At the end of the afternoon on Friday, a history and geography teacher was attacked with a knife and beheaded in Conflans-Saint-Honorine, after showing his students caricatures of Muhammad during a course on freedom of the press.

On Europe 1, the president of the national union of high schools and colleges expressed his fear, insisting on the need to continue to teach students freedom of expression including, in France, the right to blasphemy.

INTERVIEW

"The teaching community is devastated", reacts Jean-Rémi Girard, president of the national union of high schools and colleges (SNALC), contacted by Europe 1. A few hours after the attack committed against a teacher in a college from Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, in the Yvelines, attacked with a knife and beheaded, the union representative expressed, Friday evening, the fear of the teaching community.

"It's scary to think that in 21st century France, a teacher can be beheaded in the street for doing his job!"

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"We should be able to show a caricature to all our students"

At around 5 p.m. on Friday, a 47-year-old teacher was beheaded in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, and his alleged attacker was killed by the police, in the neighboring town of Eragny, in Val-d'Oise.

According to a police source, the victim, a history and geography teacher had recently shown his students caricatures of Muhammad during a course on press freedom.

As a precaution during this course, specifies Jean-Rémi Girard, "he had asked the Muslim students to leave the class if they did not feel comfortable" with these drawings.

"He even took precautions that we shouldn't have to take since we should be able to show a caricature to all our students, it's part of the moral and civic education that this teacher must teach," insists the president union.

"He took precautions to do something that is normal, that is to say to explain the freedom of the press, the law, the possibility of blasphemy, in France", continues Jean-Rémi Girard, believing that the teacher just did his job.

"Doing your job and dying because you've done your job and tried to develop critical thinking in your students, it's amazing!"

SNALC sends its condolences to the family of the victim.

We will not hesitate to call on the competent authorities depending on the information we have.

Tonight we mourn our colleague and ask for justice to be done to him https://t.co/PEQb7sdCgSpic.twitter.com/a9v0oHJRyy

- SNALC (@SNALC_National) October 16, 2020

"If one day we can no longer talk about it, that will mean that we have lost, that we have given up"

So can we still talk about freedom of expression in our schools, colleges, and high schools?

"Fortunately, we can still talk about it in our schools!", Supports Jean-Rémi Girard.

"At SNALC, we invite colleagues to continue talking about it, because if one day we can no longer talk about it, that will mean that we have lost, that we have given up, and we at SNALC, we refuses to give up ".

The course given by the teaching brutally killed Friday, is part of the moral and civic education program that must teach history-geography teachers.

Among other subjects, secularism, the death penalty, or even abortion are an integral part of this program.

A program that Jean-Rémi Girard follows, himself.

"At the start of the school year, I'm going to teach about the death penalty or abortion, and of course I will continue to do it and not tell myself that something might happen to me. profession, we are a civil servant, we have a part of the authority of the State in us. We have a mission, and we will continue to do our mission! "

"We are there to defend freedom of expression, the development of critical thinking, and we believe that national education is there so that students can understand - even if they do not agree, which is normal - and can accept the point of view of the other, and that we arrive at dialogue, not at assassination ".