Syrup sticks: Why Christ's College can't wash away its abusive past

Scotty Stephenson smeared Christ's College with syrup that won't wash off.

  When TVNZ commentator Scotty Stevenson called Christ’s College students “syrup suckers” during cricket coverage this week, he inadvertently exposed something far more troubling than a schoolyard nickname. The subsequent furore—complete with headmaster complaints, Broadcasting Standards Authority threats, and a grovelling apology—has become a textbook case of how New Zealand’s elite institutions prioritise their carefully curated reputations over confronting uncomfortable truths.

  Christ’s College headmaster Joe Eccleton called Stevenson’s comment “a sexualised slur directed toward minors” and insisted it had “no place in any public forum.” He fired off letters to parents and demanded professional consequences. The reaction was swift, theatrical, and entirely counterproductive. Welcome to the Streisand Effect—where attempts to suppress information only amplify it.

  Had Eccleton simply ignored the comment, most New Zealanders would have missed it entirely. Instead, his indignant response has ensured thousands more now know the origins of “syrup suckers”—a nickname that’s followed Christ’s College boys since 1975, when students were caught intoxicated and covered in golden syrup at a party. Rival school Christchurch Boys’ High famously waved golden syrup cans on sticks at rugby matches, chanting “Syruppers” at their privileged opponents.

  But here’s what makes Eccleton’s manufactured outrage so grotesque: his institution’s documented history of actual abuse, and the decades it took before the school showed even a fraction of this concern for victims.

The abuse they couldn’t bury

  The Royal Commission into Abuse in Care heard harrowing testimony about Christ’s College’s culture of systemic abuse. Jim Goodwin, who attended in the 1970s, described being sexually assaulted as part of a “hauling” tradition—a euphemism for institutionalised bullying that teachers knew about but did nothing to stop. He spoke of “fagging,” where younger boys became virtual slaves to prefects, and a pervasive “don’t tell” culture that protected perpetrators at the expense of victims.

  The school eventually acknowledged 70-80 complaints from former students, predominantly from the 1970s and 1980s—the era when hierarchical cruelty was baked into the institution’s DNA. Bishop Peter Carrell suggested the actual number of victims could reach 80, though the full extent remains unknown because the culture of silence ran so deep.

  Here’s the damning timeline: decades of abuse, decades of silence, and only when the Royal Commission dragged these stories into the public arena did Christ’s College finally apologise. The school’s contrition came not from institutional soul-searching, but from public embarrassment that could no longer be managed away. It came at a time where many private schools' enrolments declined, forcing many to become state integrated. The remaining private schools - where Christ's College maintained the highest fees in the country - such a bad publicity became an existential threat.

Elitism’s ugly infrastructure

  Christ’s College has long modelled itself on English public schools like Eton—institutions designed to forge leaders through a brutal social hierarchy. But what they actually created was a system where cruelty became tradition, where old boys networks ensured complicity, and where maintaining reputation mattered more than protecting children.

  Michael Neill, brother of actor Sam Neill, described his time at Christ’s College as “vile,” explaining that “at the heart of things, boys’ boarding schools had the crudest form of management—an informally permitted system of bullying. It was built into the entire structure of the thing.” Sam Neill himself called the experience “sort of insane, really.”

  Even Sir Michael Cullen, the former Deputy Prime Minister and Christ’s College alumnus, joked in his maiden parliamentary speech about how his scholarship had allowed him to “rip off” Canterbury farmers. While Cullen later regretted the quip, it captured something essential about the school’s relationship with New Zealand’s power structures—a conveyor belt from privilege to positions of influence, with accountability an afterthought.

The networks that enable

  This is where the rot extends beyond Christ’s College itself. The school’s old boys network has long infiltrated New Zealand’s corridors of power—business, politics, law, media. These networks don’t just open doors; they close ranks when reputations are threatened. They ensure that uncomfortable questions get quietly managed, that victims remain isolated, and that institutions emerge with their prestige intact.

  The Royal Commission found that survivors often didn’t report abuse because they feared going up against the school and its powerful alumni. Goodwin himself said: “I was worried about going up against the school.” That’s not paranoia—it’s a rational assessment of power imbalances in a country where the right school tie still opens doors and shields wrongdoing.

Missing the point spectacularly

  So when Headmaster Eccleton clutches his pearls over “syrup suckers” while his institution spent decades ignoring actual abuse, forgive me for finding his moral authority somewhat lacking. His complaint isn’t about protecting boys from harm—it’s about protecting Christ’s College from embarrassment.

  Stevenson’s unnecessary apology today only compounds the absurdity. He claimed he didn’t know the term’s “origin story,” as if that matters more than the school’s documented failure to protect vulnerable students. The whole performance reinforces exactly what’s wrong with our deference to elite institutions: they demand respect they haven’t earned and accountability they actively resist.

The real slur

  The real slur isn’t a nickname coined by schoolboy rivals fifty years ago. The real slur is an institution that allowed abuse to flourish under traditions of hierarchy and silence. The real slur is a system where victims were ignored for decades while perpetrators were protected. The real slur is prioritising the school’s reputation over children’s safety, then having the audacity to play victim when someone mentions an embarrassing nickname on television.

  Christ’s College wants to be judged by its stated values—excellence, tradition, leadership. Fine. Let’s judge them by how they actually treated the most vulnerable people in their care. Let’s judge them by how long it took to acknowledge the truth, and how that acknowledgment only came under the glare of a Royal Commission.

  Scotty Stevenson didn’t damage Christ’s College’s reputation. The school did that all by itself. His comment just reminded everyone what happens when institutions value image over integrity—and what happens when they try to suppress uncomfortable truths.

  The Streisand Effect strikes again. And this time, it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving institution.