The torture and abuse of a mentally-challenged Chicago teenager on Facebook Live garnered backlash and uproar from different parts of the United States and a new movement aimed to help the victim. Reddit, a popular site for sharing stories, links and anything on the internet, has a subreddit called UpliftingNews, which helped raise $160,000 for the victim.
The person behind UpliftingNews was Razor Sheldon. He said when he saw the video last week, he was reminded of the last time a viral video moved him to help the victim. The UpliftingNews subreddit contained inspirations, uplifting stories, and other content that could make someone feel better about humanity.
The first time that he tried to help someone via Reddit was the widowed school bus monitor named Karen Klein back in June 2012. In a video that went viral, Klein was taunted and harassed by kids and Sheldon asked people to figure out a way to show that there are still good people despite what Klein experienced. They were able to raise more than $700,000 during that time, The Age reported.
For the Chicago mentally-challenged teen, he posted about a call to arms story regarding the victim and intended to garner only $5,000. He said in his post, "It's been a while since we've done one of these in this subreddit, but for those of you who have seen the recent horrific Facebook live video of the young special needs victim tied up and getting tortured by 4 others, your immediate reaction is complete disgust and your second reaction is to want to help this young man."
A total of 5,000 people from the different states and other countries donated money for the victim. By Wednesday, it amounted to $160,000, The Washington Post reported.
The lawyer for the family of the victim, Neal Strom, said that the family is overwhelmed with the strangers' generosity. Strom said that the family will be using the money to provide better mental health treatments for the teenager.
