Tēnā Koutou Katoa, nau mai haere mai to the podcast The Cosmic Wāhine Guide to Living in Tāmaki Makaurau CBD Season two.
Apologies this is late and I had hoped to go video for Season two, sadly timings haven’t made that possible. Editing videos is a lengthy process, and that up against other literary works in development became an unsubstantiated commitment. So audio it is.
The lateness is also connected to my being caught in human rights proceedings of writing multiple complaints to this government agency, against five organisations of the CBD. To date I feel that the Human Rights Commission is failing me, and in doing so, they’re failing vulnerable races and cultures.
I’ve spent the summer holidays thinking about what the theme for season two would be. Let me begin by reflecting on season one being dominated by my reporting of racial profiling and racism. I hoped to move on from that with season two. But alas, I've already lodged five separate complaints of racial profiling discrimination with the Human Rights Commission, Banking Ombudsman's office, the office of the Ombudsman, and the PSPLA.
I’d like to add here to the CosWah, don’t come to live and work in the CBD. I’ll say it again, if you’re a CosWah, truly the CBD is where Angels fear to tread, whether in corporate or retail.
You will suffer from hidden racial harassment in the form of microaggressions, or experience outright racism. You’ll like me - trigger other employees.
This is compounded by the knowledge that the CBD is the best place to access vital social services for the troubled, homeless, transients, 501 deportees.
It’s well known within the business community and I’ll talk about this again, offering more details, if not in this CiChi certainly within season 2.
All these complaints I’ve alleged are Perception and Familiarity based Racism. And if you don’t know what that is, it’s stereotyping and victimising. Of me. Awful for me, but probably and I see shadow here, makes the person who served me in the moment. Emphasis on Served me! Must have felt vindicated when I walked out of their store, bank, supermarket, business, looking like my tail was between my legs.
I could imagine them gasping at my back as I sulked away wounded and pathetic. “Yip, I had her fixed and sussed right from the get go! Dirty no good Māori that she is, littering our CBD. Yeah she’s a pretender all dolly'd up in smart clothes. She doesn’t fool me, she’s a drug dealer. How else does she get that money? I betcha she’s a mule. You know.
By this statement I refer to me being judged as the front person. Or that my persona is a front to hide the truth, that I’m a dependent of the social services in the CBD, like the City Mission.
So in consideration to all this I’ve decided to call season two ‘Perceptions. Are you interested at all? Well, if you are, come along then and listen to the sound of Coal. You know C. O. A. L.
Music:
Here goes CiChi one: The Glitch in the Matrix part one.
What does the CosWah do when perception of familiarity based racism stops the Cosmic Wahine Selfawesomeness from accessing the community of the CBD and neighbourhood?
Is there danger in every step she takes? Is it all in her imagination? What happens to Māori Wahine who make complaints about private security guards?
And what about shop security?
Yeah, what about them?
The summer days in my studio apartment are quiet and relaxing if not productive with me studiously writing and leisurely creating digital art, content, poetry, fiction and happily, music. To heal my hinengaro, tinana, wairua, mauri and the trauma I’m yet to reveal to you.
This small space in the summer months is my haven. The studio apartment in the Upmarket, midtown apartment building has both sheltered and sweltered me. Sheltered me from the harm of racism committed towards me by brand stores and banks. Not quite the way I envisaged starting my year off. But it’s a twisted blessing in disguise.
The Dread.
You know what, I think it’s such a dark twisting irony that I write about racism, colonisation, assimilation and the impacts of these devices of oppression on Wāhine Maori, focussing on telling my own story. Because we’re not all homogenized.
How did this begin? And what is the beginning?
Ok. These are good questions to start with. If you’ve been following the CosWah you’ll know this one.
It started with the Library, where I lodged a complaint against a security guard for what I believed was overzealous inappropriate behaviour, bordering on racially profiling me. That complaint went to the PSPLA.
The backlash I experienced from the private protection security guard company was not expected. It left me shaken and afraid. So I didn’t give my best when it was my turn to give evidence because I was terrified that I’d get the bloodiest hiding of my life. The outcome resulted in the complaint against the security guard being discounted by the PSPLA.
That’s where it began, but where it tumbled into activity and then to where I am today? Well that’s with The Warehouse on Elliot Street in the Atrium. This is where the beginning of the end of my relationship with brand stores began. It has been a slow but sure breakup.
It doesn’t include any tantrums, public or private, that’s not my style. I never confront the staff in the stores. I do that over the emails and online.. close your eyes and imagine a māori woman sitting at a laptop furiously writing emails that house all her concerns and complaints in the moment about the objectionable behaviour. That’s me.
