Differential experiences of the pandemic, the infodemic, and information
disorders – disinformation impacts for Māori

The Disinformation Project (TDP)
s9(2)(g)(ii)
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Introduction
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This deep dive analysis explores the experiences of Māori during the Covid-19 pandemic and its
resulting infodemic. It provides historic context and offers suggestions for future Crown
responses to both pandemic and infodemic. Understanding such contexts is essential as we look
to navigate future relationships with Māori, inspired by the relationship enabled and enforced
by Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

This deep dive is based on The Disinformation Project’s (TDP) daily analysis of mis- and
disinformation ecologies in Aotearoa New Zealand, critical insights from its researchers’ study of
Aotearoa New Zealand’s history, and conversations with communities and leaders. The unique
combination of these uniquely equips us to provide both overview and insight into the way mis-
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and disinformation ecologies impact Māori.

The importance of health and social cohesion
In the middle of the pandemic’s first year, and reflecting on more than twenty years’ work
establishing the critical importance of the social determinants of health, renowned British public
Official
health expert Sir Michael Marmot, of the eponymous Marmot Reviews, wrote that “a socially
cohesive society with concern for the common good is likely to be a healthier society.”1

the
But what is social cohesion? It is increasingly well understood that relationships are important
for physical and psychosocial wellbeing, and in social determinants of health, these relationships
are conceptualised through ideas such as social cohesion, social capital, social networks and
social support. Social capital refers to shared community or group resources which individuals
access through their social networks, which we might best understand as the ecosystem, or web,
of human relationships. Underpinning social cohesion within this complex relationship-based
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construction is the idea of collective efficacy – that is, a community’s ability to create change
and exercise informal social control by influencing behaviour through shared social norms.
Whānau, hapū, community, faith and other organised or non-organised groupings are spaces
within which people experience social networks, can access social capital, and experience social
control.

In Tā Mason Durie’s critical conceptualisation 1984 of health and wellbeing within a Kaupapa
Māori framework, Te Whare Tapa Whā, health and wellbeing is a wharenui with four walls: taha
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1 https://www.health.org.uk/publications/reports/the-marmot-review-10-years-on

wairua, or spiritual wellbeing; taha hinengaro, mental and emotional wellbeing; taha tinana,
physical wellbeing; and taha whānau, family and social wellbeing.

The wharenui has strong foundations within the whenua on which it sits. These models,
conceived to describe the complex interrelationships between individual health outcomes,
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social issues, community wellbeing, and social inclusion, provide enormous insight for our
understanding of information ecosystems, disinformation, and information disorders. People
who are grounded, situated, enabled to flourish and contribute, and connected to others are far
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less likely to experience negative health outcomes -and, far less likely to experience other
negative outcomes: disconnection, information disorders, social exclusion, and participation in
fragmented realities.

The Report of the Royal Commission into the Ōtautahi Christchurch mosque attacks provides a
series of recommendations related to social cohesion. Released at the end of 2020, the report
specifies the role we all have in making Aotearoa New Zealand safe and inclusive:

Public conversations about embracing diversity and encouraging social
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cohesion should be led by political leaders and the government. There should
be transparent conversations where information is available to everyone.
These conversations need to include all communities – across the length and
breadth of the country, both rural and urban. Enduring change will take time
and investment, so these conversations will need to be ongoing.2
Official

In this deep dive report, which focuses on the experiences of the infodemic and information
disorders for Māori, these contexts are critical. The last two and a half years of the pandemic
the
have further impacted social cohesion, further eroded information and knowledge flows, and
further entrenched social networks based within information disorders. The pandemic, and
tipping points predicated by external influences such as the 2020 election’s shift to more closely
align with the US election cycle, and internal influences such as vaccine mandates and the long
Delta lockdown of 2021 have had significant detrimental impact. Unable to access spaces and
places within which to proceed with those needed ongoing and enduring conversations about
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diversity and social cohesion, communities have formed social networks centred within
narratives of exclusion, division, polarisation, and in some cases, hate. These social networks are
based within social contagion, but the social support people experience as members of these
communities is real, and unpacking the complex networked effects of social contagion will take
very real effort, time, investment and replacement of contagion with cohesion.

