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Iowa teen's suicide prompts strong anti-bullying statement

In a rare act of advocacy, an Iowa newspaper devoted the entire front page of its Sunday edition to an anti-bulling editorial in the wake of a gay teen's suicide earlier this month. The editorial called on the community to end such abuse.

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The Sioux City Journal / AP
This image shows the top half of the front page of The Sioux City Journal's Sunday, April 22, 2012, edition, featuring a full-page piece to an anti-bullying editorial and sending a strong statement in the wake of an Iowan gay teen's suicide.
  • By The Associated Press

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."

"In Kenneth's case, the warnings were everywhere," the editorial said. "We saw it happen in other communities, now it has hit home. Undoubtedly, it wasn't the first life lost to bullying here, but we can strive to make it the last.

Editor Mitch Pugh said the newspaper has run front-page editorials before but has never devoted the entire page to one.

"A lot of newspapers shy away from putting editorials on the front page, but we feel we have to be a strong advocate for our community," he said. "And if we don't do that, we're not sure who else is."

Weishuhn's mother, Jeannie Chambers, told the Journal last week that she and the rest of the family knew he was being harassed but didn't realize the extent of the bullying. His sister told a local television station that Weishuhn, a freshman, had many friends and was popular at South O'Brien High School in Paullina until he came out. Then students turned on him.

Weishuhn's family couldn't immediately be reached Sunday by The Associated Press.

Pugh said the newspaper didn't consult the family before printing the editorial.

"This was a bigger issue than one person," he said.

Andy Marra, a spokesman for the national anti-bullying group GLSEN, said the Journal's decision makes "complete sense."

"Public education is absolutely vital to addressing bullying and harassment in schools," she said, adding that community pressure could push schools to do more. [Editor's note: The original version of this piece was edited to correctly identified spokesperson Andy Marra as a woman.]

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