Rumour Versus Fact: Trying to make sense of it...

No doubt you've noticed my developing discourse on the recent events in the Ureweras. I worry that sometimes it sounds like I'm joining the us-and-them brigade of mentality - but rather I am angry at the recent opportunistic strikes being taken around this event.

I saw on Yahoo.co.nz today a comment about studies have shown that people often believe rumour over fact. Something I have seen in action personally on occasion. It is easier to get all worked up over some juicy story than the solid facts, even when faced with irrefutable evidence.

It is worth noting that in regards to Tame Iti, Jamie Lockett and the other fifteen or so people arrested by the police - we have not seen the facts yet. The courts are still going over them, and to ensure that these people get a fair trial the evidence needs to be kept secret until the process has been completed.

Yet there are many who are resorting to rumour and hearsay to justify some need to be offended. I'm sick of how the police have been a constant punching bag for people, and how in many occasions people have started kicking before the evidence is even presented.

Currently there are protests about two issues - one is the alleged boarding of a bus of children going to their Kohanga reo by armed police. The other is the general conduct of the police apparently to target the maori community when they locked down the area.

There has been a weeping bus driver talking about fearing for his life and thinking that he would be shot just like that guy with the hammer, children apparently traumatised by the experience and parents angry that the kids weren't allowed through the blockade.

Wait a minute.

Firstly, the shooting in Christchurch involved a man who was acting in an aggressive manner - and because a lot of the same people had said no to Tasers, the policeman in that situation had very little recourse to do to protect his life from a man hopped up on party pills.

Secondly, the police have said they never boarded the bus. Which brings to light a curious question - how much of this bus incident is hysteria? No doubt there were armed police present - they were dealing with a group who had threatened hunters on a legitimate outing and then exploded a napalm-like weapon in an apparent training camp.

What these people seem to have overlooked is that the Police had no idea how this group of people would react. What would have happened if Tame Iti's friends had been planning to make a message out of the raid and set off explosives or started a shoot-out?

Those children were sent home to protect them from harm and apparently that warrants a hikoi to complain that they should have been sent into a potentially explosive situation that actually could have ended up with the death of a bus full of innocents.

There was no knowing at the time. I suspect it wouldn't have exploded into something violent - Tame Iti et al strike me as naive, self-centered dickheads rather than real terrorists. But nobody could say for certain - and it is better to err on the side of caution than risk lives.

But nobody protesting at the Whakatane Hikoi seems to care about that. They have made a lifestyle of abusing and resisting the police solely based on a self-fulfilling prophecy. By creating a conflict, they promote conflict. I find much of the behaviour being reported before any facts or evidence has come out is shameful. It angers me how readily these people leap up and decry such things. And now, if Tame Iti is revealed to have been a genuine threat - it will be a conspiracy of the crown, not the truth as far as these people are concerned.

Conan

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