The country that white supremacy made

"Two wongs don't make a white"

To believe that racism is the property of the morally corrupt, rather than the property of liberal democracy itself, is comforting to those who think racism is an individual failing. If racism is reduced to a private act – one where the racist carries the shame, not his or her enabler – then there is no need to consider, let alone admit, what makes calculated acts of racism acceptable. Thus Colin Craig, Jamie Whyte, Steven Gibson and Winston Peters are not seen as products of our impoverished political culture – one where racism is strategy – but merely lone bigots. 

But the racism of the individual can’t be separated from the society that supports it. When we offer a moral account of racism while ignoring a political analysis of racism we sanction the more insidious form. Racism is part of our ancestral memory and when something is so embedded in the political culture - as racism is - then the discourse is going to reflect it. Thus Colin Craig, Jamie Whyte, Steven Gibson and Winston Peters are more than just morally corrupt individuals; they’re the descendants of an old tradition – political racism. This is where politicians articulate private racism for public consumption. 

The practice persists because racism is foundational. Our country was built on the theft and exploitation of indigenous land. While New Zealand still wears the scars of settler colonialism, Māori aren’t the only victims of racism in our little settler colony. There is a long and loud history of anti-Asian racism and underhanded anti-Semitism. Racism designed to create the perception that the majority is under ideological and demographic siege. From Jewish bankers to Chinese investors, people of colour are “issues” to win. 

The history of Māori bashing is well known and the practice itself is not exhausted, but the history of anti-Asian racism and anti-Semitism is less known. Asian peoples generally and the Chinese in particular have always been at the hard edge of New Zealand racism. Winston Peters knows as much and is prepared to exploit that history every three years. Political racism is a sort of low-grade fever that flares up every election and puts us – the body politic – at risk. 

They say "investor" or "foreign buyer" but what they mean is "of colour" with a "funny accent"
— Duckie (@DuckieMcDuck) August 11, 2014

Not that this is particularly unusual. The political class seeds and exploits fear of the Asian invasion across the world. Our parochial politicians in the 19th century were familiar with the political benefits of anti-Asian racism and in 1881 Parliament passed the Chinese Immigrants Act. The act imposed a poll tax of 10 pounds on new immigrants from China. In 1896 the tax was increased tenfold and in 1899, in an effort to further restrict “undesirable” Chinese, Parliament imposed an education test on immigrants without British or Irish parentage. When the Old Age Pensions Act was passed in 1898, Asians were excluded (even if they were citizens). All of this happened while we maintained an almost open border policy for migrants from Western Europe and, by the standards of the time, were cultivating the roots of a universal welfare state. 

It’s this ugly history that Winston Peter’s is channeling. Settler colonies work through replacement. It would seem the unspoken fear is the pattern of replacement will reverse and the next cycle, bound to happen by 2050, will be one of the non-white kind. Winston knows it, the audience fears it. Thus “two Wongs don’t make a white” was not an off the cuff and off colour joke, it was a political tactic. Winston knew it would be reported without context and those for whom it was designed would think that it refers to immigration. Racism, then, not only lives in the hearts of particularly cynical individuals – like Winston - but it lives in the heart of our society – with the voters. 

Steven Gibson is part of the same grubby tradition. Whether he knew the stigma behind Shylock or not – he must have, why use a notorious Jewish lender to describe another Jewish banker unless one intended to make a racialised slur? – ignorance is no excuse. Although there might be comparatively little organised anti-Semitism in New Zealand –meaning little statutory discrimination – social attitudes are as toxic here as anywhere. Former Premier Julius Vogel, a practising Jew, had to endure regular cracks at his faith while the political cartoonists of the day were not afraid of deploying Jewish stereotypes. The fact that Vogel served as Treasurer was seen as particularly funny (Jewish Bankers!). The echoes with Key are uncanny. From defaced billboard depicting an orthodox Jew to political cartoons where the cartoonist draws, what seems to be, a hook nose. Like Winston, we should not view Gibson as a lone fool, but a product of our political culture. One where racism is an acceptable political strategy and tactic. The same must be said of Colin Craig and Jamie Whyte too. Each is indulging in a sort of ritualistic racism. Racism is a virus looking for host. Essentially formless, but always persistent. 

Ok Steven Gibson, stop talking now, you're making it worse. "I'm not quite sure what Merchant of Venice is about... a bad deal?"
— Graham Cameron (@mvlgrimace) August 11, 2014

But where to from here? How do we change the political culture? Some suggest that racism is not long for this earth. In other words, we should wait for the racists to just die out. The offensiveness of that suggestion aside, people said this in the 60s too. Yet the thing about racism – like settler colonialism – is that it works through replacement. It’s protean. The leopard really can change its spots. 

The assumption is that history is linear – from ignorance to enlightenment. It’s true that we’re closer to racial justice than we were, say, a century ago, but here’s the paradox: while we might be more diverse, more tolerant and more committed to racial justice than our ancestors, we’re committed to an ideology that makes racial justice impossible – colorblindness. 

That is, where the way to solve the “race problem” is to pretend the problems – like inequality or closed borders – aren’t racialised. Thus measures to reduce racial inequality are, according to the colourblind advocates, racist. As one wag put it, “the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race”. 

This is the ideology that Brash, Craig, Whyte and (I’m willing to bet) at least half of the country are committed to. Racism is seen as a matter of legal distinctions, not unfair outcomes. Where many think that if we remove race from, say, legislation then the “race problem” is solved. It’s not. Racism can’t be reduced to mere distinctions in legislation, policy or social settings. If it could be then measures to correct racial inequality - like the Māori Representation Act - are as racist as the process that necessitated them – that is, settler colonialism. 

