This article seeks to explore how, why and under which conditions a move away from critique as a negative practice towards an -- educationally more valuable -- affirmative notion of critique is important in formulating pedagogies that might respond more productively to the challenges of the post-truth era. What is at stake here in reframing critique as affirmative practice in addressing post-truths in schools, is the aspiration to create pedagogical spaces that enable teachers and students to turn their attention to care for the world in ways that go beyond the post-truth/negative critique/us-them impasse. The author engages with Foucault's and Butler's analysis of critique to show how a combined Foucauldian-Butlerian framework reconceptualizes criticality as an affirmative practice. It is suggested that cultivating an affirmative attitude and ethos of critique in the school context constitutes a virtuous practice of self-transformation and a passionate pedagogical goal that teachers cannot afford to ignore.