1943: Eleanor Roosevelt Aggravates Unrest

September 1, 2019

By AHNZ

Between 1942-4 New Zealand’s warriors were fighting WW2 on the other side of the world. While our braves were away from home, tens of thousands of American servicemen flowed through our lands, our hospitality services, and our women. A social invasion, an economic invasion, a cultural invasion. All but a military invasion.

The American Invasion!

Girls were left without boyfriends, wives without husbands. Being at war only makes woman more hypergamous and the well-funded American soldiers were ready to cut loose.

“On this man-denuded scene, made more grey by petrol and travel restrictions, blackouts and shortages, came the well-garbed Americans in their thousands. ‘There were so many of them,’ sighed an 18-year-old redhead of 1942, 30 years later, recalling the sudden wealth of escorts, the burst of warmth and vitality that flowed out from Service clubs and street encounters into the suburbs.”- The American Invasion; The Home Front V1, Taylor (1986); NZETEC

The American servicemen all knew perfectly well that they were cutting in on another society’s sexual politics. A General Order posted on all United States bulletin boards and published by many newspapers read…

2. You will find the country depleted of its young men. They are absent on military duty in the New Zealand Army, which has proven itself on the field of battle in this and the first world war as one of the “fightingest” organisations in the world. In Greece, Crete, and in Egypt they fought and are fighting our battles in our war, and not only as soldiers but as individuals they and their people merit our highest respect and affection.- Ref. The American Invasion; The Home Front V1, Taylor (1986); NZETEC

Yet it would have taken the self-restraint of a Dignity Culture Saint for these men and women to refrain from fraternising. Far from it, both populations were in the thick of Honour Culture being trained for war and in a war. Along with that comes Honour Culture mating ethics: All is fair in love and war. 

First Lady Roosevelt: Putting Out Fire With Gasoline

For Kiwis away fighting for their country (and their women) in Cairo of Cassino or at home the news made for a crippling blow to morale. While our men’s backs were turned their US allies, their home government, and the women of New Zealand were betraying them. Or, so it would have felt. In the end, some 15,000 New Zealand women ended up wedding American servicemen within these few short years. Goodness knows how many pregnancies resulted inside or outside wedlock.

“You know, with things the way they are this is no time to start getting serous with a girl. You don’t know how long you’re going to be here, you don’t know when you’re going to be back again. Don’t even know how long you’re going to be alive.”- John Wayne’s character advises one of his men against courting a Wellington girl¹.

By the time US First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt visited most of the damage had been done. Battle of Manners Street, Wellington, and other riots and skirmishes had been piling up. Maoris, with their keen sense of Honour Culture, made sure they were represented just as they did after the Christchurch Massacre of 2019. In Auckland there was at least one stabbing and after Roosevelt’s visit an Otahuhu man beat his wife to death with a hammer after she told him she wished to leave him and their son with a (already married himself) US Army corporal.²

Into this incendiary situation flew Lefty Statist Darling and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. Landing on 28 August 1943, FDR’s wife toured New Zealand like royalty taking in Wellington, Rotorua, and Auckland. I think it was at her September 1st visit to Auckland that Eleanor created the following inflammatory news clip…

“Many of the women at home would like to send a message to the woman of New Zealand…so many of our boys have been stationed here that they know already how hospitable and kind the women of this country have been to the sons and husbands and brothers of the women in the United States.”

What an incendiary thing to say to further bruise the egos of our absentee men watching this newsreel far away. Roosevelt could not have been ignorant of the unsettling situation yet decided to poke the wound by specifically thanking New Zealand’s woman for transferring their attention and affection to foreigners. Wicked Witch!

—

1 Sands of Iwo Jima (1949); Ref. Youtube

2 March 1944 murder; NZ Herald; Papers Past and Lowell Sun and Auckland Star

Image ref. Wellington dance scene; Sands of Iwo Jima (1949)

Image ref. The Duke lays it out; ibid

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