With his recent gold medal win, Shaun White has been treated like a national treasure. But there's an ugly truth that NBC and the Olympic committee have been ignoring. Shaun White reportedly sexually harassed a woman in his band — and then fired her for not going along with it.
Sign the petition to take away Shaun White's Olympic medals. We shouldn't honor abusers and harassers like White.
The woman he harassed, Lena Zawaideh, was only 17-years old when she was a drummer in a band White financed called "Bad Things". According to reports, White sent her pornographic text messages, forced her to watch sexually disturbing videos involving feces, and made vulgar remarks about her relationship with her boyfriend. She also alleges he demanded she cut her hair, wear sexually revealing clothes and underwear, and refrain from wearing red lipstick. When Zawaideh said she wouldn't oblidge his sexual requests, he fired her without pay. Zawaideh filed a civil suit against White in 2016.
This is a classic scenario of a man in power that thinks he has control over everyone around him, especially to the women that work for him and look up to him as a mentor. White does not deserve to be honored as an Olympian. His text messages and Lena's other accounts expose him as an abuser, not someone we want our children looking up to.
At his press event at the current Olympic games, he called this story "gossip" and refused to take any questions from female reporters.
#TimesUp for abusers like Shaun White. Sign the petition to ask the Olympic committee to take away Shaun White's gold medal.
