There’s a viral video going doing the rounds. It’s eighteen months old now and it features what appears to be the conclusion and prize giving at a children’s gymnastics tournament in Ireland. The young girls are all lined up and in the process of everyone receiving a medal. They all seem excited as the person handing the medals over moves along the line towards each of them. 

In the middle of the line stands a young black girl, who is just as excited as all the others. But inexplicably, the person handing out the medals walks past her without handing her a medal. Every other girl receives one. 

The video is difficult to watch. You can’t help but have your heart go out to the little girl in the middle of the line. The look on her face tells the story. 

Over the last few years there has been a renewed discussion about racism in this country. We were once regarded as being a model country in terms of how we handled race relations. We were broadly regarded as one people who stood alongside each other during the toughest of times. We had a treaty and a grievance settlement process which was world leading and which seemed to work well for a time. 

The gymnastics video immediately took me back to the many days of school prizegivings, sporting awards celebrations, and business awards dinners that I have attended. Those events have seen New Zealanders of every variety, including dependents of long-established local families, new first-generation Kiwis and everything in between awarded for their achievements. Whether we are celebrating mathematical brilliance, athletic prowess, software smarts or artistic talent, all New Zealanders have been able to shine, and thus have their success celebrated. 

I think that’s why the gymnastics video affected me so much. It just seems so far removed from the reality we experience. 

In New Zealand we are currently in a moment in time where the word ‘racist’ is being used and abused, particularly by those in and around political discussion. 

During the period from the late 1940’s to the 1990’s South Africa, a country then governed by the white minority, operated a political regime that was racist and separatist. The laws of the land were such that people had different rights based on the colour of their skin. Our country was deeply involved in expressing our distaste for that South African regime. In the 1970’s, debate around our All Blacks touring South Africa twice (in 1970 and 1976) brought the horrors of South Africa’s apartheid regime into our consciousness. And during the 1981 Springbok tour of New Zealand that consciousness was unleashed as thousands of Kiwis, many of whom were as rugby mad as anyone, demonstrated against that tour, suggesting at the time that it was some form of endorsement of the South African regime. 

Those experiences alone, make many New Zealanders, more acutely aware of some of the history of racism and the small part we have played in the arguments that have occurred around this unseemly and corrosive topic. 

During the last few years, we have had a government that has tried to advance a different approach to race relations, including changes to the policy, governance, and management of various ministries and institutions.   

As these changes have been rolled out, they have prompted various discussions, including around the ownership of water, stewardship of our health and education systems, and the use of language. Even our educational syllabuses have been partly overhauled to reflect the revised approach.   

This column does not purport to state whether that approach has been right or wrong. 

However, as a result of the government process, a few brave people have stood up and debated those intentions. To do so has come at a high risk. Those people who have sought to challenge the government arrangements, including politicians, academics, opinion writers and even the occasional cartoonist, have been labelled racist, and in many cases cancelled, for doing so. 

There is no question that some politicians and commentators, on both sides of the so-called race debate, have said things that are extremist and unhelpful. Those people need to be more cautionary in how they communicate their views. 

But those people notwithstanding, we need to be able to have difficult conversations regarding a wide range of topics, without those conversations descending into name-calling and personal abuse. 

Because where there are matters that we need to discuss, we must be able to have those discussions without fear or favour. I don’t think that the majority of the people who are prepared to have the discussion, to debate both sides of the argument, the pros and the cons, are being racist in doing so.  

We may be discussing race, or for that matter, beneficiaries or climate change. The airing of a variety of opinions is vital to the ability to have the discussion. Talking about our problems will usually result in better solutions. Doing so responsibly should not, in this writer's view, result in accusations and labelling.  

When a word or a phrase is overused, we run the risk of reducing its impact. With something as abhorrent as racism, we must avoid diminishing the intensity of the meaning of something that is totally unacceptable to the great majority of our people. 

Meanwhile, watching a little girl, waiting for her participation medal, who is overlooked because of the colour of her skin, should put the meaning back into the term, and remind us just how nasty racism can be.

Bruce Cotterill is a company director and adviser to business leaders. He is the author of the book, The Best Leaders Don't Shout, a regular NZ Herald columnist and host of the Herald’s new podcast, Leaders Getting Coffee.  www.brucecotterill.com