NZ | Politics Thread

[puketotara]

Originally Posted by jarbury

one must ask "why wouldn't you get that anyway?" Do Maori people just inherently not want to become doctors? Do we assume they're too bloody stupid to become doctors without assistance? No (well at least I hope not)... it's because (generally) their socio-economic situation makes it difficult for them to compete against someone from a much higher socio-economic situation.

However, this doesn't get past the question of why not provide assistance based on socio-economic status rather than on ethnicity? I guess it might be harder to promote "a poor people assistance class" than a "Maori and PI assistance class", but in the end neither is really more offensive than the other.

In the end it comes down to the question of who is more worthy for assistance out of a rich Maori/PI student living in Parnell, and some poor white person from Otara?

But in the end, the manifestation of their previous disadvantage is only really experienced by a portion of the population (even if it is a fairly significant portion) today. Once again it comes back to socio-economic situations, which are clearly a much fairer way to decide who needs and doesn't need help. If language is an issue, then clearly it might be necessary to provide assistance there too..... although one would think that would be a more significant issue for all the Asian students we have.

when you say 'do we assume' do you mean Pakeha NZers? It isn't just socio-economic status that prevents people from achieving. there are a huge number of isssues including ethnicity, religion, gender etc

many NZers think of our country as being very open and inclusive but in reality, a poor white male probably still has a better chance of becoming educated and wealthy, than a poor Maori or PI female, it's just that no one wants to admit that our system is designed for certain people to succeed.

I'm not excluding asians or africans or arabic people (or whoever) from this discussion, they are also at risk for the same reasons, but we have large populations of Maori and PIs

I would like to see how many Pakeha NZers would be successful living in a society with values based on kaupapa Maori