The Quietening

One time I think I was treated maybe more harshly than other kids was when I was too young to be learning that ‘x’ could be a number. It came after I explained to a teacher that the absence of evidence did not equal the evidence of absence. Of course, I’ve never been a philosopher so that wasn’t exactly how I said it.

“Erm,” Mr Petrik started, in classic teacher fashion, “Nobody said you could start moulding the clay.” His reprimand was to the whole class. We’d gone agog whilst waiting for the potter to enter the room.

It was arts and crafts week, and Friday was the day that we were learning pottery. Bricks of grey clay waited for each of us on our desks. We were children left unattended in a room full of make-your-own toys. Anyone should have been able to guess what would happen.

“Nobody said we couldn’t start moulding the clay.” I replied.

“That’s another demerit line next to your name for talking back.” Mr Petrik said. He was the only one in the room who didn’t seem to think I was funny.

My name was already on the board from earlier in the week. I was a naughty boy apparently, but at least I could make the class laugh sometimes.

Disobedient, loud, snarky. I couldn’t get away with the same things that others could. Unless you only looked at our brains, I wasn’t like a lot of the other kids around me. Unknowingly, unwillingly, I went from being an outspoken young individual to an inaudible member of society. By the time my next stage of schooling was complete, I was spending less time replying quickly, and more time in my brain.

I live in one of the most multicultural cities in the world, I’ve never felt the need to fear when seeing police in my local area, and the most worried I’ve been about my safety was when I misbehaved outside and heard one of my parents tell me to “just wait until we get home”. I’d say I’m quite lucky that I’ve never experienced aggressive racism. But I’d say it also made me naïve. By having never experienced aggressive racism, I’d really just never experienced ‘overt’ racism. I grew up not knowing which of my negative experiences were influenced by someone tasting the ‘Africa’ in my name. There were a few situations growing up, like the one with Mr Petrik, where I felt that older people in my environment just didn’t ‘like me’ the same way they liked the other kids. It took me a while to figure out how to navigate that.

I thought I was pretty much guaranteed a high-paying job if I traded a university experience of fun for one with long essays and restricted expression of the self. In my mind, I needed a first-class mark to even be considered for progression past a job’s application stage. “Jordan, you have to try ten times harder to get the same opportunities, and work twice as hard to get half as much.” my mum would say. Long gone were the days that I was afraid to bring a report card home, but I still wanted to call my parents with perfect — rather than just ‘good’ — news. The 68 I’d just received in Jurisprudence, the ‘Philosophy of Law’, wasn’t going to cut it. I needed at least 70 to keep my first-class degree on track.

Professor Keeley had long hair that seemed a natural grey. He wore round thin-rim glasses and dressed in the typical professor clothes that spring to mind, but in shades of blue and navy. I don’t know how he survived the summery temperature of the room for the whole day, or even just for his office hours, but I figured it was part of his aesthetic. We’d been speaking for a while about the subject of the essay question before Keeley explained the reason I received a mark of 68.

“I reread your submission, and I have pretty much only positive things to say about it. You clearly researched the topic in-depth and posed some great questions.” His speech was slow and refined. “Where I think you fell short was your conclusion. One of your points was quite vague and didn’t have anything substantial to back it up.”

“I compared the argument that acquittal could be a ‘slippery slope’ leading to legalising murder, with the argument that ‘self-defence’ was an example of exceptions being incorporated into law based on the case that spoke about a ‘necessity’ to kill.”

“That’s where I think you may have fallen short. Compared to your analyses of R v Dudley and R v Palmer, the ‘slippery slope’ argument seemed like a far stretch with no precedent rooted in real cases.”

“The question itself wasn’t rooted in a real case… I was reaching the word-count and got creative, so I should’ve received extra credit for being a philosopher too.” I thought to myself. I couldn’t say that out loud if I didn’t want him to put a mental demerit line next to my name on his secret list of snarky students. Maybe there was something else I could have responded with… something less challenging. My thoughts took too long and the pause was palpable.

“I have to say, you’re very well-spoken, and I do like the way you think.” Keeley looked at me as if he were analysing me. “I wish they were all like you.”

I gave a grateful smile.

“What do you have to lose?” Keeley continued. “I gave you a 68, but I could be wrong. Your mark could go up as well as down, so it’s up to you.”

“I think I’ll go for the re-mark.”

