Public pressure in the wake of the Roastbusters case resulted in some small concessions – reallocation of funding to sexual violence support services, advice that schools should include consent education. This is far from enough. Sexual violence prevention and support initiatives continue to be dangerously underfunded, and consent education in schools is not compulsory or consistent. How can we address gendered violence and implement a consent-based approach in our communities? What are the barriers to transformation?

Sandra Dickson is a Pakeha feminist who has worked to end gendered violence for more than two decades. She will talk about what research tells us works to prevent sexual violence, and why working in schools could be the best chance we have to change rape culture in New Zealand – if we get it right.

Session for Fightback Conference 2015.

Free entry (koha appreciated).

Food and drinks provided. Special thanks to the Tertiary Education Union for a donation to assist with catering for this event.

Children welcome. Wheelchair-accessible. Please let us know if you need any assistance to make this event more accessible.

10:30am-12pm, Saturday 4th July
St Andrews on the Terrace, Wellington
[Facebook event]

In the wake of another crushing electoral defeat for the left, in a period with record-low strikes and record-low voter turnout, how do we begin again? Where next for the Left? A discussion facilitated by Fightback.

Daphne Lawless is an indexer, translator, editor, electronic musician and goalkeeper based in Auckland. She is a ten-year veteran of the radical left and co-editor of Fightback’s regular magazine.

Giovanni Tiso is a writer, blogger and translator based in Wellington. His main area of activism is around disability and school inclusion.

Opening night panel for Fightback Conference 2015.

Free entry (koha appreciated).

Food and drinks provided. Special thanks to the Tertiary Education Union for a donation to assist with catering for this event.

Children welcome. Wheelchair-accessible. Please let us know if you need any assistance to make this event more accessible.

8-10pm, Friday 3rd July
St Andrews on the Terrace, Wellington
[Facebook event]

Land of the Dead (2005), which portrays an increasingly conscious zombie uprising.

By Thomas Road (Fightback Otautahi / Christchurch).

A zombie is haunting New Zealand – the zombie of Marxism. The narrative of zombie apocalypse is familiar, and has had a significant resurgence in popular culture over the last few years. The image of the zombie has long been what Mark Dery punningly calls a ‘bloated signifier’, an image which is loaded with ideology, myths, ideas, and connotations.

Whether in Métraux‘s study Voodoo In Haiti where the colonial-economic origins of the zombie myth are explored and the reanimated wage slave is “a beast of burden that his master exploits without mercy”¹ or in the resolution of the satirical zombie flick Shaun of the Dead where the undead are reintegrated into society with low paid jobs in the workforce, the zombie often seems to stand in as a gothic symbol of the ‘masses’. These unwashed masses, represented by the zombie, will come to represent the different anxieties of society at the time. George A. Romero’s series of zombie films made over a period of four decades (Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead, Land of the Dead, Diary of the Dead) exemplify this well. A particular comparison of Dawn and Land is especially informative. The zombies of Dawn of the Dead are memorable as the most blatant anti-consumerist symbolism – literally banging on the walls of a mall, coinciding with the rise of consumer culture they become a representation of the worst fears of a liberal middle class being kettled into the cultural quagmire of “I spend therefore I am”². With Land of the Dead Romero’s zombies take on a wholly different character and become the protagonists – an oppressed class achieving consciousness to overthrow their exploiters in the form of the remnant human society which slaughters them for amusement³. Zombies, then, are much like the nostalgic musings of the social democratic Labour Party faithful – with the shambling remnants of organised labour on the march – a nostalgia which is no less a decaying reanimated corpse than the zombie itself.

Beyond this, zombie narratives changing character over time represent a world after the AIDS crisis, the fear of avian flu, of the insurgents within society seeking to disrupt the social order. A zombie crawling out of a grave as some kind of ‘outside’ threat has all but disappeared to be replaced with the zombie threat within – when our peers suddenly turn against us and destabilise society. Films like 28 Days Later and the shift from undead to infected indicates the more palpable fear of mega-bugs wiping out huge swathes of humanity. Rather than the shambling rotting corpse of yesterday, zombies now move at lightning speed – no longer the unionist strike but the riot. The post apocalyptic wastelands of zombie world’s are reflections of the economic apocalypse of the Global Financial Crisis, the curiosity of the ‘dead mall’ with a downturn in spending creating retail ghost-towns across much of the OECD.

