Jason's Story
Copyright© 2025 by writer 406
Chapter 12
Jason stood at the front of the first-period World History class as thirty-two kids filed in. The energy of the beginning of the day was chaotic—students talking over each other, backpacks hitting desks, the restless buzz of teenagers who expected to spend the next fifty minutes half-asleep while a substitute read from their textbook.
He’d spent the last hour watching the kids arrive at school, getting a feel for the school’s rhythm. Now, watching them settle into their seats, he could see the demographic breakdown Principal Hart had described: a mix of faces that told the story of Seattle’s changing population. Vietnamese names on the seating chart, Somali hijabs, a few students whose features suggested Chinese heritage.
“Phones away, please,” Jason said quietly, not raising his voice but somehow commanding attention. “You’re going to need your full attention for this.”
A few groans, but the phones disappeared.
He turned to the whiteboard and wrote a single question:
What happens to regular people when empires collapse?
The class was taken aback. This guy had confidence that normal subs never had. His persona felt faintly dangerous.
“Who can tell me what an empire is?” he asked, turning back to the class.
Hands shot up. “Big country that controls a lot of other countries,” offered Maria, a Latina girl in the front row.
“Good start. Anyone want to build on that?”
Jamal, a tall Black student near the window, raised his hand. “Like, they take over places and make people do what they want?”
“Exactly. Now, how many of you have family members who lived through major political changes? Government collapses, new countries being formed, borders changing?”
The question seemed to surprise them. Slowly, a few hands in the room went up.
“Thought so,” Jason said. “So, some of you already understand more about what we’re studying today than you realize.”
“The Ottoman Empire lasted six hundred years from 1299-1922,” he continued. “Longer than the United States has existed. At its peak, it stretched from Hungary to Yemen, from Algeria to Iraq. Millions of people. Dozens of ethnic groups, languages, religions.”
He turned to face them. “Now imagine that empire—that entire system of government, cops, courts—imagine it slowly falling apart over fifty years. Trade breaking down, the grocery store shelves are empty. What happens to the millions of regular people just like you guys who live there?”
Silence. He could see them thinking.
A Somali girl who’d been doodling in her notebook, looked up. “They’d be scared?”
“Why scared?”
“Because ... because they wouldn’t know what was coming next? Like, if your government falls apart, who protects you?”
“Brilliant question.” Jason wrote WHO PROTECTS YOU? on the board. “In Somalia in the 1990s, when the central government collapsed, what happened?”
Her expression changed. “My grandmother, she said families had to protect themselves. Clans. Warlords. Because there was no law, no police.”
“Same pattern,” Jason said. “When the Ottoman Empire started collapsing, people fell back on family, tribal, and religious groups. Because empires don’t just disappear quietly. Outsiders come in like packs of wolves and fight over the pieces. Trade breaks down. No food. No wages. The only thing you can count on is your family, your relatives, and your tribe. That’s real important--remember that.”
He drew a rough map of the Middle East on the board. “World War I was partly a fight over Ottoman territory. Britain, France, Germany, Russia—they all wanted access to the oil there. The automobile, remember? Everybody and his brother Larry wanted a Model T to show off how cool he was to his girl. And the people living there? They were raising their kids in a battleground.”
David, a Vietnamese student, raised his hand. “Like Vietnam?”
Jason nodded. “Very much like Vietnam. How much do you know about your family’s experience there?”
“My grandfather fought in the war. He said ... he said the big countries used Vietnam to fight each other, but the Vietnamese people paid the price.”
“Exactly the same pattern.” Jason turned back to the map. “The Ottomans chose the wrong side in World War I. When they lost, the winners—Britain and France—drew new borders. Not giving a damn about the people who actually lived there, or what languages they spoke, or their religions, or their tribes. But based on what was cool for European powers.”
He drew arbitrary lines across the map. “New countries: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine. But the people living there? Kurdish people got split into four different new countries. I spent some time living with them. Believe me, they still remember and resent it like it happened yesterday. Arab tribes got divided by borders they never agreed to. Religious communities suddenly became minorities in a new country that was ruled by their sworn enemies.”
The classroom was completely silent now. Jason could feel the shift—from passive listening to active engagement.
He sat on the edge of his desk. “Here’s what the textbook won’t tell you. When empires collapse, ordinary people suffer. Always. People like you guys. Rich people, powerful people—they adapt, they find new opportunities. But farmers, shopkeepers, families just trying to get along and live their lives? They get caught between competing armies, new governments, changing laws. They get ground up like a chuck roast through a meat grinder.”
Marcus, a student who’d been slouching in the back, leaned forward. “So what would the common people do?”
“They die. Oh, they try their best to survive,” Jason said his voice matter of fact. “But mostly they die. The tiny babies go first. Commerce breaks down. Food becomes scarce. People starve. People have to make impossible choices. Which of the kids do I feed, which do I let go hungry? Which one do I have to sell? Which one can bring the best price? Can you imagine having to decide something like that? Having to sell your youngest daughter so the others survive?
Or do you try to escape the only home you’ve ever known? Do you change your religion, your language to fit the new reality? Imagine your mom and dad sitting around the dinner table, talking this out, trying to figure out what to do. Maybe the best thing is to send you with your little sister and brother to a new place.
So, the next time you hear of refugees, like those coming out of Syria, that’s what’s happening to them. Like I said, the common people get ground up.
There is an old saying: “Whether the pitcher hits the stone or the stone hits the pitcher, it’s going to be a bad day for the pitcher.”
The class was dead silent digesting this stark reality.
He stood up, walked to the map. “In 1915, Ottoman authorities deported or killed over a million Armenians. That’s the population of Seattle proper. Genocide. In 1923, Greece and Turkey forced population exchanges—Greeks who’d lived in Turkey for generations suddenly had to move to Greece, and vice versa. Millions of people, uprooted because the powers in Europe were redrawing maps.”
Aisha raised her hand again. “Is that why there’s still fighting in the Middle East?”
“HAH,” Jason shouted, startling the kids. A passing teacher stuck her head in the door. “That’s the question. Congratulations, Aisha, you have just proved that you are ten times smarter than a lot of politicians.”
He pointed to her with an encouraging smile. “You want to take a stab at explaining why?”
She was quiet for a moment. “Because ... because the borders they drew didn’t make sense? Like, they put different groups together who didn’t want to be together?”
“And?” Jason prompted.
“And they separated groups who wanted to stay together?”
“Exactly. The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world without their own country. Why? Because when Britain and France met secretly to draw borders after the war, they gave the Kurdish homeland to four different countries. Sixty million Kurds are still dealing with decisions made by some fat cat white guys who signed the Sykes-Picot Agreement a hundred years ago.”
Jamal shook his head. “That’s messed up.”
“It is messed up,” Jason agreed. “And it’s still happening. Look at Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan. A lot of modern conflicts trace back to borders drawn by imperial powers who didn’t understand—or care about how people actually lived.”
The silence stretched. Finally, Fatima spoke. “My dad says the Middle East has been messed up since forever.”
“Your dad knows his history,” Jason said. “But here’s the important question: What do we all do with that knowledge?”
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