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Flokstra counters, “I did not say any opinion about abortion.” She had offered a medical statistic — a “big difference.” But Britton says her words were “hurtful to other students in the class.” But it’s not clear that anyone actually complained. If someone did, this was never made clear to Flokstra, then or since.

Flokstra is then accused of “shut(ting) down other people.” Flokstra says, “I don’t see how my comments shut people down. I think you are shutting me down.” Flokstra is told she must consider the other students’ “feelings” and their “safety.”

I think you are shutting me down

Like Shepherd, Flokstra becomes tearful out of frustration, yet manages to push back on the accusations, asking whether classrooms are about “feeling safe at all times, or if it’s about learning.” And, as in the Shepherd interview, outrageous comparisons are made. In the Shepherd interview, the supervising teacher compared Jordan Peterson to Hitler. In this case, Britton compares discussing actual facts about abortion to promoting hatred: “It’s not freedom of speech per se … we don’t just say whatever. Otherwise — that’s why we don’t have the KKK having a club on campus. That’s not freedom of speech. That’s hate, right?”

Flokstra’s experience is troubling on several levels, not least her teacher’s instinct to keep students ignorant of medical facts rather than risk creating ambivalence around multiple abortions.

It’s possible that the teachers, though polite, are uncomfortable with Christianity and Christians. According to Flokstra, another teacher commented in class, in these words or words to this effect (corroborated by a fellow student), “Christianity has been dominant in the past, and it needs to get brought down. If it ends up below other religions for a while, that’s OK. Things will even out eventually.” In voicing this opinion, she was not worried about Flokstra’s “feelings” or “safety,” needless to say.