Taika Waititi has labelled New Zealand "a racist place" in a new interview, saying he's been racially profiled and locals refuse to pronounce Māori names properly.
The Thor:Ragnarok filmmaker caused a stir in 2017 after criticising his home country's dirty rivers, depression rates, teen suicide rates, housing crisis and child poverty rates.
Now, Waititi has added to the list of problems he perceives in Aotearoa.
"It's racist as f**k," he told UK magazine Dazed.
"I think New Zealand is the best place on the planet, but it's a racist place. People just flat-out refuse to pronounce Māori names properly."
Waititi added that people in Auckland in particular are "very patronising" for praising how well he has done "for one of his people".
"There's still profiling when it comes to Polynesians. It's not even a colour thing - like, 'Oh, there's a black person.' It's, 'If you're Poly then you're getting profiled.'"
Waititi was interviewed for the magazine with Unknown Mortal Orchestra's Ruban Nielson, who agreed, saying he's always reminded he's "still Polynesian" in New Zealand.
Newshub.
