Something my mum said the other day really annoyed me. I
mentioned how disappointed I was at the turnout at the asset sales protest last
week (about a hundred people, which, after the 6,000 hikoi, was a bit of a let
down). Her response was “oh well, I guess they had better things to do with
their time.” This is quite a common theme which I’ve been hearing from quite a
few people lately, and I really struggle with it.
How can a person have anything better to do with their time
than fight against blatant injustice? I read a great quote the other day – it
was something along the lines of “governments don’t ignore our problems, they
perpetuate them”. And they perpetuate them because we allow them to, because we
complain as much as we want on facebook and to our friends, but fail to take
the next step of actually taking action.
While I am unconvinced that there is anything “better” to do
with one’s time than stand up for democracy, I do understand the need to
prioritise one’s life. But how hard can it be to find an hour in your lunch
break to get down to Parliament?
I think to put people’s inaction down to laziness is too
simple. While it might be the case for some (especially, admittedly, in the
horrible rainy cold weather we are having to endure at the moment), I think the
problem goes deeper for most. I think the real problem is that it is way more
easy and convenient to not care about stuff, and therefore to have no moral
obligation to act. I think that once we realise something is wrong, and here I
mean really realise it within ourselves, to the point where we can’t go on
accepting the status quo, then we have an unavoidable moral duty to act. For
most people, even if they disagree with something, like asset sales, they don’t
reach this point, because it would be inconvenient for them to do so.
An important factor that stops people reaching this stage of “caring” (for want of a better word) is that they don’t believe that they will make a difference. And why would they think otherwise, when this view is portrayed by the media on a daily basis. We saw this very clearly in the election last year, which had the lowest turnout since the 1880s, because the media said National would definitely win (so don’t bother turning up). As it happened, National didn’t win by much of a margin at all – and if even a fraction of the people that didn’t vote had voted for either labour or the greens, we may have had a different result.
Another example of the media being really useless is its
amazing silence on asset sales: http://tumeke.blogspot.co.nz/2012/06/what-asset-sales.html No wonder people aren't protesting, if they are barely even aware that its happening!
The issue of apathy and inaction is far from resolved for
me, and probably never will be. I will come back to it in later post I imagine.
For now, moving on, to a different but very related topic.
Today there was another protest against asset sales. Despite
the lack of rain (it was almost sunny
at one point) only about 20 people turned up. It was geared to be a really
depressing, lacklustre protest, until the bunch of 9 and 10 year old schoolkids
who were having lunch at Seddon’s feet started to take interest in what we were
doing. They were rather confused as puppet Peter Dunne marched up Parliament
steps, yelling back at the megaphone that was urging him to reconsider his
decision to support the asset sales bill.
But then we started actually engaging with them – first
Catherine and some of the people from People’s Power Ohariu started explaining to
these kids why we were there, and they started to understand. They took
interest in the puppet – some even drew pictures. They listened for about an
hour as we talked, with and without the megaphone, about why asset sales were a
terrible idea. I even got up the courage to say a few words – basically along
the lines that you are never too young to have a valid opinion. Even thought
these kids can’t vote, their voices still deserve to be heard – because we are the generation that will have to
deal with the consequences of today’s ill-conceived decisions.
We learnt that these kids were actually from Ohariu, and
that Peter Dunne had visited their school! We couldn’t have planned it better
if we’d tried. They were so perceptive and enthusiastic, really inquisitive and
keen to learn more. They all had their cellphones and cameras out taking
pictures of the action. A couple of them even made a video on their phone about
why asset sales are a bad idea – which they proudly showed me. I encouraged
them to put it on facebook… but their teacher didn’t seem so keen.
They moved away, to the Parliament steps to take a group
photo. We were talking amongst ourselves, when suddenly we hear them chanting,
“don’t sell the assets! Don’t sell the assets!” It was such a beautiful scene.
I’m sure it was a very memorable Parliament visit for all
concerned – kids and teachers alike. It was so cool chatting to them and
opening their eyes on asset sales – obviously an important issue. But even more
importantly, I hope that they realised from their interaction with us that
protesters are not the weird scary people that the media portrays us as, but
passionate and articulate people exercising our democratic right to fight
against injustice. Hopefully we empowered them a little bit to think for
themselves more broadly, and not just on asset sales.
Moral of the story? Kids are fucking awesome.
Age is an interesting thing. I was going to write that the
older generation had given up and its up to us to fight our battles. But then I
realised that’s not true. Apart from me and one other person, everyone at the
protest today (and last week) was roughly in the 40-60 age bracket. They
haven’t given up at all, quite the opposite, they are leading the struggle. It
is our generation who is visibly absent. Why are we so apathetic when we are
the ones who will be directly affected?
I tried to address the problem of apathy above, but I didn’t
get very far. It’s a complex issue. But I do think it affects our generation
worse than any other. Maybe its because we have had everything handed to us on
a plate, and never had to fight for it, so we don’t appreciate what we’ve got,
or how quickly it’s disappearing?
I wish we could be more like the kids we met today. So eager
and inquisitive, perceptive and keen to learn more. Passionate, inspired, and
hopefully empowered by what they learnt. I can only hope that once they get to
my age (HAH! That makes me sound so old) they won’t fall into the traps of
apathy and indifference that are so familiar to us all.
PS: the official version of today's events here: http://peoplespowernz.wordpress.com/2012/06/21/security-block-peter-dunnes-entry-to-parliament/
