I am sick to death of the demonization of Chinese migrants in New Zealand. This latest opinion piece from The New Zealand Herald is nothing less than propaganda playing into a lot of middle class fears about the Auckland housing market and kiwis' need for someone to blame. Not only this, but it throws out sweeping generalizations as to the class of Chinese immigrants—"...we have been absorbing lower quality immigrants.."—and creates an 'us versus them' dichotomy that smacks of New Zealand's prejudice towards Chinese immigrants of the 1800-1900s. Maybe bringing back 1881's poll tax and restricted entry requirements, 1907's English reading tests, and 1908's severely limited entry permits would help as well? We can strike the government's 2002 apology for its suffering caused to Chinese immigrants off the record, if so.
Moreover, "Instead of seeing a balanced ethnic mix, Auckland started to acquire an unwholesomely Chinese flavour" is a stand out quote from this train wreck of an email—apparently from a Chinese migrant real estate agent called 'Adam", which is just so convenient for Winston Peters and his stance on Auckland's housing market. This use of the word unwholesome cuts me to my core. My flavour is unwholesome, because there's too many people like me in New Zealand and it's threatening the well-being of the country. At least half of this piece is dedicated not to the tailspinning Auckland housing market, but instead deriding Chinese immigrants as a collective. A collective who seek to only bring to the country "dodgy places" with "poorly designed, cheap signs", and uncork a bottle of champagne when a young-and-in-love (100% kiwi) couple's potential first home is stolen away from them "...by someone screaming in [M]andarin." This block quote says it all:
"It is about how do you want your Auckland and your New Zealand to be? Do we want trained, skilled professionals to bring our economy to the next level or all we want to see is another Chinese restaurant around the corner, or foreign visitors mistaking Auckland for China?".
Implicit within this is again a dichotomy between kiwis and 'the Chinese', where you're either in favour of trained, skilled professionals who are working to Make New Zealand Great Again, or you're in favour of that dodgy looking 'Golden Dragon' on the corner of K Road.
In the end, the article doesn't offer any solutions, to either the Chinese problem or the housing one. It drops a 608 word bomb of insidious rhetoric about how Chinese immigrants threaten the wholesome nature of our country, and leaves you with an ominous ultimatum: "It is time for us New Zealanders to rethink." I agree. It's time for us to rethink the quality of our finger-pointing politicians, the quality of our national news outlets, and most importantly, how terrible the Yum Cha will be when we eventually get rid of those dodgy, unskilled, low quality Chinese.
Moreover, "Instead of seeing a balanced ethnic mix, Auckland started to acquire an unwholesomely Chinese flavour" is a stand out quote from this train wreck of an email—apparently from a Chinese migrant real estate agent called 'Adam", which is just so convenient for Winston Peters and his stance on Auckland's housing market. This use of the word unwholesome cuts me to my core. My flavour is unwholesome, because there's too many people like me in New Zealand and it's threatening the well-being of the country. At least half of this piece is dedicated not to the tailspinning Auckland housing market, but instead deriding Chinese immigrants as a collective. A collective who seek to only bring to the country "dodgy places" with "poorly designed, cheap signs", and uncork a bottle of champagne when a young-and-in-love (100% kiwi) couple's potential first home is stolen away from them "...by someone screaming in [M]andarin." This block quote says it all:
"It is about how do you want your Auckland and your New Zealand to be? Do we want trained, skilled professionals to bring our economy to the next level or all we want to see is another Chinese restaurant around the corner, or foreign visitors mistaking Auckland for China?".
Implicit within this is again a dichotomy between kiwis and 'the Chinese', where you're either in favour of trained, skilled professionals who are working to Make New Zealand Great Again, or you're in favour of that dodgy looking 'Golden Dragon' on the corner of K Road.
In the end, the article doesn't offer any solutions, to either the Chinese problem or the housing one. It drops a 608 word bomb of insidious rhetoric about how Chinese immigrants threaten the wholesome nature of our country, and leaves you with an ominous ultimatum: "It is time for us New Zealanders to rethink." I agree. It's time for us to rethink the quality of our finger-pointing politicians, the quality of our national news outlets, and most importantly, how terrible the Yum Cha will be when we eventually get rid of those dodgy, unskilled, low quality Chinese.