WCAX removes story that led to transphobic attacks on Randolph student

A Vermont television station has deleted the online version of a news story that garnered national attention and provoked a barrage of transphobic messages toward a transgender Randolph student and her family.

Links to the original story from Sept. 28 on the website for WCAX now turn up an error message and related social media posts have disappeared. The story’s deletion was first reported by Seven Days.

WCAX’s story quoted a Randolph Union High School volleyball player who objected to a transgender teammate’s use of a school locker room. The story was then cited in media reports by Fox News, the New York Post and Britain's Daily Mail tabloid.

Roger Garrity, WCAX’s news director, said in an email that he made the decision to pull the story “so that others could not continue to use our reporting to attack people in the transgender community.”

While the story is no longer available online, Garrity said that WCAX had not retracted it, which generally happens when a news outlet no longer stands by the veracity of its reporting. The 2-minute, 41-second report, he said, was “intended to examine an apparent gap in state education policy that pits students against each other.”

Garrity also said that WCAX is “working on a message” to its viewers that acknowledges how the story has been used to attack the transgender teen. “We strongly condemn anyone who uses our journalism to cause harm to others,” he said.

VTDigger reported last week that the family of the transgender student disputed elements of the story and faced significant transphobic messages and online posts following the national media reports. The website for the Orange Southwest Supervisory District was hacked and subsequently disabled by the district.

Layne Millington, superintendent of the Orange Southwest Supervisory District, which includes Randolph Union High School, called WCAX’s story “probably the most irresponsible story I’ve ever seen” in more than three decades working in education.

“It was very one-sided and, unfortunately, when things are one-sided and only presenting one view, it's predictably going to lead to misunderstanding and misinterpretation in terms of how people react to it, which is kind of what happened,” Millington said Wednesday.

Millington estimated that about 150 people had gathered at the high school Tuesday night for the first of two community forums about the issue.

“It was civil,” Millington said. “And I appreciated that an awful lot. I think there were some good ideas that were shared and, hopefully, if nothing else, that got people to think about the broader implications of everything that's happened here.”

The decision to remove a story, rather than to update or correct it, can be a difficult one, according to Dan Kennedy, a media critic and professor of journalism at Northeastern University.

“When you have a story that's causing a lot of harm and has very little news value, you don't really want to leave it in place so that it continues to do harm,” Kennedy said in an interview. “Even if most of the harm that that story can do has already been done. So how do you handle it?”

Kennedy also referred to the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics, which has a directive to “minimize harm.” Kennedy points out to his students that, contrary to popular belief, “it doesn’t mean ‘do no harm.’”

“But what it suggests is, you don't harm people, unless there's a public service component to it (or) unless it serves the public interest,” Kennedy said. After learning the facts of the WCAX story, he said, he didn’t believe there was a “good reason” for the harm caused to the transgender student.

LGBTQIA+ gives weak men that don’t see themselves being able to compete, or ugly women that can’t see themsves living up to any ideal of beauty, a way out.

It gives some lacking attention what they need, while it empowers others (special/proteced status).

Here is what it is not: heathy (hiv/aids, syphilis, anal fissures), productive (no children), moral (against every major religions teachings), natural, historically culturally acceptable.

Let’s also get this straight. There is no “gay gene.” The human genome is mapped and it wasn’t found. But maybe like XX and XY that isn’t science anymore. It is a BEHAVIOR and
some people choose to not have sex, ever.

Not only is it a behavior which of course you can alter and people usually do over their lives, but it’s also no more than a FETISH. Homosexuality may as well be big breasts, leather, fur, boots, nylons, public, spanking, breath play, orgies or a long list of other sexual preferences folks have. It is no more than a fetish/sexual preference we have bestowed a special status on.

Homosexuality is a behavior and a fetish, but it’s essentially all about poop, and that is why it spreads disease so well. The anus isn’t made for insertion nor deposits, and it’s FILTHY. Again, maybe this isn’t science in 2022 America, but poop is loaded with waste products and bacteria. Playing with poop is not smart, it’s like playing in the cities sewage pipes, also not clean.

So here we have it- if you’re a weak little punk that doesn’t get the attention you feel you deserve, dye your hair some weird color and claim your a homo, but try to steer clear of this actual behavior because it is “unhealthy” regardless of the smiling faces on the CDC website (they’re all about science).

This needs prior context, and that is not a criticism.

"Parents who spoke with The Daily Signal said .
Early on a foggy Wednesday morning, we met up with some of these young ladies at the local bowling alley-turned-diner. Nervous to speak out, but determined to speak her truth, each girl sat down, mic’d up, and offered her own explanation as to why she believes her voice is not being respected.
“A male was in our locker room when volleyball girls were trying to get changed,” said Blake. “And after I asked him to leave, he didn’t, and later looked over at girls with their shirts off. And it made many people uncomfortable and feel violated. And I left as soon as I could in a panic.”
The trans-identifying student’s guardian, Melissa Sivvy, has insisted to The Daily Signal that her child is a girl, deserves to use the girls’ locker room, and never behaved inappropriately.
Offered a chance to respond to this story, the child’s guardian asked The Daily Signal to explain what “biologically male” means and what the girls meant by saying that they were uncomfortable having her child in their space while they were changing.
“Your child is biologically male, correct?” I asked Sivvy on Wednesday evening.
She responded: “Do you think adults should be thinking about what is under children’s clothing? Seems a little inappropriate to me.”
Parents we spoke with told us that they are outraged that the school district and the high school would allow such an incident to even occur—they don’t want biological boys in their daughters’ locker rooms, and they are bewildered as to why the school system is apparently prioritizing the needs of students who identify as transgender over their daughters. They also strongly pushed back against allegations that speaking up is hateful.
“I want all kids, all kids at RUHS to feel safe, all kids nationwide to feel safe in their spaces where they need to change or are supposed to be private spaces,” Blake’s mother, Jessica Allen, told us. “We have to get creative as a nation to really figure out how to keep everybody safe, and everyone working together…let’s have an open dialogue about how to keep everybody safe and feeling comfortable, because we’ve taught children to protect their bodies.”
“All that matters is she’s uncomfortable. It’s pretty simple,” he added, describing his daughter and her friends as “tough, resilient young girls.”
Blake tells us that she is not only failing to get support from the school—she’s also facing punishment. Emails viewed by The Daily Signal show that school officials are investigating her for “harassing someone based on their gender” and have launched an investigation into this allegation following a “Hazing, Harassment, and Bullying” process.
Blake says she does not regret speaking out.
“I’m glad I spoke out because there’s still so much that could be done, that the law could be changed, because now it’s national news,” she told me. When it comes to the trans-identifying student, “He had the right to go in, but once we said we were uncomfortable, he should have just left. It should have been that simple.”
“They care more about that one single student than the rest of the girls. So they’re telling us all to go get changed in the single stalls instead of the locker room. And the trans person can have the locker room while all of us go into different places.” “I feel like the team’s really brave about doing this because we all knew what was going to happen if we did, the consequences. If one of us were to get a scholarship, they could find this on the internet and take it away,” she added. “And so there’s many consequences to doing it, but I think it’s really important that we’re doing it.” “They need to make a change and make everybody comfortable.”

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