In the aftermath of the Christchurch massacre in which 50 Muslim worshippers were killed by a white supremacist terrorist targeting the city’s mosques, some of the country’s Maori leaders objected to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s adoption of the phrase ‘this is not us’ in her references to the atrocity. It’s a fair objection: just like Australia, New Zealand is a colonised island(s) nation that has a long history of settler violence. To say ‘this is not us’ is to erase the uncomfortable fact that mass white violence is very much a part of New Zealand’s recent history.

‘The fact that we are saying “this is not us” is denying the fact that it has happened in our nation before,’ said Ngati Rangi leader Che Wilson, recalling some of the violence visited on Indigenous bodies by the Crown in New Zealand’s past. The Maori Council executive director, Matthew Tutaki, added, ‘I don’t want to see the opportunity pass us by that we don’t have an honest conversation about the fact that racism is alive and kicking.’