From early childhood onwards, New Zealand children are not being taught to question. They are being taught to accept.
Three powerful narratives dominate their schooling:
- The climate apocalypse
Children are told we face imminent catastrophe. The message is framed as urgent, moral, and absolute. There is no space to weigh evidence, consider timelines, or debate solutions.
- The Treaty “principles”
The courts and politicians invented “principles” in the last 50 years — yet schools teach them as if they were written in 1840. The actual Treaty texts are barely touched. Children are taught a political construct as though it were history.
- Māori spirituality under the guise of culture
Atua, karakia, and wairua are presented as “cultural practices” — but in reality they are religious. This is not an ancient, unchanging belief system but a reconstructed religion, embedded in classrooms without parental consent.
It reinforces mana as coming from the atua through whakapapa — and only Māori whakapapa to the atua.
It legitimises a Māori sovereignty agenda that elevates one ethnicity above others.
It undermines democracy by presenting spiritual authority as superior to the will of the majority.
Teachers insist “it’s only culture, not religion.” That is gaslighting. It is obviously religious instruction, embedded in state schooling against the secular principle.
Finland: The Media Literacy Experiment
By contrast, Finland has spent decades trying to teach media literacy — since the 1970s, from preschool up.
In early childhood, children are shown that media is created for a purpose.
At pre-primary (around age six), they are taught to distinguish fiction from truth.
In schools, media literacy is woven across subjects: headlines in language class, persuasion in art, evidence in science, institutions in social studies.
Children even make their own media to understand how editing and framing change meaning.
On paper, it looks strong. Media literacy is treated like maths or science: a life skill.
But when COVID struck, it failed. The system slid into the slogans of “misinformation, disinformation, malinformation.” Official narratives became “fact.” Dissent was “fiction.”
Decades of media literacy did not produce independent thinkers. It produced compliance.
Lessons for Us
Whether through indoctrination in New Zealand, or a failed media literacy experiment in Finland, the outcome is the same: children are not learning to question power.
If teachers themselves can’t or won’t model questioning, children cannot learn it.
By contrast, Finland has spent decades trying to teach media literacy — since the 1970s, from preschool up.
In early childhood, children are shown that media is created for a purpose.
At pre-primary (around age six), they are taught to distinguish fiction from truth.
In schools, media literacy is woven across subjects: headlines in language class, persuasion in art, evidence in science, institutions in social studies.
Children even make their own media to understand how editing and framing change meaning.
On paper, it looks strong. Media literacy is treated like maths or science: a life skill.
But when COVID struck, it failed. The system slid into the slogans of “misinformation, disinformation, malinformation.” Official narratives became “fact.” Dissent was “fiction.”
Decades of media literacy did not produce independent thinkers. It produced compliance.
Lessons for Us
Whether through indoctrination in New Zealand, or a failed media literacy experiment in Finland, the outcome is the same: children are not learning to question power.
If teachers themselves can’t or won’t model questioning, children cannot learn it.
A Better Way Forward
True media literacy must go deeper. It must train children (and adults) to ask uncomfortable questions:
- Follow the money — Who funds this? Who profits if we believe it?
- Who is in charge? — Which institutions are shaping this message? Are they accountable?
- Is it global? — Does this align with UN or WEF narratives? Is it serving a global agenda rather than a local debate?
- Why this religion? — Why is Māori spirituality being embedded in schools? Who benefits from calling it “culture” instead of religion?
These questions cut across all three New Zealand narratives — climate, Treaty, and spirituality — and across Finland’s media literacy model too.
Conclusion
The future does not need children repeating climate slogans, Treaty “principles,” or prayers to atua.
It does not need adults who blindly trust official COVID stories.
The future needs people who can think, discern, and choose wisely — even when no one is watching.
References
- Martens, H. (2010). Evaluating media literacy education: Concepts, theories and future directions. Journal of Media Literacy Education, 2(1), 1–22.
- Kiili, C., Mäkinen, M., & Coiro, J. (2021). Rethinking academic literacies: Designing multifaceted and digital literacy pedagogy for Finnish schools. Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy, 16(2), 65–81.
- Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture. National Media Education Policy (2013; updated 2019/2020).
- Finnish National Agency for Education (EDUFI). National Core Curriculum for Basic Education (2016).
- KAVI – National Audiovisual Institute, Finland: Media Education in Finland: Policy, practice and research.
Judy Gill BSc, DipTchg, is a parent, former teacher, and a staunch advocate for secular education.
18 comments:
There is no indoctrination in the classroom. The children are cleverer than you think, but that’s nothing new either. The Māoris aren’t coming to get ya. The transgenders aren’t coming to get ya. It’s ok to look at what is happening in places at the head of climate change disaster wave, like Tuvalu, and react like any normal empathetic person would. It’s ok.
All those things are fine anon 0824.
What we object to is wasting our time and money on your maori, climate change, and transgender smoke bombs, thrown up in the air by dishonest politicians trying to hide their inability or unwillingness to do anything useful.
