Teachers are warning that extremism is taking hold in classrooms, pointing to the influence of online figures such as Andrew Tate, Donald Trump and so-called “trad-wife” ideologies.
At the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) conference in Christchurch this week, one teacher claimed a “spirit of inhumanity” had entered classrooms, blaming a toxic online culture of masculinity.
Deputy Prime Minister David Seymour said while he found some of these influences disturbing, the bigger question was why boys were gravitating towards them.
“There’s no question that if you see people like this Andrew Tate fellow, the things that he’s saying are not things that I would ever support or agree with. In fact, I find them quite disturbing. Yet he is getting an enormous following from young men,” Seymour said.
“The problem in this reaction is that there’s sort of an undertone of boys are bad and it’s their fault. If the attitude of your teacher is you’re fundamentally bad, and someone else comes along and says, no, you could be good if you behave like this, then I’m not surprised.”
He said the poor academic performance of boys deserved far more attention.
“If it was any other group, there’d be a commission of inquiry and we’d take a good hard look at ourselves. Why is this group oppressed and failing academically? If Andrew Tate is seen as the best option, why haven’t teachers provided a better option for these boys to follow?”
Seymour said he had also heard from parents who felt their sons were being marginalised.
“There’s some unacceptable behaviour, but then ask why are these young people gravitating towards such awful figures? What alternatives have they been offered in the classroom? Apparently not very attractive.”
He criticised aspects of the New Zealand histories curriculum, saying it created resentment by casting people as “victims or villains” according to events before they were born.
“That curriculum is being reviewed and fixed, and that’s an ACT Party coalition commitment. But clearly there are people who are pushing an ideological barrow and using education to do that,” Seymour said.
He linked this to what he called post-modern thinking.
“This ideology says there is no reality, only perspectives. If you start saying you’ve got to do reading, writing and maths for an hour a day and learn a knowledge-rich curriculum with actual science, then these people react and say that’s suppression or colonisation. It’s just rubbish, and unfortunately, it sounds like it’s infected parts of the education system.”
Seymour said schools should focus on equipping students to think for themselves.
“A figure like Trump is a complex figure. There are probably things that all people agree with and disagree with, like any prominent politician. But students should be equipped to think for themselves, not told what to think.”
He stressed that most teachers did not share activist views.
“There are tens of thousands of good teachers out there who don’t want anything to do with this and are actually really supportive of what the government’s doing, giving a knowledge-rich curriculum which is worth learning from and allows you to actually set yourself up for a future.”
