Written By: - Date published: 10:43 am, October 22nd, 2008 - 78 comments
Categories: activism -
Tags: patu
There’s been a bit of fuss about the ’81 tour lately and whether it is pertinent to today’s politics. For years now I’ve suggested to those too young to remember the tour to watch Patu because it provides a visceral sense of just how important the tour was as a formative political event and it captures the sense of near-civil war that people on both sides of the divide felt at the time.
Now, thanks to the wonders of the interweb and the vision of NZ on Screen, you don’t have to hunt Patu out at the Aro Street video store or from the local university archive.
You can watch Patu online here, and I challenge anyone to watch it and claim the tour is no longer important.
Hat tip: Russell Brown
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Felix:
Support the Police, I doubt you or I could last one day in the job.
Brett, I do support the police. When I was younger I could have done the job, but it isn’t one I’m particularly interested in. Their systems (computer, people, and management) look archaic from the outside.
However supporting them blindly is just outright daft. The police partially separate themselves from the rest of society in their institutional nature. Now that is a good thing in that they aren’t the playthings of political forces (regardless how much the clown or hooten thinks otherwise). However it does mean that they have to reform themselves internally as the society they serve changes.
The police need external comment to help it reform itself. Generally the type of comment in the msm hasn’t useful for a while because of their advertising driven headline obsession. Apart from that and the little bit of an interface that they have to the police minister, they appear to get little structured external comment about their performance and flaws.
That is the underlying flaw in the polices institutional model, it allows the culture in the police to move a long way from the rest of society. It is what leads to problems like the Louise Nichols and others saga, to the continuing questioning about their handling of protest groups and industrial relations, to questions about operational priorities like south auckland and incis, etc. Each of those in turn causes alienation and a drop in the required support levels that the police depend upon to do their job.
It is noticeable when the police get bad msm headline issues these days, that there are groups related to the issue that don’t raise a finger to defend them or to point out that it is an aberration. In fact they will often put the boot in as being the only way that change can occur in the institution of the police. It isn’t a particularly efficient way of getting change, but it is really the only one that seems to work.
Now that is a problem.
My brother was in red squad and is adament that it was incidents like that of Joe Bloggers family:
Officer 1 – Served entire campaign
x2 crush vertebra after being stomped
x1 broken nose
x3 broken rib
x1 eye injured
Result: Has required massive amounts of surgery especially in recent years as age has caught (about 12 lots so far and another scheduled for Jan), has to wear an eye patch.. Likely to be medically discharged over the next 12 months.
Officer 2 – was injured fairly early on (2 match I think)
Damaged knees after being struck with steel pipe.
- Medically discharged mid 80′s
And things like watching his best mate being mauled by a group of protestors at the second game, coming out with a broken nose, cheek bone, ribs & lacerations.
This happened in the early scirmishes and forced police to take the hard line action. He also asserts that they were there to stop the confrontation of protestors with rugby supporters who were just as passionate and numbered many times more. They were in his words basically trying to protect the protestors from the supportes but where being used as a vehicle by politicians and some high ranking police officers with political ambitions. Coupled with a subversive element in the protestors instigating violence as well it was a clash that was imminent just from day 1.
Just another veiw of the big picture!!!
akldnut…how we do know you are telling the truth and why are you cutting and pasting someone elses post?
you are just spamming in my opinion
Akldnut: There is no question that the violent parts of the protests were violent. As has been pointed out above there were people who really wanted to have a go at the police. Of course you’d have to ask yourself why there was such a need by parts of society to want to do that type of rumble. From what I saw when I was younger was that the level of racism in the police in those days would drive anyone of the wrong colour to want to hammer the police.
However the people prepared to be violent were a minority amongst the protesters. At the most, probably less than a quarter of them.
The real question I have about the tour, especially in that last test, was why the police felt the need to fall upon the peaceful protesters and baton the crap out of them. Were they just soft targets to vent frustration on?
Almost 30 years on those incidents still color the way a lot of people view the police, and consequently the level of support that they receive. The problem for the police is that often the people who do get involved in groups pushing for social change (as milo implicitly pointed out above) are our idealists and often the best and brightest of their generations. What they see the police doing at age 20 will affect the viewpoint of them as they move into public society, and will affect the level of support that they give the police 30 years later.
BTW: You can just link to other comments (right-click on the date and copy the link location). There is no need to copy-paste them.
Brett the trouble is that if I start “supporting” people on the basis that they can do something that I probably couldn’t, then I’d likely find myself “supporting” all sorts of people whose jobs I couldn’t do:
Commercial whalers (because I get seasick)
Shortland Street cast members (because I have a sense of dignity)
Robbie Williams (because I lack his looks and charm. And I have a sense of dignity)
Iprent: October 23, 2008 at 9:25 am. Does the date-copy-paste work for a Mac- no right button? If not anyone know how?
Randal – I have no reason to lie,nothing to gain whatsoever. I’m just sorry that I came into this at such a late stage. (because I’ve just spent the last 3 days pamphlet dropping in West Auckland) I was Living in Aus at the time and was saddened and sickened by what was happening to my people. I am BTW Maori as is my brother.
I repeat nothing to gain whatsoever.
I was cutting and pasting because I didn’t know how to link, not spamming. (Thanks Iprent)
I was not trying to vindicate what happened, just show you that there was another side to see in the big picture and that not all cops were assholes (although it may have seemed that way) that some were there for good, to actually protect and serve. Unfortunately as with the protestors there were some real cowboys as well.(to say the least)
I agree there was a level of racism in the force during that period.
BTW heres something to ponder. Did you know that the Govt back then pulled all the Maori and Pacifica cops through-out the country to remove the Maori at Bastion Point so the demonstrators could not scream the race card at the front line cops. (My Brother was there also)
Well gotta go now deliver some more pamhlets