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Women of the Polynesian Panthers by Ruth Busch

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Women of the Polynesian Panthers by Ruth Busch Auckland Women's Centre AUTUMN ISSUE QUARTERLY 2016 IN THIS 01 Women of the 02 New Young Women’s 03 Stellar Feminist 04 SKIP Community ISSUE: Polynesian Panthers Coordinator, line-up at the Garden Opening Māngere East Writers Festival AND MORE Women of the Polynesian Panthers By Ruth Busch A wonderful evening (also empowering, stimulating and reflective to list just a few more superlatives to describe this event) took place at the Auckland Women’s Centre on the 23rd of March. As a follow-up to the previous Sunday’s fundraiser documentary about the Black Panther Party in the US, the Centre organised a panel discussion focussing on Women in the Polynesian Panthers and their Legacy. It was facilitated by Papatuanuku Nahi who welcomed the jam packed, mostly women, audience with a karanga that set the mood for the evening. The speakers’ panel was made up of Panther members, Miriama Rauhihi Ness and Dr Melani Anae, or (like our facilitator, Papatuanuku Nahi and her sister, Kaile Nahi- Taihia) women who traced their current activism directly to being raised by Panther parents. Sina Brown-Davis, Te Wharepora Hou member, and our speaker prior to the documentary screening, was also a panel member. Pictured: Sina Brown-Davis The speakers discussed racism and other More than that, that activism was the answer. Pacific abuses that had led them to form/join the Island and Maori communities could not wait for the government to come up with answers to homelessness, Panthers in the 1970s, their numerous poverty, police harassment and enforced incarceration. successes and the issues remaining to be The Dawn Raids in 1976 underscored both the systemic addressed still/now. It was inspiring to hear racism of the Muldoon government and the effectiveness how these women (sometimes as school of the solutions the Polynesian Panthers came up with. Within 6 weeks of Panther action to carry out girls who had to sneak out of their homes Dawn Raids on Ministers of the National Government in order to attend meetings) challenged the (complete with sound systems and floodlights and individual and systemic racism that was so press), Muldoon’s Dawn Raids were halted. In addition, commonplace in their lives. the Panthers led strikes, educated people about their legal rights, opened homework centres, gave rides to Drawing inspiration from the ideas of the Black Panther families of prisoners, fought for improved housing and for movement developing in the States, these foremothers a better educational system. and their Panther brothers made the myriad forms that It’s hard to give a sense of the privilege that we, the racism takes visible and formulated an analysis that listeners, felt as we heard the stories of the founding was both anti-capitalist and anti-racist. Their actions mothers of the Polynesian Panthers, this movement underscored what second wave feminists were also learning that the personal is political, that our lived literally formed on the streets of Grey Lynn and Ponsonby. experiences matter. Continued over page Auckland Women's Centre Quarterly Autumn 2016 New Young Women’s Coordinator, Māngere East She has spent the last few years following her passions including theatre, film, kapa haka and volunteering at We are excited the Mangere East Community Centre. This year she to introduce is studying for a certificate of social services at Te you to our new Wānanga o Aotearoa in Māngere. She has already Māngere East established a thriving Young Women’s Group for AWC at the Māngere East Centre. They have been enjoying Young Women’s whakawhanaungatanga, learning from each other’s Coordinator, Jane journeys, exercising and attending local community Paul (Ngapuhi). events together. It is difficult and expensive for young Jane is a 21 women from low income suburbs to complete the 3-step process to obtain a full driver’s license. In partnership with year-old woman our Young Women’s Group at Roskill South, they have born and bred in started a new project ‘empowerment through the journey Pictured: Jane Paul (Ngapuhi) Māngere East. of attaining a driver’s license.’