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h-ugo  ·  4012 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Colonial New Zealand

The author here seems a bit too quick to describe isolated incidents as typical of NZ society. Yes, there is a large of people with racist views but this is quickly changing - at least superficially, as people realise it is (at least) not socially acceptable to air their racist views.

Also, on the Kiwi/Iwi billboards - only "mild criticism form the national media"? I remember that the discussion of these billboards raged for weeks in the national media and was quite heated.

It's easy to ascribe a national character to a few examples. I wonder if the author spent any length of time in other cities around NZ. Christchurch has a reputations as quite a racist city, compared to, say, Wellington (a city roughly the same size).