Hawai‘i Is Your Place, So Fight for It
Former two-term governor John Waihe‘e III calls for young people to rise up. Now.
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John Waihe‘e III | 70 Years Old
John Waihe‘e III was Hawai‘i’s fourth governor (from 1986 to 1994) and the first Native Hawaiian to hold the office. But he was an activist long before that, pushing among many things for the adoption of ‘Ōlelo Hawai‘i as the state’s official language. Even at age 79, Waihe‘e hasn’t lost his fighting spirit and remains a vital voice in the Islands as a key leader of the Hawai‘i Executive Collaborative’s Rediscovering Hawai‘i’s Soul movement.
As told to Diane Seo:
I’ve been an activist for as long as I can remember, way before I was in politics. What keeps me doing whatever I’m doing is the belief that Hawai‘i is a special place and that we have an obligation to take care of it. It’s our inheritance, and not in terms of property. What we’re really inheriting is a special attachment and a relationship, and this relationship works if you appreciate it. It’s called aloha ‘āina. When you love the land, you take care of it. And when you take care of it, the land responds back to you.
When we were growing up in Honaka‘a, we had this phrase, “us guys.” Saying “us guys” from Honaka‘a is saying we have a relationship that goes beyond friendship. We have an obligation to keep it special. That’s the beautiful thing about Hawai‘i, it’s the foundation for everybody to discover who they are. All of us guys, with all of our contributions, with all of our specialness tied to the place. It’s that relationship that I think is your inheritance. Hawai‘i is yours. What are you going to do with it? You’re gonna let it just slide away into oblivion? Or are you gonna cultivate it?
I think Hawai‘i’s soul is both eroding and growing at the same time. All of a sudden, the Bishop Street and Moloka‘i activists are on the same page. It happens because they both worried about the same thing, whether this Hawai‘i is going to even exist. Today, we have the diaspora. People are disappearing every day. It’s become too common to say I got priced out of paradise. It’s become a Hawaiian concern, a local concern, the concern of everybody. So what are you going to do? You’re going to run away from it? Or are you going to change the trajectory?
For young people interested in standing up for Hawai‘i
Just do it. This is your home. Don’t be afraid to do it. There’s a value to speaking out and calling people on things that you don’t consider right or if there’s an injustice. I was fortunate enough to live through Hawai‘i’s renaissance, the rediscovering of itself. We had a revolution to turn things around, do something different. I think we’re in the same place now. We all know that what we’re doing is not working. You’ve got to change the trajectory.
To young people from Hawai‘i living away
Come home. What can we do differently that would make it attractive to come home? Help build the society for us. How do you create a revolution? First, you get people to understand their relationship with place, so that it’s worthwhile to do.
Back when I was young and raising my fist, I went to a seminar on how to organize, and I remember the one thing said, which has stuck with me my whole life, is that people don’t fight for half a loaf of bread. You’ve got to take the whole challenge on. You gotta have people here saying they’re gonna change the system. We need a revolution, otherwise, all we have is rhetoric. If you can do something anywhere in the world, why not come here? Well, people say, “we’ve got this barrier, that barrier.” Tear it down. Us guys from Hawai‘i got to stick together.
One of the joys of being old is you don’t care. Who do you care to impress? And that’s one of the natural discoveries that people learn as they just get along in life. Who cares? I’ll say what I believe. I’ve decided that my role in life is to grow old, loving Hawai‘i. That’s what I’m doing now, and that’s what I intend to do for the rest of my days.