Colonial Context
Released Colonisation is in fact the history that has never left us… acts of subtle (and
not so subtle) discrimination, the frequently coded demeaning of our people

2 https://christchurchattack.royalcommission.nz/

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in many media outlets, and the nagging public hectoring which questions the
Treaty or the worth of being Māori are an unarticulated, ever-present
burden…3
Aotearoa New Zealand’s colonial past, and the operations of colonisation in the present, are
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important backdrops through which to assess and understand Māori experiences in Aotearoa
New Zealand in 2022. The cultural, social, and economic impacts of colonisation are varied and
substantial. While it is outside the scope of this deep dive to assess each of these in detail, we
will highlight the impact of land confiscation on Māori lives and health outcomes.
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The nineteenth century saw mass confiscation of Māori land by the Crown as punishment for
actions which were deemed rebellious. Historian Vincent O’Malley has argued that the invasion
of the Waikato by the colonial government on 12 July 1893 is the definitive origin of the colonial
state of New Zealand, far more so than any twentieth century conflict.4 The raupatu (land
confiscation and alienation) that followed saw land ownership shift from Māori to settlers and
the colonial state.

Land confiscation must be viewed within the context of Tā Mason Durie’s conceptualisation of
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Te Whare Tapa Whā. As established above, in the model whenua (land) is the foundation of the
wharenui of health and wellbeing. Land confiscation and continued alienation from land must be
seen as a contributor to poor Māori health outcomes – and are essential context through which
to understand Māori experiences of the pandemic, the infodemic, and information disorders.

Entwined with land confiscations was the labelling of Māori as ‘rebels’ against the Crown –
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applying labels to scapegoat and cement Māori as ‘other’.5 The labelling of Māori extends
beyond the context of the 1863 Settlements Act, extending to frames of ‘subversives’, ‘traitors’,
‘savage inferiors’, ‘filthy primitives’, and ‘terrorists’.6 The operations of labelling and
the
consequences of scapegoating, entwined with land confiscations, are essential contexts for
understanding Māori experiences of the pandemic, the infodemic, and information disorders.

Intergenerational distrust and lived experiences of systemic neglect, fuelled by two centuries of
being ignored and abused by those in power7 has generated mistrust in state authority –
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mistrust which is grounded in experience and lived reality, but which can be manipulated by
conspiratorial thinking. The preconditions for propensity to entertain and then believe in
conspiratorial thought include a sense of lack of control over one’s own circumstances, a sense
of isolation, and a sense of disconnection from others. The complex and interconnected forces
of colonisation, land dispossession, labelling of Māori, and mistrust by Māori of state authority
are key factors influencing the way Māori have responded to both the Covid-19 pandemic and

3 Moana Jackson, "Preface - the Constancy of Terror," in Terror in Our Midst?: Searching for Terror in Aotearoa New Zealand, ed.
Danny Keenan (Wellington: Huia, 2008), 3.
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4 Vincent O'Malley, The New Zealand Wars: Ngā Pakanga O Aotearoa (Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 2019).
5 Māmari Stephens, "Beware the Hollow ‘Calabash’: Narrative, Analogy, and the Acts of Suppression," in Terror in Our Midst?:
Searching for Terror in Aotearoa New Zealand, ed. Danny Keenan (Wellington: Huia, 2008), 191.
6 Jackson, "Preface - the Constancy of Terror," 2.
7 Te Rina Triponel, "Protesters Are Ignoring Tikanga – and That's Dangerous,” NZ Herald, https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/te-rina-
triponel-protesters-are-ignoring-tikanga-and-thats-dangerous/NVOEIWXLQILQXAUPYIE2RH2I2Y/, Accessed 10/8/22.

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its associated infodemic. These historic and contemporary contexts then intermingle with the
lived experience of the pandemic and infodemic to further erode information ecosystems,
enabling the experience of information disorders which are now present in Aotearoa New
Zealand.

