Controversy erupted at Middlebury last week after a question from a chemistry midterm came to light that invoked the Holocaust. The question identified Hydrogen Cyanide as “a poisonous gas that Nazi Germany used to horrific ends in the gas chambers during the Holocaust,” and then asked students to calculate a lethal dose of the substance for one person.
There is a general consensus that this exam question was awful, or at the very least should not have been asked. Complicating matters somewhat, however, was that news of the test question broke when a student-run satirical newspaper wrote a humor piece about the incident.
As an editor of the school newspaper and a member of the Jewish community, I volunteered to write a news article to set the facts straight. I wanted to get it out as soon as possible in the hope that it would help calm the mayhem that had descended on Middlebury’s little corner of social media. Students, both Jewish and not, immediately began hurling accusations of over-sensitivity and anti-Semitism at each other in comments sections as people took sides on the satire article and the college’s response to the whole situation. Memes sprang up in our campus Facebook group as if by magic. I hoped that a healthy dose of information would help soothe the situation.
As I started contacting sources, I wished that the newspaper had broke the story first. I felt like things would have gotten less heated if there had been facts first, humor second. Here’s the problem, though: I had known about the test question for weeks, but I had said nothing to anyone else on the editorial board. I had the power to make this information public and yet I held back.
As I worked on the story for two days straight, I asked myself: why did I decide that this news was not worth reporting?
As much as I hate to admit it, I think a fair amount of internalized anti-Semitism played into my decision to stay quiet. Like a lot of Jews, my first reaction to off-color or downright offensive comments is to downplay their impact—to tell myself and others that it’s fine even when it hurts. Or to deflect my attention and remind myself that my peers of color face far worse on this campus every single day than I do as a white-identifying Jewish student.
To be clear, I believe that this is true and incredibly important to remember, but I also know that acknowledging my privilege does not mean I should ignore anti-Semitism when it happens. When I first saw the question, however, I talked myself out of telling any of the other editors on staff. I now feel that was a mistake.
I also did not want to bring the hurt of this into my college newsroom, a place that I cherish beyond measure. I believe with every fiber of my being that the work that occurs in our tiny basement office, which is always 20 degrees too hot, is some of the most important work that happens at this school. Every week we grapple with incredibly tough issues and do our best to hold the powerful to account. I did not want to walk into that space and make myself a victim. Anti-Semitism makes me feel voiceless, and I did not want to introduce its power into the room where I found my voice.
There was also a part of me that did not want to leave the newsworthiness of this issue up for someone else to decide. As much as I kept telling myself everything was fine, I knew it would hurt for another person to tell me this was not significant
Deep down, I knew that it mattered the minute I saw the leaked photo of the midterm in my inbox. I think my friend got it right when I showed it to her and she said, “Wow, this question is asking how much Hydrogen Cyanide it would take to kill me.” There is a pain in that and I felt it. I did not want to bring that pain up for scrutiny and debate.
When I did finally take on the story, I reported it to the best of my journalistic abilities and I did so quickly. While the situation is still developing—the chemistry department announced last Wednesday that the professor who posed the question will take an emergency leave for the remainder of this semester, for example—we got the facts out there.
Now that my reporting is over, I have been able to take a step back and process some of the feelings I had to set aside to do my job as a reporter. I helped Hillel write a statement in response to the situation and I have let myself feel sad that this happened.
However, I did not want to let this moment pass without examining my own reasoning for keeping this knowledge to myself for so long. I want to recognize that those reasons are rooted in valid feelings and experiences but also that they led to a choice that I personally regret. For me, that has become an inextricable part of this story.
Sarah Asch studies English literature and creative writing at Middlebury College, where she will graduate in February 2020. She serves as the editor at large of the Middlebury Campus and her past work has appeared in the San Francisco Public Press and Tikkun Magazine.
Featured image credit: Pixabay/Free-Photos.
