Warning: This post is about suicide and could be triggering from some readers.
A 13-year-old girl named Izabel Laxamana recently took her own life.
Izabel was reportedly left devastated after her father posted a video online of the moments after he cut all of her hair off.
And now family and friends are questioning whether or not that video led to Izabel’s death.
It is unclear what Izabel was in trouble for, but in the video she can be seen sitting at a table while her father berates her for “getting all messed up”.
As a result, he cut off Izabel’s long black hair and posted a video of it online.
While the father’s video has been taken down, a copy later emerged.
In the video, a man presumed to be Izabel’s father, can be heard saying: “The consequences of getting all messed up? Man, you lost all that beautiful hair.”
He pans the camera between his daughter and a pile of her hair on the ground.
“Was it worth it?” The man asks.
“No,” Izabel responds.
Shortly after Izabel’s death, a local blog blamed the video for her suicide.
“Public shaming is a form of abuse,” it said.
“There are those who will say that it teaches a lesson. So does punching someone in the face. That doesn’t make it okay to do to your children.”
A website and Facebook page, Justice for Izabel, has emerged to raise awareness of public online shaming and calling for Izabel’s father to be prosecuted.
If this post brought up any issues for you, or you just feel like you need someone to talk to after reading it, you can contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 at any time of the day or night.
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Top Comments
The hair cutting thing can be cultural. I remember a year 9 girl at our school stole money from a teachers staffroom (the teacher just wanted her money back, as it was about $300). Parents shaved her head as punishment for stealing and then lying about it. Her hair was super long down to her bum. Pretty awful. She just wore a hat. No suicide.
If he's posting that on social media as a form of punishment in the belief that it is a normal way to behave towards his daughter, then I shudder to think what he was capable of behind closed doors. The poor child probably just wanted to escape. If there are other children in the family, social services needs to intervene immediately.
He cut her hair!!!! behind closed doors he probably makes her eat her vegetables, shower, etc What an abusive monster!!!!! If a haircut is enough to trigger a suicide then there are serious underlying psychological issues that need to be addressed. I am tired of people throwing "abuse" accusations based upon ridiculous "evidence". A hair cut is not abuse. Publicly shaming someone can be awful to witness but it can also be an effective means of punishment, it is being utilised in indigenous communities to try to minimise recidivist crimes, and seems to be far more effective than incarceration at reducing recidivism. Her hair was cut, she wasn't forced to walk naked down the street while people booed and hissed at her. How do you teach children that their actions have consequences if you never allow them to experience any consequences? I do not know why he cut her hair, or what he was punishing her for i.e if the punishment was appropriate for the behaviour that triggered it, but it grossly minimises the genuine cases of child abuse when a video of a haircut has internet warriors demanding social services intervention.
Sorry, but for a teenage girl, cutting her hair is as good as making her walk naked down the street. Everyone, especially teenagers, want to be accepted, and this public shaming by her father not only humiliated her at the time, but every time she looks in the mirror for the next year, she is reminded of it. And every time her school friends see her, they are reminded of it. It opens her up to all sorts of bullying. This is repulsive behaviour by someone who needs to give her guidance, with reasonable consequences, not humiliation. This happened to a child at my son's school, whose parents cut her hair for misbehaviour. She was mercilessly teased by the other children, and her family was viewed as a bit strange, so she was constantly excluded. Luckily for her, it was her final year of primary school, and there was some hope of a new start the following year, but it was a horrendous time for her.