The Maori Party would be amongst the strongest proponents of te reo. But now Tariana Turia is very angry about prisons having Maori names because of the negative connotations associated with these institutions.
"We know too, of the extreme objection that mana whenua took in the process of establishing a name for the Waikato based prison, at Spring Hill, early last year" said Mrs Turia. "Iwi had objected to the name, Puke Puna as they did not want Maori culture associated with the facility" recalled Mrs Turia.
"And yet still the Department persists with a whole new vocabulary of Maori names for their jails: Arohata (Tawa), Te Piriti, Te Wairere, Te Mahinga (Paremoremo), Kia Marama (Rolleston), Te Hikoinga, Rangipo (Tongariro), Kareo (Youth unit at Northland); and I'm sure there's plenty more where they come from" said Mrs Turia.
"Then we have all of the elaborately named programmes, such as 'Te Wairua o Nga Tangata (community probation programme) or even the expensive branding exercise to create a Maori sub-title for the Department".
"Is it meant to seduce us all into thinking these places are actually good for Maori, by virtue of having a Maori subtitle?" asked Mrs Turia.
Can anybody make any sense of her outrage?
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6 comments:
I have the same feelings about Inland Revenue ;)
Can anybody make any sense of her outrage?
I can make laughter out of it, if that's any good to you?
Tariana Turia's brain is significantly disconnected from reality. She believes in, and listens to "ghosts", and believes that ethnicity is something real that objectively affects who people are and what they do.
The sense to make from it is that it is the ravings of a deranged woman - and she could yet be a Cabinet Minister under a National led government one day.
She's outraged at non-Maori giving Maori names to non-Maori institutions. It's pretty obvious and quite understandable.
"non-Maori institutions"?
They are owned by the state, which includes Maori.
So if Maori are part owners, and iwi don't want them to be called by Maori names, but they're called by them anyway, wouldn't that bug you a little if you were Maori?
They may be partly owned by Maori under our law, but culturally... well perhaps you should ask someone who knows more about Maori culture than I.
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