Post by Kiwi Frontline on May 15, 2019 5:05:22 GMT 12
Dear Editor (Sent to The Press 6/5/19)
Ekant Veer, a University of Canterbury lecturer, may well claim the word Pakeha is not an insult, but the problem with the term Pakeha is that it refers to everyone who is not Maori no matter what race or ethnicity. Being Maori means being tangata whenua, therefore holding a special status that comes with ethnic-based rights and a superior recognition of culture and beliefs. The term Pakeha, is not in itself derogatory, but it does by definition carry a cultural inferiority. For these reasons Pakeha is an inherently racist term.
I am of European heritage, of Welsh and Scottish descent. I don't describe myself as Welsh or Scottish, nor as a Pakeha, but rather as a New Zealander or a Kiwi, because these are inclusive terms. They include everybody who considers New Zealand home, be they of European, Asian, African or American extraction and is also inclusive of Maori.
We need to be country where we celebrate our differences, where our diversity enriches us, where ethnicity matters but does not bestow privilege, where all citizens are united equality under the law. If we continue down the path of separatism and don't unite as New Zealanders we will fail as country.
RICHARD PRINCE, Tauranga
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Nelson Mail 3/5/19)
Contrary to Gary Clover’s spin in (1/5/19) the Treaty of Waitangi does not give Maori ‘exclusive rights’.
In Article One the chiefs cede full sovereignty, Article Two guarantees property rights to all New Zealanders and that Maori landholders grant the Queen the exclusive rights to purchase their lands should they wish to sell, this was to protect Maori from opportunistic land buyers. Article Three granted Maori the rights of British subjects, a huge boon to the many Maori slaves.
The ToW was signed in Nu Tirani (New Zealand) the mythical Aotearoa was not mentioned.
Professor Paul Moon (NZ Herald 29/1/13) says that the ‘Fourth Article’ which emerged in the 1990s is easily debunked as it does not appear in either the Maori or English texts, and that exponents of the "fourth article" who cite conversations held between Hobson and others at Waitangi as somehow constituting binding parts of the Treaty is based on false reasoning and an impoverished understanding of international law.
Mr Clover, by their own admission Maoris arrived here by seacraft and only approximately 500 years before Europeans, further they believe that the spirits of their dead leave Cape Reinga to return to Hawaiki, how can they be ‘indigenous’?
GEOFF PARKER, Whangarei
sites.google.com/site/kiwifrontline/letters-submitted-to-newspapers/unpublished-letters
Ekant Veer, a University of Canterbury lecturer, may well claim the word Pakeha is not an insult, but the problem with the term Pakeha is that it refers to everyone who is not Maori no matter what race or ethnicity. Being Maori means being tangata whenua, therefore holding a special status that comes with ethnic-based rights and a superior recognition of culture and beliefs. The term Pakeha, is not in itself derogatory, but it does by definition carry a cultural inferiority. For these reasons Pakeha is an inherently racist term.
I am of European heritage, of Welsh and Scottish descent. I don't describe myself as Welsh or Scottish, nor as a Pakeha, but rather as a New Zealander or a Kiwi, because these are inclusive terms. They include everybody who considers New Zealand home, be they of European, Asian, African or American extraction and is also inclusive of Maori.
We need to be country where we celebrate our differences, where our diversity enriches us, where ethnicity matters but does not bestow privilege, where all citizens are united equality under the law. If we continue down the path of separatism and don't unite as New Zealanders we will fail as country.
RICHARD PRINCE, Tauranga
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Nelson Mail 3/5/19)
Contrary to Gary Clover’s spin in (1/5/19) the Treaty of Waitangi does not give Maori ‘exclusive rights’.
In Article One the chiefs cede full sovereignty, Article Two guarantees property rights to all New Zealanders and that Maori landholders grant the Queen the exclusive rights to purchase their lands should they wish to sell, this was to protect Maori from opportunistic land buyers. Article Three granted Maori the rights of British subjects, a huge boon to the many Maori slaves.
The ToW was signed in Nu Tirani (New Zealand) the mythical Aotearoa was not mentioned.
Professor Paul Moon (NZ Herald 29/1/13) says that the ‘Fourth Article’ which emerged in the 1990s is easily debunked as it does not appear in either the Maori or English texts, and that exponents of the "fourth article" who cite conversations held between Hobson and others at Waitangi as somehow constituting binding parts of the Treaty is based on false reasoning and an impoverished understanding of international law.
Mr Clover, by their own admission Maoris arrived here by seacraft and only approximately 500 years before Europeans, further they believe that the spirits of their dead leave Cape Reinga to return to Hawaiki, how can they be ‘indigenous’?
GEOFF PARKER, Whangarei
sites.google.com/site/kiwifrontline/letters-submitted-to-newspapers/unpublished-letters