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Class Struggle 96 August/September 2011
1
 
Class Struggle 96 August/September 2011
2
Brief Stuff
 
QuQuQuQuake City sees Redake City sees Redake City sees Redake City sees Red
Christchurch city workers are organising to oppose the worsteffects of the disaster capitalist solution to the ‘rebuilding’ ofChristchurch. To recap, our analysis shows that CHCH as amicrocosm of current rightwing solutions to the impact ofglobal crisis is Aotearoa. The NACTs have legislated for directcabinet rule of Christchurch in a state of emergency that willsee the ‘disaster’ used as a pretext to restructure capital inthe region.This means the liquidation of much fixed capital and its re-allocation from small capitalists to the big Canterbury andnational and international corporates. We saw the first movein this direction with the man-made ‘earthquake’ of thesacking of Ecan to allow big dairy farmers to grab cheapwater rights. Now as we predicted,
The Press
 reports: “TheCentral Christchurch recovery is under threat as quake-wearyproperty owners start using their insurance money to buy newbuildings in Auckland and overseas.”Equally, it means the liquidation of much variable (livinglabour) capital as workers are shunted around, forced out oftheir munted homes and into the already flooded reservearmy of unemployed. So now we have the worst affected RedZone areas planned for evacuation with compensation offersfor relocation at 2007 levels.The elite manipulation of property values through slowrelease of new sections is dispossessing many former home-owners in East Christchurch, especially of working-classPakeha, Maori, Polynesians and Asians.National Party investors and land developers have formed aneo-feudal aristocracy with "tangata whenua" -Ngāi TahuHoldings CorporationandNgāi Tahu Property- for direct rule through CERA that has subordinated egalitarian democracyand its vestige in the elected Christchurch City Council, whichis fragmenting. The capitalist dictatorship has here becomeovert and very apparent, historically unconscious of theimplications of its outright liquidation of social democracy inCanterbury - the major political dynamic. The reactionarynature of "political correctness" around Maori nationalism hasthus been starkly revealed.Frustration is pent-up on this and the growing range ofeconomic issues. Another example is the rail transportproposal in the "presidential-style" Mayor's Central City Plan,which - contrary to the recovery needs of urban Rangiora,Kaiapoi, Rolleston, Hornby and Lyttelton - prioritises businessdemands with a brand new and expensive CBD-to-Universityrail link starting point. Opposition is thus becomingwidespread
.
 After months of autocratic refusal to allow the citizens of theworst affected areas of CHCH into the plans for their futures,they are now mobilising in their neighbourhoods and all acrosstheRed Zoneto get answers and to get full compensation.This grassrootsmobilisationlooks like it could become amajor factor in deciding the upcoming election.
PPPPike River Mine Exposedike River Mine Exposedike River Mine Exposedike River Mine Exposed
The Royal Commission of Inquiry in to the Pike River MineDisaster is exposing officially what anyone with half a brainknewat the time. Even John Key back in June told anaudience in Australia that Pike River Mine, a coal mine proneto methane leaks, would have been illegalin Australia. Themine had only one ventilation shaft which had a fan belowground that would be destroyed in an explosion. This shaftwas also totally unsuited as an emergency exit even thoughthe CEOPeter Whittallstill defends it as adequate
.
Safety manager Neville Rockhouse who lost his youngest sonBenjamin, 21, told how his older son Daniel, one of two whosurvived the explosion, hadnot reportedhis safety concernsto his father because of ‘peer pressure’. Rockhouse also saidhe was on the point of resigning as safety manager because hedid not think the ventilation shaft was adequate as an escaperoute and kept pressing management to build a ‘fresh airbase’. He is backed up by former manager Doug White whosaid that the mine has no “plan to deal with an explosion”and no adequate real time monitoring of faults.Following this evidence the spokesperson for the families ofthe 29 dead miners Bernie Monk said: “These guys went into adeath trap. They had nowhere to go and it has always been inthe hearts of the families and now it’s out there.” Monk wasalso critical of the incompetent rescue operation that gavethe families “false hope” when experienced miners weretelling them there was no hope.Years of funding cuts to government regulators, removal ofmandatory inspections, and pressure to produce a profit,combined to make the mine a “death trap”. Key still promisesthat the men will be recovered, but it’s now up to theminer’s unions to make sure that the mine doesn’t beginworking again before the men are recovered. The least thatKey can do is to immediately reinstate compulsory mineinspections and union monitored health and safetyregulations, while fully compensating the families.
 
