“He repeatedly puts words into the mouths of others — to make it seem like his views are universal,” writes Brian Tweed about David Seymour. (Photo: RNZ Phil Smith)
The verbal tricks rolled out by politicians are many and varied. Here, Brian Tweed picks apart one method that’s popular with ACT leader David Seymour.
Politicians are notorious for dodging questions and turning the kōrero around to suit their own agendas. We’ve come to expect them to stretch the truth, but listening to some of the rhetoric from our current government ministers is especially painful.
Chlöe Swarbrick put it best when she said: “We can’t leave politics to the politicians.”
As a university lecturer, I spend much of my time marking degree-level assignments, master’s and PhD theses, and writing and reviewing academic articles and books.
Recently, I decided to “mark” a transcript of one of David Seymour’s interviews as if it were a 100-level assignment.
It failed — badly. Not because a TV interview needs to meet university standards, but because the logic was flimsy, unsupported by evidence, and full of misleading rhetorical tactics. We have people running the country whose words wouldn’t pass a basic university assessment.
That should concern all of us.
One of the most striking techniques Seymour uses is what I’ll call political ventriloquism. He repeatedly puts words into the mouths of others — whether it’s the Waitangi Tribunal, iwi leaders, councils, developers, schools, a shadowy cast of nameless people, or even a future version of New Zealand, to make it seem like his views are universal.
This creates the illusion that his perspective is common sense, and that anyone who disagrees must be an outlier.
Another name for this tactic is gaslighting.
Gaslighting is usually associated with personal abuse — manipulating someone into doubting their own reality. In politics, it’s a way of making entire groups of people question what they know to be true.
Let’s look at some key examples from the interview that I assessed — last year’s Q + A between Jack Tame and David Seymour about the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill. I’ve highlighted in bold where the ventriloquism happens.
Inventing a collective opinion
Very early in the interview, Seymour says:
“[We have] a version of the principles that’s totally inconsistent with liberal democracy and says that there is a partnership between races in terms of the Court of Appeal . . . other people say there is a partnership between the Crown and Māori . . . and the problem with that is that we look at ourselves as part of a collective based on ancestry.
Who is this “we”? Who exactly is looking at themselves in this way? Seymour is making it seem like the whole country is grappling with a problem that he alone has identified.
And what exactly is wrong with looking at ourselves as “part of a collective”? It might be anathema to those who believe in the cult of individualism, but we’re all part of collectives of one kind or another, whether that’s based on ancestry, nationality, politics, ideology, or whatever — and many of us don’t see it as a problem at all.
Imaginary oppression
Seymour continues:
“. . . rather than as a group of individuals who have all different things about them, all different hopes and aspirations and challenges and choices trying to overcome what they face on their time on earth to flourish in their own way. That’s what we should be looking at, but instead, we’re told: ‘You’re tangata whenua. You’re tangata Tiriti. You have a different role in society.’”
Who exactly is doing this telling? Who is assigning people to these rigid roles and limiting their freedom? Seymour creates a shadowy force controlling our society, when in reality being tangata Tiriti or tangata whenua is a simple recognition of historical fact — not a set of restrictions.
No one is being forced into a role. Of course, as tangata Tiriti, I can’t be tangata whenua. But why would I want to be? Or want to deny the existence of tangata whenua?
The mysterious enforcers
Seymour claims:
“We are constantly held back by this idea that before you can take a person seriously, you’ve got to ask: ‘What’s your ancestry? Which side of the Treaty partnership [are you on]? How should I talk to you?’”
It’s hard to know exactly what Seymour is referring to here. Perhaps he means the practice of pepeha. But pepeha isn’t an interrogation — it’s just introducing yourself in a Māori way. It’s certainly not a barrier to being taken seriously. Again, Seymour has invented imaginary agents enforcing rules that don’t exist.
Pepeha assumes that you are legitimate and important enough for others to learn about who you are, where you come from, and how you might be related to them. These are all good things to know. Pākehā can do it too, in a slightly different way.
A spectral Waitangi Tribunal
He goes on:
“And you see this in the recent report by the Waitangi Tribunal on my bill . . . where they said this bill will trample all Māori. Well, hang on a second, actually, since when do they speak for a whole race of people? Since when do all of us have to think the same and take the view that the Waitangi Tribunal think?”