The moment that delivered The Warehouse and me into the complaints process via the Human Rights Commission? That was on Matariki Eve 2023. It was Friday the 13th of July. I entered the store at approx 8.30am to collect two items. A watch and a smoothie maker.
Behaviour is everything.
I got the watch first then I headed to the back of the store to get the smoothie maker. I know I can hear you all now. Tsking at me, I was a silly girl, wasn’t I. With the stereotyping imprinted on me of being a no good typical dirty Māori! The shop security got up in my face and confronted me in the store. Outrightly told me “I’m watching you. I watch the jewellery, you have to buy that right now.” He said more stuff but I think you’ll get the general gist.
I of course started to object, then grudgingly I took it to the counter to leave it with the store supervisor. Because I was going to make a complaint. He on the other hand walked away from me to another part of the store, flexing his shoulders and straightening his back. Cause he knew my eyes were burning into it.
I went and got the smoothie maker. I was furious and shaking with anger. I was triggered. However as I’m a CosWah, the Cosmos held onto me tight. You know that this shit happened to me and mum in 1975 in the now long gone Rendells store in Panmure.
Same shit just different day. And this time not by UK settlers. This time by Tangata Pasifika. All the bloody memories of 1975 humiliation flooded back to me.
Now 2023. That it was Matariki Eve made me even more discouraged about our country. I don’t know what to say about me referencing this spiritual celebration. But I’d had enough of the Warehouse staff doing this to me.
I took the complaint of this event and all the other incidents in this store I alleged as racial profiling, that I had complained about to the store staff and manager. I took them to the Human Rights Commission.
Just so you know. The complaint process with The Warehouse just sucked! I mean it sucked rotten eggs. The manager treated it like contempt. I didn’t have photographic or video evidence. I don’t want to alienate myself from my resources.
You know, like Oh he said to me. “It was nothing, really, nothing you should be worried about. It was misinformation. The shop security got the wrong information. We’ve corrected it now. We’re very sorry.”
And I thought. “Bullshit!” This is the same racism as 1975. I mean this guy talked to me like I was an ignoramus and couldn’t tell my racial profiling from racism thank me very much. The manager had a south african accent which just raised my blood pressure.
Such stuff for him would be everyday, when a person comes from a country like South Africa. And I thought how pertinent that he’s the manager of the store in the CBD, where the Lost Generation of Māori, the walking dead zombie soulless Māori reside in rough it out sleeping conditions.
According to him, the CBD is considered super dangerous. Not that he openly blamed the Zombies. Even more so during Covid and the mandates. Wow, that time in the CBD was hell! The shit of paranoia about Māori, cause it's all over the media isn’t it.
We’re the sickest, poorest, no vax, no boosters, protesting against all of that, no care. Instead of the truth, that Te Iwi Māori are being rightfully cautious.
And many like myself were vaxxed maxxed and boosted from the get go. That behaviour and sense of preservation did not move people who held concerns and suspicions about me as a
Māori. My being vaxxed and boosted with evidence to prove it, did not create serenity for municipalities and the business, health and dental sector in the CBD.
Sure the Lost Generation of Māori aren’t dressed to the nines. They’re not pleasant to look at and they smell equally unpleasant, they beg for food and I’ve even seen reviews of them being
called. “Insufferable!” Well. I thought that review sounded very……condescending from soandso suchandsuch.
I can’t apologise for the Tangata Streeters who belong to the Lost Generation of Māori walking dead zombie soulless nation, who have unbelievably difficult mental and personality disorders to cope with, alone. It’s bloody heart breaking.
I’m a member of the Lost Generation who grew up without the traditional path, my education and religion (Catholic) were tools of assimilation like cigarettes and alcohol that the colonisers used to culturally and racially disfigure me, inside and out.
Add to this, and I know many roll their eyes at my stating that alcohol and cigarettes are tools of assimilation, because it’s Sci-Fi and magical. Yet the empire needed to assimilate us so that colonisation could take place. They go hand in hand.
Wrapped in this bubble, so many māori in this lost generation didn’t know the dangers inherent in smoking, drinking and drug use during pregnancy and after the birth of a baby.
We have thousands of our tangata carrying the burden of fetal alcohol syndrome that puts them on the back foot taking away their natural ability to thrive in a Western EuroCentric collective path.
Just so that we’re clear with each other, the Tangata Streeters do me no harm. After three years of becoming a familiar face amongst this populous, there are a few who refer to me as Whaea. If I see Security Guards moving towards them in inappropriate behaviour, yes, I do stand up for the Tangata Streeters.
Individual Security guards on the main drag do date collection, and I've encountered a security guard using a disguised camera to take photos of us. What they do with that information on behalf of either their clients or their company is anyone's guess.
