Reddit and 4chan Responds To Verbal Harassment Of Karen Klein
UPDATE: Over $200,000 has been raised for Klein as of 6/21/2012!
Over $540,000 as of 6/22/2012!
Yesterday there was a video that gained national attention. A group of 12 and 15 year old children teamed up and heavily abused bus driver Karen Klein in Greece, New York. The entire 10 minute event was caught on video. Storify user Ben Doernberg put together the responses to the video from Reddit, 4Chan, Twitter, and the media. Klein is a hearing-impaired grandmother of eight and she was hired to keep the kids safe on the school bus. The students mocked her weight, low income, threatened to hurt her with weapons and vandalize her property. At one point, one of the kids said that her children should “kill themselves” for being “ugly.” Klein said that was the most hurtful comment because her son took his own life 10 years ago.
Within 7 hours of the clips being uploaded, the Reddit community worked to identify the specific school that the students attended and sent e-mails notifying school district officials and local news outlets in the Greece, New York area. Some Redditors found Karen’s Facebook page where she discussed not having much money and being a widow for almost 17 years. Reddit user Max Sidorov created a donation page on Indiegogo.com called “Lets Give Karen -The bus monitor- H Klein A Vacation!” Over $33,000 has been collected thus far on the donation page. Discussion board 4Chan started a hacktivist movement to identify many of the students that were on the video. 4Chan contacted the students’ parents directly. The four students involved in the verbal abuse are being investigated by the authorities.
In the 2000s and 2010s, a cultural anti-bullying movement gained popularity in the U.S. and U.K. During the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, it was determined that the two students that had killed 13 people, wounded 24, and then committed suicide had been bullied for years. There is evidence that suggests that bullying increases the risk of suicide. Verbal abuse should not be tolerated in any way, shape, or form. If you have been the victim of bullying or know someone that is a victim, visit StopBullying.gov to find out more information.
People need to stop condemning an entire generation for this. This kind of stuff has always happened. I’m sure baby boomers and Gen Xers are salivating at the mouth now that they more ammo to throw at the younger generations. As if they’ve never done anything remotely like this, because as we all know, baby boomers are all so pleasant. Get real, the kids did something mean, but it doesn’t mean that this is all they will ever be.
The fact that bullying has existed for generations doesn’t make it right. It is the responsibility of all of us to keep bullying from happening. It has nothing to do with ammo against younger generations, what are you talking about! Honestly you are one of the reasons that this is still happening, because you accept it as status quo.
WHY are you concealing and redacting the names of the harassers? This is why and how they think they can get away with it – FTW!
As the author of this article, please note that I am not concealing and redacting the names of the bullies. The image that shows the redacted names was created by somebody else. The investigators in this case are redacting the names of the bullies because they are juveniles. They will be punished in September when the school year starts again.
Try reddit or 4chan, theres plenty of people looking forward to crucifying these kids and quite possibly their parents if all goes well.
Apparently the lawyer of the “juveniles” is demanding that since they are getting death threats that they should be entitled to some of the monies raised by Reddit. All of his personal information is now public knowledge. HAHA Don’t mess with these groups!!
ha! what a joke. Maybe if a campaign called “Donations for kids that verbally abuse senior citizens” actually gets money, they should be entitled to the $0.04 that it gets.
4chan? Really? The same people who are happy to bully and harass people on the internet? The same people who harass surviving family members of people who commit suicide?
Um, yeah, okay. Glad you all are so concerned now. Maybe you could cut the crap you routinely pull on the people you’ve decided deserve the same treatment.
Hello Reality Hurts! There are many different types of people on 4chan! Including the types that harass people deserving, not deserving, and just people that like to harass regardless!
As with any group they don’t all share the same opinions. Just because fat people make me want to vomit up my Krispy Kremes, that doesn’t stop my brother from reminding me about the cushion and the pushin’. The one thing that binds my bro, his circus freak girlfriend and myself is Diabetes. Do you see what I’m getting at here? 4chan is just the chronic illness that binds each of them together.