Class Struggle 96 August/September 2011
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But don’t hold your breath as the NACT regime is pushing hardfor mining to pull the economy out of a hole. And behind thistragedy is the fact that predatory, destructive capitalism putsits profits before people’s lives. That the only assurance thatmines can be safe is to put mining in Aotearoa under publicownership and workers’ control.
Racist White Immigrants
Margaret Mutu (above), Professor of Maori Studies at AucklandUniversity, generated a storm when shecalledfor whitemigrants to NZ to be screened for “white supremacist”attitudes. She based her view on findings of a Department ofLabour survey that found that more Maori than others were‘negative’ towards immigrants. According to Mutu, “Maorifeel very threatened as more groups come in and swampthem.”Most of the storm of opposition that followed rejected Mutu’scomments as themselves racist for discriminating againstwhite migrants on the basis of "colour, race or nationality" -the official Race Relations Office definition. Mutu wasattacked by some for making the statement as an academicbut was correctly defended by her Vice Chancellor and otherson the grounds of academic freedom. Her response was thatshe was making a considered statement based on theevidence, and as a Maori shecould not be racistincommenting on “white supremacy” because she “was not in aposition of power.”We agree with Mutu. You cannot be a racist unless you imposeyour views on an oppressed group by means of power. Beingan individual, even Professor, does not give you the power todo that. Thinking that other people, tribes or family membersare different and inferior is not racism unless you can oppressthe ‘other’ in such as way as to materially gain by it in thelong term. Historically racism, as we know it today, wasinvented by European colonisers to classify non-Europeans assubhuman to justify ripping off their riches and impose whitesupremacist rule. The Catholic Church had a huge upheavalbefore it recognised Native Americans as humans capable of‘salvation’. It took a couple of centuries for black Africans toachieve this select status.When direct colonial rule was overturned lots of white racistsretreated to countries where they attitudes where notchallenged. The British in India went ‘home’. NZ was alreadycolonised by a settler population of white supremacists whoprofessed equal citizenship but stole the land and went towar against self-rule. Racism in NZ was used to justify thecolonial domination and destruction of Maori society to turnland intoprivate propertyand drive Maori into the reservearmy of labour.Post WW2 de-colonisation' saw NZ open up to a big flow of‘kith and kin’ from post-colonial Africa and Britain and in thiscountry racist attitudes were usually unchallenged becausethey were hidden or accepted as ‘normal’. Such 'kith and kin'are still preferred migrants today. So there is some truth towhat Mutu says. In many cases racists don’t recognise theyare racists because racism has been ‘institutionalised’ andmade respectable as ‘biculturalism’ or ‘multiculturalisn’ bythe dominant ‘white culture’.On the other hand, 'reverse racism' is not really racism sinceit can’t be imposed. If it could then Maori would be runningthe country and whites would be complaining about being atthe bottom of the heap. So-called reverse racism is no morethan the expression of historic grievances of the colonial pastbeing reproduced today as Maori marginalised off their landand concentrated in the so-called 'underclass'. White racistshide their racism by trying to claim that this grievance-drivenresentment is equally if not more pervasive and potent asEuropean racism.Some Maori recompense has been made, especially to iwicorporate elites, but only by begging the state to redress pastwrongs and playing by the rules of capitalism – that evenBrash can agree with. But begging is hardly the action ofracists even iwi elites. And if the begging begins to look like‘special treatment’ then the racists come rushing out to cry‘one law for all’.In the final analysis New Zealand remains a racist country andthe evidence for that is the majority support for the NACTregime that continues to plunder land and resources, mostrecently the Foreshore and Seabed, preventing any possibilityof Maori emerging from marginalisation into economic self-sufficiency. So long as NZ remains a capitalist semi-colonydependent on land based resources ultimately stolen fromMaori, so will racism continue to be part of the fabric ofsociety.
““““HHHHands on” Sexands on” Sexands on” Sexands on” Sexyyyy EducationEducationEducationEducation
Teachers simulating sounds of orgasm for their students; oraland anal sex as alternatives to vaginal penetration; how tomasturbate; pulling condoms over black plastic penises. Theseactivities could be part of the story line of any number of thepornographic videos making billions for their owners on theinternet.But no, this is the gist of sex education in some Auckland,New Zealand, schools. Yet instead of widespread sighs ofrelief knowing that their kids are being prepared to navigatethe delights of commercial sexploitation in the capitalistworld, a full blownmoral panicis spreading among Aucklandparents.Letters to the editor from stiff and uptight in East Auckland,from over and out in West Auckland, all complain that theynever had such a good time while they were at school. Thereis such a shortage of black penises in their neighbourhoodthey want to know if adult night classes are available.Now that it is no longer politically correct to lynch people toget erections it seems common sense to stop simulating anddo the real thing. After all the kids are doing it, so let’s allowthem the right of ownership and control over their bodies andnot reserve that right for parents, porno kings, sex slavetraders, rapists and the Dominique Strauss Kahns of thisworld. Less simulation, more sexuality.
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