Great Barrington — A lynching threat reportedly made by a white student to an African-American student last month is purported to have been provoked by a racially charged social media fight between the two Monument Mountain Regional High School students, according to the parent of another student.
Monument parent Linda Shafiroff said, while she thought the threat was “deplorable,” both students had been engaging in insults that highlighted racial tensions at the school as well as political divides and cultural differences — much of it, she added, likely funneled from national election-year politics into this rural New England high school.
Shafiroff, a building contractor, provided the Edge with a series of Snapchat messages posted by the African-American student who reported he was threatened. She said all the students in the group chat had seen the Snapchat “story” in which the student wrote, “white trash hicks,” and said “F–k your country,” with an upside-down American flag and a middle finger emoji. Another said, “and the stupid ass people out there wonder why I burned a flag on 9/11.” Another: “–k your flag!!!!!” with an image of a burning flag,” and lastly, “F–k everything this corrupt, backward ass country stands for!!!!!!”
Shafiroff said the messages had riled up a number of students, particularly those who wear caps bearing American flags and identify with a social group that considers themselves patriotic.
“There were two kids involved in very poor behavior, but only one was punished,” Shafiroff said of the incident, noting that the senior who uttered the threat was given a 40-day suspension that, after legal action, was lowered to 30 days.
Shafiroff’s main concern, she said, is that the Monument administration “lost an opportunity and set a poor example” by punishing only one student, and by not “jumping in to educate kids, not segregate on the issue.”
Since the incident, the school has held assemblies and other cultural events to tackle racism at the school. But Shafiroff says it isn’t enough. “Racism should not be tolerated on either side,” she said. “Both kids should be doing so much community service.”
Monument Principal Marianne Young said the “concerns” about all aspects of the situation, including the Snapchat posts, “have come to us from a number of people.”
“Any information regarding this whole scenario,” she continued, “both the racial comment then all the pieces that seem to have been woven into this, we are aware of as much as anyone else is.”
Young said the school was working “both with individual students and the school as a whole to address these racial challenges.” Young refused to answer specific questions, however, citing privacy laws.
The school’s student handbook says this sort of behavior is off limits and that students must “conduct themselves with tolerance and respect for the opinions and cultural, racial, religious and political differences of others. To speak with civility and act with common courtesy.”
Shafiroff said she agreed with school officials and other leaders that the presidential election had ignited a sweeping fire of xenophobia and anger all around, and that teenagers were susceptible.
The episode began when the African-American student, a football player, reported to school officials he had been threatened with lynching or hanging and also said he thought he had been threatened because he had kneeled during the national anthem at an away game. The act is a form of protest over police brutality against African-Americans; an NFL player was the first to “take a knee,” as it is called.
Local and federal law enforcement investigated the threat as a possible hate crime but closed the investigation, saying the offense did not warrant prosecution.
Also, the threat was a “second-hand verbal threat,” according to someone who was told this by school officials but who did not want to be identified for this story. According to this source, the white student “told a female student he wanted to take [the African-American student] out in the woods and hang him.”
The local branch of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) organized support for the student at a recent home game which drew several busloads of people who came to kneel during the anthem.
Shafiroff said the administration’s handling of media interest in that game was questionable and one-sided.
“Normally no one is allowed on the field but coaches and players and refs,” she said. “But the press were allowed on the field.”
Berkshire NAACP President Dennis Powell was there to kneel and show support for the student who reported the threat. When asked about the Snapchat posts and the existing tension between the students, he said the threat was “totally inexcusable, I don’t care if they were calling names back and forth — that’s what teenagers do. This [white student] reacted to something going on nationally.”
Indeed, it worries Powell that the threat may have been made in response to the kneeling, given recent national incidents like one in Beaumont, Texas, where a youth football league knelt during the anthem and immediately started to received death threats. That situation deteriorated to the point where the season was cancelled. Powell said “the bigger problem” is the national backdrop of racial divides and election politics.
But Powell says he thinks Principal Young is “heading in the right direction with these conversations. The country is in serious dilemma,” he added. “These are teenagers, but look at what the adults are saying.”
Ultimately, Shafiroff said, she has compassion for all teenagers who, as they develop into adults, can make grave mistakes. She said the white student who made the threat is learning the hard way.
“The whole town thinks he’s a racist,” she said.
Gwendolyn Hampton VanSant, Multicultural BRIDGE founder and executive director, said that teenagers need the adults to “provide an environment to unpack the cultural differences…cultural attitudes towards race gives [teenagers] such weaponry against each other.”
VanSant said she didn’t know about the Snapchats. But from the beginning of the episode, she has said she believes “restorative practices” are the best way forward and still need to happen. “That facilitates the accountability of each student and the impact that they have on each other and their communities.”
She said it was unfortunate that it hadn’t been handled this way right from the get-go. A restorative approach, she said, would have “uncovered” more details early on rather than having the “layers and biases…trickling out.”
