Dialogue: Forgive but don't forget

By SANDY BURGHAM

Last week, as the shockwaves from Sir Peter's brutal and senseless murder reverberated through every household in New Zealand, for a minute we felt glad to live here: a land of no river rats, but of sound values, of police integrity and an assured justice system.

Thank goodness we can pull our families close to us and enjoy a New Zealand Christmas upon these safe shores. But as we busy ourselves with pre-Christmas nonsense, a new reality is dawning.

Through the sparkly windows, experimentally decorated with the new vogue of house lights, past the ham-ordering and stocking-filling, once the alcohol-induced fog has lifted, we may see with disturbing clarity that this peace and goodwill fantasy we are trying to create no longer exists.

Not in our country anyway, where the value system still favoured by the majority is being challenged by that of the minority. Let's face it, we live in a country where fathers stab stepdaughters; where MPs compensate jailed gang members and police do much the same to dodgy informants, funding a further murder of an innocent; where a triple murder can occur in a quiet clubroom dedicated to the memory of those who served this country; where an unsuspecting citizen is randomly attacked by an axe-wielding nutcase.

And where soap opera and rugby heroes throw glasses at barmaids because they are not getting enough attention (shame on you, you silly little boys.)

Last week, at a bank not too far from the RSA triple-murder site, people were understandably a little jumpy. It was pension day, and as the good citizens lined up dutifully and respectfully to wait their turn, a gang of four large blokes disturbed the peace. They were doing nothing wrong but then again they were doing nothing right.

Their presence was intimidating, and they knew it as they lounged around, shouted, jived, swore and teased the teller.

The citizens patiently waited as the potential bullies tired of their quiet audience. After the tiresome fellows left, nothing was said, yet eyes darted among the queues, catching glimpses of the weariness and wariness.

These days, when the average punter says he is quietly going about minding his own business, he is living in fear: fear of being seen to be too hard on the underdog; fear of being labelled a redneck; fear of being the next bashed up.

Occasionally we blame the parents, or the education system, some even blame colonisation for certain misdemeanours. But maybe we should all blame ourselves for our apathy in just standing by and muttering under our breath.

While it's too easy to jump on the GE Free bandwagon without having a clue about the other side of the story, it seems a lot more difficult to be actively vocal about the extreme behaviour of a minority who ruin it for the rest of us.

Thus I am incredulous at a deadly leniency creeping in our psyche as we seem to over-compensate for snatching someone's freedom for awhile, despite the reasons why.

We seem to be going out of our way to consider the creature comforts of wayward types who threaten the lives of innocents.

Should we be denying prisoners fish and chips? Should inmates move prisons so that they are nearer their families? I wonder why these issues seem top of the agenda.

We are considering wiping the slate of minor offences after 10 years. How does this serve the majority of New Zealanders who have respected the rules and kept their noses clean?

While I welcome an extended minimum parole period of 17 years at one end, why are we being so lenient at the other, when petty crime seems to so easily escalate into random murder?

I am all for giving people another chance, but this is a country of third, fourth, and fifth chances. While we may forgive, we shouldn't forget. By all means let's support people turning their life around, but why pretend they have never broken the law? If someone is capable of crossing a line, let future employers, wives, sports coaches and fans beware.

Goodness knows what visitors think when they arrive here after being spun a tourism line about a South Seas paradise. While we don't have the gun-toting madmen which give a trip through some of the Third World a bit of an edge, danger lurks when you least expect it - jogging, sleeping, and cleaning the clubrooms. It's the New Zealand way.