Originally Posted by
JandM
Do you have a source, please, James?
Only source is my parents who were shocked with the fact that people were now openly called pakeha on tv and radio shows.
It would appear that the origins of the word were non-derogatory; then it became used in a deregatory way, at least in some places; and then became non-derogatory again. Similar in some ways to the N-word but that is only non-derogatory now when used by some people and remains derogatory when used by others (which sort of goes back to my point that words by themselves can't be offensive - it is the way that they are used and the meaning behind them that causes the offense.
Personally I'm not a Pakeha nor NZ European (nor Maori) as I find all of these terms divisive; I'm a New Zealander or a Kiwi.