New racism

Racism that we deal with nowadays differs to those of the past. People in society nowadays claim to be colourblind and not judge someone by their race. However, it is just a more politically correct way to be racist. In the past, racism would be of biological nature and has developed from one of aggressive prejudice to subtle prejudicial behaviour. New racism operates on essentialism, objectifying national identity and cultural rituals. It does this by setting the anglo culture and nation as the norm and anything else that does not fall into that category gets labelled as ethnic. This is where binary opposites come in and those of ethnic background gets put under "nature" and the white is labelled "cultural".

Even shows like the Cosby Show was successful in portraying Blacks as middle class citizens in America, it conforms them to Anglo standards. In a sense, the show was a justification that Black people can live just as white people can, thus normalising Black culture and assimilating them into white culture. Assimilation requires that people of colour adopt the way of life of the Anglo culture, thereby losing their own cultural and social specificity in a bid to gain white acceptance. Even though Obama has been elected as president, he still operates on the same administration as Bush. He has not changed anything in terms of accountability, transparency or civil obligations. This is an example of eurocentrism which is defined as an approach that takes European values, judgments and beliefs and cultures as normal, natural and ideal. In other words, it makes European Values central and dismisses others to the periphery.

If our world is a global village, then why can't people act like it is? Even though people are not overtly racist or white supremacist, they still uphold the mentality that white culture is the norm.

FILTHY CANNIBALS ?? - WELL, THATS NOT VERY NICE IS IT

My friend was sent these messages on facebook. He has reported them and blocked the sender but they create new profiles and continue to send him hate mail.

Exhibit (A)

dear maori animal
shut your fucking savage mouth you filthy cannibal
the British should have lined you dogs up and executed you
Maoris are fuckin inbred lowlife cunts - and they ARE SCUM
Does that cunt beat you ? Does he make you pay his bills ?
LOL You are a fucking loser - dont even bother trying to respond..
PS Im not muslim - but even if I was - its better than being a cannibal dole bludger

Exhibit (B)

LISTEN COON:
i dont care what comes out of your savage, cannibal mouth. shut up and keep your head down. its bad enough youre fuckin alive - dont fucking rub it in by going around acting tough. your people are crap - NOBODY LIKES MAORI CUNTS !! people are only scared of yall - because you have short tempers and act like babboons now go die you ugly fuck... scum of society. you look like a farkin drugged up loser cunt

Being Maori myself I don’t actually find these comments overtly offensive, mostly because I feel sorry for this person. It still amazes me that one person could hate another so much merely because of their race. It makes me think of Hitler and the Nazis, Mugabe and his violent regime, Stalin and the red square... the list goes on really. How sad. When will the hate stop?

...In reality, probably never.

Perhaps if anyone was disillusioned that racism is no longer alive and still kicking in Aotearoa you could pass on this message to them.

Happy days.

Really….? Oh so that’s who causes all the trouble!

Today I was reading through the New Zealand Herald, there was an article on the recent Riot’s in London and I came across an image of six white policemen arresting one black man. First off to just say this is interesting… but take a look at this image and see how the white policemen are all surrounding him and even choking him, in a sense they are showing complete dominance. I find that this image has a strong sense of Stuart Hall’s ‘White Eye’ concept and how it heavily affects the media. “Why did the media choose this image to depict the riots in London?” It may have started out as a black protest for justice on an alleged racial outcome but I get a strong sense of white people trying to portray a view of dominance and power. “Don’t mess with us because you will lose”. You could even go as far to say that the media is subtly portraying whites as the dominant race.