“Okay. Good luck.”

I left Keeley’s office with a sense of accomplishment. There was hope for a successful re-mark reaching the boundary I was looking for, and in the case of failing that, I’d impressed my professor and left a good impression. I replayed the conversation in my head on my walk back to my dorm room, but the rerun snatched on a segment. “You’re very well-spoken.” I know it was a compliment, but it felt like a weird one to be pointed out. I wondered if he expected me to speak differently. That would’ve been ignorant of him. I don’t need to speak a certain way. My own voice asked me why I felt so offended by that. “Is that something he would have pointed out if I wasn’t black?”

“I’m pretty sure I’m overthinking it now.” I thought to myself.

I hated that I couldn’t be sure what his thought process was. I was the ignorant one. It’s not like he said I was “so well-spoken.” or that he “wished they were all like me”, but I still didn’t know what to think. The thought bounced around my mind like the old DVD logo. Or maybe more like a long game of brick breaker.

Janina came to my student dorm that evening to begin preparations for our friend group’s game night. She was one of my first friends in university, also studying law and probably the ring-leading mother of our group. She’d taken over my flat’s kitchen to cook a fusion of her family’s ndolé dish with a side Korean-style fried chicken.

“Did you hear there’s been another racism allegation in K-pop?” Janina said as soon as she sat down on the kitchen sofa opposite me.

“Another? Tell me why you like K-pop again?”

“Jordan, I’ve seen your YouTube history. Do you want to continue acting like you don’t like K-pop, or should we talk about the river in Egypt?”

I’ll admit, I didn’t have a witty response to her at the time. Janina carried on after stumping me.

“The Nile.” She said, pronouncing it like “Denial.”

“I get it.” I said. “I’m not in denial.”

“Sure. Anyway, Jauem was high-fiving people at his concert but then skipped over a couple of black fans. There’s video and everything.”

I watched the video after Janina got it up on her phone. It showed Jaeum, a Korean singer whose songs I liked, high-fiving his fans from the stage while they stood in the rain as he performed. At one point, he pulled back and seemed to wave to a couple of fans before going back to high-fiving more along the line. The video cut to another perspective. Now, viewed from the sight of the girls reaching out to touch the star, Jaeum was high-fiving fans to the side before pulling back when he got to them and resuming just to the side of them. In the second video, one of the other fans could be heard asking if the two girls got skipped. There were a couple of expletives as they confirmed that they had been denied physical contact with someone they adored.

“Then” Janina followed, taking back her phone, “he posted an ‘apology’ on Instagram, look.”

I took her phone and read the apology post, split into two slides:

Hi Everyone,

I’d just like to address the matter concerning the interaction I had with my fans yesterday evening at my Gwangalli Plaza concert.

I’ve been away from music, recovering from some personal issues for almost 2 years and being able to perform for my fans again after so long was an invaluable and precious experience to me.

I’m writing to explain the reason behind my actions at the concert just to clarify any misinterpretations of events. Feeling moved by the support of my fans, I reached out to connect and give high-fives with as many people as safely as possible. For safety reasons, I decided to only give high-fives to the front row and to not reach too deeply into the crowd.

I am sincerely sorry that my actions gave any impression of discrimination. I love every single one of my Jamies, wherever you’re from, and I never intended to discriminate against anyone.

Stay safe x

I wanted to believe Jaeum, but the video was damning. Misunderstanding or not, the small interaction had made a big splash.

The whole of the game night had passed before I thought to consider how the girls involved felt. I didn’t even consider the feelings of the young black girls that supported him. Spiralling down in a search for finding the truth beyond the videos and the apology I asked myself if I should continue supporting him. If the video showed what it seemed to show, then the answer was obviously ‘no’. I stumbled upon a post by the person who had been skipped in the video.

“I used to listen to Jaeum every day after school and even introduced his music to my friends and family. My sister even bought his last album for me for my birthday because she knows how much I loved him. So yeah… this really fucking hurt.”

I’m not going to lie, I liked his music too. But at that point, I didn’t think it was the intention or the ‘truth’ that ultimately mattered most. It was also important to appreciate the impact that events had on people’s feelings. Despite me believing the likely sincerity of the explanation/apology after reviewing another fan’s “unbiased analysis” of the video, I decided to stop listening to Jaeum’s music for a long while out of respect for the young girls’ feelings.

