A photo of teen boys laughing and doing the Nazi salute is going viral. Prom has never been immune to racism and cultural appropriation. But this photo is the latest to expose the blind racism that runs rampant in some high schools. The photo, which features a group of boys from Baraboo High School in Wisconsin shows the group laughing and performing a Nazi salute on their way to junior prom.
The photo was then posted to social media and picked up by a local journalist, sending the internet into a tailspin. But who would take such an obviously disgusting and absolutely sickeningly hateful photo?
One student had this to report about the photo shoot: “There was a photographer taking pictures of the whole senior class and he wanted one of the boys and one of the girls. When he took the girls pictures he was extremely rude and gross towards us. Then when the boys took their picture, he told them to do that and was laughing about it.”
The photographer, identified as Peter Gust has since removed the photo and replaced it with this bizarre message: “Due malevolent behavior on the part of some in society, this page has been modified. To anyone that was hurt I sincerely apologize. To those who have harmed then, we as society often ignore them I have chosen not to do that. YOU ARE JERKS! Grow up!”
Cool, he’s a lunatic. Cool, cool, cool. And everyone’s just blaming each other. Cool, cool, cool.
Though, it looks like this is just the tip of the iceberg. The journalist posted messages he received from alumni to his twitter page @jules_su.
ike this account, who said, “I’m mixed and a classmate of mine posted this about me. When my friend reported it to the school, they did nothing. They said, they can’t prove it was her, even though one of her friends told them it was her… 2 years ago today the kid on the far right of the prom picture put this photo of me on his story and tried to make fun of me for not supporting trump. He continued to mock and harass me for being a feminist as well. This is a snap pointing to two hispanic student with the caption, dirty mexicans in bound. can 100% support the claims of racism at that school. The use of the n-world was pretty common among a lot of white students.”
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“At Baraboo High School, students of color make up 12 percent of the nearly 1,000 students, and these reports consistently tell the lack of reprimand for this behavior from the administration… The day after Trump was elected I heard one of them shouting white power in the hallway. I immediately went to a school official.. I was told that I should look up videos of black lives matter protestors being hostile and that I should get thicker skin. A student wore a confederate flag sweatshirt to school every single day and was not told to change once.”
The school responded quickly with two statements: “The photo of students posted to #BarabooProud is not reflective of the educational values and beliefs of the School District of Baraboo. We are investigating and will pursue any and all available and appropriate actions, including legal, to address.”
The school followed up with a letter to parents, saying: “Let us be very clear, hate has no home in the Baraboo School Distrist. Our schools are spaces where all people, regardless of their race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin or ancestry- are respected and celebrated. ”
Many have responded on social media, including the Auschwitz Memorial Museum which said: It is so hard to find words…This is why every single day we work hard to educate. We need to explain what is the danger of hateful ideology rising. Auschwitz with its gas chambers was at the very end of the long process of normalizing and accommodating hatred.
Wisconsin State Representative Jon Erpenbach also released a statement that said: “There is no place for hatred, intolerance and racism in our society,” Erpenbach said. “Unfortunately, based on what these students see coming from the White House, some of them may believe what they have done is acceptable. It is absolutely not. Leaders, from the president on down, need to condemn racism in all its forms and work toward a world where we learn from the mistakes of history.”
What do you think of this anti semitic prom pic? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter at @WhatsTrending.
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