Writer and former broadcaster Michael Laws, who served as an MP and Mayor, is now a councillor on the Otago Regional Council, and talkback host on The Platform.
Friday, February 28, 2025
Michael Laws questions the selective use of Māori words.
Labels: Michael Laws, Normalising Maori language
Michael Laws questions the selective use of Māori words.
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Writer and former broadcaster Michael Laws, who served as an MP and Mayor, is now a councillor on the Otago Regional Council, and talkback host on The Platform.
Writer and former broadcaster Michael Laws, who served as an MP and Mayor, is now a councillor on the Otago Regional Council, and talkback host on The Platform.
10 comments:
The large telco I work for does exactly this. Pathetic pandering tokenism.
Tokenism is the practice of making only a perfunctory or symbolic effort to do a particular thing.
In other words it is virtue signalling for the sake of being seen to be as you stated Mr. Laws 'down' with it.
It is the same symbolism when you see the gays from the Greens promoting Gaza and by virtue Hamas......It is like they do not understand that gay people in Gaza have a short shelf life.....
Oh dear - entirely agree, but the poor man is just part of the woke stupidity that obtains in so much of the country these days.
well said. I'm totally over it. Our mayor wastes valuable time with her rehearsed Te reo drivel at every occasion. None of the audience understand.
I encounter it from ex-Stuff media people (I was one years ago). Name dropping to demonstrate solidarity with the ''oppressed indigineous'' (who are all part British, Irish or other European). It is a wee virtue signal. It is also a kind of pseudo-academic sneer of superiority and quite snobbish, a bit like saying: Who are you calling pretentious? Moi?
I totally agree and have been saying similar things for a number of years but not so eloquently !
For me, the mixing of te reo in to English is only enhances the latter at the expense of the former. The English language will continue to expand by taking and using other languages- giving English much more texture than it was previously.
I find that the use of te reo without translation is also a means to obscure and it would be much more honest if we had documents in both English and te reo - just like the Canadians do with French
In saying that at least those who do mix in standard Maori with English allow us to identify the racist twats early into the interaction
What infuriates me even more is the substitution of maori words devised post colonisation; ie days of the week, months, numbers. Gratuitous is the word I endeavour to apply wherever I can. And does mahi mean work in general or work maori style? Similarly rangitahi? Similarly whanau? Does it embrace common nuclear families, or does it imply the not uncommon maori style rambling family with a myriad aunts, uncles, cousins, illegitimate children, solo mothers, their hangers on, reapportioned children, country cousin visitors etc?
My colonist WW2 uncle was ahead of his time. He regularly referred to visiting management as rangatira, discussion with as korero, broken objects as puckerued, etc etc
I have great regard for Laws. If he was on TVNZ and/or RNZ their audience problems would be resolved. And the Coalition's vote concerns. But so far I have resisted live watching in real time; otherwise my life would be taken up totally.
I hope he is safe from maori nutters down there in one time civilised Otago, where now even the universityb is subverted.
The maori insurrection and takeover must rank among the most artful the world has ever experienced, if not the leader.
Michael's take on it is spot on. When people do it to us, we do our best to show our displeasure. It will only be by calling out the stupid virtue signalling that it may eventually die a death. We were at a large Council event last Dec where the first 20 minutes was consumed with all manner of Te Reo prayer, babble, singing, haka, etc. before one word of English was uttered. My dear wife in sheer exasperation said quite loudly, for all to hear "For Christ's sake!" - no-one disagreed but there were an awful lot of sheeple present who blithely seemed to just accept the blatantly rude misbehaviour of the Council chucking the rubbish at us when their job is to collect it not to dish it out. Wondering which Council? - Far North District! This Council is imposing Te Reo on its staff, who are "all loving it" (more rubbish that we ratepayers are coughing up for). It is compulsory indoctrination. What is the Local Govt Ministry doing about it,? Sweet beggar all.
Excellent point! The mixing Māori words into English sentences doesn’t show respect to either language. If anything, it galvanises the dislike for Te Reo by people who truly value and respect the English language.
It would help immensely if TV1 news gave away completely its Maori language salutations at the commencement of the 6pm news and sometimes after an ad break. Also the sports presenter Andrew Savile always babbles off with some type of Maori gobbledegook in his introduction. To put it bluntly it succeeds only in making the presenter look and sound utterly stupid.
I catch TV1 news most nights, but with a major difference. I take it later in the evening, off my Sky hard disk, so am able to fast forward through the ads and any items that are of no interest. Dan Corbett the weather presenter sticks to an English language script though he manages to slip in some politically correct pronunciations of Maori language place names.
By the way has anyone out there noticed that TV1 news more often than not has at least one Maori interest story per each broadcast? Might all of this be regarded as some sort of subliminal brainwashing?
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