Just a day later, my flatmate, Jess, asked me if I play basketball after commenting on my height. I said “No.” but probably more curtly than I needed to.

“Because you’re wearing basketball shorts and an ‘And1’ t-shirt.” She explained.

I couldn’t see through the dark fog that had crept around my mind and I was flailing as a result. What I’d interpreted as a possible assumption made by the fact that I was tall and dark was just Jess forming a connection and I’d handled the situation with all the dexterity of an elderly snail.

“Oh. I used to play when I was a kid, but not competitively. I wanted to, but I never got the chance.” Jess’ question bordered a very fair presumption.

I felt ashamed somewhat, taking her question out of context, and the ball came back to base for me to consider whether I’d overthought any of my other experiences. Professor Keeley had paid me a complement and here I was, still wondering if he could have been backhandedly complimenting me and insulting my race. I didn’t realise how much of a mental corner I’d driven myself into, thinking about this over and over. I sat on the floor of my university dorm room between the bed and the radiator.

“Hey buddy, you okay?” Winston’s voice said over the speakerphone. I’d speed-dialled him almost absent-mindedly.

“Oh. Man… I don’t know. My professor said I was ‘very well-spoken’ and I don’t know how to take it.”

“Why did he say that? I mean you do speak well… but what was the context?”

“I got a 68 on my assessment and wanted to figure out what I was missing to get 70, or if there was any point in me asking for a re-mark. We had a conversation about the law, and he said that as part of some feedback.”

“Ah.” Winston said. “Well… microaggressions are a thing. I don’t blame you. He probably meant what he said with the best will in the world, but thinking about it so much isn’t something you should feel bad about…”

“He also said he wished they were all like me.”

“Who’s ‘they’?” I could hear Winston’s eyebrows furrow over the phone.

“I think he was referring to other students. The module isn’t very popular with the class.” I’d only accepted that while speaking with Winston.

“Oh. That makes sense…”

“Yeah…” I said. “I guess it just bothered me a bit. I couldn’t think clearly.”

“It’s something he won’t necessarily think about the same way you would.”

“I wish I could speak so recklessly.” I was feeling more relieved. The dark cloud around my head had lightened in colour.

“Well… there are known knowns, known unknowns and unknown unknowns right?” Winston started. “Things we know; things we know that we’re unaware of but can learn; and things we don’t even know to think about. I know not to say certain things like the ‘N-word’; but as someone who’s white-passing, I’ve said some things that kept me thinking about them because I didn’t mean it to be racist and didn’t know if it would be considered that way. As for unknown unknowns, there’ve been times I might say something and not even know it was bad to say. You’ve called me out on some things like that and I learn from it. I appreciate that. Then again, there are also times where calling something out is a bit… I don’t know. I don’t know which of those your experience with your professor falls into, but maybe it’s something you just have to give the benefit of doubt to and let go. Ever since I learnt that ‘No can do’ came from people mocking Chinese migrants’ speech patterns, I haven’t been able to think about anything else when I hear someone use that phrase. It’s not your fault that some things hit different for you.”

Winston’s words sank in, and I felt the cloud fully lift from my brain.

“You were triggered.” He ended.

“No.”

“Yes. You were triggered.” Winston laughed before composing himself. “We’re long overdue a meetup by the way, so I hope you make it through the summer… you know- since you’re a snowflake- ”

I cut the phone.

Thinking about it, I realised that Winston was right. I’ve been called ‘well-spoken’ in the past, but it never felt like a compliment. At best, it was extended family stating that I ‘spoke posh’; at worst, it was someone saying that I wasn’t ‘black enough’ because I was of eloquent tongue. Hearing it as a genuine compliment caught me off-guard. When I thought about it, I don’t think Professor Keeley had any of those thoughts in mind. I’d had a respectful argument with him which he appreciated in a student. He wasn’t saying that I was more articulate than he was expecting. He was whole-heartedly complementing me. Unlike the case with Mr Petrik where I know for certain that I was treated harshly on multiple occasions for being a smart black 9-year-old, I had no lasting reason to believe that Professor Keeley was treating me differently because of my race. I settled on the decision that: with room to doubt, benefit should be given at least once, so Keeley’s name wouldn’t go on my mental board and he would get no demerit lines name today.

For now, for that, it was better to let ten guilty people go free than condemn an innocent one.