The zombie, in fact, contains a much more sinister and reactionary image. As an iteration of the popular imaginary, it is a grand example of sooner imagining the end of the world than the end of capitalism. But more than that, zombie narratives are the fears of the elite generalised. It is always the gated community, often being in fact a space of embattled whiteness, which survives best in the looming zombie apocalypse. In an era when the middle and ruling classes are quickly cloistering themselves away from the rest of us, the dispossessed masses outside the gates appears as the majority of the planet – and the worst fear is that somehow the infected and subhuman will penetrate these zones of security. Travis County residents in Christchurch were in a furore over a prefab unit being built in their neighbourhood – an unacceptable insurgence of the unwashed masses, probably renters, into their idyllic community⁴. Phil Ochs’ classic Ringing of Revolution of and the mansion on a hill – the last bastion for the ruling classes mirrors the phenomenon:

In a building of gold, with riches untold, lived the families on which the country was founded
And the merchants of style, with their made velvet smiles, were there, for they also were hounded.
And the soft middle class crowded in to the last, for the building was fully surrounded.
And the noise outside was the ringing of revolution ⁵

Indeed, the cloistering of the survivors into highly militarised mini-states in a zombie narrative is reflected in real life by the actions of states across the Anglosphere and Western Europe. Most explicitly represented in World War Z by the state of Israel’s ability to resist the oncoming zombie horde, the highly militarised and exceptionalist nations of the world are clamping down on security and immigration. Whether it’s the anti-immigrant rhetoric of the Labour Party and New Zealand First⁶, the Nauru Detention Centre⁷, Obama’s record rate of deportations⁸, or new legislation in the UK which looks to expel all immigrants earning less than £35,000⁹, it is clear that the ruling class is preparing for scenarios where separating the dispossessed and most exploited sections of society is essential.

It’s widely known that Marx himself was a great fan of the gothic novel, notably the opening passage of The Communist Manifesto spoke of the spectre haunting Europe – and the imagery associated to the ruling class is nothing less than vampiric. However, contemporary Marxist formations may have taken on this gothic character in quite the wrong ways. The Socialist Workers Party UK has been criticised since the 80s, along with many similar activist organisations, as a self-perpetuating ghoul. Recruiting from idealistic under graduates whose brains are consumed for fuel and are then discarded, burnt out, and are often put off politics for a life time. Richard Seymour, formerly of the SWP writes eloquently about how the business as usual Marxism in the UK seems more and more about banging our heads against a wall¹⁰. A futile re-enactment of the life of the glory days – various theorists arguing that we must return to whatever their personal favourite year was for true militant activism. This ritualistic headless activism may not be dominant in New Zealand. The anti-capitalist left is largely starting from square one, but woe to us if we do not learn from other parts of the world the easy traps of organisational forms that are more concerned with their own self preservation than with overthrowing the oppressive social order.

Avoiding the zombification of Marxism is paramount, and doing so will require a commitment to opposing the traps of headlessness, of the nostalgia for a reanimated corpse of the post-war welfare state, and instead developing a collective vision of a society beyond capitalism. We must allow ourselves the time to stop and seriously assess the situation, in order to avoid clawing aimlessly at the walls built to fortify the ruling class from the mess they’ve created. Capitalism itself alienates us completely from our own lives, and a left which does not clearly aim towards the continuous rupture of this state of affairs will be just as stale and paralysed with rigor mortis as the dead end of capitalism.

“More than this, capitalist society is death organized with all the appearances of life. Here it is not a question of death as the extinction of life, but death-in-life, death with all the substance and power of life. The human being is dead and is no more than a ritual of capital. Young people still have the strength to refuse this death; they are able to rebel against domestication. They demand to live. But to those great numbers of smugly complacent people, who live on empty dreams and fantasies, this demand, this passionate need just seems irrational, or, at best, a paradise which is by definition inaccessible.” ¹¹

The Mattachine Society, a ‘respectable’ gay organisation, opposed the Stonewall Riots which kicked off the Pride movement. Policing of queer politics for respectability continues to this day.

Article by Emilie & No Pride in Prisons concerning events at Auckland Pride 2015, reprinted from GayNZ.

Trigger warning: Rape mention.

I: ON THE EVENTS OF PRIDE 2015

Earlier this year, Auckland Pride Festival Incorporated (Pride Inc.) permitted the New Zealand Police Force and Department of Corrections to march their members in uniform and on horseback in our parade. The New Zealand Police Force engage in structurally racist policing practices, as does the Department of Corrections – from apprehension to conviction to sentencing, they institutionally discriminate against Māori. Most sickeningly, the Department of Corrections forces many trans women to serve their sentences in men’s prisons, where they are at extreme risk of sexual violence. They refused an Official Information Act request so we have no idea how many trans women they are subjecting to this treatment. We are not even allowed to know for sure what steps they take to protect trans women from sexual violence during their incarceration, but every indication seems to be that they simply put us into ‘protective’ solitary confinement for extended periods of time – a practice defined by the United Nations as torture. By every metric, these institutions are shamefully discriminatory ones – the Department of Corrections in particular were keeping Wellington trans woman Jade Follett in a men’s prison during the period the parade took place.

