Whiplash: How to not be a teacher.
As someone who had been a victim of bullying, the film Whiplash (2014) hits a little too close to home for me. Especially the fact that the perpetrator of the bullying behavior in the film is a teacher. As the story progresses, negative emotions such as anger and sadness rise from within me as I relate to the character in terms of being treated badly by a mentor figure.
That doesn't mean it's a bad film. In fact, this film's a masterpiece.
Today's film review will be about Whiplash (2014), an excellent movie that portrays the tragedy of Andrew Neiman (Miles Teller) the ambitious drummer genius who wanted to be the very best but fell victim to the abusive teaching methods of Terrence Fletcher the psychopathic music teacher (J. K. Simmons). This film won Best Film Editing and Best Sound Mixing at the 87th Academy Awards, and J. K. Simmons won Best Supporting Actor for his magnificent performance at portraying the monstrous character that is Terrence Fletcher.
The psychology behind this movie is about bullying, or rather the motives behind and the impacts of teacher bullying, where the teacher misuses his/her power as a mentor figure to punish or belittle students to the point where it's beyond the ethics of disciplinary action (Twemlow et al., 2006). The power dynamic between Andrew and Fletcher had been shown with detail in the film, with Andrew being the one without power due to his need of Fletcher's approval of him as a good musician, and Fletcher being the one with power over Andrew as his teacher.
This film is a deconstruction of the argument of whether pushing people to the limit with overly strict methods is a good idea or not. The methods Fletcher used in the film, however, were beyond strict to the point it's considered bullying behavior. Punishments inflicted by Fletcher ranged from verbal abuse (usage of sarcastic remarks, excessive yelling, and racist or homophobic slurs) to physical abuse (repeated slapping and throwing chairs) should the student's performance was unsatisfactory. He performed those methods with the strong belief that this is the most effective way in giving birth to talented musicians, and simple words of encouragement are dangerous as it will make the student's progress stagnant.
While his argument for the correctness in his methods seemed somewhat justified, it was completely undone by his true motives: to maintain his reputation as one of the most impacting personalities in the music industry. While in the film he mentioned that he's doing this because he didn't want the jazz genre to die, he was willing to sabotage a whole performance just for the sake of petty revenge, which is shown at the end parts of the film where he deliberately gave Andrew the wrong music scores just to humiliate him as a revenge for testifying against him for causing the suicide of one of his best students due to his abusive methods. All he cared for was not the maintenance of the art of jazz (seeing that he didn't taught his students to understand it as an art but rather as a competitive sport that requires perfection in every tune and tempo), but fame and power.
Effects of bullying behavior on adolescent victims may include anxiety, depression, unhappiness and low self-esteem (Nansel et al., 2001). Moreover, Haynie et al. (2001) also found that victims of bullying have the tendency to exhibit antisocial behavior and lower levels of self-control coupled with short temper. As shown in the film, Andrew before his encounter with Fletcher was a happy and passionate drummer, albeit a little socially awkward. Since the abuse he suffered from Fletcher's teaching methods, he had been corrupted into an unhappy, antisocial individual determined to earn the approval of his psychopathic mentor. He didn't even feel remorseful for dumping his girlfriend for fear of the relationship being a hindrance to his path to excellence, and throughout the course of the film he acquired Fletcher's temper and yelling tendencies before he could acquire his approval and respect.
The film tried very hard to show us the adverse effects of tyrannical teaching methods, yet the ending confused me, as it showed Andrew performing an amazing drum solo and shared a smile with Fletcher. Andrew had gained Fletcher's approval while losing his self-respect and girlfriend, and Fletcher smiled for he had successfully created a talented musician yet again with his methods. Which begs the question: Is this kind of teaching method truly necessary to produce excellent students? Was Fletcher's philosophy right all along?
Turns out, it's not.
While discipline is an important factor that facilitates focused and effective learning, it must be coupled with a well-managed lessons with a good teacher-student relationship with mutual respect, which Fletcher succeeded in the former but not the latter. Moreover, research had shown that students with caring teachers exhibit higher academic grades due to their reduced anxiety (Miller, 2008), which suggested the possibility that Fletcher's methods won't work so well in real life scenarios, as the anxiety created would diminish performance.
Even if it did create excellence, the cost of the student's mental and emotional stability was a price to high to be paid.
In conclusion, Whiplash is an emotionally engaging movie that discusses the adverse effects of teacher bullying and serves as a reminder that even for the sake of excellence and discipline, violence is not okay in teaching and education.
Thank you for reading.
References:
Haynie, D. L., Nansel, T., Eitel, P., Crump, A. D., Saylor K., Yu, K. & Simons-Morton, B. (2001). Bullies, victims, and bully/victims: Distinct groups of at-risk youth. J Early Adolescence, 21:29–49.
Khuluse, N. L. (2009). THE EFFECT OF DISCIPLINE ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT
IN SECONDARY SCHOOL (Dissertation). Retrieved from: http://uzspace.uzulu.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10530/410/khuluse%20liberty.pdf?sequence=1
.
Miller, R. M. (2008). The Influence of Teachers Caring Behavior on High School Students Behavior and Grades. Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs). 1633.
Bullying behaviors among US youth: Prevalence and association with psychological
adjustment. Journal of the American Medical Association, 285, 2094-2100.
Twemlow, S., Fonagy, P., Sacco, F. C. & Brethour Jr., J. R. (2006). Teachers who bully students: a hidden trauma. International Journal of Social Psychiatry.
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