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The pandemic
The arrival of Covid-19 in Aotearoa New Zealand caused significant unknowns for New
Zealanders.8 Official Covid-19 communications in early 2020 were celebrated domestically and
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internally, for their clarity and for contributing to Aotearoa New Zealand’s successful elimination
strategy.9

Researchers Alex Beattie and Rebecca Priestley have described how Covid-19 communications
did not reach all communities in Aotearoa New Zealand in the same way, saying that te ao Māori
– such as use of te reo Māori and referencing of the East Coast wave – was used tokenistically.10
Public health expert Dr Rhys Jones called the 1pm daily briefings “an exercise in whiteness”,
critiquing the way Māori were not included in them as partners.11 This reflects the way that
Māori did not experience the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic in the same ways as non-
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Māori, highlighting the pandemic generated different experiences for New Zealanders.

In September 2020, Te Pūnaha Matatini researchers prepared modelling for ethnicity-based
inequities in Covid-19 effects estimated inequalities in fatality resulting from Covid-19 infection
by ethnicity.12 They concluded that Māori and Pacific communities were at greater risk of fatality
that non-Māori and non-Pacific, and that these factors needed to be included in future disease
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incidence and impact modelling.13 The paper concluded that if there was rapid community
transmission in future, it would create unprecedented stress on the health system - which would
“almost certainly amplify existing racism in the healthcare system.”14 Te Pūnaha Matatini’s
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report warned that pre-existing inequalities in the health system would exacerbate poor
experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Just as Māori have been labelled and used as scapegoats throughout Aotearoa New Zealand’s
history, so too did this happen during the pandemic. Writing on the spread of mis- and
disinformation during August 2021-November 2021, TDP noted:
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For example, mainstream media’s reporting on the uptake of vaccination by
Māori has increased a perception of Māori as vaccine hesitant and anti-

8 Luke Fitzmaurice and Maria Bargh, Stepping Up: Covid-19 Checkpoints and Rangatiratanga (Wellington: Huia, 2021), 1.
9 Alex Beattie and Rebecca Priestley, "Fighting Covid-19 with the Team of 5 Million: Aotearoa New Zealand Government
Communication During the 2020 Lockdown," Social Sciences & Humanities Open 4 (2021): 1.
10 ibid., 7.
11 Rhys Jones, "Covid-19 and Māori Health: ‘The Daily 1pm Briefings Have Been an Exercise in Whiteness’,” The Spinoff,
Released
https://thespinoff.co.nz/atea/13-05-2020/covid-19-and-maori-health-the-daily-1pm-briefings-have-been-an-exercise-in-whiteness,
Accessed 9/8/2022.
12 Nicholas Steyn, Rachelle N Binny et al., "Estimated Inequities in Covid-19 Infection Fatality Rates by Ethnicity for Aotearoa New
Zealand," New Zealand Medical Association 133, no. 1521 (2020).
13 Ibid., 28.
14 Ibid., 36.

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vaccination, which has been picked up within circles of disinformation in way
that capitalises on racism and further targets disinformation towards those
groups. This allows for the targeting of Māori, and the intensification of anti-
Māori racism within mis- and disinformation circles.15
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The same period also saw blame of Māori centred around the spread of Covid-19 from Auckland
to Waikato, and references to gangs as rule-breakers and spreaders of Covid-19. This implicit
messaging relies on old tropes – blame, labelling and scapegoating of Māori for the behaviour of
others. Just as Māori were scapegoated in the early colonial period of Aotearoa New Zealand’s
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history, so too were they scapegoated during the pandemic.

