In brief

• The NZ Herald has allowed a young Māori activist, Layla Christenson, to passionately advocate for “inherent rights” and “equity” for Māori.

• It is expressed in lofty platitudes, but doesn’t special rights for some mean the rest are second class citizens?

• The treaty “experts” so often claim their decades of experience are critical to interpreting the one page treaty, but it all seems like advocacy to us and that Christenson is a young missionary like Greta Thunberg. 

• The article also looks to be undisclosed AI, which the Herald has recently said they would like to avoid.

ChatGPTreaty 

Layla Christison’s NZ Herald opinion piece on the Treaty of Waitangi appears to advocate for a two-tier society. It also appears to be AI generated and the test for that came out with a score of 98.07% AI GPT. 

Despite  clichés about “all cultures being valued” and “diversity,” the measures Christison advocates lead to resource distribution from the many to the few, based on race. Every Kiwi can decide how they feel about that.

Do inherent rights(for some) equal superior rights (for some)?

Christison argues for recognising the “inherent rights as tangata whenua” and promoting “equity” for Māori. 

Her use of the word “equity” implies guaranteeing equal outcomes as opposed to “equality,” which guarantees equal opportunity. Sounds like modern day leftist principles being applied to the 1840 document.

Māori voices are already amplified

Christison calls for systemic changes and “actively listening to and amplifying Māori voices” at a time when Māori representation in government is at its highest in New Zealand’s history. 

In fact, Māori are over-represented in government when compared to the population. This is even without considering the Māori seats, which can be a real trump card under the MMP governance system. 

In addition to Māori seats, there is Māori language broadcasting, Māori educational opportunities, and funding for Māori businesses. Several iwi are sophisticated, multi-billion dollar entities. 

Divisiveness and harms to social cohesion

Christison envisions a future where people work “collaboratively toward genuine partnership and shared futures.”

The Treaty does not use the word “partnership”; the notion of a partnership arises from later interpretations and judicial decisions. 

Moreover, the degree to which the partnership concept applies to any situation is an argument, not a fact. For many, any argument attempting to justify governance arrangements based on race is a non-starter and deeply offensive.

Many believe that activists’ pursuit of race-based rights lacks democratic justification and that repeated terms like “colonisation” and “systemic racism” have fostered a victimhood culture, harming social cohesion.

Alternative ChatGPT treaty article

We put instructions on this issue into ChatGPT, which we are confident are different than what Christison used. This was: 

Prompt: write an article from the perspective of a person who doubts the Treaty of Waitangi is a “partnership” between Māori and the Crown and that it is a divisive element within NZ society.

We were impressed it didn’t seem to be filtered and instantly produced an article which reasonably countered Christison.

Giving credit where it’s due

Christison is correct in stating, “It requires humility to admit when we’re wrong, courage to confront uncomfortable truths, and a willingness to educate ourselves continuously. It’s about challenging ourselves to confront our own biases and privileges and actively working to dismantle the systems that perpetuate inequality.” 

Everyone can agree with that, as long as they get to choose whether “equality” refers to “equality of opportunity” or “equality of results”. 

We also think NZME deserves credit over the last several months for giving voice to both sides of the Treaty debate on numerous occasions. For instance, they recently ran a prominent ad for Hobson’s Pledge, an organisation against preferential rights based on race, which garnered controversy from pro Treaty activists. Of course they were paid for the advertisement but presumably Christenson had her article run for free.