Suicide of Ash Haffner

Ash Haffner was a North Carolina student who died by suicide in 2015 at age 16, after being bullied for years because they identified as LGBTQ.

Background

Ash Haffner was born April 28, 1998 as the child of April Quick. Starting in the 8th grade, after identifying as lesbian, Ash started becoming bullied by peers and was also denied becoming friends with some other girls by their parents. Since the 9th grade Ash was gender-questioning. A note that Ash once wrote about that topic reads:

"he? she? it? thing? Be so quick jumping to labels. my pronouns do not define me. but when you ask me if I'm a boy or a girl, I don't know how to answer. I haven't even identified yet so just leave me alone and call me Ash."

In their spare time Ash made poems and songs which (insofar recorded) Ms. Quick, Ash's mother, posted on Ash Haffner's YouTube channel after their death. Among them are "Sleepwalking", "Poison" and the song that has been named as "Ash's song".

After Ash cut their hair short, the amount of bullying increased and finally culminated in suicide on February 26, 2015. After Ash texted friends warning them of their plans, the friends alerted Ash's mom. Their mom rushed down and saw a crowd gathering on the street. Ash had jumped in front of a car during rush hour.

On Ash's laptop the following text was found:

"if I die ... I don't want to be remembered as the faggot gay girl with all the scars on her arm. unfortunately that's who I am to a lot of people. if those people would have just stayed silent and kept their ignorant thoughts in their heads then maybe I wouldn't have those scars on my arm. maybe. it wasn't always about what they had in their heads, it was what was inside of mine to. I just didn't understand why I felt the way I did when I had a decent life. I may have come from a broken family but I always had a roof over my head and a loving mother who fully accepted me for who I was and never stopped trying. she was the only person who never gave up hope on me. but anyway, I don't want to be remembered as the girl with problems, just remember me as someone who understood and stayed strong for as long as I could."

Ash's classmates at Porter Ridge High School held a vigil in their honor while speaking out against bullying.[1] Ms. Quick later became an anti-bullying activist.[2]

Media coverage

Media coverage after the death of Ash was heightened because recently three American transgender teenagers died of suicide: Leelah Alcorn, Zander Mahaffey, Melonie Rose; and because youth suicides in North Carolina reached a peak.[3]

The earliest media coverage of Ash's death in Gay Star News,[4] and in Planet Transgender,[5] suggested that Ash was fully transgender and, moreover, suggested that Ash's mother did not accept them as transgender. A blog reported two different statements about Ash's gender identity by people who claimed to have known Ash personally.[6] A later article in the Charlotte Observer provided more background detail and pictured an open and honest mother.[7] Gay Star News added a section to the original article indicating that it had been premature to depict Ash as fully transgender.

There were also commemoration videos about Ash on YouTube by various people, among them a video by the transgender teenager Kovu Kingsrod, which Ash's mother added to the playlist on the Ash Haffner YouTube channel.[8]

See also

References
  1. Paul Farrell "Ash Haffner: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know", Heavy.com, April 17, 2015
  2. "Mother of Ash Haffner and others begin battle against bullying", STOPit
  3. Andrew Rhew "Youth suicide: all the little things start seeming like big things", North Carolina Health News, October 3, 2016
  4. Darren Wee "Transgender boy, 16, commits suicide after years of bullying", Gay Star News, March 2, 2015
  5. Kelly Busey "16-year-old trans-teen Ash Haffner kills himself", Planet Transgender, March 1, 2015
  6. Zoe "PSA about people debating Ash Haffner's identity / pronouns", Sexistentialism, March 11, 2015
  7. Karen Garloch "Charlotte-area teen Ash Haffner struggled with gender identity", The Charlotte Observer, March 28, 2015
  8. Kovu Kingsrod "Ash Haffner's suicide", YouTube, 2017
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