(Jacob Bruns, Headline USA) Six middle-school children have been arrested and charged with hate crimes for their participation in a Snapchat mock “slave auction,” The Blaze reported.
Hampden, Massachusetts, District Attorney Anthony Gulluni told reporters that six Southwick Regional School students were charged with online bullying for their actions.
“I intend to be very clear: Hatred and racism have no place in this community, and where this behavior becomes criminal, I will ensure that we act, and act with swift resolve, as we did here, to uncover it and bring it to the light of justice,” he said.
The DA also drew attention to the fact that, in this instance, racism was combined with another form of evil: bullying.
“Bullying, especially when it involves race, is an insidious force within a school community and within a community at large,” he said.
He proceeded to call it “deeply damaging to victims” who undergo “humiliation” as a result. Anyone who would bully another, like the six children involved in the Snapchat group, he called “vile, cruel and contemptible.”
The incident prompted the DA to initiate a three-pronged plan to address racist attitudes, including the creation of a new police unit that will specifically target potential bullies or racists.
But measures taken by local authorities have not satisfied everybody.
Allyson Lopez, the mother of one of the children targeted by the mock slave auction, told school officials that without seeing the issue through the lens of race, they could not fully understand the trauma faced by her daughter, and so were incapable of addressing the issue.
“None of you on this panel understand because you don’t stand in [my daughter’s] shoes; you don’t stand in my shoes,” Lopez said, indicating that the racism might run even deeper than the student body.
“Up until today, you haven’t done anything to make it better,” she continued. “… You still don’t get it, because you’re looking at me spaced out.”
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