This is a more subtle example of ventriloquism. First, Seymour misrepresents a statement of what the Waitangi Tribunal thinks (that the bill will trample all Māori), turning it into an accusation that the Tribunal is presuming to speak for all Māori.
He’s implying that an expert body delivering an opinion on the impact of a policy on a group of people is somehow denying them the right to think for themselves or forcing them to take the same view.
This spectral Tribunal doesn’t exist, and no one is claiming this happened, except Seymour.
Developers in distress
Seymour argues:
“The people who are leaders of a Māori organisation, an iwi or rūnanga, in my area, get consulted about development of, say, a subdivision of more houses for other people, [which] means that they can hold it up. They have to do a cultural impact assessment. A lot of developers will tell you that that can be really grating and hold up developments for years.
What that means is . . . I live in a country where it’s harder to get homes built . . . because the RMA has to observe or at least have reference to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. The councils go away and say: ‘Well, the Treaty is a partnership, so therefore, we have to consult both partners.’”
How many developers? Which ones? Seymour’s “a lot of developers” remain nameless, and we’re given no evidence that cultural impact assessments are the main cause of delays. Nor any evidence that councils are seeing this as a burden.
It’s just another instance of ventriloquism where Seymour creates an invisible army, puts words into their mouths, and makes it sound like this vague group of people all agree with him.
Schools gone rogue?
On education, Seymour paints a dramatic picture:
“Instead of asking, well, you know, what is actually the best knowledge in the world for the students that are going through school now to have to survive and thrive . . . we say, ‘Ooh, well, hang on a minute, what does the Treaty say? What does the partnership require?’
All of a sudden, you find that your school has decided to take on compulsory te reo, and whether or not you like it or want it, you are required to be pulled out of maths and English and science to do a language that only a few, 100,000 people, in the world actually speak.
Instead of saying, I respect people’s right to do it but no thank you for me . . . You can’t go down to your school and say that because people say, ‘Oh no, you’re racist.’”
Firstly, Seymour pretends that schools ignore the “best knowledge”. They don’t, and they can’t, because the required knowledge is in the national curriculum.
Then, apparently, schools all consult the Treaty instead to decide which knowledge to teach. They don’t, they can’t, because they follow the national curriculum.
Then “your school” all of sudden decides that te reo Māori will be compulsory and takes children out of maths, English and science. Which schools have done this? Where are students being yanked from maths to learn te reo?
No one is taking kids out of maths, English and science to learn te reo.
Then, there are mysterious people in “your school” who call you a racist if you don’t want your child to learn te reo Māori. Not only are invisible people doing this, they are having words put in their mouths. It’s just not true.
Once again, Seymour presents fiction as fact.
The world agrees — apparently
Seymour claims:
“The reason that people admire New Zealand is that compared to any of those other three Anglo countries [USA, Canada, Australia], we’ve taken the view that all New Zealanders have equal rights — that’s actually what our Treaty says.”
Apparently, the world admires New Zealand precisely because of ACT’s policies, which alone are responsible for good racial harmony.
Who are these admirers? When did the Treaty ever say that? He Whakaputanga and Te Tiriti make it clear that the rights of Māori and settlers were distinct. The idea that the Treaty is about universal equality — rather than the protection of tangata whenua rights — is a spurious reinterpretation, not historical fact.
A future New Zealand that sounds suspiciously like David Seymour
Finally, Seymour predicts:
“One day we’ll get to a stage where people say: ‘Yeah, yeah, people used to make all these legal arguments and say [the Treaty is] a partnership, but eventually we realised that being separated into two different racial categories was a dumb way to run a country. Now we’re a country with equal rights . . . and we will be a much better country and so much more able to solve all our problems.’”
Seymour pulls off a remarkable feat of ventriloquism. He calls up an entire future New Zealand to validate his argument, claiming that tomorrow’s New Zealanders will inevitably see things his way. Gaslighting the nation by inventing a future one that’s telling us just how dumb and crazy we are now.
Conclusion
There are many other examples of ventriloquism in the interview. In a 30-minute interview, David Seymour creates “dummies” who say what he wants them to say at least 14 times, almost one every two minutes on average.
