In the United States, young Morgyn Arnold saw her face disappear from the official photo of her high school cheerleader team. She is the only member with Down’s syndrome.
It was in Utah, in the western United States, that a 14-year-old girl experienced unprecedented violence. Morgyn Arnold has Down’s syndrome and enjoys an ordinary teenage life who loves to sing, dance and cheerlead. This American sporting practice is well known to her because her father and one of her sisters (Morgyn is the youngest of a large family of 7 children) were also cheerleaders.
In her high school in Shoreline, the young chief cheerleader (she is a team manager) is very popular with her teammates according to her mother, interviewed by the New York Times. And to add: “They have done everything to be as benevolent as possible. It’s rare to find people who welcome her as she is.”
Like every year, the school publishes a directory with the portrait of all the students and also group photos of the clubs and sports associations which have kept the school alive during the past year. Of course, the cheerleader team is there on the day of the shoot. Morgyn proudly poses among his girlfriends.
However, when the directory was published and on social networks, this is another photo that the school has chosen to promote. This time, the girl with Down’s syndrome has disappeared. According to one of the teammates confiding in the New York Times, we would have asked them, on the day of the photo, to pose once all together and then another time without Morgyn …
Supported by his entire team
According to Jordyn Arnorld, 25, the exclusion of her little sister was calculated. She explains the sadness of the latter when she discovers her ousting: “We heard the news when we saw Morgyn come home with her phone book and devastated. Seeing her so hurt broke our hearts.”
The school, after removing posts with the wrong photo on social media, said it had launched an investigation to find out how this could have happened. On the side of Morgyn’s parents, everyone calls for calm and hopes that this will serve as an example. “We can’t go back and put it in the phone book, so we would like to make sure that doesn’t happen to anyone else”, tells his father to New York Times.
The young girl has already forgiven those who hurt her and is eager to come back next school year to find her teammates who have supported her in this ordeal. Hoping that, this time, the photo published in the directory reflects reality …