The infodemic
Alongside the Covid-19 pandemic emerged an infodemic: the “overabundance of information –
some accurate and some not – that makes it hard for people to find trustworthy sources and
reliable guidance when they need it.”16 In TDP’s preliminary evaluation of the impact of
disinformation in Aotearoa New Zealand we noted:
Aotearoa New Zealand’s communities have differential experiences of past
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pandemics, different measures of health and wellbeing, and different
experiences of state services and state intervention. The pandemic and
infodemic are also taking place within different nation-states, with different
political systems, worldviews, and approaches to healthcare and the role of
government. These contexts necessarily inform community and individual
responses to the overabundance of information experienced. Understanding
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how the infodemic has presented in Aotearoa New Zealand enables us to
better evaluate ways in which unreliable and untrustworthy information
differentially impacts our communities.17
the
As early as 2020, we highlighted that different communities in Aotearoa New Zealand are
experiencing and responding to rising infodemics in different ways. Within the mis- and
disinformation ecologies studied by TDP, Māori are targets and scapegoats, producers, and
subscribers. The complex interrelationship between these phenomena must be viewed within
the context of the infodemic’s unique impact on Māori and historic experiences of colonisation.
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Racism – Māori as targets of mis- and disinformation
Anti-Māori racism is a key feature in the anti-vaccination, anti-mandate ecologies studied by
TDP. A defining feature of this is the ways in which the worst producers and promoters of racism
frequently align themselves with Māori, drawing a distinction between “real Maori” and “Maori
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15 Kate Hannah, Sanjana Hattotuwa, and Kayli Taylor, "Mis- and Disinformation in Aotearoa New Zealand from 17 August to 5
November 2021," (2021), 8.
16 World Health Organisation, "Infodemic,” https://www.who.int/health-topics/infodemic, Accessed 10/8/2022.
17 Max Soar, Victoria Louise Smith et al., "Evaluating the Infodemic: Assessing the Prevalence and Nature of Covid-19 Unreliable and
Untrustworthy Information in Aotearoa New Zealand’s Social Media, January-August 2020," Te Pūnaha Matatini  (2020): 2.

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elites”. Such discourses align with both good Muslim/bad Muslim rhetoric that emerged post
9/11,18 and to the ways Māori were divided during the colonial project.19

This generation and amplification of division by non-Māori subscribed to mis- and
disinformation ecologies in Aotearoa New Zealand results in violent targeting of Māori with high 1982
profiles, such as Members of Parliament. One disinformation producer says of a Māori Member
of Parliament: “She is literally above the law and rules that apply to the rest of us. I believe she's
a self loathing one part in 512 Maori if that, with dyed hair, spray on tan and a moko to Act
exaggerate her Maori credentials purely for greed and riches beyond anything she could
accumulate in a million years of life. A truly horrendous human being and a quintessential
definition of a psychopath.” The racist targeting of this MP is common, as are attacks against
Māori colleagues in Parliament, public health, academia, and Māori leadership.

In the context of Three Waters reform, racism against both Nanaia Mahuta (as Minister for Local
Government, and spokesperson on the issue) and Māori as a whole is common. In one
comment, a disinformation producer based in Ōtautahi Christchurch divides Māori by signalling
a Māori elite, and targets Nanaia Mahuta: “Councils including Christchurch will capitulate to
whatever Nanaia Mahuta dreams up, and be backed by extremist elite Maori in the Maori
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party, who stand to become very very wealthy while non Maori cowards in government say
nothing.” Anti-Māori racism, and specifically targeting of wāhine Māori is the norm within the
anti-vaccination, anti-mandate location of our study. This is expressed via language, imagery,
and meme, and is violent and hateful in expression. There is little to no pushback to this
dangerous speech targeting Māori, even from subscribers and producers who are Māori. This
lack of pushback is enabled by the establishment of two groups of Māori, as above. In recent
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days, the proliferation of the specific racist term ‘house n*gger’ has been updated to ‘house
hori’, used to describe the group of Māori who are members of the so-called ‘elite.’ In operating
this tool of divisiveness between members of a historically marginalised group, disinformation
the
producers build both an audience for their messaging, and develop a group to be blamed and
scapegoated.

Information Disorders
Two critical disinformation discourses studied over the last two and a half years target Māori in
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ways that capitalise on genuine lived experiences of the state, systemic racism, and the slow
violence20 of colonisation. In these discourses, Māori are both promoted as producers of
disinformation and sought after as subscribers to disinformation. Neither of these roles are safe
– in that, much like the end of the Parliament protest, however Māori are enticed into
conspiratorial thought, the historic scapegoating of Māori as ‘traitors’ or ‘terrorists’21 will leave
Māori blamed for events, actions, and narratives that others have also participated in.

