March 22, 2016
Panthers remember struggle for equality
As activists in the United States mark the 50th anniversary of the founding to the Black Panthers, in Aotearoa many of the original Polynesian Panthers are reflecting on why they came together in the early 1970s.
There’s an event at the Auckland Women’s Centre in Grey Lynn tonight where the wahine will share stories of their struggle.
One of the speakers, Sina Brown-Davis, says it was an intense time, when issues like the Vietnam War, decolonisation, and Maori land rights fired people up.
She says young activists saw themselves as part of an international movement of coloured and indigenous peoples, but with their own issues to fight.
"It’s like ‘black is beautiful’ resonated with the Polynesian Panthers. Maori and Pacific Islanders were the convenient scapegoats with what all is wrong with New Zealand society. The exciting thing the Polynesian Panthers and their Maori allies latched on to is that the politics was founded in the librealities, in the struggles of our everyday lives, no we won't be treated like second class citizens, no we won't watch our children be hassled and brutalised by the police, No we refuse to be treated like this at school," she says.
Sina Brown-Davis says today’s generations owe a lot to the young Pacific islanders and Maori who refused to be treated like second class citizens.
Tonight’s event at Warnock St starts at 7pm.
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