Maori after Brash: The media and the message

Maori and Pakeha take their views about each other from the media. GRAHAM REID reports on the information gap

Pinned to the wall by Chris Wikaira's desk is a quote from Martin Luther King: "People don't get along because they fear each other. People fear each other because they don't know each other. They don't know each other because they have not properly communicated with each other."

A cynic might say that's exactly the kind of aphorism a Wellington PR consultant would have at hand. But Wikaira is a former journalist and broadcaster - 14 years in Radio New Zealand, many as its specialist correspondent in Maori affairs - and chairman of the Maori Journalists Association.

He has a keen understanding of the interaction between Maori and the media, and the lack of information that helps to keep Maori and Pakeha apart. Our survey of What's Eating Pakeha? last week, the subsequent reaction and this week's investigation of the Maori perspective confirmed there is a gap of understanding.

Maori cultural reticence to approach the media is historical and complex. As Wikaira notes, for decades Maori saw themselves in the media only in a negative context, and while that has changed and journalists today treat Maori issues with more sensitivity, "that perception lives large within Maori society.

"Maoridom doesn't feel it has traditionally had a fair go from the media and some of that is as simple as the pronunciation of names and place names. If you can't get simple things like that right how can you get the complex stuff right?"

Gary Wilson, a head of the Mana organisation - Mana Maori Media radio news and Mana magazine - takes a larger view. He believes those working in the mainstream media are unresponsive to, and ignorant of, things Maori.

Pakeha journalists have come through an education system that hasn't given them New Zealand history or Maori language, are trained by Pakeha tutors whose strength isn't Maori, and the climate in newsrooms has a Pakeha perspective. Nor can they identify what the Maori stories are and who to go to.

"So you have a massive failure of professional capacity on the mainstream side ... ignorant mainstream Pakeha news organisations keep missing the big stories and will focus on the manageable stories."

He cites Waitangi Day protests, which attract attention like a fight in a playground while the media pays scant regard to the underlying issue - recognition of Article II of the treaty guaranteeing tino rangatiratanga.

Wilson accepts Maoridom's lack of sophistication when dealing with the media and its leaders' failure to recognise the strategic importance of a strong media voice, but says Maori leaders are almost always dealing with interviewers who don't understand what they are talking about. "They are speaking across the cultural divide."

Paul Diamond, Radio New Zealand's Maori programme producer, says for historical reasons the media has not been seen as a high-status profession for young Maori, and Maori is a tough round to cover. It requires patience, constant contact and often having to be an advocate for stories with editors who are indifferent to complex Maori stories that require time out of the office.

For journalists there are inherent and specific difficulties in dealing with Maoridom. It is often difficult to know who is speaking for whom within Maoridom. Someone may be styled as a spokesperson for an iwi, but may be a spokesperson only for an organisation within an iwi and not entitled to speak for the iwi as a whole.

There is also the folly of assuming Maori speak with one voice. Iwi have their own history, which they bring to any issue, and are often divided over matters on which Pakeha assume Maori would be united. "You bring me the different arms of the Christian church - and we're not talking about Buddhism or Islam, just the Christians - agreeing on everything and I'll bring you Maoridom agreeing on everything," says Wikaira. "The media want all Maori to agree because that makes it easier: there's a brown box you can go to and tick things off."

Last year former Herald writer Gilbert Wong expressed the frustrations of a non-Maori journalist when he wrote in Metro about the Orakei Trust Board entering negotiations over a land claim for the Auckland isthmus.

"To an outsider, the world of Maori is a parallel universe that looks familiar but ultimately defies easy explanation.

"In pursuit of this story I turned up for appointments to find nobody there. Phone message after phone message would never be returned. I began to wonder if some of the people I was assured were there even existed.

"At other times I knocked on strange doors hoping for an interview and ended up invited to feast on the freshest skipjack tuna, prepared raw, Tahitian style, a strong red and spirited conversation.

"Those who did speak were generous and patient, as if explaining things to a child. The trouble was that the explanations often escaped the easy question-and-answer patterns of journalism. My subjects could not help but tell long stories, digressing at every point, like water running down the countless channels and runnels gouged into an ancient hill. After hours of discussion, the sorry journalist would end up with barely a word to publish."

There are also cultural mores in Maoridom: the telescoping of time which means matters of the distant or recent past can co-exist with the present; and the use of metaphorical language, which can be loaded with meaning but doesn't translate readily into the convenient and often necessary constraints of print journalism or television .

Pauline Kingi, regional director of Te Puni Kokiri in Auckland, acknowledges the difficulties that Maori language can create.

"There is genuinely a miscommunication occurring in the subtle nuances of the use of te reo in an English context, and the transliteration across is often quite problematic."

Cultural attitudes also complicate the Maori-media relationship. Face-to-face interaction is an integral part of Maoridom, which may explain Wong's unreturned phone calls. The lack of personal contact has become even more noticeable in recent years, says Wikaira.

"As attitudes to reporting have improved, the resources have declined as newsrooms have downsized. Radio is almost all done over the phone these days, and television is like a guerilla mission: you swoop in, do your thing and are off again. Then you layer on lack of trust from previous bad experiences and you get a stalemate, like a Mexican standoff."

Kingi notes Maori may not write letters to newspapers frequently but will be vocal in their opinions in an environment where they feel safe, such as on the marae or iwi radio where there is a more personal interaction. Letters to newspapers and face-offs on television and radio current affairs programmes tend to be like parallel monologues.

Maori have traditionally preferred dialogue - even if it is lengthy and seemingly inconclusive to Pakeha - that a marae-based culture afforded.

In this regard the fast-paced media is often diametrically opposed to the way Maori have conducted debate.

"Maori don't go to the media, it's partly about not having a relationship," says Kingi. "It requires effort and a willingness to want to hear what that [other] perspective could be.

"The Maori side is quite concerned that a relationship is forged and intended to be ongoing. It can't be just crisis, incident or article-driven, it has to be about a more substantial commitment to a working relationship. It requires patience on the part of the media - and a relationship has not been forged. It's about trust, respect and a commitment to that pathway we are all walking on."

But the diversity of opinion within Maoridom means not all Maori are walking the same path. The iwi radio network can offer only regional voices. The Maori Television Service may be able to provide a national Maori dialogue, but television is rarely an inclusive medium.

Wikaira says an error the mainstream media makes about Maori is not recognising that it is fundamentally conservative and reluctant to take its opinions to the street.

"I have to question how representative those who are prepared to stand on a soapbox are of Maori society."

He also notes the change in the nature of Maori activism from the young academics who came through in the 70s and 80s to those who now command media attention.

"Maori protest today is the raison d'etre for the disaffected. It is those who are looking for a cause, a reason to be."

Kingi: "I need to say this about What's Eating Pakeha. I was impressed by the way, if you looked closely at the commentary from the Pakeha community, they were very reasonable voices and measured in their comments."

But often lacking in knowledge.

It will take patience, time and a change in the way mainstream media gathers its Maori news before that cultural divide is bridged. But Maori will also have to change.

Wikaira refers to that statement pinned to his wall. "It's incumbent on both sides of the fence to take heed of each other. Nothing's going to change if people don't stand up and say something."


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