Unlike many people of colour – and some movements of the left – just as many young people reject a political analysis of racism. Ours is a moral account of racism. Racism is Bad, thus we must remove race. When one thinks like this it’s then possible to claim that we’ve built a post-racial society. We really haven’t, though. It takes a determined effort in self-deception to think that, say, if we just remove Māori placements in university then, by magic, racism disappears. If we stop talking about race, racism disappears. 

The reasoning is seductive, but a deception. Racism , as Gary Younge put it, is “discrimination planted by history, nourished by politics and nurtured by economics, in which some groups face endemic disadvantage”. Thus racism is not so morally bad that we should never talk about it, rather it is too important that we can’t afford not to. As another wag put it, “the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to speak openly and candidly on the subject of race”. 

Thus the way to confront the racism of Colin Craig, Jamie Whyte, Steven Gibson and Winston Peters is not to pretend that they are lone wolves feeding off of a dying voter base, the way to confront racism is to take it out of the private domain and put it in public. Pretending race doesn’t exist solves nothing, the solution is where people of colour tackle the spoken and unspoken bigotries. It is where we take the opportunities politicians create and lead the discussion. Don’t let well-meaning liberals or anyone else wish it away - that only creates more seething resentment (on both sides) - we need to establish that, actually: race matters. Let's not stop talking about it.  

Anne Tolley: an agent of colourblind racism?

Green co-leader Metiria Turei: stereotyped and slandered.

From Stuff.co.nz:

Tolley said she was insulted by Green Party claims that she was out of touch. 

"I'm actually insulted to be lectured about how out of touch I am with average New Zealand by a list MP who has no constituents, lives in a castle and comes to the House in $2000 designer jackets and tells me I'm out of touch," Tolley said. 

It is not the first time National MPs have attacked Turei's choice of clothing. Justice Minister Judith Collins said last year on Twitter that a speech by Turei was "vile, wrong and ugly, just like her jacket today".

It’s easy to think that racism is an act that belonged to other people, in another time, in another place. Except it isn’t. And it never was.

Some New Zealanders are aware of the realities of the racial hierarchy: the wealth gap; the employment gap; the apprehension, prosecution and conviction gap. But less New Zealanders appreciate the language of racism. Not the language of niggers, kikes and kaffirs. But of "semantic moves" - of coded insults and racist premises.

We live in the age of racism without racists. Racism comes with its own stigma. People want to avoid that. But rather than change their behaviour, society has invented rhetorical parachutes. Suddenly racism can’t exist without racial words. Racism becomes the use of "Wogistan", but not the history and ideas that sustain it.

Tolley didn’t need to mention race. Her attack is loaded with social, political and racial assumptions. The unspoken context is that Metiria, a Maori woman who lives well and dresses better, is acting out of turn and out of step with her community. How can she be in touch with her community when she isn’t living like them? The premise is that a Maori woman cannot dress well and claim to represent her people. Because Maori live exclusively in poverty, amirite.

But Tolley can. She dresses like her community, lives with them and – it seems – perpetuates their prejudices. The premise is that her community is well off and that gives her the right to live well, dress well and hold power. Tolley is constructing a self-serving stereotype. A world of (literally) black and white where binary assumptions can be made about how racial communities live.

Metiria explains further:

"I think they seem to think it is all right for them to wear perfectly good suits for their professional job but that a Maori woman from a working-class background is not entitled to do the same. I think it is pure racism." 

Ask how the attack was racist, Turei said she shopped at the same place some of her opponents did. 

"They do not think that a professional Maori woman from a working-class background should be able to wear good suits to work," she said. 

"I buy my clothes from some of the same shops they do. I think they find that they can't cope with that and I think it's because I'm a Maori woman from a working-class background."

The common refrain is Tolley didn't invoke racial terms, ipso facto, she isn't racist. But it takes a determined effort in self-deception to strip Tolley’s remarks of their racial context. Metiria doesn't conform to Tolley's idea of what and who Maori should be, therefore Metiria is out of touch with her community. That's racial stereptyping. That's colourblind racism.

A hijacked version of colourblindness has become the dominant racial ideology in New Zealand (and across the west). Because of that most New Zealanders are hyper-attuned to racialism. But what they refuse to acknowledge is when racial stereotypes – stripped of their overtly racial words – are projected onto individuals, situations and communities. Like, say, when the assumption of Maori poverty is projected onto a Maori politician.

There are several comparisons: when people discuss the warrior gene it can be framed as “science” and not a narrative used to explain inherent Maori criminality and violence. Welfarism can be used as morse code - a way to talk about Maori dependency without explicitly racialising the prejudice. Positive discrimination can be used to attack the growth of the Maori worldview in universities. The subtext is clear. It's colourblind racism.

If there's no such thing as race - "I don't see in colour" - there can be no such thing as racial disadvantage. We're all a lump of humanity that cannot be distinguished. But this sort of colourblind racism is self-serving. It preserves the status quo and ignores why some people are better off than others. Where the colourblind ideologies of liberalism aimed to control for prejudice in society, the colourblind ideologies dominant today work to validate prejudice.

Master Republican strategist Lee Atwater (father of the Southern Strategy) explains how racial discourse had to change (and did):

“You start out in 1954 by saying, “Nigger, nigger, nigger.” By 1968 you can’t say “nigger”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Nigger, nigger.”

Racial ideologies are highly contested. Rejecting colourblind racism is a political struggle. Colourblind racism seeks to silence multicultural pluralism and, instead, celebrate a kind of monocultural nationalism that can't include non-conformists. That serves the status quo. Racial progress is stalled. We can't allow the racists to create their imaginary future. And calling Tolley on her (conscious or unconscious) racism is part of that.