18 Mahmood Mamdani, "Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: A Political Perspective on Culture and Terrorism," American Anthropologist 104,
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no. 3 (2002).
19 Sue Abel, "Tūhoe and ‘Terrorism’ on Television News," in Terror in Our Midst?: Searching for Terror in Aotearoa New Zealand, ed.
Danny Keenan (Wellington: Huia, 2008).; Alison McCulloch, "'Maori Terror Threat': The Dangers of the Post-9/11 Narrative," Pacific
Journalism Review 14, no. 2 (2008): 212.
20 Rob Nixon, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor (Harvard University Press, 2011).
21 Jackson, "Preface - the Constancy of Terror," 2.

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Lived experiences of sexual violence – Māori as producers of mis- and disinformation
In a particularly distressing and complex set of disinformation narratives, the lived experiences
of people, particularly wahine Māori, related to family and sexual violence are cynically used to
promote conspiratorial narratives related to QAnon. QAnon is a wide-ranging and baseless
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internet conspiracy with origins in the United States and global influence. QAnon subscribers
believe that a collection of Satan-worshipping political leaders, celebrities, and billionaries rule
the world – engaging in paedophilia, human trafficking, and the harvesting of blood from
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children.22 This particular conspiratorial narrative links older narratives around satanic ritual
abuse, antisemitic narratives of ‘blood libel’, and antisemitic dog-whistles based on a global
conspiracy of elites. How this narrative is promoted to and by Māori has deep ties to lived
experiences of abuse, including abuse in state care, as highlighted by the ongoing work of the
Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Church Care. International contexts for
Indigenous peoples, including the policies of removal of children from their families in Canada
and Australia, and subsequent neglect, abuse, and murder feed into the veracity of this set of
narratives: for Indigenous peoples, the mass kidnapping of children and systemic sexual abuse
are both lived realities.

Information
A wāhine Māori mis- or disinformation23 producer had a successful tour of the country over late
autumn/early winter 2022, holding meetings at which QAnon rhetoric and imagery was posted
alongside specific Aotearoa New Zealand references to Oranga Tamariki, current legislation to
remove the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, and practises of the removal of tamariki
Māori by Oranga Tamariki which were investigated by a number of agencies. This narrative is
powerful for those who have experienced the surveillance state and its agencies – from Oranga
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Tamariki to the Ministry of Social Development (and their earlier iterations), as well as the
Ministry of Education and myriad healthcare providers. Whānau Māori are far more likely to
have these experiences than non-Māori.
the

A recent example reveals the utility of promoting Māori as producers of disinformation by those
mis- and disinformation ecologies who largely espouse anti-Māori and racist ideologies. A widely
reported case in which a defence lawyer argued that a 12 year old child ‘consented’ to sexual
intercourse (which is a legal defence in Aotearoa New Zealand as we do not have statutory rape
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provisions within our legal framework24), is widely picked up within the mis- and disinformation
ecosystems studied. It is framed as evidence of widespread state-supported corruption and
involvement in the global conspiracy described above. In this frame, the judge is a sexual
predator in cahoots with others. The genuine and distressing sexual abuse of a child, currently
before the courts, is cynically used to further distress and sensitise communities with lived
experience of sexual harm not to target perpetrators but to incite action towards overthrowing
the state. For the wider ‘freedom movement’ which is grounded in ideas which discriminate
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22 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/25/qanon-conspiracy-theory-explained-trump-what-is
23 The individual’s own belief in the veracity of what she promotes makes the categorisation of this as mis- or disinformation difficult,
since it is clear that she has lived experience of abuse, including abuse within the state system.
24 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/05/calls-for-changes-to-new-zealand-law-after-rapist-claims-sex-with-12-year-
old-consensual

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against Māori, involving Māori enables a convenient and culturally familiar scapegoat when or if
violence takes place.

