They say school is where you learn how to think.
That's a lie.
It's where you learn what to think—to mirror, to memorize, to maintain harmony.
But sometimes, rarely, they ask you to speak your mind.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau once wrote:
"We are born weak, we need strength; helpless, we need aid; foolish, we need reason. All that we lack at birth, all that we need when we come to man's estate, is the gift of education."
A noble idea. One that teachers love to quote when they want to sound like they're shaping lives instead of handing out worksheets.
But what Rousseau failed to mention is that education isn't neutral.
It doesn't just give you reason. It gives you a lens—and someone else chooses the glass.
School doesn't teach you how to think.
It teaches you how to function.
You memorize the moral framework of whoever writes the curriculum. You mimic emotional intelligence in group work. You nod through contradictions in textbooks because questioning the format gets you a lower grade.
It's not education. It's calibration.
Still, there are some subjects where the illusion is thinner—where people at least pretend to think.
That's why I both dreaded and respected Modern Ethics and Communication.
Modern Ethics and Communication wasn't always a core subject.
It was added three years ago, after the school board decided that "emotional intelligence" was the new academic trend.
A calculated move, dressed up as progress.
They said the class would "bridge personal development with critical reasoning."
What it actually became was a place where students debated feelings in structured, socially acceptable ways.
It turned awkward silences into curriculum.
Most treated it like a break from real subjects.
I didn't.
Words are weapons. Motives are patterns.
If you study people long enough, their ethics are just strategy in disguise.
Fujimoto-sensei entered the classroom with a small stack of white sheets clipped together. No slideshow. No preamble.
(Page 52: "Faculty Profiles")
Hanae Fujimoto – "The Soft Surgeon"
Smiles often, but only before a confrontation.
Voice is calm. Intent is surgical.
Tells students "dialogue is growth," but asks questions meant to expose weaknesses.
Believes truth and empathy can coexist. Naïve—but deliberate.
Conclusion: Cuts you open, then asks how it felt.
"Today," she said, placing them on her desk, "you're going to think for yourselves—at least, I hope."
She passed around the pages.
Five open-ended questions, printed in clean serif font:
1. Is it better to be kind or to be honest?
2. Does emotional understanding lead to truth, or obscure it?
3. Are people defined more by their intentions or their actions?
4. What gives a life meaning: empathy or integrity?
5. Is there such a thing as a truly selfless act?
"You'll choose one," she said, stepping back. "Write an essay. Be personal, be precise, and—if possible—be brave."
I didn't hesitate. I already knew which one I'd choose.
Number four.
What gives a life meaning: empathy or integrity?
They were all the same question in disguise.
I chose the most direct version of it.
A week passed. The essays were graded, but Fujimoto-sensei didn't hand them back.
Instead, she stood in front of the class with a quiet intensity that signaled something was coming.
"I read all of your essays," she said. "Most were thoughtful. Some were careful. But two… were neither."
Pause for effect.
Then she smiled.
"Two essays chose opposite answers. But they both had something the others didn't: conviction."
I should've seen it coming.
"Ren Yukimura. Aira Minami. Please come to the front."