■ Women of the Polynesian It was wonderful to hear the history of the Polynesian Panthers told by women who were its founders. These Panthers, continued women were part of a bridging generation: they were often Their presentations “humanised” the Struggle and their first generation kiwis born of immigrant parents, attempting present day staunchness moved us all. Each of the to envision who they were, shaped by intergenerational participants is still advocating for change and direct action. disjuncts between their island born/non-urban parents and Each emphasised that many of the gains made in the past themselves, trying to understand what it meant to be black have now been eroded and/or better hidden, and that the and kiwi within a context of white racism. analysis of the Polynesian Panthers is still relevant. Poverty They challenged us to re-commit ourselves to their and racism continue to be the reasons why Maori and basic principles: Pacific Islanders remain at the bottom of the heap in so » to annihilate all forms of racism and many areas. The fight against inequality is alive and well. Prisons are big business in Aotearoa today and the neo » to celebrate Mana Pasifika. liberal narrative that calls for the privatisation of prisons, They inspired us, especially the many young people state housing, and child protection is proceeding apace. in the room who were encouraged to take on the most Lawyers, psychologists, the justice system itself all make pressing issues they face, learning from what has gone good livings from the misery of black people. Climate before and from what has been developed overseas change is a price being paid by the Pacific for the West’s but finding their own Aotearoa based answers, while industrial development. Black lives matter everywhere. standing proud. ■ Pictured: Dr Melani Anae, Miriama Rauhihi Ness, Tomo Nahi and her moko Auckland Women's Centre Quarterly Autumn 2016 Stellar Feminist Line-up at the Writers Festival By Tessa Morgan After the success of Alice Walker headlining the Auckland Writers Festival in 2014, the organisers have again produced a stellar feminist line-up. Such a selection makes sense because not only are women the biggest readers, but they are slowly eclipsing men as authors of best-sellers, as Paula Hawkin’s gripping thriller Girl on the Train attests. Gloria Steinem Carmen Aguirre Hanya Yangihara Gloria Steinem, a feminist activist Carmen Aguirre is a Canadian actor Hanya Yangihara book A Little Life for more than sixty years, has been and playwright who will be discussing has been widely celebrated as one seminal to the development of 20th her new memoir, Mexican Hooker #1. of the most moving – if not unsettling century feminism. Founding editor of An actor, the title refers to Carmen’s – books written recently. Exploring Ms Magazine in 1972, her memoir, frequent typecasting in stereotypical the depths of masculinity and male My Life on the Road, is her most and racist roles due to her Hispanic sexuality in a group of four male recent achievement; it chronicles her (Chilean) heritage. This book is her friends, Hanya also tackles head on lifetime of touring the world for social own narrative of confronting the man sexual abuse and the ramifications justice causes. Considering the who raped her when she was 13. of such violence over one’s lifetime. current political climate in America, She is also the author of Something Hanya’s graphic distortion of the and in particular the mounting Fierce: Memoirs of a Revolutionary American dream is at times almost anti-woman sentiment spouted by Daughter, in which she focuses on too much to bear, but owing to Donald Trump, as well as evidenced growing up with her mother who was the clarity of its writing and the in the closing of abortion clinics both a radical feminist and prominent uniqueness of perspective, it is one throughout the country, Steinem’s activist against the fascist Pinochet of those books and, she is one of insights on the ‘State of America regime in Chile. those writers, you never quite Panel’ should be fascinating (and stop thinking about. potentially disturbing!). Barbara Brookes Susie Orbach Jeanette Winterson Barbara Brookes, one of Susie Orbach, author of the feminist Jeanette Winterson is an English New Zealand’s best historians, has classic Fat is a Feminist Issue, award-winning adult and children’s just released her new, and long- will be here to discuss her current writer who became famous with overdue, A History of New Zealand activism against media pressure on her first book, Oranges Are Not the Women. While the history of men in women that fosters negative feelings Only Fruit, a semi-autobiographical New Zealand is unusually rich, little about their physical appearance. novel about a sensitive teenage girl scholarship has been devoted to Susie played a key role in bringing rebelling against conventional values, New Zealand women’s experiences. problems of women’s relationships including heteronormativity. Her A deeply ironic truth considering to their bodies and their eating into autobiography Why Be Happy When how often we are reminded that mainstream thought. Her message You Could Be Normal (2011) is witty, New Zealand women were the first of loving your own body is perhaps fierce, and celebratory - a tough- in the world to get the vote. Barbara, even more topical than when her minded search for belonging. As a feminist historian, has previously book was first published in the well as appearing on her own at the focused on abortion in New Zealand 1970s, considering the rise of social Festival, Jeannette is also speaking and England and is currently media and the body-shaming with her partner, Susie Orbach.
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