I’ve reported the concern to the Privacy Commissioner, as there's nothing in the PSPLA Act that permits a private protection security guard to photograph individuals. But I’ll probably get a very lame response as has been my experience with the Privacy commission about these activities.
Now, let's go back to the Human Right Commission process for a bit. I want to tell you about this process, what it was like, for someone like myself. Making a complaint consists of going online, at the time I started making complaints they just had the info line via their email.Today they’ve got a bit more sophisticated in the way they collect data to streamline the complaints process.
It’s better, though. Now how do I approach the complaint? Well that part is very confusing for me. Because, if I’m being victimised there has to be integrity of being vulnerable, but that’s not realistic for living in the world and society right?
I mean we can’t all go about our lives as the walking wounded. Nor can we be the impenetrable staunch wahine, who holds justifiable anger and frustration. Because that’s not real either. We know the process is easy and simple. What happened? What are we unhappy about? What outcome would you like?
Of course the HRC wants to know if I’ve, through their online complaints process, tried to sort it out with the person / company. Now this is very awkward, you know. Trying to introduce what you believe is microaggression / profiling and demographics. This is an impassable let alone an impossible route to take.
All those I’ve made complaints about to the HRC, have gone unresolved and the request for mediation has been declined. So it’s a tough one. I can’t say if it's the same for others, but as of today I’ve lodged a total of six complaints in the period between Feb 2022 to Jan 2024.
An email is sent acknowledging receipt of the complaint. Then the complaint is received via a triage process that does the first evaluation and lets you know one way or the other if your complaint falls within their Act. They’ll either give you advice on where else you can seek
guidance for your complaint if it doesn’t. Or, they’ll give you a reference number and a timeframe for when the dispute resolution team could make contact.
The wait times are long and can take up to three months to hear from someone and then another one-two months to get the unresolved result. Because let's face it, no one but no brand is ever going to admit to racial profiling. They’ll probably use the experience to teach themselves how-to, without getting caught next time. But that’s my own opinion.
A dispute resolution team member will be appointed to your complaint and contact you either via phone or email and ask you for the details and go through the letter you’ll want sent to the company. And from my experience, if you don’t have recorded or photo / video evidence, or eye witnesses, it's a foregone conclusion that you’ll not get a positive resolution as an outcome.
If you haven’t had an apology from the company before approaching the HRC, then through that process you could ask for one? I’ve learnt through the many ups and downs of going through the washing machine to invite the defendants to mediation.
For the smaller complaints I’ve decided to let those go unresolved, not happy about that, but hey I’ve reset my approach to these processes. To one of learning, gaining wisdom and experience. For knowing when and how to push back. The most vital thing for all this is credible evidence, and it’s either got to be CCTV, or your own.
Whatever you do, don't violate the other person's privacy as much as you can, and if you have to record them, for example in the premises, let them know. For the supermarkets because of the contentious nature of these businesses, public concern is being raised for the safety of their staff and security. I strongly advise against recording any security guard following you or doing what you believe is racial profiling, unless you're ok with the possibility of being alienated from the store.
It’d be hard for you if, like me, it's our local home store and the only one we’ve got suitable access to. So let's not do anything to put that in jeopardy. Instead wait till we get home and then
take the complaint online through the emails right away, while the whole issue is still hot in us, we can pursue it while the memory of it is fresh.
Better yet do what I do and record myself entering the supermarket doing my shopping, like a vlog I suppose. If you’ve got the talent to make into a little doco of interacting with the security whom you feel is following you? Again I’m recording myself whilst doing that, so the camera is pointed at me.
With regards the inner city metro supermarkets, New World and Woolworths Countdown? Both these are highly volatile where Te Iwi Māori are concerned, at least from my observations and this year I’m undertaking empirical research methodologies to capture the evidence of lived experience.
Note here, it’s about dignity, for tangata whenua like myself who are disenfranchised living alone and far from our tupuna whenua and iwi. My recording of these experiences is to tautoko and protect myself from the indignities and humiliation I experience from the retail sector in the CBD of perception and of familiarity based racism.
Well my lovely CosWahs this brings part one of CiChi one to a close. Tune in next time for part two in a week’s time, all going to plan that is. But I’ve got the date in the Calendar, and if I’m not overwhelmed with having to follow up with those who are defending themselves against my allegations. I should be back with part two as I said in a week’s time.
Till then stay cosmic in the CBD, I love you, be well. This is Ciana Reimond for the CosWah signing off for now.
Season Two: Perceptions - CiChi #01 The Cosmic Wāhine Guide to Living in Tāmaki Makaurau CBD.