Dear Pakeha, I get this feeling some of you think Treaty Settlements are the end of our debt
I get this sense that many Pakeha seem to be under the impression that once all the Treaty Settlements have been settled, that’s somehow our debt paid off for all that land confiscation and racist injustice.
As if an indigenous people who lose 95% of their land and economic power with all the cultural collateral damage that intergenerational wounding causes through space and time could in some way shape or form be healed by a State reparations system that only returns 1% of the actual value and economic losses.
Cue belly laughs now, ha ha, ho ho.
“Soz for all that land confiscation and theft and all the social damage that poverty has inflicted, here’s 1% of what’s owed you, now stop blaming us”, seems to be a tad disingenuous from the white brothers and sisters in the audience.
The impact of the massive theft of land reverberates 179 years. Maori are 380% more likely to be convicted of a crime and 200% more likely to die from heart disease and suicide. Maori are paid 18% less and 34% leave school without a qualification. Maori die earlier and suffer more.
To add insult to injury, Don Brash claims any action to try and reflect that impact gets labeled ‘special privilege’.
If anyone is under the delusion that settling the last Treaty Settlement somehow means we’ve dealt with all of this past injustice and it’s time to ‘focus on the future’, can I humbly suggest that all the finalisation of the existing Treaty claims will merely be just the first chapter in the genuine apology book.
We have an enormous amount of work to repair the Treaty injustices occurring now with inequality and poverty, and we have an obligation to extend that level of support to everyone living poor in this country.
The beauty of our egalitarianism and liberal progressive democracy is that it collectively enables agency of all individuals, living up to that promise demands more than a lip service white wash reparations process.
The so called settlements, for example (roughtly 2 billion 90’s). No other indigenous people got a deal like that.
Then there’s what may happen to Auckland as a business hub (and to the whole of New Zealand as side effects ripple out) if there is no “fiscal” and “monetary” union between Māori and government.
By the way, New Zealand as-is needs serious reforms, but I’ve had enough of National party governments and successive governments using brown people as an useful scapegoat for problems of their own making.
Maori think they can own “our” water – na.
The Chinese think that just because no one owns the water they can just bottle it and export it to China without restraint or even royalties – well er OK, because its legal and we cannot stop it.
Those who take from others, can too be taken from.
who owns the water SPC our government said nobody but our council bylaws allow for foreigners to come and take our water for a small fee now this is not right and need to be fixed.
The treaty settlements have provided every Maori citizen with the financial equivalent of a brand new, budget brand colour television. You know, the kind of financial asset that Ellen gives away to audience members on every show. No thanks. I’ll take a freehold property in Auckland, an investment property in the city of my choosing, a no questions asked superannuation income, free education till death, and privileged access to employment opportunities, public services and society.
Sorry my calculations were incorrect. Of 100 Maori citizens wanting to get into an Ellen show, only one ever does get in, to claim the television. A majority of Maori will never see any of this fabled and ample ‘treaty settlement’ being trotted out, this television. Probably just as well, the quality of programming on free-to-air tv is so dire that you’re doing Maori a favour.
Back in 1840, a television was probably the equivalent of a broken musket, a flea-infested blanket and a couple of rusty nails, and for this those cheeky little colonials were able to purchase four square kilometres of pristine native forest (land surface area divided by number of Maori). If you think the treaty settlements have been a success then the treaty minister may have slipped you a devil’s lettuce side salad with your half cooked barbie on Waitangi day.
Sorry my calculations were incorrect. Of 100 Maori citizens wanting to get into an Ellen show, only one ever does get in, to claim the television. A majority of Maori will never see any of this fabled and ample ‘treaty settlement’ being trotted out, this television. Probably just as well, the quality of programming on free-to-air tv is so dire that you’re doing Maori a favour. Back in 1840, a television was probably the equivalent of a broken musket, a flea-infested blanket and a couple of rusty nails, and for this those cheeky little colonials were able to purchase four square kilometres of pristine native forest (land surface area divided by number of Maori). If you think the treaty settlements have been a success then the treaty minister may have slipped you a devil’s lettuce side salad with your half cooked barbie on Waitangi day.
One thing I get sick and tired of hearing from our pakeha whanau is ‘we all had the same chances/opportunities in our country’ now this is plain bullshit cause we didn’t it was those that governed and the agencies set up to help like state housing corporation that were bloody racist and they helped their own people not us when are our pakeha whanau going to get into their heads that the state was one of the worst for being mean, nasty and discriminative to our people. If it wasn’t for Maori Affairs our people would not have had any homes so bad and entrenched was the racism in many government departments. Housing is now a major issue in this country.
Maori today have the best of both worlds – they get to enjoy the benefits of Western civilisation, but don’t endure any material hardship or suffering in their lifetimes like past generations of Maori may have during the Musket Wars/New Zealand Wars etc.
The tldr has to be “stop complaining about shit that happened to your ancestors.”…live in the present.
I would like to see Andrew debate Margaret Mutu I think she will wipe the floor of him and those old turkey red neck racist views he holds of our people and the treaty that has never been upheld keeps upsetting him.
A snapshot of the lefts idea of racial harmony, breakout the muskets boys, you get what you can take and hold in this world
[Laughs in colonial winning]