As COVID-19 pandemic has forced a shift from classroom teaching to online learning since schools continue to remain shut for over 4 months, a photo of a teacher who was apparently bullied by his students during an online class on a Zoom call went viral on social media, so much so that the news portals published the incident as news.
Below are screenshots of reports surrounding the viral photo:
India Today:
The Tribune:
The News Now:
55-year-old teacher gets bullied during online class; heartbreaking incident goes viral.It sheds a light on the teaching patterns that have changed during the pandemic. https://t.co/5k7ODEpCvw
— Cobrapost (@cobrapost) July 17, 2020
Claim:
Teacher in the viral photo was bullied during an online class.
Fact Check:
The claim is false because the story shared with the viral photo is ‘fiction’.
AltNews found that the story was shared by a Facebook user, Syed Mohammad Fahim on June 30.
Fahim clearly mentions at the end of the post that he wrote a ‘fictional story in solidarity to all teachers who are victims of Zoom bombing by shameless students’.
Below is a screenshot:
It is noteworthy to mention that the Facebook post didn’t have the viral photo attached to it.
The story was shared on social media by the Instagram page ‘tedthestoner’ on July 16.
View this post on Instagram
This definitely deserved a share. Read,understand, implement. Trolling ≠ bullying(This is aFictional story for those asking) Principal suddenly called the 55 year old teacher and told him to learn how to take class online. He doesn’t have much to say as he knows that if he denies he will be laid off, at this age in this situation he can’t do any other job, to pay for his family he has no choice. Unwillingly he takes his smart phone to his daughter. His daughter helped him to understand the basic of Zoom, his hands often shake to go around the tabs, he often freezes trying to understand how this thing works but he has no choice. The next day he goes to a market to buy a new white board. The price of these small board soared up, but without these how can he take the class? He took the board in a rickshaw and came home. Placed the board in a chair and started practicing the lesson. It was harder than he thought, staring at a camera and teaching but he has no choice. The next day he wore a new shirt, will be seeing his students after one and half month, his daughter helped him to setup the smart phone, and the students were added and the class went on. He was shaky, his voice cracked every now and then he was nervous but he has no choice. Suddenly an unknown ID started using slang at him, the F word, the A word, open threats. He couldn’t understand how should he react, he shouted out of anger and embarrassment, a teacher is being humulated infront of his students. His life work of earning respect from his students seemed to vanish in seconds. His daughter taught him to mute students but the student could unmute himself, the student kept on using slangs and he did it for entertainment. The only thing the teacher could do was to end the class, as he has no choice. He called for his daughter, she came running and saw her father in tears, she held him tightly tried to calm him down but he kept crying as he never faced such humiliation in his life. That he had troubled sleeping that night, as he knew the next day he has to wake up and face the same ordeal as he has no choice. Note:Abusing a teacher doesn’t make you cool, It makes you sick. Credits: Syed Mohamad Fahim/FB
A post shared by Ted The Stoner (@tedthestoner) on Jul 15, 2020 at 10:14pm PDT
Although the page did credit the story to Fahim, it omitted the ‘fictional’ part. The post was shared along with the viral photo.
This Instagram post was picked up by news portals.
Origin Of Viral Photo
The viral image was found to be a screenshot of a video of an online class held in Bangladesh. Facebook user Hafiz R Rahman had shared the video on June 29.
According to Hafiz’s Facebook post, the teacher’s name is Mohiuddin. The video shows an online class that the teacher had taken for the students of Milestone College, Dhaka and he was harassed. Rahman said that he is an ex-student of the college.
A follow-up link was also attached to his Facebook post. The link leads to another video where he said that he has informed by the college authorities of the incident.
Although several people asked Rahman to take down the teacher’s video, he said that he will take it down only after appropriate action has been taken against the student mentioned in his earlier post.
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