Vaccines, whakapapa, and dispossession – Māori as subscribers to mis- and disinformation
Māori are also subscribers to mis- and disinformation ecologies. Such subscription must be
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viewed within the context of Māori experiences of colonisation and abuse by state power.25 A
key disinformation narrative we have observed and analysed for the last two and a half years,
that of vaccine hesitancy or vaccine resistance/refusal, provides a clear example for the ways in
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which experiences of social and physical dispossession, systemic racism, and the surveillance
state enable Māori participation in disinformation narratives.

These experiences, coupled with facile disinformation producers’ manipulation of international
narratives about corrupt elites into an Aotearoa New Zealand, and specifically Māori context,
see preventative healthcare such as vaccination framed as tools of colonisation and
dispossession. A wahine Māori disinformation producer associated with a large ‘alternative
news’ cluster describes, at odds with widespread historical and contemporary understandings
by Māori scholars of Matauranga Māori, how in the past “there was no hapū or iwi, there was
just Māori.” This false construction (it is widely accepted that precolonial identity was whānau,
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hapū and iwi based, and that Māori as an identity marker is postcolonial) works in a number of
ways. Firstly, it feeds a narrative frame that there are ‘Māori elites’, usually iwi based, who are,
in this construction, ‘bad’ Māori, and that ordinary Māori, disconnected from hapū and iwi, are
‘good’ Māori. This trope has already been identified above. Secondly, this operates to further
disconnect iwi Māori from their whānau, hapū and iwi which are critically, locations within
which information is assessed, knowledge is exchanged, and decisions are made based on that
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information and knowledge. In this manner, a construction of divided Māori works for the wider
anti-establishment ‘freedom movement’ to perpetuate conspiratorial thought and alienate
Māori as subscribers to disinformation from accessing their traditional means of information
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evaluation, furthering information disorders.

Vaccine-related disinformation has and continues to target Māori as Māori, in that vaccine
disinformation has focused on harm to whakapapa – with pregnancy, childbirth, pēpi and
tamariki as key visual and emotive frames. Whānau Māori experience healthcare system
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racism,26 and that racism is especially experienced by pregnant people and their loved ones. The
leading cause of death for pregnant Māori in Aotearoa New Zealand is suicide. When
vaccination is presented, as the Covid-19 vaccination has been within mis- and disinformation
ecologies studied by TDP, as harmful for pregnant people, babies and young children, this works
powerfully within communities who experience more detrimental health outcomes within our
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25 Triponel, "Protesters Are Ignoring Tikanga – and That's Dangerous".
26 Rebekah Graham and Bridgette Masters-Awatere, "Experiences of Māori of Aotearoa New Zealand's Public Health System: A
Systematic Review of Two Decades of Published Qualitative Research," Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health 44, no. 3
(2020).

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healthcare system. Vaccine hesitancy has increased, and more tamariki Māori are now behind
on other childhood vaccinations than before.27

The intentional manipulation of whānau Māori decision-making about vaccination has pulled
some Māori into a worldview that sees vaccination as part of a widespread global conspiracy
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which some call ‘the great reset’, which claims that once again global elites are seeking to
drastically reduce the global population. For communities worldwide who have experience of
eugenics, from forced sterilisation to forced abortion, which Māori are one of, this narrative
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resonates. The sad reality that those who are promoting this worldview are in fact themselves
white supremacist or eugenicist is hidden from sight by the promotion of Māori voices for
cynical ends. The Covid-19 vaccination roll-out, which focused on age-based bands, saw Māori, a
younger population than other ethnic groups, exposed to disinformation about the specific
vaccine and wider vaccine disinformation for longer, and at a time, the Delta lockdown, when
Aotearoa New Zealand’s disinformation communities grew at pace.28 The impact of exposure to
vaccine disinformation framed to describe threats to the wellbeing of particularly women and
girls, a hallmark of dangerous speech29 has entrenched vaccine resistance and refusal within
communities that previously were vaccine neutral or hesitant. The potential for outbreaks of
preventable childhood diseases alongside new threats such as Covid-19 and monkeypox are
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likely to have differential impacts for Māori, particularly tamariki Māori.

