"Shopdroppers" act against racially offensive products

Tu Tangata, Issue 16, 1 March 1984, Page 18

"Shopdroppers" act against racially offensive products

A group calling themselves “shopdroppers” were active in stores around the country in the fortnight before Christmas.

“We’re just the opposite of shoplifters,” a spokesperson explained. “We leave something behind tiny stickers identifying racially offensive products, such as souvenirs.”

The stickers, “This Product INSULTS the Maori People” / as shown above, have been put on a selected group of products candles in the form of Maori heads or figures, tea towels, cushioncovers and handkerchiefs printed with Maori faces, topless Maori maidens, and a number of others.

“I’d stress that the issue is not just bad taste,” the spokesperson said. “We’re not wasting our energy on plastic tikis. It’s racism when Maori men are shown as stereotypically fat, lazy or stupid, and women as promiscuous and cultural insenstivity.”

“Cultural insensitivity is harder to explain across cultures, but the candles for example are grossly offensive because the fire destroys the spiritual power of the chief or other person portrayed on the candle. In the same way, when people blow their noses on the pictures on the handkerchiefs or sit on the cushions, they defile the mana of the people shown there.

“It’s roughly equivalent to putting some revered person like the Pope, the Queen, the Virgin Mary or your own mother on something like a spittoon or a chamberpot.

“We’re not Pakeha do-gooders: the Race Relations Conciliator, Hiwi Tauroa consulted 20 of the most respected people in Maoridom, and they unanimously condemned these products.

“And we’re not telling anyone what they may make or sell or buy: the stickers just let everyone know the unpleasant truth about these products. After that it’s up to their own consciences.”

(The stickers are available from “Stickers” PO Box 779, Wellington.)