Post by Kiwi Frontline on Feb 25, 2016 16:21:45 GMT 12
The Tears of Papatuanuku
I note with some relief that nowhere in this list (see link below), anyway, is the suggestion made that Maori are entitled to water because when in the past they sold land they nevertheless did not sell the water flowing over it. I have heard that argument raised elsewhere, though; and to it I would make a very simple reply. It is, mutatis mutandis, the same reply used by the Court of Appeal in the 1963 Ninety Mile Beach case. (That case was of course overruled by a later Court of Appeal embarking on its own disgraceful political adventure in the Ngati Apa case, which began the whole foreshore and seabed controversy.) But in 1963, when the suggestion was made that the foreshore and seabed might have Maori owners different from the owners of the Maori land above the high tide mark, the simple question was asked ~ where did those owners go when the tide came in? And in the same way, if there is a suggestion that land was sold, but not water (a suggestion which surely cuts against that holistic Maori worldview of everything being one, and connected) the answer can surely be made ~ how was access to that water to be got when the land had been alienated?
So all in all, the arguments of the Waitangi Tribunal are rubbish ~ a mixture of uncritical gullibility, mumbo-jumbo, racism and illogic, all fortified by inbuilt bias. These twelve ‘indicia’ are stupid. They establish beyond reasonable doubt the intellectual bankruptcy of the Tribunal. Yet this body of highly-paid Maori lobbyists masquerading as an impartial tribunal considers them adequate arguments. They have a low opinion of our intelligence; they obviously think it is on a par with their own……
Read David Round's amusing yet serious NZCPR guest commentary here > www.nzcpr.com/the-tears-of-papatuanuku/
I note with some relief that nowhere in this list (see link below), anyway, is the suggestion made that Maori are entitled to water because when in the past they sold land they nevertheless did not sell the water flowing over it. I have heard that argument raised elsewhere, though; and to it I would make a very simple reply. It is, mutatis mutandis, the same reply used by the Court of Appeal in the 1963 Ninety Mile Beach case. (That case was of course overruled by a later Court of Appeal embarking on its own disgraceful political adventure in the Ngati Apa case, which began the whole foreshore and seabed controversy.) But in 1963, when the suggestion was made that the foreshore and seabed might have Maori owners different from the owners of the Maori land above the high tide mark, the simple question was asked ~ where did those owners go when the tide came in? And in the same way, if there is a suggestion that land was sold, but not water (a suggestion which surely cuts against that holistic Maori worldview of everything being one, and connected) the answer can surely be made ~ how was access to that water to be got when the land had been alienated?
So all in all, the arguments of the Waitangi Tribunal are rubbish ~ a mixture of uncritical gullibility, mumbo-jumbo, racism and illogic, all fortified by inbuilt bias. These twelve ‘indicia’ are stupid. They establish beyond reasonable doubt the intellectual bankruptcy of the Tribunal. Yet this body of highly-paid Maori lobbyists masquerading as an impartial tribunal considers them adequate arguments. They have a low opinion of our intelligence; they obviously think it is on a par with their own……
Read David Round's amusing yet serious NZCPR guest commentary here > www.nzcpr.com/the-tears-of-papatuanuku/