Māori responses to pandemic and infodemic
For Māori, Covid-19 prompted action across various health, education, and social services to
protect their communities.30 These actions can be seen as exertions of rangatiratanga and of the
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continued work of Māori to protect people and communities from the worst effects of the
pandemic and infodemic.

the
One example of the action taken by Māori to protect their people is the checkpoints set up
during the Covid-19 lockdown in early 2020. As Luke Fitzmaurice and Maria Bargh explore, the
checkpoints are examples of rangatiratanga.31 As they point out, the success of the checkpoints
highlight that Crown-Māori partnerships, such as those at the checkpoints can be Māori-led;
that rangatiratanga has never stopped being expressed by Māori; that rangatiratanga is not
vested solely in iwi but can be expressed by a variety of Māori political structures; and that
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Māori can draw on a wealth of skill and knowledge when needed.32 The checkpoints show a way
in which Māori responded in tikanga-led ways, collaborated with Crown agencies, and acted in
ways that benefited both Māori and non-Māori.

27 Anna Howe, Emma Best, and Matthew Hobbs, "Nz Children Face a ‘Perfect Storm’ of Dangerous Diseases as Immunisation Rates
Fall,” The Conversation, https://theconversation.com/nz-children-face-a-perfect-storm-of-dangerous-diseases-as-immunisation-
Released
rates-fall-188157, Accessed 11/8/22.
28 Hannah, Hattotuwa, and Taylor, "Mis- and Disinformation in Aotearoa New Zealand from 17 August to 5 November 2021."
29 The Dangerous Speech Project, "Dangerous Speech: A Practical Guide," (2021).
30 Fitzmaurice and Bargh, 2.
31 Ibid.
32 Ibid., 78.

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Conclusion
The colonial context and its impact on the economic, cultural, and social lives of Māori is directly
intertwined with differential experiences of both the Covid-19 pandemic and its resulting
infodemic. Such experiences of both pandemic and infodemic are complex. Government
communications did not reach Māori in the same way they did non-Māori, with one public
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health expert calling the daily 1pm briefings “an exercise in whiteness”. During various Covid-19
outbreaks, Māori were scapegoated, blamed, and mis-represented as vaccine hesitant. The
practice of labelling and scapegoating slots into a long history of labelling Māori.
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Anti-Māori sentiment proliferates throughout the mis- and disinformation ecologies studied by
TDP, directed at Māori collectively as well as at high-profile Māori. Māori subscription to QAnon
rhetoric must be appreciated within the context of lived experiences of abuse, including abuse
in state care. Recognising intergenerational trauma and deep mistrust in the state is essential
context for understanding such experiences of Māori during the infodemic. Similarly, vaccine
hesitancy is also context-based and historically informed. It must be understood within histories
of eugenics and state control of non-white bodies.

Despite these complex, historically grounded, and real experiences for Māori; iwi and hapū
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Māori have responded in a number of ways to protect the safety and wellbeing of their people.
These efforts have not just protected Māori – checkpoints established by Māori kept non-Māori
safe too.33

For decades, advocates and academics have recommended ways that the Crown can adequately
work alongside Māori. Fitzmaurice and Bargh argue that the checkpoints show how the Crown
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can adapt itself to work alongside tikanga-based practices, and thus generate successful
partnerships.34 The case study of checkpoints set up by Māori early in the Covid-19 pandemic
offer an opportunity to critically assess the way the Crown and Māori collaborate on issues of
the
national significance. Public health expert Dr Rhys Jones, when critiquing the lack of partnership
present in the Covid-19 briefings called on the Crown to include Māori at the decision-making
table. He argued this would have positive effects on all of Aotearoa New Zealand – reducing
inequalities.35  Our analysis, which is informed by daily and grounded research, draws us to
recommend the same. Bringing Māori leaders and communities to the table to lead, inform, and
under
assist with both pandemic and infodemic responses in is the best way to ensure equity; and to
mitigate against the effects of the colonial past and present.

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33 Ibid., 31.
34 Ibid., 73.
35 Jones, "Covid-19 and Māori Health: ‘The Daily 1pm Briefings Have Been an Exercise in Whiteness’".

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1982

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