Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 3, Number 12, 1 Kekemapa 1986 — Code of Conduct [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Code of Conduct

By Poka Laenui (Hayden F. Burgess) Trustee, Oahu

I wish to share with you a Hawaiian Code of Conduct I recently eame upon. The conquest of a nation is only complete, not by military subjection, however thorough, but by destruction of the indigenous culture. Therefore, every Hawaiian is responsible to all other Hawaiians

for the survival of our Hawaiian cultural identity. We hereby dedicate ourselves to retain, teach and rescue our Hawaiian cultural identity for the sake of our posterity, our fellow Hawaiians, our nation and ourselves. 1. Since the Hawaiian language is a fundamental pillar of our identity, we shall make every effort to leam, use and teach, whenever practicable, our Hawaiian language.

2. Our children are the most treasured investments of the values and traditions of our culture; we must make every effort to cultivate in our children the pride in being Hawaiian and provide every possible opportunity for them to leam of the values and traditions of our people. 3. We shall practice Aloha, the heritage from our ancestors, mindful of the virtues of Akaha'i, Lokahi, Oluolu, Haahaa, and Ahonui. 4. We shall engage in hard work, realizing that laziness breeds unhappiness and weak minds. 5. We shall continually strive for spiritual development and adopt an attitude of tolerance and under-

standing to those who conceive of spirituality in a different way from our own. 6. We shall extend and display respect to all others whieh reflects our own appreciation of humanity. We shall carry our pride quietly, neither boasting of ourselves nor speaking badly of others — often a dishonest method of self praise. Yet we must be unashamea of our principles and honest in our criticisms.

7. We shall try to avoid conflict and cooperate with those who do not understand us and whom we do not understand; yet, we shall speak our truth openly and stand firm in our own beliefs and right to assert our Hawaiian identity. 8. We shall be patient, enduring the pains of injustice but never surrendering to or joining such injustice. 9. We shall respect and engage in humor, the helper to love and affection, the positive expression of humanity. 10. (to be filled in by you). Mahalo for letting me serve as your trustee these past four years.