I have ways of coping on Waitangi day. I tend not to look at the news. I definitely do not go to any celebration, or watch the TV news, or go where the crowds are. This day has been a flashpoint for Maori radicalism as long as I can remember. And the time that the radicals have may be coming to an en
From Facebook, and a local Tory MP. In a seat with a lot of poverty, a lot of Maori , and a lot of Maori poverty. He knows these people don’t vote for him, but he’s tried to do his duty. And when Chester Burrows found that The PM was no-platformed by the Northern (Nga Puhi) tribe because of the TPPA he wrote this.
A dialogue isn’t one person speaking and the other only allowed to hear. Freedom of speech is not reflected in a gagging order. You don’t invite people to your place for a yelling at with no right of reply. What really brasses me off is that some of us are working bloody hard out here on the front line of politics to change the conversation with Maori. We’ve put up with all sorts of crap from pakeha for being too good at listening to tangata whenua. We’ve lost members, votes, dollars and support.
Now Nga Puhi have given every racist bigot a reason to continue the hate.
Cheers for that!
The problem is that this is a time when the socially wounded are doubling down. And while twitter is full of people saying let’s celebrate this day, a minister of the crown had a sex toy thrown at him, the day before the protestors blocked the roads… and people on the left are talking uprising.
My worry is that the Maori nationalists may see this as a time for protest and rebellion. They tried this 150 years ago (with the possible exception of Grey invading the Waikato). And it did not work even though the settlers were not that much more than they were. And despite having similar levels of armament. The British Colonial forces and the loyalist Maori won, won, and won again. If the land was settled by treaty, the fate was sealed by conquest.
But there is a romantic idea that Maori can rise up and cast off the Pakeha who outnumber them seven to one, and the Asian and Pacific people, who outnumber them two to one. These people have never read the Day. Immigration is invasion.
What could happen, however, is that the Pakeha lose patience. We have been yelled at, wailed at,
told that we are rednecks: we have been called racist — despite having married into other races, and having cousins marry the girl who farmed Maori land next to the family farm — we have been told that we owe reparations for all inventions and developments because of the treaty.
We may decide to ignore them. We may decide to rip the treaty up. We may decide to destroy the Maori land courts, the Treaty commissions, and say it is just part of history. The current elite would hate this for they use the treaty as a stick to oppress the Pakeha (European) majority.
But Burrows has a point. The Radicals are causing a reaction. And it is disgust. We have avoided violence for 150 years. Domestically. May that continue. For our young men study war thoroughly and well.
