Iowa paper devotes front page to fighting bullying
In a rare and forceful act of advocacy, an Iowa newspaper devoted the entire front page of its Sunday edition to an anti-bullying editorial after a gay teen committed suicide.
Relatives have said 14-year-old Kenneth Weishuhn Jr. suffered intense harassment, including threatening cellphone calls and nasty comments posted online, after coming out to family and friends about a month ago. He died April 15 from what the local sheriff's office described only as a "self-inflicted injury."
The Sioux City Journal's front-page opinion piece calls on the community to be pro-active in stopping bullying and urges members to learn more about the problem by seeing the acclaimed new film, "Bully," which documents the harassment of a Sioux City middle school student. It notes that while many students are targeted for being gay, "we have learned a bully needs no reason to strike." [continue]

Tags: Iowa, bullying, gay, schools, suicide, teens
Permalink Reply by Jonathan Simeone on April 22, 2012 at 8:01pm Dallas, I was seconds from posting the same story. I'm so glad a newspaper took such a strong stand against bullying.
So am I, but JFC, I'm sick of reading about these kinds of stories. He had his whole life ahead of him.
It's terrible Dallas .. I hear these stories everyday. In fact Austin just had some bullying issues in the news the other day. It's becoming too prevalent.
All I can say is that I hope all the media attention helps, and not hurts the situation. Sometimes I think hearing about it puts the idea into kids heads, but I'm not sure.
Permalink Reply by Nerdlass on April 22, 2012 at 8:16pm If only the schools could be more diligent... and peers step up to defend each other... :/ It's tough being a teenager. I can only imagine how tough it is for gay teenagers...
It certainly can make you feel like an outcast.
Permalink Reply by Jonathan Simeone on April 22, 2012 at 9:01pm I think coverage of an issue is almost always a good thing. The greatest exception to that is when the coverage is on Fox Nes.
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