Fight Club Rants Run Rabid Online
posted 4:40 pm Mon February 04, 2008 - Greenbelt, Md.
Racist, sexist and homophobic rants are apparently all the rage at one school in Greenbelt and those hate-filled messages are prompting calls for the school system to crack-down.
The taunts and threats come from a group called the Roosevelt Fight Club and despite the school's efforts to halt the club, it's still popular at Roosevelt High and on the internet.
Students say some of their classmates, instead of composing essays, focus of gun violence, homophobia and racism. They face-off in verbal confrontations which wind-up on the internet.
"I watch it on You Tube. It's a lot on MySpace too," said one student.
Janvier Gholson says it started last year and now all you have to do is log on to see a classmate bragging about murdering or maiming someone. "Many many kids many many guys."
"If that's how some people feel, like, I don't think there is anyway we can stop them from doing it cause they do have like freedom of speech. I mean you may not agree with it but we can't stop them," said student Dawnette Samuels.
Regina Thompson's niece told her about the fight club and it's popularity. "She's in tenth grade. She is already been approached by this so this is not nothing now. I'm shaking now.
"I wouldn't want to see my son on anything like that." Sean Anthony's son goes to Roosevelt and believes the fight club is a bi-product of hip-hop culture. "Those the same kind of stuff you hear when you listen to the different rappers you know what I mean?"
The school system says the fight club consists of one clip which keeps getting recycled. It says it reprimanded the students in the video, yet the system admits it is hard to rein in anything once it takes off on the internet. Right now, there's no way of knowing whether the rants have turned into any physical acts of violence.
© 2008 NewsChannel 8, a division of Allbritton Communications Company-
All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
The 'RUNNING MAN' icon is a registered trademark of America Online, Inc.
NewsChannel 8 to leave comments on news stories.