David Seymour’s ventriloquism isn’t just about rhetorical flair. By presenting his views as the consensus, he erases the voices of those who genuinely hold different perspectives. He also fuels distrust — suggesting that Māori rights and Treaty obligations are inventions designed to limit individual freedom.
But reality tells a different story. The Waitangi Tribunal exists because breaches of the Treaty happened. Tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti exist because that is simply the nature of our shared history. Pepeha, te reo, and cultural impact assessments aren’t barriers — they’re ways of recognising and respecting Aotearoa’s unique identity.
Of course, David Seymour isn’t the only politician who uses rhetorical techniques and logical fallacies of one kind or another to score points and make himself appear good and right at the expense of the opposition. Plenty of politicians employ similar tactics. But — to combine one of David Seymour’s characteristic phrases with one of Christopher Luxon’s — what I would say to you is, doesn’t that just tell you everything that’s wrong with our political system?
Yeah, nah, we can’t leave politics to the politicians. And we can’t let them get away with ventriloquism, either. The next time a politician claims that “everyone” thinks a certain way — ask who the “everyone” is and who is actually speaking the words.
Brian Tweed is originally from the UK. He has worked extensively as a mathematics and science teacher and advisor in both English-medium and Māori-medium schools in New Zealand for the past 30 years. Brian is currently a senior lecturer in Te Kura o te Mātauranga, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehūroa / Massey University, teaching the history, sociology and politics of education.
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Brian, I was glad to come across your article — it’s both timely and vital. We need more people, especially those in positions of influence, to shine a light on tactics like these with clarity and courage. Your concept of “political ventriloquism” doesn’t just describe Seymour’s rhetoric — it offers the public a sharp lens for decoding his entire platform.
I’ve been developing a public accountability platform aimed at exposing figures like Seymour who operate behind rhetorical smoke screens while advancing corrosive, ideologically driven agendas. Your piece will be referenced there — fully credited — as essential reading. Thank you for naming the strategy and calling it what it is.
We need more educators and analysts who are willing to confront manipulation — not just with passion, but with precision.
Seymour Speak is insidious and manipulative. He has introduced the word ‘race’ into the national conversation. The word race is odd language for this country, and it has a harsh ring to it. Seymour seems to have picked it up from the American alt-right and plonked it into the New Zealand discourse. Here, we are more used to words like culture, affiliations, heritage, background or ethnicity.
With the right to free speech comes the responsibility to speak truthfully and ethically. ACT’s alarmist rhetoric about race has deliberately and cynically encouraged the kind of anti-Māori vitriol that we have encountered in our social media pages. Seymour Speak sounds an awful lot like dog whistling. Thank you, Brian, for calling it out.
Barbara Blake and Rob Smith for Te Tiriti Is Us
I’m gobsmacked! Never have I encountered such an on-the-spot- analysis that puts into words just what I feel about Seymour and yet can’t quite find the words of my own that crystallise it. I know and feel what he says about Te Tiriti and his Bill is wrong, becaue to me it FEELS wrong – but here are words that explain to me just why I’m feeling this sense of outrage! In the very first instance of analysing what Seymour says Dr. Tweed puts his finger on it all for me with his comment “What exactly is wrong with looking at ourselves as “part of a collective”? It might be anathema to those who believe in the cult of individualism, but we’re all part of collectives of one kind or another, whether that’s based on ancestry, nationality, politics, ideology, or whatever — and many of us don’t see it as a problem at all” – Thank you, Dr. Tweed, for shining a light where all has been murk-ridden and gas-lit ever since the unfortunate Coalition took office..
I have one point of agreement with David Seymour, which is that the tangata whenua/tangata tiriti dichotomy is unhelpful to our nationhood.
The phrase tangata whenua references the relationship of a people to a specific area of land in a specific locality. In itself it does not tell us anything about their relationship to te motu katoa.
The term tangata tiriti on the other hand is a recent invention which postulates that non-Maori draw their right to be present in the land from the Treaty of Waitangi, and therefore through the British Crown, and ultimately from the British monarch. That being the case, their “right” to be present in Aotearoa could also be rescinded by the monarch. That puts Pakeha in an invidious position in relation to the Crown, and only incidentally in an inferior status to Maori.
