Up close with New Zealand’s most notorious gang | Hacker News Reader

Up close with New Zealand’s most notorious gang

huckmag.com

67 pointsbdcook51 comments

>He points out that despite only making up 16 per cent of the country’s entire population, Māori make up over 50 per cent of the prison population. It’s this culture of prejudice and division, he argues, that has allowed Mongrelism to thrive.

Oh no, I feel the need to be the ranting Pakeha. There's always bloody one ;(

Note that this doesn't state 'Maori commit over 50% of the nation's violent crimes', but instead walks right past that and talks about a mysterious prison population that somehow just came about. Maori commit crime at a disproportionate level to their population, they are incarcerated at a greater rate almost wholly due to this. This is occurring because of socioeconomic inequalities that need to be addressed and remedied on a cross-generational timespan. Starting with improved early childhood and educational outcomes and working outwards from there. Not starting with kids viewing gangs as an attractive life choice.

As a demographic, Maori are at a notable disadvantage. On an individual basis, every fuckwit locked up for violent crimes deserves to be there.

NZ does have proven bias in it's criminal justice system, but painting a picture of NZ culture as 'of prejudice and division' shows a lack of understanding and narrow lens. Article's got my back up because small-town NZ is terrorized by gangs and by romanticizing them, as I feel this article does, it lends a legitimacy to plain criminality that actively sets Maori at even further disadvantage.

The piece is capped off with this statement:

>Working with the Mob is a singular lens through which to look at the social dynamic of the country. It is also true that there are hugely positive things happening for Māori and Aotearoa New Zealand is at the global forefront of addressing the difficult inheritance of colonialism.

Can't help but feel placing that statement earlier, where more article readers will actually encounter it, would be less ass-covering and more honest journalism.

You can't accept bias etc and then make this statement "On an individual basis, every fuckwit locked up for violent crimes deserves to be there". It makes no sense to accept institutional racism at a macro level, because it makes you feel good, then dismiss it as a contributing factor at a micro level. It's an incredibly disingenuous position - worse than all the pink-faced jerks ranting on about 'bloody murries..'.

You can accept that bias exists, while denying that it explains very much of the difference.

Again I know nothing about NZ, but in places where I've seen numbers, you can invariably show that the amount of bias in policing/sentencing statistically significantly different from zero... but also that is explains at most a few percent of the differences in violent crime convictions.

Thanks for this. I know nothing about NZ but you could replace just a few nouns to translate this to many other countries, sadly.

Not to pick on you, but I'd like to add that I think it's helpful to disentangle three things which often get rolled up together:

1. "commit over 50% of the nation's violent crimes" is a fact, today. The criminal justice system has to respond to each individual crime, for the usual mix of retribution / discouragement / removal. Every one of these violent crimes has a victim, on whose behalf we act. And very often the victims are similarly skewed towards some group -- such victims are no less deserving of our protection.

2. "is occurring because of" is a theory about past causes, which historians can argue about. There are many theories. But we don't need to wait for them to reach a consensus. It makes no difference to an individual's guilt or innocence of some crime.

3. "be addressed ... Starting with improved early childhood ..." is a theory about the future effects of policies we might adopt. This is also independent of the other things: a policy that improves outcomes for children of a crime-prone demographic isn't going to depend on whether #2 decides the group is of the oppressed-by-colonisers variety or the unassimilated-post-asylum variety. But whether it works or not is an empirical question, not a moral one.

Remember - being 50% of a prison population does not mean that they commit 50% of the crimes. They may do - they also may commit more or less. But all you can deduce from the prison population, is the number of people tried and convicted.

Of course, but it's a start. They aren't exactly running gulags.

10% committing 50% of crimes is a factor of 10 over-achievement, there's no reasonable argument that the odd wacko prosecutor tips the scales this much.

Counting the victims is another crude proxy, the coroner really does see every murder victim. And IIRC this shows roughly the same disparities in major demographics, in most countries.

Isn't the point that they are societally disadvantaged through that institutionalised racism? And by being marginalised, pushed to a life where they are more prone to commit the violent crimes for which they are incarcerated? ("gangs")

I live literally on the other side of the world so maybe there is something else going on in NZ I don't know. But if it's anything like.. well, anywhere else, then I know the story pretty well: institutionalised discrimination -> social marginalisation -> gangs & crime -> overrepresentation in prisons -> people saying "oh my gosh look at them! they're all criminals!"

substitute for any race.

Exactly that. People all want to "stop living in the past", but the past they want to forget is the one where Maori were treated like shit, so they can ignore why the present looks the way that it does: it was created by that past.

"NZ does have proven bias in it's criminal justice system"

Exactly what part? Making sweeping statements like this is dangerous. Does racism exist? Yes. Point it out specifically and I'll fight it with you, but you had better point to specific cases otherwise you risk unfairly tarring people with the same brush.

Let me give you an example.

Years ago I was called up for jury duty. This was back in the days when juries needed to return a unanimous verdict.

I'm Pākehā the defendant was Māori... which made no difference to whatsoever to me. I took this man's fate seriously and carefully weighted the evidence presented.

However, deliberation was locked for two days as the two other jury members, who were both Māori, refused to return a not guilty verdict.

No matter what we did we could not convince those two other jury members and we were forced to return to the judge as a hung jury which required the defendant to remain incarcerated until a retrial.

We were told not to speak to anyone as we walked out of court and as we did, the defendant's family shouted abuse at jury members, including calling us, and that would include me, racist.

I remember feeling so upset over it, especially since I wanted to tell them that it wasn't me, the problem here was Māori being racist to Māori... it had nothing to do with Pākehā racism toward Māori!

So as someone who was temporarily part of criminal justice system, it isn't as simple as your sweeping statements indicates.

That’s really grim.

The bias can also happen earlier than that too. My (white) father managed a big warehouse with a Samoan man. They had the same pay, same company car and similar route home. Every few weeks the Samoan man was pulled over and had his ID checked and was questioned about the late model car he was driving. My father wasn’t ever pulled over.

Thomas Sowell's book Discrimination and Disparities discusses discrimination and has made me reconsider what is actually happening in the type of scenario you describe.

I highly recommend it.

>Exactly what part?

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/84346494/new-zealands...

"From 2010-2014, police and justice figures show Maori made up 51 per cent of prison sentences, 40 per cent of prosecutions and convictions. And yet, over the same period, Maori made up only 30 per cent of those who received pre-charge warnings - in other words, were let off - compared to 57 per cent of Pakeha."

This one might be hard to meaningfully argue either way without getting into some kind of 'Maori are more likely to argue with police' kinda speculation. Also, I agree with you anyway - While there is bias within the system, it's not that bias alone (or even primarily) that's driving higher incarceration rates for Maori. It's systemic socioeconomic disadvantages that are really more about 'poor people to go prison more' coupled with 'a disproportionate number of Maori are poor'.

>I remember feeling so upset over it, especially since I wanted to tell them that it wasn't me, the problem here was Māori being racist to Māori... it had nothing to do with Pākehā racism toward Māori!

Sucks ;(

As an Aussie, I was expecting a mob of angry Sheep ;)

I'm an Aussie. :thumbdown:

I'm a Kiwi, thumbs up.. no offence taken.

you want peter jacksons (horrendous) movie Black Sheep https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=Hhck0SLcA6I

His early catalogue of horrors are all charmingly horrendous and most also contain copious amounts of fake blood.

Curiously, Black Sheep is the one weird horror film from NZ that isn't by Peter Jackson: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sheep_(2006_New_Zealand_...

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