12:22 AM |
Source: NZHerald
Deborah Coddington: Driven to desperation by culture of shame
4:00AM Sunday Mar 29, 2009
By Deborah Coddington
What sort of society puts its international reputation ahead of the welfare of a woman who, too frightened to acknowledge her unwanted pregnancy, gives birth in a plane toilet and hides the baby in a rubbish bin?
And what sort of society locks that same woman in jail, separating her from her breastfeeding baby, one week after she's had a "complicated" birth?
Shame on both our countries.
It's not the first time Samoa has cried "shame" when one of its unmarried mothers has been caught trying to jettison the unhappy result of extra-marital sex, and I bet it won't be the last.
In a vox pop conducted on Samoan streets this week by the Samoan Observer, most citizens said they believed the 29-year-old in question had brought shame to her home country.
It was the same in 2006 when a 20-year-old Samoan student at Otago University was convicted for infanticide for throwing her newborn baby out of the window - many in Samoa called these acts an "international embarrassment".
On the other hand, there have been words of extreme kindness from those in positions of power, such as Labour MP for Mangere, Su'a William Sio.
In an editorial written for the Samoan Observer - which I doubt many white New Zealanders will read - Sio stressed that abandoning a baby was not Samoan culture, and "cannot be allowed to be entertained as acceptable behaviour, no matter how difficult the circumstances".
However, Sio raised yet again the problem of the so-called culture of shame, whereby the fear of having done something wrong and bringing shame to the family leads these mothers "both in Samoa and in New Zealand" to dump their children.
Parents, he said, need to discuss sex more openly.
So what is the point of prosecuting this woman, already facing a bill for hospital care? Under the Crimes Act, she faces a maximum penalty of seven years' jail for abandoning a child under the age of 6.
I'm not suggesting we shouldn't have laws protecting children, or that unwanted babies should be dumped with impunity (and let's not go near the second and third trimester abortion argument at this moment), but, in the circumstances, one would have thought the police could have used discretion, kept a watching brief on mother and baby's bonding progress, and backed off.
She is also exposed to further prosecution under the Immigration Act for not disclosing her pregnancy to the authorities when she signed up for the Recognised Seasonal Employer scheme.
This heavily pregnant woman is accused of "lying". It is reported that "even her mother and father" didn't know she was pregnant. Yeah, right, everyone says.
Taihoa. Nearly 20 years ago my then editor at North & South, Robyn Langwell, reckoned she'd heard every excuse for lateness when I phoned from National Women's Hospital at 11am and said my kids' Fijian nanny, Leba, had just delivered a boy.
She'd been part of our family for four years and none of us knew she was pregnant, including Leba.
She went to the emergency department at 4am with back pains and got the fright of her life when doctors told her why.
At first she didn't want little Timmy, as we named him, but that lasted all of five minutes and now this fine young man, a New Zealand citizen but living in Fiji, is a credit to her.
I don't know who fathered Leba's child. Pride and modesty prevents these women from tracking down the culprit and demanding he accept his responsibilities, if not financially, then at least emotionally.
Which is why prosecuting these young women is so unfair. It takes two to make a baby, but the male side of the equation, who presumably was willing at the time of conception, has abandoned the baby before nature has even determined whether it will be a girl or a boy. When does he ever get punished?
In the case of the Pacific Blue baby, there's every likelihood the father is still in this country, since it is only seven months since the mother was previously working in Gisborne. But I won't hold my breath waiting for a proud dad to step forward and support his new family.
It's a terrible thing to throw a baby away and we recoil in horror at the news. But before judgment is passed so swiftly, shouldn't we put ourselves in the shoes of the abandoner?
Even if she knew she was pregnant, she obviously had no advice or care. Mid-flight, she suffers excruciating pain, holds on until landing, then goes to the loo and - all alone - has her baby.
Everyone's off the plane, she's in a foreign country, she has to earn money for her family, the company's paid half her airfare, she can't claim welfare, she has no husband or family with her, she's lost a lot of blood, is desperate, and panicking.
Would you calmly walk to the Customs officer and say, "Look what I have to declare"?
Endz
Woman who had baby on Auckland flight 'ruins Samoa's good name'
10:13AM Wednesday Mar 25, 2009
by Cherelle Jackson
Photo / Supplied
When the incident of the Samoan mother on the Pacific Blue flight hit the shores of the fairly peaceful Samoa, what swept through the nation was a mixture of shock, sheer curiosity and embarrassment.
News people in Samoa called the incident an 'international embarrassment,' saying the incident had ruined the good name of Samoa.
The editor of the Samoa Observer, Keni Ramese-Lesa, wrote a day after the incident: "This international embarrassment would never have happened if the systems we have in place were working. For instance, aren't people like this woman required to undergo a full medical check-up before being given the okay to be part of such schemes?"
Discussion forums on the Newsline Samoa newspaper have been overwhelmed by people outraged at the incident, because it gives Samoa a bad name.
"How embarrassing!!! How could she? What was she thinking? She thought she would get away with it?" Atinae wrote on Samoalivenews.com.
Coffee shops and the women's committee buzzed with exaggerated stories of the incident, trying to figure out where the woman comes from, her family and any other gossip worthy details.
The CEO of the Ministry of Health, Tupuimatagi Palanitina Toelupe, has already reaffirmed that travelling at seven months term is not a good idea.
Those who processed the woman's papers are pointing fingers, and some just not talking, as they try to figure out exactly who or where they went wrong.
The prime minister's department has yet to issue a statement.
The New Zealand Immigration office in Samoa has remained behind closed doors.
What is perhaps interesting about all of this is that the locals are not shocked the woman left her baby in a rubbish bin, but rather that she did it outside of Samoa, and on a plane.
A comment by a friend put this into perspective.
The friend, a 24-year-old waitress, says: "I can't believe she had the guts to do it outside of Samoa, really."
Sadly, the incident is one that is repeated often in Samoa.
In my career as a news reporter I have reported on numerous cases of newborn babies being abandoned at birth.
The common theme amongst the cases are the disregard for whether the baby lived or not.
Among the cases are two of newborns in plastic bags, one newborn wrapped in a blanket in the bush and another thrown in a river and left for dead.
In most of the cases the babies end up dying before they were found.
So when the Samoan woman left her baby aboard the rubbish bin of the Pacific Blue flight and survived, I personally breathed easy.
The common theme amongst those who have freely expressed opinions in Samoa about this case is finding someone to blame and berating the woman for her 'stupidity' and 'ignorance.'
What could have been a joyful incident on board the Pacific Blue flight from Samoa turned into a very sad incident.
This incident occurs often enough to warrant a shift in the mind frame of Samoan society.
I am neither an anthropologist nor a sociologist, but I know the pressures that face the Samoan woman today.
For an advanced society, bearing a fatherless child is still viewed as a 'shame' and the expectations imposed on a Samoan tamaitai (woman) to adhere to matrimony before bearing a child is not only unfair but unrealistic.
So in the process of trying to defend the pride of their families, those who do abandon their babies do the opposite by 'shaming' their families with such blatant disregard for human life.
The actions of this one Samoa woman suggest that something is certainly amiss in Paradise.
Copyright ©2009, APN Holdings NZ Limited
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