I suggest that Pakeha should not be made to feel that their very existence in the land is subject to the discretion of the Crown as implied by the term “tangata tiriti”. Ultimately the mass of Pakeha will not and should not accept such a status of permanent subjection to the British Crown and the whole imperial system. Therefore the notion of tangata tiriti is intrinsically flawed.
Historically, two categories of Pakeha came to Aotearoa. All those who came prior to 1840, and many of those who came after, were allowed to settle by the direct grace and favour of Maori rangatira. Nothing to do with the Treaty. They can be regarded as legitimately present on the land. Others came under the mandate of the British Crown, for the purposes of subduing, oppressing and dispossessing Maori. They were the illegitimate invaders and beneficiaries of the raupatu.
But how can we sort the descendants of the one group from the other? The short answer is that it is not possible to do so on the basis of whakapapa, and we should not even try. Instead we must look to a new covenant in which those who embrace rangatiratanga and reject colonialism are tangata motu, regardless of their whakapapa tinana.
Pakeha, like Maori, have a choice. They can choose either to be tangata motu like those hundreds of thousands who joined or otherwise supported te hikoi mo te tiriti, or to be shameless colonialists like David Seymour and his ACT party colleagues.
Aside from that, it astonishes me that David Seymour can decry the fact that “we look at ourselves as part of a collective based on ancestry”. Exactly how is the New Zealand Head of State selected? Solely and entirely on his whakapapa. His ancestry. Which just happens to be British. Not Maori. British. So here again, the brazen hypocrisy of the colonialists is revealed for all the world to see, yet who dares to call them out?
Geoff presents an interesting argument about the collective identity of Pākehā which has stimulated some questions for me as a secular humanist, democratic socialist and anti-monarchist who believes that relationships between people should be founded on equity. Has this argument been developed by others here in Aotearoa and/or other post-colonial places?
I agree with Pania’s comments re David Seymour’s ‘liberal democracy’ in that only 8% of Aotearoa voted for it. His idea of a democracy (and there are many, many varieties) is focused on individuality, economics, meritocracy and white supremacism. Brian Tweed’s analysis of Seymour’s insidious rhetoric is revealing.
Instead, what we need is a TeTiriti-centric democracy where equity (not equality) is the main focus. That is what the rest of the world has admired until now, and we need to focus on developing this unique form of democracy on our founding documents, He Whakaputanga, and Te Tiriti o Waitangi. Reciprocal, respectful relationships between the two parties that signed those documents are needed, rather than the Trumpeting of Seymour.
The up-front comment is one of the most revealing to me, and I believe Dr. Tweed wrote it in a draft version of this blog. Seymour often says words to the effect of, ” totally inconsistent with liberal democracy” as if we chose Aotearoa to be a liberal democracy. We did not, most of us (according to the statistics), most resoundingly did not vote for a liberal democracy, and as Melanie Nelson points out, a portion of our population do not know what he means when he says that. (I don’t know how many, and it would take good research to figure it out, but there are enough to have given ACT seats and power in parliament, and there are enough who don’t understand to have allowed that to happen). David, ACT, and their dream of liberal democracy got 8 – 9% of about 77.5% of the population who can vote. (I just checked that on the electoral website, it’s easy to do). Not many, right? But his dream of liberal democracy, which boils down to only those with resources and money are free to have freedom and be equal. At the same time, the rest of us can individually blame ourselves for our poverty and unequal status, lack of food, housing and human rights, and don’t even think about working together collectively, is only loved by a tiny percentage of the population in Aotearoa. I hope that Melanie Nelson’s cautions get out there to all people who think that taking individual blame for society’s ills is the right thing to do, because I most surely do not want to become a little USA.
This raises an interesting point, at least to my mind.
I have always thought that Aotearoa NZ was a social democracy. Yet both coalition agreements with National include, under the category ‘Strengthening Democracy’ the requirement of the coalition parties ‘to uphold the principles of liberal democracy…’
I have not been able to find any equivalents to this requirement in any of the various agreements used to form prior coalition governments since the advent of MMP (but accept I may have missed it).
Where did this come from, and why now?
My guess is that it originated with ACT and was accepted by National and duplicated with NZ First.
Either way, this was a debate not had, and not voted on, but merely appeared as a baked in requirement after the fact in the Coalition.
It especially grates that it was not preceded by a referendum on what is meant by …’the principles of liberal democracy…’!