Bullying will stop at no cost, as the family of a high school boy in Bay Village, Ohio, has found out through an activity for a good cause.
Instead of dumping water and ice like the challenge calls for, students poured bodily fluids and cigarette butts over their stripped classmate, while catching the whole incident on video.
“Bullying with special needs kids is an issue in society today, and it a lot of the time goes unnoticed by peers and teachers,” said Fletcher Turner, a freshman at Blue Valley West who has a brother with Down Syndrome.
While fulfilling the ALS challenge in September, a boy attending Bay Village High School asked for the help of his peers because of his special needs. The classmates used this opportunity to pull a prank on their classmate.
“I thought it was very wrong that they took advantage of him,” Turner said. “You know it’s just not a nice thing to do to people — to anyone in general, but especially taking advantage of someone that doesn’t know better.”
The Bay Village incident has caused awareness for the cause of bullying throughout the town of 15,000 people. Family and friends are upset about the uproar and have promised to bring those who bully to justice.
“Maybe this will put some more light on bullying and draw some more attention on how serious an issue it is to kids and all the consequences it has,” said Emily Holden, a teacher working in Africa.
Law enforcement is investigating the case in order to find the students who participated in the making of the video.
“It’s very wrong what they did,” Turner said. “They should at least be fined or maybe [assigned in-school suspension]. It’s something you don’t get away with.”
According to ALS Association, the ALS movement is causing awareness for the disease and has raised more than three million dollars.
“I think before that incident, everything we’d heard was so positive — it was a huge movement for our community and our country,” Holden said. “It doesn’t taint [the message] 100 percent but it puts one bad thought about the ALS challenge into everyones mind.”