This reminded me of a block of middle school when our honors writing/literary teacher had to take some leave for health reasons. The substitute had no idea what they were getting into. Tried to talk to us like infants, so he quickly got our ire. Didn’t have a very strong resolve and this hadn’t gone unnoticed by one of the more snarky, bullish students. One day, the sub tried to relate to us by telling a personal story, one element of which was then turned back on him as an insult. The whole class couldn’t help but laugh. We’d destroyed this poor man. Once our teacher returned, she was certainly disappointed, but not entirely surprised either.