Just days after a Minnesota teen claimed to have received death threats after coming out on social media, another student in the same school district has come forward with similar claims.
As local news channel Fox 9 reports, 8th grader Noah Ratgen says his family's driveway was vandalized with "God hates fags" in large letters about a week after he came out on social media last fall.
"It hurt -- just like calling someone fat or ugly," Ratgen, who attends junior high school in the Centennial school district in Circle Pines, Minn., told the news station. Ratgen's parents reported the incident to police, but no arrests have been made to date, according to the report.
"There's no reason to do it at all," he added. "I just don't understand why we're such a big problem."
Ratgen's claims follow those of Ryan Eichenauer, a high school senior who said he received two anonymous letters which contained death threats in class earlier this month. Eichenauer shared a videotaped coming out message on Facebook just before the start of 2014.
Much like British Olympic diver Tom Daley, Eichenauer refrained from using the terms "gay" or "bisexual" in his coming out video, but nonetheless admitted being attracted to boys.
In 2012, 17-year-old Jay 'Corey' Jones of Rochester, Minn. committed suicide after allegedly being tormented by his classmates for being gay. That same year, Minnesota's Anoka-Hennepin School District had to fight back after a controversial Rolling Stone article drew attention to its treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students in the wake of a rash of teen suicides in the region.
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