Scandal at Kansas University after cheerleaders allegedly blindfolded and stripped naked in hazing ritual
Two Kansas University cheerleaders have come forward to reveal that six members of the first-year members of the cheer squad were subjected to a hazing ritual in 2017.
According to the two who chose to remain unidentified, the cheerleaders were blindfolded, stripped naked and berated in the "initiation" ritual.
The event was allegedly run by senior members of the cheerleading squad and three alumni. According to the sources, the cheerleaders were humiliated by a series of tormenting activities, and one victim was so traumatized that she left the university before completing her studies.
Multiple sources told The Collegian that the first-year squad of cheerleaders was severely bullied last year; six members told the student-run-newspaper that they were asked to meet near the university's stadium, where they were compelled to run up and down a hill before being blindfolded, separated and taken to a vacant house.
The University launched an investigation into the matter following the complaints that the cheerleading coaches allowed the unfortunate ritual to happen on a yearly basis.
As a result, the whole squad has been put on a year-long probation, expecting good behavior.
The two said they were abused during an "inflation" event for the first year members of the team last July while they were on campus for a children's summer camp.
The cheerleaders arrived at the university stadium as per the team's orders in sprint shoes and were asked to run up and down the hill. The seniors then blindfolded them, put them inside a car and took them to a vacant house, the two unanimous victims said.
One said she was forced into a washing machine and the other said she was put in a cardboard box, which was banged repeatedly on its sides. They were then frogmarched into other rooms where they were asked a series of questions.
For each question, they answered wrong, they were forced to take a piece of clothing off. Eventually, the girls stood there naked; the six were then allegedly taken into a different room, while one of them said she remembered being separated from the group.
“I had taken my blindfold off along with another girl sitting next to me, and two alumni guys walked in and saw us naked,” she told student newspaper, The Kansas State Collegian.
After the group was split, two of them were taken downstairs and "initiated" and the rest were subjected to public shaming.
“They took me and two other girls, put us in a room together and told us we are ugly, we don’t deserve to be on the team and our skills weren’t good enough,” one of the cheerleaders said.
This ruinous incident has left the two cheerleaders emotionally traumatized to an extent that one of them decided to leave the Kansas University forever.