In this spoken monologue, the narrator recounts a classroom exercise where a teacher whispers to each student that they are either a witch or a regular person and then asks them to form the largest group without witches. The mere suggestion of witches triggers immediate suspicion, interrogation, and the rapid breakdown of trust, even though no child actually raises a hand as a witch. The narrator uses this story as an extended allegory for how fear, rumors, and labeling—whether as "witch," "liberal," "conservative," "vaxxed," or "unvaxxed"—can fracture societies, erode friendships, and fuel political polarization. The piece questions who benefits from sowing such suspicion, suggesting that manipulators profit while communities turn on each other. It concludes with a call to reject the whispered rumors and refuse to play the divisive “witch‑hunting” game, arguing that the moment we start hunting, we have already lost.
Chapters
My daughter came home from school one day and said, Dad, you're not gonna believe what happened in history class today. Her teacher had told the class they were gonna play a game. He walked around the room and whispered to each kid that they were either a witch or they were just a regular person. And then he gave the instructions. He said, form the biggest group you can that doesn't have a witch in it. If your group has even one witch, all the regular people fail. The witch passes. She said the whole room instantly lit up with both discussion and suspicion. Everyone started interrogating each other. Are you a witch? How do we know you're not lying? Some kids stayed in bigger groups with friends they thought that they could trust, but most broke off into smaller exclusive cliques. They turned away anyone who seemed uncertain, nervous, or gave off even the slightest hint of being guilty. The energy shifted fast, from a group of friendly classmates to suddenly everyone being suspicious of everyone. There were whispers, finger-pointing, side eyes. Trust dissolved in minutes. So finally, when all the groups were formed, The teacher said, okay, time to find out who fails. Witches, raise your hands. And not one hand went up. The whole class exploded. Wait, you messed up the game! And then the teacher dropped the bomb. Did I? Were there any actual witches in Salem? And everyone fell silent. That's when it hit them. No witch was ever needed for the damage to happen. Fear had already done its work. Suspicion alone divided the entire class, turning community into chaos. Was it ever necessary to shut down every school for COVID, or did we all allow fear to control our thoughts, our opinions, and choices, dividing our communities and creating suspicion? And we continue to see this every day— different words, Same playbook. Instead of witch, it's liberal, conservative, left-wing, right-wing, vaxxed, unvaxxed, pro-this, anti-that. The labels shift, but the tactic is the same. Get people scared, get them suspicious, get them divided. Then sit back while trust crumbles, friendships end, families split, and neighbors turn cold. And all because of a whisper that was never true in the first place. The danger was never the witch. The danger is the rumor, the suspicion, the fear, the planted lies. But here's the question that we really need to be asking: who told us to look for the witch in the first place? Who benefits from planting the suspicion, from whispering the rumor that makes us turn on On each other. Because while we're busy interrogating each other, someone else is quietly pulling the strings, and we never look at them and what they might be doing. Refuse the whisper. Don't play the game. Because the second we start hunting witches, we've already lost.
