by actions and decision-making.
I haven’t seem much reference to the 3 Ps, on either side of the argument. I did hear Seymour say that the current state of affairs is an impediment to business-as-usual – as he would – and in much SM comment, criticism of the legal and bureaucratic gravy-train associated with the current interpretation of ToW, presumably, with the recognition of partnership, participation and protection. To be fair those against the TPB do touch on the demise of partnership, participation and protection, as it currently stands, but it seems that noone directly refers to these as EXISTING principles. The 3 Ps are invisible.
There seems then to be principles and principles. When I look at Seymour’s three principles that underpin the TPB I can’t recognize the three principles I knew. Are they even the same things? Clearly not. How fucking confusing is that! And if I am a bit confused there will will tens of thousands more. But who among those tens of thousands are in fact consciously aware of the 3 Ps anyway? But if the critics of the TPD are on the money, Seymour’s revised principles appear to undermine the principles of partnership, participation and protection. That seems to be the intention. Am I right?
And while on the topic can someone please rewrite the three principles of TPB into PLAIN English. Ok granted, for the sake of law they need to expressed in a language that most of us are not all that familiar with. Seymour says he wants transparency and discussion. Well, a good start would be to revise the legalese terminology and put three principles into plain old English that everyone understands. That’s the way to get people engaged. Not be talking down to folk in a language that is the domain of the legal profession and bureaucrats. Written in plain English we ordinary folk can judge what they really mean.
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