A group of high school students planned a walk-out Monday to protest the treatment of three rape victims who were students at Norman High School in Oklahoma. “Jezebel” broke the story on Friday of the three girls and the bullying to which they were subjected after reporting.
All three were victimized by the same person, an 18-year-old male student, who was suspended for the rest of the school year. The girls, a fourteen-year-old and two sixteen-year-olds, have left the school due to the harassment from other students that they say became unbearable.
Soon after the attack, the perpetrator visited a friend and began bragging about the assault of one of the sixteen-year-olds. The friend began taping the conversation because he said he ?knew right off the bat that wasn’t cool.?
*Trigger Warning*
?She was, like, incoherent. Like you could not talk to her at all? And I was just like, alright, get on your knees.?
Upon returning to school, the sixteen-year-old student faced bullies immediately. She was confronted in the hallway by a student who taunted:
?I hear you love being raped??
The victim swung at her attacker with her school bag and both were suspended. Later, the victim’s mother reached out to the bully to ask for his kindness. He replied that he had seen the video tape of the rape, had decided that she enjoyed the attack, and that her daughter was a “harlet” (sic) who ?slept around.? The tape was soon discovered to have been disseminated throughout the school.
Despite pleas to school administrators by the victim’s parents and the victims themselves to address the treatment of the victims by other students, the bullying became so intense for all three victims that they eventually left Norman High School. One student, the fourteen-year-old, has been unable to return to any school after she was subjected to bullying in her transfer school as a result of her attack. In protest, hundreds of students walked out of the school today, joined by parents and community members.?The protesters held signs and created a list of demands?that included bullying prevention education for the student body and an on-site victim’s advocate.?Friends of the victims have also created a Facebook group and were trending on Twitter today under the hashtag #yesalldaughters.
? ??
Stories like these have become far too common. Internet bullying and harassment from other students permeated social media in the wake of the Steubenville rape trial.?Sixteen-year-old Jada?became a victim of online bullying after she was sexually assaulted when Twitter users posted pictures of themselves replicating the position in which she was photographed after being raped, which was tweeted by her attacker. The student from the University of Virginia who recently came forward with her story of sexual assault at a frat house says that the bullying others suffered was one of the reasons she was convinced not to?report her assault by seven fraternity students.
Let us learn from those students who walked out of Norman High School today and speak out against the victim-blaming, victim-shaming, and bullying of rape victims.
Let us know your thoughts at the Liberal America Facebook page. Sign up for our free daily newsletter to receive more great stories like this one.
