Bad behavior Whether it’s online, in school, via text message or at the workplace, bullying has become an American epidemic. We spoke to the following alumni taking a stand against it. BY S.L. GUTHRIE Photography by Duane Zehr and Daryl Wilson
It was supposed to be good fun. The guys would sit across from sports reporters Julie DiCaro and Sarah Spain, and look at them while reading mean tweets. A video camera would roll in the background. Everyone would laugh, and it would almost feel like being on Jimmy Kimmel Live. Only that’s not what happened. Early on, the tweets were pretty tame. One called Spain a “scrub muffin,” while another wanted to ban all links to DiCaro’s feed. But as the words became ugly and laced with violent threats, the atmosphere in the studio quickly changed. “It was like the air got sucked out of the room,” said Brad Burke ’01. “These guys instantly looked at these
things and the specter of knowing (they would) have to call this woman a c*** to her face was extremely difficult for them.” The resulting video, “#MoreThanMean — Women in Sports ‘Face’ Harassment,” became a viral sensation in April that generated nearly 1 billion impressions worldwide and extensive media coverage. In May, Burke and his partners earned a coveted Peabody Award. A PR exec for Chicago-based Weber Shandwick and co-founder of the podcast “Just Not Sports,” he came up with the idea while reading a series of tweets on DiCaro’s feed that were particularly repugnant. It wasn’t the first time the brand sports content developer noticed the lack of a level playing
Bradley Hilltopics Fall 2017
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