Difficult Subjects
“Today,” said Mr. Bawn, “we are going to talk about freedom of speech. Who can tell me what that is?”
It was the last class of the day, and the room was full of sleepy teenagers who didn’t want to interact. There’s an unconscious understanding among them at times like this, and they know that one of them has to answer or else the teacher will do something loud and annoying to wake them up.
One of the dumb kids at the front mentioned something about Muslims going crazy when you show a cartoon of Mohammad.
“Yes,” said Mr. Bawn, “that’s a good example. You see, in an open society, we all have the right to say whatever we want. That includes the right to cause offense.”
One of the girls put her hand up. “But shouldn’t we be, like, inclusive and stuff?”
The teacher took a deep breath. “Of course. And that’s something I’d like to talk about today. How far is too far? I’m going to take a look at some things that have caused controversy over the years, and we’re going to talk about where we draw the line. How free should our speech be?”
The whiteboard was showing a PowerPoint presentation from his laptop. The first slide said FREE SPEECH?? The text was in the default font and slightly off-center. He hit the space bar and went to the next slide — an old, black-and-white, hand-drawn cartoon from the 1930s.
Instantly, twenty-four heads turned and stared at Fiona.
Time seemed to stop for her. It was like the sun had gone out, like winter had suddenly arrived and sucked all of the heat from the room, from her body. She had never seen this cartoon before and yet she had seen it a million times. The hook-nosed Jew, sneering and conniving, clutching his bags of gold in one hand. The other hand controlling a marionette.
Time started again, and now she felt the burning of all those eyes on her. Mr. Bawn noticed that his class’s attention had shifted to another point in the room, and slowly he put two and two together.
“Oh, Fiona,” he said, “are you Jewish? I didn’t realize.”
She didn’t know where to turn. She didn’t want to look up and see the cartoon. She didn’t want to look around and see all those eyes. She didn’t want to see him. Instead, she stared at the French textbook on her desk. It showed a rolling meadow somewhere in Provence. She wished that she could fall down, down, through the cover, and land in that meadow, far away from this situation.
“Well, you might be able to help us then,” said Mr. Blanc. “It’ll be helpful to have your voice in our discussion.”
Fiona kept staring at the book and wishing she was in France.
“Or, if you find this upsetting, you’re welcome to sit outside and study quietly.”
Everyone was staring at her. Whenever something embarrassing happened, her mother always told her not to worry because the other kids would have forgotten by tomorrow. But she could sense this was different. Everyone here would remember this day, the day the Jewish kid freaked out.
Aiming to be as unmemorable as possible, Fiona slipped her books off her desk and got to her feet. Walk slowly. Walk calmly. Don’t act like you’re storming out. Close the door gently.
The bench outside was usually for punishment. She’d see kids on her way back from bathroom breaks, and she would wonder what they did. Oh god, she thought, please don’t let one of my teachers walk past. Don’t let them see me and make a mental note that I’m trouble.
She tried to study a little French, but the words were slippery and seemed to keep running away from her.
At times like this, Fiona always prayed for a comet to hit. It was her go-to stress fantasy. A big comet right on her head, vaporizing this whole city in an instant. If it wiped out civilization, then all the better. Let humans go the way of the dinosaurs. At least everyone would forget her that way.
She closed her eyes and waiting, hoping to hear a whistle, like the sound of a giant rock falling through the sky. But the sky remained silent.
In the classroom, everyone laughed at something.
The hallway was freezing. She pulled her arms around herself to keep warm and pretended to be studying French. It was the only way to guarantee she wouldn’t make eye contact with anyone.
After twenty minutes, Mr. Bawn cracked the door open and said, “okay, it’s safe to come back in now.”
The last part of the class was mostly about the internet. Mr. Bawn seemed to be very angry about something called cancel culture. He never mentioned the topics discussed in the twenty minutes she had missed, and she never discovered what had been in the rest of the presentation.
But every time she looked around, she felt that everyone was glancing at her from the corner of her eyes. Like she had somehow betrayed them or disappointed them. Or like she was a visitor filling someone else’s seat.
