"It is very easy for us to actually go along with this kind
of stupidity and bigotry. Once you start, it is the thin
end of the wedge" - Dame Sukhi Turner. Graphic by Jeremy
Gordon.
Were Paul Henry's questions on breakfast television
this week just a bit of light-hearted "shock jock"
entertainment or the tip of an ugly racist iceberg?
Mark Price sought a couple of southern opinions
on what was said by the middle-aged, upper income, white-male
broadcaster from the North Shore.
Jill Caldwell sees no great value in debating the rights and
wrongs of Mr Henry's comments.
"I mean it's great that people are recognising that human
potential is greater than defined by how you look on the
outside, and that's fantastic.
"But it's a kind of a pointless argument because the reality
is we do have these two kinds of conflicting forces."
Ms Caldwell, of Brighton, who co-wrote the 2007 book 8
Tribes: The hidden classes of New Zealand considers human
beings to be "innately racist".
"We learn not to be. But we've got all these kind of
unconscious systems which are differentiating people on the
basis of things like the colour of their skin, how old they
are, what sex they are.
"So, all this behaviour, this kind of separating out if you
are the same as me or you are different from me stuff, we're
having to sort of counteract."
She considers where Paul Henry went wrong was in giving in to
those "underlying impulses".
"It doesn't make you a bad person. It makes you an
undisciplined person.
It doesn't make you ignorant but it just makes you someone
who kind of gives way to their underlying inner animal."
She believed there were "principled reasons" for overcoming
the "inner animal" but also practical reasons.
"We are all here on this small island and it's better to get
on with each other than to not.
"Social cohesion is a lot better than social friction and
acknowledging other people's diversity gives you strengths
that you wouldn't otherwise have.
"There is enormous value in not saying you can't sort of work
with a particular person ... because you limit the potential
of your country, your society by discriminating."
8 Tribes divided New Zealand into groups with a
similar "social identity" and did not attempt to define the
"myth" of the typical New Zealander.
It dealt with the way in which New Zealanders formed
"clusters" according to different sets of values.
"So, Paul Henry lives on the North Shore and surrounds
himself with other people who presumably have similar views
and values to him.
A name, residential address, and (preferably residential) telephone number is required from readers who comment on ODT Online. These details will not be visible to site visitors.