Pride Inc. did not only allow employees of these institutions to march in the parade – certainly, those individuals have the right to be proud of themselves as queers and march – but by inviting these institutions to march their employees en masse and in uniform, Pride Inc. used our parade to explicitly endorse these institutionally discriminatory organisations. This was a cynical hijacking of our parade, intended to celebrate our communities’ acceptance of a society which wants us dead or worse, to cosy up to repressive state apparatuses who only serve the needs of a white, middle class, cisgender clique. None of us have anything in common with these people, nor they with us. All they want is a position of power and comfort from which they can sell out our parade, our resistance, our community. Pride Inc. exist to sell us out to whichever bank or political entity will pay up, be they labour abusers like ANZ or apartheid terror states like Israel. Pride should be worth more than that.

This year a number of our members nonviolently impeded the Police Force as they marched in pride of place in our parade and I, the only visibly Māori and trans member of the group, was assaulted by a member of Pride Inc.’s security, who broke my arm and hospitalised me for days. (For the record – it was a broken arm, not a hairline fracture). This is the price of addressing Pride Inc.’s hypocrisy. This is what Pride Inc. values. Marginalised queers need to stay in the margins, or we will be forced there with violence. This is what Pride Inc. has made our parade into – an opportunity not to challenge the powers which destroy us and celebrate our victories over them, but to regurgitate their PR and participate in their marketing.

We are not proud of our racist cops. We are not proud of our torturing jailers. We are ashamed of them, we are ashamed that they marched in our parade – we have no faith in Pride Inc. and no pride in prisons.

Pic from GayNZ.

II: IN THE AFTERMATH

Neither Pride Inc. nor the closely affiliated Gay Auckland Business Association (GABA), responded with anything but denial. The president of GABA can be seen in footage of my assault harassing me and trying to destroy another protester’s cellphone footage. They exploited the chaos immediately after the parade to pass off everything as unconfirmed rumours, even after the reality of my injury came to light. They have consistently refused to communicate with No Pride In Prisons in any manner more comprehensive or sensitive than publicly casting us as troublemakers, even fabricating details of No Pride In Prisons protesters assaulting parade-goers. The police were similarly more invested in making it clear that it was security who broke my arm than in taking any action to apprehend the man who had just dragged me by the hair and broke my arm in front of dozens of uniformed police officers. Four months later and I’ve still yet to hear anything from the investigation which the police promised.

GABA in particular were very hostile. Their refusal to be held accountable by the community extended so far as to include blocking all persons under 21 from engaging with them on Facebook – a striking decision from an organization which funds scholarships for school-leaving youth, their recipients including at least one member of No Pride In Prisons.

The public reaction on social media was much the same. Myself and No Pride In Prisons were incessantly attacked by members of the community. Some sent rape and death threats. Is this what we, as a community, want around our pride events? Rape threats and broken bones for young women sick of prison violence against queers and glory for the government departments who facilitate it? Are Māori queers and queer prisoners to be less welcome in Pride than their jailers?

When they incorporated themselves, Pride Inc. also opted to sever all of their obligations to uphold the Treaty of Waitangi. This is extremely worrying, and extremely telling. When a majority-Pākehā organisation takes steps to explicitly exclude itself from accountability to Māori members of the community which it claims to be representing, we are at risk of being further disenfranchised. Just as your queerness is precious to you, so are Māori experiences of sexuality and gender precious to us. These traditions were almost lost to us during colonisation, just as our language was almost almost lost. Like te reo Māori, the Treaty of Waitangi promises Māori the right to retain our precious cultural practices – including the uniquely Māori traditions of takatāpui. Any organisation purporting to be representing queers must accept the responsibility to work in partnership with takatāpui – not the tokenising, disrespectful, ultimately violent disregard Pride Inc. has shown us.

III: WHAT IS TO BE DONE
Over the past few decades, we’ve seen the increasing commercialisation and corporatisation of Pride, wherein businesses and organisations with a financial stake in Pride events come to be prioritised over those most marginalised members of queer communities. No Pride in Prisons’ original message was that the first Pride at Stonewall Inn was a riot, against the police, and that this legacy has been appropriated and erased by the subsequent Pride movement. What we saw at the 2015 Auckland Pride Festival was precisely this trend. We saw the visibility and prioritisation of corporations, oppressive institutions, banks, those members of Tāmaki Makaurau’s queer community who least need the movement, and the violent exclusion of anyone who objected.

The fact that the body running the Auckland Pride Festival now exists as an incorporated society, rather than a charity, means that those organising the Festival have a vested financial interest in the events. It also means that Pride Inc. creates the rules which govern its conduct. Pride Inc. is capable of evading accountability for its conduct and decisions to a far greater extent than it could as a public charity. In light of the events at Auckland Pride Festival 2015, this should worry the queer community.

No Pride in Prisons believes that when Auckland Pride Festival broke the arm of a protester, police neglected to allow her immediate treatment, and known Pride Inc. officials responded to the protest with disdain and vitriol, Pride Inc. lost its mandate to hold Pride events. Pride Inc. has proven its inability and unwillingness to listen to members of the community it professes to serve. As a group, they no longer represent us; indeed, they never did.

The time has well passed for them to be removed and allow for us to build something new; something better.

See also

• 7 Thoughts on Pride and the act of Protesting, Kassie Hartendorp

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