That's not accurate. Sure, some Maori thought like that. But it wasn't until much later that it became received wisdom. I'd argue because it was a useful justification for colonization. The truth is that Maori had a diversity of views about what Britain represented and that those were nuanced and liable to change. Point in case, the Ngāti Porou who had signed the Treaty of Waitangi and had amicable relations with the Crown, split in the 1860s between Pai Mārire supporters, who wanted to establish an independent Maori state, and those who resented Pai Mārire as a 'foreign' innovation. So within a single "friendly" Maori group in the 1860s, there were at least two strands of thought none of which were, properly speaking, pro-British. Now it just so happens that those who disliked the Pai Mārire ended up fighting alongside the crown in the East Cape Wars. The traditional narrative says that they did so because they were loyal Maori and that's what loyal Maori did. What's missing from that analysis is a recognition of the fact that the loyalists had their own complicated reasons for fighting - 'foreign' infiltration being one reason - and that the Crown's decision to get involved in the East Cape simply made settling their existing scores that much easier.
