You may well think the same about this latest Stuff article from which I've quoted parts, with comments. But if you pay close attention to what the early missionaries said about Māori fathers, consider the effects of colonisation and the nonsense about "warrior genes," and heed the stories of the fathers interviewed, you could well have your own Damascus moment. Click here to read the full article.
Pre-colonial Aotearoa
"In pre-colonial Aotearoa Māori society was not patriarchal, and men and women had complementary roles. Domestic violence was uncommon, and anyone who caused harm to a woman or child would be dealt with swiftly by the tribe. As Professor Kuni Jenkins and Helen Harte write in their Children’s Commissioner report: 'The most observed practice was shared and loving parenting.'”
"Records from early settlers about 18th and 19th century Māori family life reveal men who wrapped their babies in blankets, sang them oriori or lullabies, and taught them with games and waiata.
'One of the finest traits I have noticed in the New Zealanders is that of parental love; the men appear chiefly to nurse their children, and are generally to be seen with one on their back covered up under their mats, the little things appear likewise sensible of their fathers’ love for they seem principally to cling to them,'” missionary Richard Taylor wrote in 1839.
A year later, the Rev. Samuel Marsden, observed : “I saw no quarrelling while I was there. They are kind to their women and children. I never observed either with a mark of violence upon them, nor did I ever see a child struck.”
And in 1841, author Joel Polack wrote: "The New Zealand father is devotedly fond of his children, they are his pride, his boast, and peculiar delight; he generally bears the burden of carrying them continually within his mat.”
Pākehā men were surprised — and even annoyed — to see how Māori treated their children, at times considering them too indulgent. Theirs was not a seen-but-not-heard culture. Māori kids were taken everywhere from a young age, including to councils of war, and even expected to ask questions.
Here’s Polack again: 'The children are seldom or never punished; which, consequently, causes them to commit so many annoying tricks, that continually renders them [from a Pākehā perspective] deserving of a sound, wholesome castigation.”
So what went wrong?
Generally, from the 1800s onwards, Māori life began to be torn apart through tribal conflicts, land wars and colonisation. Communal living was replaced with the nuclear family and new, Western models of gender roles encouraged male dominance. The uprooting of whānau, hapū and iwi through dubious land sales and confiscations, urbanisation, assimilation policies and removal of Māori children by the state led to generations becoming dislocated from the nurturing traditions of the past.
"At every economic downturn," writes University of Waikato Professor Brendan Hokowhitu in Educating Jake: A geneology of Māori masculinity, "Māori men were the first to lose their jobs, throwing many who had moved to the city for employment into lives of poverty. Under-educated young Māori men were disenfranchised, penniless, and some turned to gangs or crime ... This has created an often dysfunctional urban masculine culture … and largely debilitated Māori men from functioning as equals in society.”
Consider also — the effects of the NZ government's policies:
"The Native School system, started in 1867, was begun to educate Māori. While Māori had a strong desire to learn, it was led by a stream of superintendents who balked at teaching the “dark races,” anything academic. This was justified as common sense by the state. “The natural genius of the Māori in the direction of manual skills and his natural interest in concrete, would appear to furnish the earliest key to the development of his intelligence,” Inspector of Native Schools James Pope said, in 1906." **
Neglect or assimilation ("What the shark said to the kahawai") and not integration (and the preservation of Māoritanga) was government's official and unofficial policy from the 1840s until well into the 1960s, witness the 1961 Hunn Report where in State housing areas Māori were "pepperpotted, at a ratio of 1:5 among Pākehā to avoid a Māori slum and help them to learn from Pākehā.
Think also of the very mixed effects of Alan Duff''s Once were Warriors which was the first time that a major movie centred on Māori. "It was very positive in the sense that it bought domestic violence and the urban Māori story to the forefront,” says Brendan Hokowhitu, father of four and Waikato University professor of Māori and Indigenous studies.
"But no doubt, for many, it reinforced stereotypes of Māori.
"Still, now, the main way we see Māori men — and Māori fathers — presented in the media is as violent, criminals, sexual predators, and child abusers. These images become normalised, and internalised.
"The saddest part? Māori start to believe it, too."
There were also media reports of academic research, later qualified and explained, which purported Māori men were born with a "warrior gene" that caused them to be violent towards women and children!
The statistics are well known: "Māori men today make up more than half of all prisoners, despite being 16.5 per cent of the population. Māori women and children are twice as likely as Pākehā to be victims of domestic violence. Māori babies are taken more frequently by the state, young men are more likely to be homeless, drop out of school or take their own lives , and adults die earlier and in poorer health.
"Too many people see these statistics as deficiencies of race and Māori culture, says Prof. Hokowhitu.
“Māori do not have the latitude the rest of the population enjoys. When a Pākehā dad does an offence, you just write him off as an individual. When it’s Māori or Pacific, we tend to describe the culture as the cause."
In the Stuff interview, Lyall Te Ohu, a father of a six and one year old, says he gets frustrated with negative portrayals of Māori.
“If people’s views are that Māori dads are violent and absent and would rather spend their money on bourbon and cigarettes, of course you can find examples of that.
But if you go to any sports event you can find loads of Māori and Pacific Island parents and fathers who are pushing hard to be great examples for their children, and to lead their children into a positive way of life.”
Most Māori fathers are like most Pākehā fathers. They don't always get it right but they try their best for their children.
Unfortunately, it is not always shown like this in the media. Which makes it worse. Thank you, Stuff, for the article
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**I taught at Otaki College in the late 1960s. The Form 3 entrance class was streamed. For their optional subjects 3A and 3B students mainly took academic subjects, while 3C took domestic science and woodwork. There were a few Maori students in 3B but almost all were in 3C. I wonder what the situation is today.
-- ACW
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