Ignoring racism won’t make it stop
Like many New Zealanders, I’ve spent the past couple of weeks watching the uprising in the United States, agonising over ways I can help, without being a pain in the giant white bottom.
Speak up and I run the risk of inserting myself in the middle of suffering that isn’t mine – who wants to hear from yet another Pa¯ keha¯ woman wringing her hands? I know I don’t.
It’s also true that faffing about just means wha¯ nau already burdened with racism are left to do the exhausting work of confronting it, too – staying silent creates a tacit agreement with racists.
I mean, you’ll notice who else is strangely silent at the moment.
All those fierce, ‘‘unbiased’’ defenders of free speech who screamed bloody murder over white supremacists Stefan Molyneux and Lauren Southern being told to bugger off.
They were out loudly denouncing US President Donald Trump for threatening protesters with violence and prison, because that is the literal definition of free speech being curtailed, right? Someone in power threatening to lock you up for saying something they don’t like?
Sorry if you landed here hoping for a jolly old tale about the time I accidentally showed my whole behind in public or foolishly swooned over some ridiculous star, I don’t have one of those in me at the moment.
A couple of days ago, I pulled together a list of resources for people wanting to understand what’s going on in the US, and here in New Zealand – and what they can do to help.
This column is not for them.
It’s for people who think they don’t need to be of service, that all this hoopla is just lawless youth running amok, and anyway it has nothing to do with New Zealand, because we’re not racist here.
It’s for you because – and I’m not at all sorry to be the one to tell you – you are part of the problem.
I know how hard that is to hear, I feel how hard it is every time someone rolls their eyes and says ‘‘white feminism’’ or ‘‘Karen’s gotta Karen’’.
But the good thing about that feeling is that you can feel it at all. Irredeemable racists don’t feel anything like that. They just feel scorn and hate. Congratulations, you’re redeemable!
Today, I’m just interested in the slightly defensive, unconsciously racist you, my friend.
I’d like to issue you a challenge.
The protests here, the uprising in the US, the statues being toppled in the UK – if it’s all really unwarranted, I challenge you to watch a documentary called 13th.
That’s all. Just kick back and watch a 140-minute movie by Academy Award-nominated, Emmy Award-winning director Ava DuVernay.
I’m not asking you to sign anything, or join in anything, or donate anything.
You don’t even have to have an opinion about it. Hell, you don’t even have to pay anything for it, it’s free to watch on YouTube right now.
You might want to do all of those things at the end. I believe in you.
I believe in you even though I can already hear you saying, ‘‘well, yes, that’s awful, but what’s it got to do with New Zealand?’’
OK, since you ask, read Scott Hamilton’s response to journalist Chris Trotter when he tried to claim the term ‘‘white supremacy’’ only applies to countries such as the US and South Africa, not dear old New Zealand.
It’s a thread on Twitter, but also a post on YourNZ.org titled: Some history of ‘white supremacy’ in New Zealand.
He talks about the brutal suppression of te reo Ma¯ ori in public schools, the removal of Ma¯ ori and Pacific Island children from their parents (an issue that is ongoing), and about Ma¯ ori being banned from ‘‘white toilets’’, showing that the tools of white supremacy – assimilation and segregation – are as much a part of our history as in the US, whether we like it or not.
Listen to RNZ’s The History Of White Supremacy podcast, which details the dawn raids of the 1970s and 80s, when Pacific Islanders lured to New Zealand to do manual labour in the boom years of the 50s and 60s, were viciously grabbed from their homes, prosecuted and deported when the work dried up.
‘‘But that was all such a long time ago. We all say kia ora and whatnot now. It’s all good.’’
OK, fine, final challenge: Read activist, intellectual and spokeswoman for Arms Down, Emilie
Ra¯ kete’s piece for The Spinoff, The Whakapapa of Police Violence, and her conversation with David Farrier for his blog, Webworm.
‘‘The Land Wars never ended,’’ Ra¯ kete writes. ‘‘We just started calling them the War on Crime.’’
It’s confronting stuff. But if we don’t know where we came from, how the hell will we ever figure out where we’re going?
After that, you deserve a treat.
Go watch novelist Chimamanda Ngozi
Adichie’s excellent 2009 Ted Talk, The Danger of the Single Story. It’s funny, insightful, enlightening, and only 15 minutes.
That’s all, just watch a couple of things and read a couple of things. You can do that, right? No-one’s going to call you privileged, or call you out. It’ll just be you, listening to some people tell their stories, maybe ones you’ve never heard before.
Let these stories sink in and trigger the deep core of justice I know you have in you.
The work on your own anti-racism is ongoing, and let me tell you, it’s not always easy, but starting is.