Newhart Middle School Altercation
School
In an unexpected altercation, Fred Newhart Middle School in Mission Viejo has been under fire for a recent altercation between two groups of students. According to various eyewitness accounts, during lunch break on the 20th and 21th of Jan., a group of LGBTQ supporters got into an argument with a group of Christian students. Two students got on the lunch tables and began to wave pride flags, while to counter this another group of students got on another table and waved crosses at the students yelling “you shall seek forgiveness,” followed by Bible quotes.
According to Principal Judith Murphine in a letter sent out to families, “there was no violence toward any student” despite the rumors. Although after this statement was spread, a fight between a Newhart student and a student from another school arose. The following Monday the fight broke out and a video showed the student being repeatedly punched, standing next to another student who had a pride flag draped over their back.
As of now, there has not been any details if the fight was related to the altercation between the LGBTQ students and the Christian students. In another letter to families, Principal Murphine stated how “Unfortunately, at the end of the day today, a student from another campus came to our school and engaged in an altercation with one of our students.’”
Parents and fellow worried students have asked if there has been more violence, which Murphine has rejected. Murphine has only stated that there was no violence in the Thursday and Friday demonstrations.
As of now almost all flags are now barred from the school to prevent these situations from ever happening again, but crosses were not barred from students. For the first few days after the altercation, there were sheriff cars outside the school in order to ensure safety, but as of now the students have calmed down and no altercations have occurred.
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tyler • Sep 22, 2022 at 4:58 pm
stumbled across while trying to find out about the new fight btw. some of this is not true(IM NOT HOMOFOBIC NOR DO I HAVE A RELGION ) it was wrong what the kids did to them, but like pray the gay away did not happen. Also the gay student here have been like doing… weird things, IN FRONT OF PEOPLE, so that’s weird. And not going to lie they were not being a good friendly riot to say the least. the gay students are not star students, most are failing and get in trouble all the time. They give a bad name to the gay people. sooo this make the rest of the students look bad too, also most of what she said is not true, BUT the principle speech was very bad and what she did to stop it did not work.
Lily • Mar 23, 2022 at 8:41 pm
Hello, I was one of the students from the middle school of Fred Newhart. My friends (the two people that stand at the table with their pride flags) and many more who supported the LGBTQIA+ community got verbally harassed and had food/ holy water thrown at them by other homophobic kids. We are unclear if all of them were Christian. But my point is there was bullying involved as well many of my friends were harassed verbally and made uncomfortable by the ones trying to “pray the Gay away”. There was no fight involving the two of my friends that I mentioned earlier but most people thought they did. To be honest, to be a part of something so crazy that makes me feel that I’m in a nightmare makes me want to die. I thought schools, teachers, and Principles were there to help you through hard times but they never did anything. They just want to forget about it. Thank you for reading this. I am Lily and I’m in seventh grade.