Some Orange Countians are in the Bay Area this hour not to take in the sights this holiday weekend but to be featured speakers at a national anti-bullying event.
The Monster March Against Teen Bullying, which pushed off at 10 a.m. and is to end at the steps of San Francisco City Hall, honors the late Daniel Mendez, a San Clemente teen who shot himself in 2009 due to being bullied.
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My former colleague Spencer Kornhaber wrote about a candlelight vigil on the one-year anniversary of the San Clemente High School sophomore's death, organized by the Cool 2 Be Kind Club that was created on campus in his memory:
Daniel's sister, Victoria Mendez, stepped into a leadership role with Cool 2 Be Kind this year. Today, her and Daniel's mother, Anna Mendez, is scheduled to speak in San Francisco.
So is Jonah Mowry, a Lake Forest teen whose anti-bullying YouTube video posted in December went viral and earned praised from the likes of Lady Gaga, Jane Lynch and Paula Abdul. It currently has 9.2 million views on YouTube:
My former colleague Marisa Gerber wrote about Mowry's then-looming appearance on Good Morning, America:
Peggysue Mowry, Jonah's mother, is also scheduled to speak at today's Monster March Against Teen Bullying, which was originally set for Sunday but was later rescheduled to ensure all participants could attend.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.