Eulogy For To Kill A Mockingbird

When I was younger, it was hard to make myself heard. One day in my 4th grade class, we were learning about Jewish traditions, and their history in Egypt. I am half Jewish, so I thought it would be important for me to listen to what my teacher had to say. I had never studied the Torah, but my family and I had always celebrated Hanukkah and Passover. As I soon learned, there was an obvious bias in the room. The way my teacher talked, the way he had cloud of judgement on his brow, the dogmatic feeling he imparted, stung, as if being pricked by a thorn. My teacher had faith in the other God: the other half of my family’s background. Second half. I did not, and until today, believe in either faiths, but hearing these words made my skin crawl. The

I wanted to speak for him (for me). Ready to defend my the peer , I made a subtle cough. I was going to be like Scout from the book To Kill A Mockingbird, I was going to stand up for the boy just as Scout did for Walter Cunningham. “I rose graciously on Walter’s behalf: Ah- Miss Caroline?” (Lee, 26). I started to rise, but much more cautiously than Scout. I stood with a sole purpose, to call my teacher out. Sweat started to rest on me like a sticky humid coating. My eye began to twitch with expectancy. I felt like I weighed a thousand pounds. It was going to happen, but it was not meant to be. The bell sounded just at that moment, it had both a saved me and denied my opportunity to speak. All the children ran outside for lunch, until only I remained. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came from my mouth. I had not spoke up for what I believed, and instead I muttered those defeating words:“Thank you for the lesson”. I walked away. I had let myself and the other kid down, and I knew

I had learned something, Most of the other kids actually did see what was happening, even if it was on a very subtle level. They dismissed what they saw because it didn’t necessarily concern them. Just as in To Kill a Mockingbird, they (the jury of peers) could have condemned an innocent man to death with barely the bat of an eye. As long as it did not affect their own personal lives, it was easy. This is essentially what the jury at Tom Robinson’s trial ended up doing. They all knew that he was innocent but they did not speak up, and unfortunately like the jury, I knew it was wrong but I let my voice be unheard. “The jury never looks at a defendant it has convicted, and when the jury came in, not one of them looked at Tom Robinson” ( Lee, 282). All of this kids in my class turned a blind eye to what my teacher had said, and almost all of them refused to talk about it