John McLean
Citizen typist. Enthusiastic amateur.
Max Rashbrooke is an academic at Victoria University of Wellington. Max also curates his own personal website, writes bits for various publications and even does the very odd TED Talk.
First up, I’ll state my humble opinion that Max’s views are sincere and he genuinely has the best interests of New Zealanders at heart – especially the interests of the country’s less fortunate inhabitants.
About 18 months ago, at late notice, Max pulled out of a lunch that I’d proposed and he’d accepted. I’d suggested lunch partly because I agree with Max that the extent of wealth inequality is a significant societal problem for New Zealand. I was keen to exchange ideas on what can be done to address burgeoning wealth inequality, plus discuss whatever other topics would have come up over a casual lunch.
The night before we were due to break bread, Max spurned my overtures because, according to his spurning email, my Substacks involve “abuse” and “conspiracy theorizing”.
Max writes regular columns for Stuff’s Saturday publication, the Post. His latest, in the 18 October 2025 paper edition, was headed If violence is a political solution, we must find a better way. There was a problem with Max’s original heading, because – except for lawful state violence against criminals – violence should never be a political solution to anything. The heading has been changed in the online version. Max exhibits, in spades, the New Left’s cryptic attitudes towards political violence.
Here are Max’s Post musings, for your mindful mastication:
Max appears paranoid about violence from political elements he hates. He outwardly suggests – in his latest in the Post – that NZ First Government Minister Shane Jones is threatening to kill public servants who stymie the statutory fast-track process:
On the populist front, we already have New Zealand First’s Shane Jones threatening to “exterminate” any public servant activity that slows down his beloved fast-track process…
Max’s rhetoric is afflicted by a rash of references to impending violent civil strife:
Political insiders, meanwhile, predict an especially ugly election campaign next year, one potentially scarred by a renewal of antiimmigration rhetoric.
On the hard side, our politicians – especially the women and ethnic minorities most often targeted – will need greater physical protection.
Comment from yours truly: Who are the “women and ethnic minorities” that Max has in mind, as most often targeted? Female Jews? Winston Peters (the Māori gentleman who got the crossbar through his window)?… I think not.
Rashbrooke harbors special animus for the New Zealand First political party:
…Winston Peters calls regulators “the Stasi” for daring to hear complaints against Sean Plunket’s the Platform.
It’s clear Max is referring to NZ First and its supporters with his disparaging references to “anti-immigrant rhetoric”, “authoritarian populists”, “rising tide of anger”, “unacceptable elements of political anger”.
The following can only be a reference to NZ First and its supporters (with perhaps a tinge of ACT):
Respect shouldn’t be accorded to authoritarian worldviews where they involve xenophobia and other bigotry. We must be clear that some politicians are now testing democratic limits and weakening human norms. We have to defend persecuted minorities and turn up to protests.
What protests does Max think that he and his fellow travelers must turn up to? Almost certainly the “mega strike” protests by Labour Party-wedded unions – the Public Service Association, Post Primary Teachers Association, New Zealand Educational Institute Te Riu Roa, Tertiary Education Union, Association of Salaried Medical Specialists etc., etc., etc.…
Just be careful at those protests Max. Don’t get run over by the juggernaut Marxist, pyknic PPTA President Chris Abercrombie.
Being a member of the cultural elite, Rashbrooke is ardently anti-“populism”. But I’ve got news for Max… populism is freedom and democracy. In Abraham Lincoln’s famous words from his Gettysburg Address over 150 years ago:
“– this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – …government of the people, by the people, for the people [i.e., populism], shall not perish from the earth.”
Mercifully, democracy has not entirely perished from the earth, but Max is caught in a trap. He sincerely wants to help end poverty, but also wants to de-farm, de-mine and otherwise de-industrialize New Zealand – “I frequently disagree with farmers, for instance, over their unwillingness to take responsibility for their planet-heating emissions and riverine pollution.” Such ‘de-ing’ would further crash the New Zealand economy, leaving even less for the downtrodden. That’s the Max-22.
Max loves to lecture and is no genuine fan of free speech. In a July 2021 piece he penned for Stuff, Max attempted the following mangled Muslim-Māori mauling of free speech:
Hate speech can…create an atmosphere which is itself threatening. As the Islamic Women’s Council spokesperson Anjum Rahman said recently, “We know that hate speech can turn into hateful actions”.
Ministers would do well to convene something like a Te Tiriti-based citizens’ assembly, in which a perfectly representative group of ordinary people could discuss the issue deeply, hear from those affected by hate speech, and make recommendations that reflect the wider public’s considered view.
Max clearly considers me a bigot. He’s entitled to his view and I frankly couldn’t care less. The most unsettling sentiment I feel towards Max is pity. Because he won’t talk to a robust mix of New Zealanders with differing views – he’s stuck, in a stasis of his own immutable ideologies.
Max has now attained a dizzying level in Academia’s Ivory Tower where there is little original or heterodox thinking. Rashbrooke and his boring brood brook no dissent from, and will defend to their deaths, their cookie-cutter woke world views.
In faux concession, Max “admits”, “We have to recognise that urban liberal politics can sometimes seem condescending.” The true and appropriate admission, which you won’t hear from urban “liberals” like Max, is that their politics are in reality illiberal and categorically condescending and censorious.
Deep down, what Max and his mates and minions really want is to hijack the apparatus of state, including the universities, in order to “educate” (i.e., cajole and coerce) the populace into all becoming good little right (i.e., New Left)-thinking citizens. The vision is not of an evolving, egalitarian pluralism. It’s a dystopia of authoritarian wokery. In other words, a form of fascism, on which I’ve previously written:
FASCISTS!John McLean 3 November 2023
Let’s wrap this up. Max’s latest Post piece includes, “…many [white New Zealand men claiming discrimination] are simply reacting angrily to having their behaviour challenged by #MeToo”. Seeking redemption from his cis white male original sin, Max self-identifies as a male #MeTooist – or perhaps even a full blown feminist DUDE. But isn’t that simply feminist appropriation/performative ally-ship…Max? On the off chance that Max is just trying to get laid, he could contemplate donning the pounamu…
This article was originally published on the author’s Substack.
