A bullied schoolgirl was left bloodied and bruised after a violent fight with a female classmate that was caught on video. Sierra Spencer, 13, is seen punching, clawing and wrestling with another girl as other students stand and cheer them on in Maryville, Washington.
She said she was pressured into the brawl after her classmates taunted her.
SEE THE VIDEO HERE
Today experts said the video was symptomatic of a wider trend of bullies using YouTube to increase the victim’s humiliation – and the site had a responsibility to monitor its content more closely.
Her mother has reported the fight to police and said she wants all the children involved held accountable, including her daughter.
Sierra had to go to hospital after the fight on Friday, and couldn’t attend school on Monday because her face was so badly swollen.
The fight took place in a wooded area in Marysville, off school property.
In the video, which has since been removed from YouTube, the two blonde, ponytailed girls claw at each other’s faces, land brutal punches and wrestle each other to the ground.
Their fellow classmates jeer and yell as the fight becomes more and more violent. One can be heard saying : ‘Oh, f***, that was a good hit to the temple! Dude, that must’ve hurt!’
Another says: ‘Yeah, one-punch knockout! That’s what I say!’
Sierra said it was the fourth fight she had been bulled into this year.
Her mother, Kenis Watson, said her daughter had been taunted so much she made her switch schools, and even taught her at home for a while.
Her face visibly swollen, Sierra told King 5 News: ‘It’s the peer pressure. If I say I don’t want to come, they look at me and think I’m scared or a little baby or something.
‘So all that peer pressure makes me want to do it more.’
She told KOMO4: ‘If I touch my nose it till hurts really bad because of all the blood that was coming out of it.’
Mrs Watson told the channel: ‘It’s just upsetting to me that this can go on, and that there’s essentially been no accountability.’
Marysville School Superintendent Larry Nayland said the two girls had already been put in separate classrooms, but there was little he could do off-campus.
He told King 5 News: ‘Its not a problem in school, and we’re limited in how much we can control in what happens after school.’
He said he had identified the students who watched the brawl, and will address bullying and spectator fights.
Jodee Bianco, an anti-bullying campaigner who does prevention work in American schools, told MailOnline sophisticated technology like YouTube is giving the bullies new weaponry to taunt other children.
By putting the bullying into the public domain, it makes the humiliation even worse.
She said: ‘The bystander phenomenon has been around forever - nobody does anything, because they are worried the cool kids will turn on them.
‘But what YouTube does is escalate the bystander phenomenon. The role has always been passive, now it’s being elevated into an active participant, and that is redefining the entire dynamic of bullying.’
‘The weaponry they use to perpetrate bullying is more technically sophisticated, so it cuts a wider and deeper swathe.’
Ms Bianco, who describes herself as a ‘bullying survivor-turned-activist’, called the video site as ‘heinous’, and said the problem is getting worse as more children use it.
‘I think YouTube hides behind first amendment rights and it should be held accountable, they should not just allow videos to go on there without checking them first.
‘They have an ethical and moral responsibility to check videos before they go up. YouTube should do it voluntarily, and if not it should be enforced under federal law.’
