November 16, 2006

White New Zealanders, have you ever stopped to ask yourself "Who am I?", "What is my identity?", "What defines who I am?", "What words and symbols do I feel comfortable associating with myself?". For White New Zealanders, those can be hard questions to answer sometimes. What is the basis of our identity? What does "Pakeha" mean? Does it just mean "White person living in New Zealand"? Anything else? Anything special about that anyway? What symbols do we have? What do we call ourselves?
posted by Mr. Knickerbocker 18 years ago
  • Kiwi The word you're looking for is Kiwi
  • Yes, and we hate intellectual fuckers like you. Mr. Knickerbocker. Just keep your head down or the tall poppy syndrome will deal with you.
  • "Yes, and we hate intellectual..." SLAP Shut the fuck up, idiot.
  • Yup, that's the typical Kiwi attitude.
  • *jaw drop*
  • He throws out Kiwi right away, doesn't exactly explain why. But he's not really looking for the right word, he's looking for the right flag. I don't know what to think of his ideas he comes up with. I thought he was like the time cube guy at first, but reading his reasoning I'm not as convinced he's crazy. And what are you on about zqwerty?
  • The swastika had indeed been a fairly benign symbol for centuries before it was appropriated by the Nazis but one suspects that Mr. enzedblue has ulterior motives. Although he does seem to like bananas, which should count for something around here.
  • Poor guy, having no sense of identity. I don't know how he thinks we (whoever "we" would be in this case) are supposed to ignore the negative connotations of the swastika born of the 20th century. It's not that simple. There is a select group in NZ that thinks white NZers have no cultural identity to speak of and that we need to create one. They're called the New Zealand National Front.
  • I don't see a problem with continuing to calling myself a Canadian Kiwi =(, being white or otherwise. In fact, I don't see a reason for any differentiation at all.
  • On the California census and on my California driver's license I put myself down as "Pacific Islander" but that was mostly for shits and giggles and because I prefer "caucasian" or "european" to the standard "white" option.
  • Is it only majorities that get their own flag?
  • When I was coming to NZ in 1973 people said to me watch out for the cults, and they were right, the place is full of religious nutters and cults.
  • Excuse me, are you the New Zealand National Front? Fuck off! We're the National Front of New Zealand! If you want to join you have to really hate Australians. Do you really hate Australians?
  • This site is proof that neo nazis should not be allowed access to hallucinogenics.
  • I assumed the site was an attempt at satire.
  • *checks irony module. goes to look for new batteries.*
  • He throws out Kiwi right away, doesn't exactly explain why. Because kiwi birds are flightless, ya dink. Did you not know that?
  • Excuse me, are you the New Zealand National Front? Fuck off! We're the National Front of New Zealand! If you want to join you have to really hate Australians. Do you really hate Australians? What have the Australians done for us... besides the roads, the aqueducts, bridges, running water, literacy....
  • What have the Australians done for us... besides the roads, the aqueducts, bridges, running water, literacy.... Not to mention driving back the orc invasion.
  • I asked my roommate (who's from NZ), and she says she'd rather be called "Pakeha". Also, we both agreed that using "white" about pale people, but no other racial/colour designation is rude. Either it's "white", "brown", "black", etc, or you should say "European" or "European-".
  • My roommate also knew some of the orcs - but she was too short. I thought they ought to have cast her a little frightening orc child. They also filmed The Last Samauri in her local park.
  • He throws out Kiwi right away, doesn't exactly explain why. I believe the reason he gave (paraphrased): Kiwi doesn't fit because it's not exclusively white; it pertains to all NZers. Swastika. Well done, champ.
  • Kiwis are brown and fuzzy - both of them. Humans who wore born in NZ, or have permanent residency, are New Zealanders. In surveys, such as the Census, we get to choose European NZer or Maori NZer. However even being maori is a choice these days, as although they have their own electoral roll, they can choose whether to be on it or not. And we don't need yet another new flag - everybody's doing it. A whole bunch of ideas here , the maori flag, and the Hundertwasser flag. Hone Heke had the right idea.
  • I do think it's possibly to reclaim the swastika for it's original, good symbolism. I think it's needs to be done, actually. But that's not going to happen on a flag for white people. Here we have have "haole". It's technically supposed to mean foreigner (literally, it's "without breathe"), but it's reserved for white people. Depending on context, it can be derogatory, but it isn't always. And there's a flag for Hawai'ian nationalities separate from the state flag. I can't imagine a need for a flag for haoles, though. That'd only serve to make haoles more isolated from Hawai'i.