We also object to nz politicians using those ghost causes to launder our tax money back into their own pockets.
Our climate change inflated insurance premiums just paid for Chloe Swarbruck Scott Simpson, and Rachel Brooking's business class tickets to london..
From my experience, too many teachers are lefties and only too happy to groom the vulnerable. It’s sad to watch their prodigy earnestly spout brainwashed nonsense during organised Climate days encouraged by the corrupt MSM.
Rob Beechey raises the important issue of teachers' role in all this.
Primary teachers tend to have poor backgrounds in science and it is fair to say that most of them wouldn't have a hope of passing a first-year undergrad exam in chem or physics. But lecturing children about climate change makes them feel authoritative in a science-related area.
After plenty of brainwashing in Educ Faculties, they'll be much better versed in Treaty ideology and Maori superstitions, and it makes them feel oh-so knowledgeable and important when laying down the law on these issues to children.
It sure beats having to teach kids to read and write and carry out arithmetical operations.
I remember learning about 'adverbial clauses' at primary school in the 60s. I wonder how many primary school teachers today even know what that means.
Change is scary, it was scary 60 years ago, and it is scary today.
Rational resistance to fashionable nonsence can be even more scary!
Great stuff Judy, and right on the money. Easy to see how damaging the education system is, by reading some of the comments here. That said, maybe we are 20 years too late in recognising the problem. From what we see of our ‘leaders’ they seem not to have noticed the large sharp axe coming down on our cultural neck. Let’s keep making a hell of a noise about it. We might catch their attention some time.
I have seen so many indoctrinated teachers spouting left wing racist rhetoric .
A lot of them mark themselves with a chunk of Chinese greenstone hung around their necks on a piece of flax.
Trust them to look after your children ?
No way.
I agree with what Anon @ 9.36 is writing, but have no idea what Anon @ 8.24 is trying to say and can only think Anon @ 9.36 is a better translator than me.
💯, our kids are being indoctrinated by left wing teachers, if one can call them that . The poor little things are terrified of ‘climate change’ , instead of being taught that the climate has always changed and will continue to do so regardless of whether we humans are here or not. As for so called Maori spirituality, it seems ironical to me that it is in the classroom, when quite rightly, no other religion is . Teach comparative religion if we must , or better still let the parents push their own brand in the home .
There are no ‘treaty principles’ stop telling the kids there are , teach the equality of all people and why this is fundamental to society.
100% teach kids critical thinking, to not accept what those in authority are saying…ask why they are saying it , who benefits, is there a money trail
Thank you Judy for exposure of what the school system is doing.
I have observed this for some time.
Not only should our children be taught free thinking but also critical thinking.
What I would like to add is that the brainwashed are now in parliament wrecking our lives with carbon credits and net zero hogwash.
It is interesting that no one has mentioned the importance of years 0-2 (precognitive years) in how we see the world and react to it later in life. Gabor Mate, in 'The Myth of Normal' explains it very well, how it works culturally and neurologically.
Having begun my teaching service in 1949 and completed 50 years of it I cannot believe how a once proud and high quality profession has sunk to the level of baby-sitting while promoting undemocratic fake history and teaching what to think rather than how to think. It's not just 'you pay peanuts and you get
monkeys" but the expectation of duties and responsibilities shouldered by teachers has spelt the end of free and creative intellectual activity because the "woke" agenda demands strict compliance and conflicting views are a no-no. In addition the function of teachers has expanded to cover counselling of families, involvement in community affairs, supervision of legal decisions, and monitoring student activities wherever they are,
outside school or not. Doing this requires strict adherence to a proscribed agenda that cannot be questioned. Teachers have to be conditioned robots today rather than creative individuals.
What is your experience as a ‘former teacher’?
I hate when they ram climate control down our kids throats. It’s not broccoli!
Thank you for this, Ms Judy.
Education should help young people ask hard questions, but questioning is not the same as denial. Teaching climate science and Te Tiriti o Waitangi is not ideology. It is an act of moral and intellectual integrity, grounded in evidence, history, and the many ways of knowing that shape Aotearoa.
The climate crisis is not abstract. It is already here in rising seas, burned forests, failed crops, and families forced from their homes. It exposes who bears the cost of decisions made far away and who has the privilege to treat those consequences as debate. The ability to ignore impact is a luxury, and it belongs mostly to those least affected by it.
Climate justice is bound up with racial justice. The same systems that exploit land and atmosphere have long exploited people. When your writing treats Māori culture and climate education as parallel forms of indoctrination, it repeats that pattern: a refusal to see how oppression and environmental harm are entwined.
To call this teaching indoctrination is to confuse humility with weakness and truth with threat. Real critical thinking depends on a moral compass, the courage to face complexity, and the honesty to admit when one’s comfort relies on someone else’s harm. I hope you will use your voice and your influence for something that brings people toward understanding, not further away from it because clearly you are an advocate with passion and conviction.
The previously established academic foundation is broken, too often unquestioned ideology dominates where facts should be imparted and subservience to 'guidelines' negates parental authority.
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