We can’t just ignore radical teens - The Centre for Independent Studies
Donate today!
Your support will help build a better future.
Your Donation at WorkDonate Now

We can’t just ignore radical teens

Punchbowl Boys High School Principal Chris Griffiths was stood down
Punchbowl Boys High School Principal Chris Griffiths was stood down

Pollies and bureaucrats often prefer to avoid talking about the hard topics. But there comes a point where behaviour they describe as “anti-social” is actually criminal.

Violent threats allegedly made by two men against the new Punchbowl High principal are the latest in an ongoing saga at the troubled school. Is all this just ‘boys being boys’?

It’s the latest in an ongoing saga at the school described by Education boss Mark Scott as “off the rails.” He has concerns the school is now a hotbed of Islamic extremism.

This is a new and growing problem. Teenagers used to cause the rest of us headaches merely because of their drinking, rowdiness and unentertaining mood swings.

However, Australian authorities are now scratching their heads about what to do with teenagers who want to express their individuality by committing brutal acts of terrorism.

Threats made by a small minority of Muslim teenagers to behead, shoot, bomb or drive vehicles into their fellow citizens — especially police officers — must be taken seriously.

But no one knows quite what to do. The government’s School Communities Working Together program is intended to help schools “in countering anti-social and extremist behaviour.”

Former Punchbowl High principal, Chris Griffiths — a recent convert to Islam — was stood down because he refused to sign his school up to get involved with the program

The guidelines – and that is all they are – set out what senior teachers are to do if faced with a range of situations such as extremist threats made by students.

In most scenarios, the first key action is to make a phone call to the School Safety and Response Hotline. Then chat to the student involved to try and discover a motive.

The police must be supplied with any relevant information if a serious indictable offence may have been committed – but then the law also imposes that requirement on you and me under those circumstances.

But when the student has done little more than ‘exhibit’ anti-social or extremist behaviour, the guidelines simply say the staff “may” provide police with information.

Griffiths, who made it hard for police to enter his school, is also alleged to have wanted only Muslim students – an unrealistic goal for any government school to set itself.

He is on the mat for disobeying department instructions. But by refusing to sign up to the government’s behaviour program, has Griffiths made it more likely extremist acts will occur?

Recent reports indicate that more than half of ASIO’s investigations are directed at people aged 25 years and younger: three times what it was a few years ago.

Intelligence agencies are working flat out to tap into teenagers’ social media networks to try to get to them before they get to us. Governments are putting a lot of money behind them. But the challenge for these ‘de-radicalisation’ programs is complex. No single program has successfully turned a radicalised teen back to being a good citizen.

Part of the problem is that in our pluralist society we think there are many sources of truth which can coexist. We think we simply need to appeal to reason and tolerance.

Pluralists are happy to live with ambiguity. But religious extremists reject all that. They say there is only once source of ‘truth’ — and they are prepared to kill in its name.

Dislodging such deadly ideas from the heads of teenagers requires more than government programs. It needs the determined effort of all Muslim communities and their leaders.

Perhaps beliefs that lead to terrorism can be changed. But ‘de-radicalisation’ programs may really only make us think we are doing something about a problem we don’t yet understand.

Peter Kurti is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies