If you look behind and beyond the crowd who comprise the face of Trump (or Trump-like) supporters such as Billy Te Kahika who organized a rally in Wellington in January or the 1,500 Auckland anti-mask protesters a week or so earlier, you'll find a much more surprising number of highly educated New Zealanders who support much of what Trump represents, racism, ultra-right politics, denial of documentary and scientific evidence. Ironically, they also criticise Trump on the US election results and his role in the storming of the Capitol.
They seem to comprise three separate but sometimes interconnected groups. The first is Don Brash and his Hobson Pledge troopers, with connections to the NZ Centre for Political Research and the One NZ Party; the second, the Kiwi Frontline Forum and its associated Democracy Action newsletter; the third, Juana Atkins, Cam Slater and other writers on The BFD blog. Another Then, of course, there are the outliers, the mainstream journalists who share similar views, most vocal of whom is Mike Hosking.
These groups of generally highly educated and well-off ultra-right protagonists could have been protesting about any one of many social issues: poverty and increasing income disparity, hospital waiting lists, no free dental care and the rotten teeth of the poor, the price of housing, low wages, foreign ownership, a capital gains tax, the environment, carbon emissions, cruelty to animals, protecting our wild life, and more. But they have little or nothing at all to say on any of these issues except when they can criticize the Labour government — or unless they can attack Māori who they claim to be of most favoured citizens, despite the multitude of statistics that show otherwise.
Brash's Hobson's Pledge
We know something about Don Brash and his Hobson's Pledge members. Former Reserve Bank governor Brash was leader of the National Party when he delivered his Orewa Speech in January 2004. It addressed the theme of our race relations and in particular the supposedly special status of Māori people. Brash approached the once-taboo subject by advocating 'one rule for all' and ending what he saw as Māori's special privileges. (Wikipedia). A poll taken after the speech showed support for National jumped from 28 to 45% — which says much about some people's views towards Māori.
Hobson's Pledge was formed some years later in 2016 to lobby against "Māori favouritism". William Hobson was our first Governor-General and co-author of the Treaty of Waitangi. It is said he greeted each chief who signed the Treaty with "He iwi tahi tatou" (We are now one people), which Brash took to mean we should all be treated the same.
Brash and his supporters think equality means sameness, and that if everyone is treated the same, they will have been treated equally. Any attempt to correct imbalances is inverse racism. They want to abolish today's official interpretation of the Treaty.
They write of Treaty hysteria, false history, absolving Māori of all guilt and blaming Pākehā for everything wrong, past and present. Further, they claim the Treaty of Waitangi is being re-written by the Treaty of Waitangi Commission and others. They do not distinguish between sovereignty in the English version of the Treaty and rangatiratanga in the Māori version. They say the idea of a Māori-Pākehā "partnership" is a recent invention, and decry the supposedly blatant (pro-Māori) racism with which they say we are awash today.
The titles of the books they have written and advertised for sale on their website tell much about their content and bias:
- Twisting the Treaty
- Tribes, Treaty, Money, Power
- One Treaty, One Nation; Once We Were One
- The Kingiite Rebellion
- Dividing a Nation, the Return of Tikanga
- New Zealand, the Fair Colony
- Free Speech Under Attack
- To All New Zealanders, Are We being Conned by the Treaty Industry?
Most have several authors, including:
- Hugh Barr, former academic, University of Waikato
- Mike Butler, property investor and journalist. This article highlights his views on Māori.
- Reuben Chapple, a list of his books
- Peter Cresswell, Auckland businessman, Principal at Organon Architecture
- David Round. Law lecturer, University of Canterbury. Fields include Constitutional and Administrative Law; Environmental and Planning Law; Treaty Of Waitangi and the Law Relating to Indigenous Peoples.
- Ross Meurant, former police officer, a businessman, National Party MP, founder NZ Conservative Party. This party is based on his right-wing economic philosophy: Sell government assets and reduce government involvement in business.
- Dr Bruce Moon, retired physicist and self-made historian on Māori and the Treaty. Chapters in his “New Zealand - The Fair colony” read, "Ngai Tahu’s crooked path from rags to riches”, “Changing our country’s name by stealth”(presumably from New Zealand to Aotearoa!--ACW), “Some tips about Te Reo”, “The Waitangi Tribunal must go”.
- Dr John Robinson, mathematician, physicist, historian. Books:
When Two Peoples Meet, the New Zealand Experience
Twisting the Treaty, a racial grab for wealth and power
- Andy Oakley, businessman, One NZ Party leader. Christian fundamentalist.
For these people, from different occupational backgrounds but with similar views and political affiliations, the most pressing social issue confronting New Zealand seems to be our race relations, not with a view to correcting imbalances, but with the intent of keeping Māori where he is now, towards the bottom of the heap.
All this under the guise of equality: He iwi tahi tatou, indeed.
Given present social and economic conditions in the country there seems little likelihood that the views of these men could lead to major unrest such as that we're seen in America, but the potential and divisiveness is there if conditions were to worsen. Meanwhile, they merely forment bad feelings and undermine efforts to make New Zealand a better and fairer place for all its citizens.
My next posting on this subject will deal with the NZ Centre for Political Research and the One NZ Party, and possibly with the Kiwi Frontline Forum and Democracy Action, though they could be left to a later post.
-- ACW
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