Respect needs to be earned.

At age 12, my classmate got beaten up in front of our Primary 6 cohort for a mere reason of staring. This teacher, who obviously had an issue with temper management, was extremely riled up because he claimed that my friend was staring at him. My friend instantly denied that and said, he did not do anything! No one believed him or no one bothered to listen to his side of story.

He was slapped on his face several times, pushed onto the ground several times, beaten and humiliated in public, and all of us watched in silence. Nobody should punish a 12-year-old like this, no teacher should have the right to hit a child like this in public, no one should abuse a child like this. If indeed, my friend did stare at the teacher disrespectfully, the punishment should be carried out according to the book — detention or meet the parents etc. No one should punish a 12-year-old like this. Furthermore, he did not even listen to my friend’s explanation.

Even though we know he had been wronged, NOBODY, NO TEACHER OR STUDENT, said anything. After the incident, we complained about it to our form teacher, Mr Ong, a very personable and friendly figure which naturally helped us to open up to him about the unjust we felt for our friend. We ranted and vented our frustrations to him for a long time and at the end, he was pissed. He felt the injustice our friend had suffered then, and decided go and talk to our principals about it.

Days later, Mr Ong told us the principals would be coming in later. He called us to tell the principals what we saw, and all the frustrations we had vented to him before. He was giving us a chance to defend our friend, to fight for our friend. At that point, all of us felt this sense of justice, and the will to speak up against that old disgusting teacher. I was so determined to speak up against the despicable teacher myself. Yet, the minute the principals entered the class, the class was as silent as a mouse. Nobody dared to say anything at all. By that time, Mr Ong was pissed, “Come on, tell them the things you all have told me!”. None of us had the courage to say anything against the principals.

I couldn’t remember what the principals said after, but basically they said some nice and politically correct words, and all of us just nodded. And they left.

Hence, after that day, the issue was covered up by the principals, no punishments were given to the teacher, nobody was to talk about the incident anymore. Our friend, got humiliated and slapped for a stupid reason and the teacher escaped scot-free. The principals had to cover the incident up because if this incident was leaked, it will reflect badly on the school.

After the principals left our class, Mr Ong’s face was in his hands. He was utterly disappointed and let down by us. He couldn’t believe what he had just witnessed — our timidity, our double-standards, hypocrisy.

He then voiced that he doesn’t respect our principal at all, he thinks he was not deserving of his respect. And that, not all figures-of-authority are to be respected. Respect needs to be earned. And then, he said he was very disappointed, and he left the class, crushed.

I remember, at that moment, the immense regret I felt, the embarrassment, I can still feel it even till today. I was disgusted by my own timidity. Since that day, speaking up against injustice has become the most important root in my character. I never want to let any injustice goes unpunished, any bully to carry on their teasing, or any authority to abuse their power.

It is also that very day that I realized, not very adult or figures-of-authority is deserving of respect. It was almost an early enlightenment that I did not see prior to that incident. They are capable of corruption and deceive just like every body else. Not even when they are carrying a noble title — principals, social workers, president of united states. In fact, it is these people with power, that is more susceptible to moral decadence in order to protect their power.

I guess that is why, I have a tendency to not respect authorities — my secondary school English teacher who was always grumpy and accusing, my Chinese teacher who always waste our time in class by talking about her personal life, my general paper teacher in JC who was extremely lazy and neglected his work for his personal problems. I spoke up against each of these teachers back then, disrespected them openly and filed my complain to other authorities about these unprofessional teachers. They do not deserve my respect simply because they are my teachers. Authority over me does not command my respect.

Only someone with fine character is deserving of respect.

I guess, since 12, I was not friends with popular people, but those who were marginalized. I was not the class pet and teachers tend not to like me but those whom I respect, I will shower them with love and I will remember them dearly.

Respect needs to be earned. THAT I AGREE SO GREATLY. and I will not hestitate to speak up against anyone, if they are not just.

Hence, thank you my friend, in primary school for teaching me such an important lesson since young. Till today, I still regret that day so badly, and I hope you are doing fine even after suffering that injustice.