On September 22, The Tyler Clementi Higher Education Anti-Harassment Act was introduced to the Senate and the House.
This was also the anniversary of Tyler Clementi’s suicide.
For those who don’t know, Clementi was a student at Rutgers University in 2010, where his roommate filmed him sharing an intimate moment with another man without Tyler’s consent. The footage was posted online by his roommate, and Clementi was outed, humiliated, and shamed.
Not long after, Clementi took his life by jumping from the George Washington Bridge.
He was 18 years old.
If the Anti-Harassment Act passes, “Colleges and universities that receive federal funds … will have to pass policies to address harassment and bullying that target a number of historically oppressed identities, including sexual orientation and gender identity,” writes Alex Bollinger of LGBTQ Nation. “They will also have to recognize cyberbullying as a form of harassment.”
“It’s an epidemic, in my opinion, and unfortunately I see it even through celebrities who are using social media platforms in harmful ways to attack people’s characters as opposed to having civil, respectful conversations,” says Jane Clementi, Tyler’s mother and co-founder (alongside his father) of the Tyler Clementi Foundation. “Technology is a great thing,” she says, speaking to PinkNews, “but we need to teach people how to use it as the good tool it is, and not to allow people to weaponize it, to harm others, like they did with Tyler and so many others still to this day.”
The bill was originally introduced in 2010, not long after Clementi’s death, but this time, it’s being introduced with 26 Senate co-sponsors.
“I don’t want to say it’s going to get better today or tomorrow, because if you are aged 10 or 12 and are in an unsupportive school or home, it may get worse in the next few steps,” says Jane Clementi. “But look broader. There are people and places you can go to for support, you just have to keep your eyes and ears open. It will get better. We are on an upswing—percentage-wise, more people now are welcoming and celebrating varieties and differences in everything that we are. Just hold on. Don’t make rash, quick decisions that can’t be changed.”
