Deborah Coddington: In-your-face no match for Pacific grace

Back in the early 1970s, I would have said "far out, man". While I'm reading a story about Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr singing at a New York concert to - once more - give peace a chance, my phone rings and a young lady says she's researching a documentary about New Zealand's hippies.

So much water under so many bridges. For the sake of all those now-adult children with mystic names, I hope much of what went on in those crazy times is never regurgitated for public consumption.

In some ways they were the best of times, but in others the worst of times. They were sexist, oppressive and ignorant.

Women charred their complexions by slaving over wood-burning stoves, destroyed their figures by breastfeeding litters of flower children and were expected to cook for multitudes of poetic, egotistical, anti-establishment men with far nobler objectives in life than earning money to support their families.

Monogamy was a quaint, bourgeois insecurity, and young women who came from abusive backgrounds were especially vulnerable to exploitation.

On the other hand, there was a sincerity in many who chose an alternative lifestyle. Drop out and live off the land, be self-sufficient and save the planet - sound familiar?

You may laugh, but some of us truly thought by co-ordinating our protest movements around the world, we could bring an end to conflicts like the Vietnam War. I still wake up on April 30 and remember Mobilisation Day - "The Whole World Watches".

Others, guys of course - Tim Shadbolt, Alister Taylor, Peter Verschaffelt, the Bower brothers - more closely involved in organising the protest movements, were legends in their own used army greatcoats.

Despite a token acknowledgment in later years of Maori sovereignty, the hippie peace movement was ethnocentric. We knew nothing, and cared even less, about Pacific issues - unless it involved jumping on a frigate and sailing off to Mururoa to protest nuclear testing.

We were all about revenge - Nixon Out Now! Eat the Rich! Get Holyoake! (How ignorant was that?) Stop the Tour! We looked to America when we should have asked close neighbours.

Peace is never achieved via vengeance, but through forgiveness, and humbling examples of this were demonstrated recently by two Pacific families, Tongan and Samoan.

In Auckland, when courier driver Halatau Naitoko was shot by police, the pastor at his funeral told mourners the slain father was a compassionate man with a loving heart who would want forgiveness over his death.

"To Mum, Dad and the family, to the Church and to the Tongan community of Aotearoa, my blood is only crying out for forgiveness ... even to the beloved policeman who fired the fatal shot."

In an extraordinary contrast to the family of Stephen Wallace, who have pursued the police through the legal system for years, Naitoko's family invited police to his funeral.

And last month at the funeral of Moliga Tatupu-Tinoa'i, stabbed to death in Johnsonville, the brother of the accused murderer, Emani Tinoa'i, stood and asked for forgiveness.

"We're so sorry. No matter what I say, I will never bring back the life of this mother, sister, and sister-in-law."

Mana MP Winnie Laban explained to me the seriousness of this custom, this ifoga. Laban attended this funeral and said to be present when an apology is offered, then accepted, is "profoundly moving" - but it is not done lightly.

"It can take three days, with the family of those apologising being made to sit outside. Fine mats are exchanged, and people are reminded of their rights and responsibilities. It's not just a matter of saying sorry and getting excused.

"The whole family has been violated, the whole community. It's not just the individual. We have a saying that roughly translates to, 'you still have to meet on the street'."

It's hard to say sorry and genuinely feel the regret. But even more difficult is accepting and forgiving, especially, I imagine, when a child's life has been taken. It must be so much easier to assuage grief with anger and vengeance. But does that bring peace to a troubled heart?

Yet isn't that where world peace starts? Not with John-and-Yoko love-ins, not with Lennon ringtones on your mobile, but with Herculean examples of forgiveness by individuals?

Today's a good time to think about it. My 5-year-old granddaughter knows nothing of hippies (unless Barbie comes as a hippie), but she's on to it: "Easter's not just about eggs, you know," she said. "They nailed Him to the cross and He forgave them. Think about that."