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After an 11-year-old girl received a disturbing note that urged her to kill herself, so many people wanted to do something to show that they care about her and sent her positive letters.
“I've been getting flowers, I've been getting anonymous things from people that I don't even know will drop it off at my school. I came to my locker after gym and I saw my whole entire locker filled with notes and I love it,” says Venice Anderson.
Some of those letters read, “stay positive,” “keep being you,” and “you are beautiful, strong, kind, and amazing.”
All of this support coming after she received a hateful note reading in part, “do us all a favor and kill yourself.”
Venice says, unfortunately, being bullied isn't anything new.
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“I’ve been bullied all my life,” she says. “When I was kindergarten I used to be called terrible names. I cut my hair because I thought I wasn't good enough and no one liked me.”
But she says these experiences made her stronger, and now she’s taking a stand for anyone who has been bullied before.
“I think we should all live in a nation and a world where we are all equal to each other,” she says.
In the meantime, she wants to thank the community for all their kindness.
“Thank you so much. I thank you for all the things that I have and that I've received from people. I also thank you for empowering me and to keep going on,” she says.
The school has met with a detective and they are investigating.
If you would like to send Venice kind letters of encouragement, her family says you're more than welcome to do so! KHQ will collect the mail and send it to the family all at once. You can mail your letters to:
KHQ Local News
Attn: Nichole Mischke
1201 W. Sprague Avenue
Spokane WA, 99201
(story: Katie Chen; photo & video: KHQ.com)