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Wednesday, September 18, 2024

Suze: Why This Race-Fuelled Rhetoric?


My personal response to having te reo shoved up my nose is to reject it altogether.

It’s OK for the Waitangi Tribunal, Māori activists and the previous Labour Government to force us into Māori separatism but anyone not in favour will have their arguments labelled race-fuelled rhetoric.

Winston Peters’ was the undeserved recipient of that label in the House last week.

Greens Co-Leader Chloe Swarbrick asked Winston Peters “…does he consider it constructive to open a six-month select committee process on the Treaty Principles Bill when experts such as Dayle Takitimu have said it is “stirring up race-fuelled rhetoric in this country”?

This led to a short discussion about who is the country’s current expert on the Treaty. According to Tākuta Ferris that would be Dayle Takitimu. Anyone know who she is? I didn’t either, but Google tells me she’s a Gisborne-based Māori activist. No surprises there. (See: Hansard, NZ Parliament)

Another favourite divider of the country is the surreptitious infliction on te reo on us, particularly in education. I call it bullying.

Why should we adopt it? Reasons given by te reo advocates include:

1. Protect and revitalise Māori culture;

2. Key part of Māori identity;

3. Unify Māori;

4. Unify the nation;

5. Improve relationships between the Crown and Māori.

I argue we could achieve all the above points without te reo.

But there’s a better reason for te reo, and it’s one they won’t talk about because it amounts to bullying: te reo is used as a political tool wielded by activists on their opponents. Don’t debate – just bash your opponents over the head.

The Greens are riding the te reo horse after their previous ride dropped dead (that would be man-made climate change) but speak out against them and your arguments are ‘race-fuelled rhetoric’.

If politicians did what they are appointed to do, New Zealanders would have been asked before having te reo foisted on them.

I am fed up to the eyeballs with being told how to think!

A clear mandate was given at the last election to the coalition Government to mothball Māori separatism, remove reference to the Treaty Principles from legislation and erase their intrusion into every element of NZ life.

While the coalition Government drags its heels on reversing separatism, the Greens ride that horse for all it’s worth, which means te reo entrenchment.

As Te Wiki o te Reo Māori approaches, the government is considering deprioritising teaching te reo Māori in our schools.

“Te Reo Māori is a taonga unique to Aotearoa we must protect and empower at all costs,” says the Green Party’s Education spokesperson, Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan.

“Our indigenous language provides us all with an opportunity to connect and engage with the very essence of Aotearoa and deepen our understanding of Te Ao Māori. An Aotearoa that upholds and embraces Te Tiriti is one that allows te reo to flourish.

Preschools are fairly writhing with te reo, with questionable success, illustrated by the following tale.

“What are you doing?” said a family member to my four year old granddaughter.

She looked up from her drawing and answered “Mahi”.

“What’s that?” the family member asked.

My granddaughter shrugged her shoulders, she didn’t know.

“Work” the family member tells her “Why don’t you just say ‘work’?”

My granddaughter mulls this over saying out loud “Work, it’s work” as she continues drawing.

I think NZ has gone nuts: it’s the only explanation.

I’m tired of te reo: it’s glaring down from every wall of my local library, jumping off media pages (the same idiots who changed New Zealand’s name to Aotearoa without public consultation or consent) and still evident in tardy government departments, despite them being told to cease and desist.

My personal response to having te reo shoved up my nose is to reject it altogether. I won’t learn it, speak it or acknowledge people who speak te reo to me.

Make te reo unsustainable by refusing to succumb. Let’s see how the activists and silly afficionados like that!

Suze sees herself as a New Zealander whose heritage shaped but does not define, and believes unless we protect our rights and freedoms they will be taken off us by a few powerful people. This article was first published HERE

11 comments:

anonymous said...

Will NZers be " nuts enough" to accept the radical Maori pressure for ethnocracy to replace democracy ? Or will they come to their senses in time? This is now the key question - and the clock is ticking.

Anonymous said...

Good idea, ignore it and it will go away. We need to stop giving it oxygen and by the way, coalition, get off your backsides and make English an official language of NZ in the statutes, it will only take five minutes and we will thank you.

Anonymous said...

Same for the same reasons. I dont like being told what to do either.

Anonymous said...

“While the coalition Government drags its heels on reversing separatism”.
Yes, and by design, as it was the corporate STATE that started this deliberate apartheid agenda and the STATE will carry on fulfilling this divisive agenda no matter what wing of the uni-party circus is playing at being in charge.

Basil Walker said...

Just shut off TVOne and rid yourself of the maori gabble . Heaven knows what tourists must think of our TV news He Fye aki neigh???

Allen Heath said...

Their language, their problem. If it is so important for this Neolithic language to be preserved as I am sick and tired of hearing, then let culture to whom it belongs deal with it, and leave the rest of us in peace. I am definitely with Suze on this one and just ignore any use or mention of the Maori language. It has no relevance for me, as far as I'm concerned, and has only one redeeming feature; it makes reading the cringeworthy newspapers a very brief exercise as I skip most of the content.

Doug Longmire said...

Well said, Suze.
As many polls have shown - a large majority of New Zealanders (80%) feel the same as you.
Personally, my position is this:-
I am not deaf
I am not Maori
I am not blind
I am not Chinese
There, I do not use sign language, Māori, braille or Mandarin.
However I fully accept and respect that some people need or prefer to use these languages.
All I ask is that I do not have any of these forced upon me.

Ellen said...

It is not doing Maori any service to report any ill-thought 'expertise' as if it had any fact or logic behind it. This 'debate ' is demeaning to all. Maori culture had reached its zenith when the British arrived, as everything thereafter became inextricably mixed with the imports. I think it would be more respectful to focus on retention of the original - so many of the noisiest are lamentably ignorant of their own history, they make it a laughing stock.

anonymous said...

PS The madness has captured Auckland University which will install a compulsory Maori culture course for all degrees. Now like a seminary or a madrasa - not a university.
The gravity of this madness should not be underestimated.

Anonymous said...

I feel that since the Coalition Govt got in we’re being subjected to more Maori (and mostly made up) language. It used to just be greetings, now we’re being subjected to it being the first thing you hear from automated voices for pretty much all service providers, as well as thrown at random into broadcasting, adverts & woke podcasters…even when they’re talking about completely unrelated topics such as getting older! Susan Devoy’s commentary on this stuff pretty much sums up the wokesters.

It is nuts. It is turning our country into a bunch of pigeon-speaking idiots where those, for whom English is not their first language, actually speak it better.

Worse, it makes many of us actually hate it when, before it was being rammed down our throats, we used to love it.

Maori has no relevance to anyone other than those who wish to speak it. This insanity has to stop.

Anonymous said...

Thats why I left New Zealand 1 year ago. Maori this Maori that. Had enough of it.