A young man in Virginia says he has no regrets over waiting to release a video he saved of a high school classmate using the N-word when she was 15, which ultimately resulted in her not attending her dream college this year.
“I wanted to get her where she would understand the severity of that word,” Jimmy Galligan, who is 18 and biracial, told the New York Times of his former high school classmate, Mimi Groves, who is 19 and white. Both attended Heritage High School in Leesburg, Virginia.
“He tucked the video away, deciding to post it publicly when the time was right,” the New York Times reported of why he didn’t release the video when he first saw it last year.
He released it this summer when protests and riots spread across the country following the death of George Floyd. It was also after Groves had been accepted to the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, where she was slated to compete on the school’s cheer team.
“The next month, as protests were sweeping the nation after the police killing of George Floyd, Ms. Groves, in a public Instagram post, urged people to ‘protest, donate, sign a petition, rally, do something’ in support of the Black Lives Matter movement,” the New York Times reported.
Groves realized that the video of her saying “I can drive, [N-word]” was public after she was met with condemnation from a stranger on social media for supporting the BLM movement while also previously using racist language.
“Her alarm at the stranger’s comment turned to panic as friends began calling, directing her to the source of a brewing social media furor. Mr. Galligan, who had waited until Ms. Groves had chosen a college, had publicly posted the video that afternoon. Within hours, it had been shared to Snapchat, TikTok and Twitter, where furious calls mounted for the University of Tennessee to revoke its admission offer,” the New York Times reported.
The video’s circulation ultimately ended with Groves giving up her acceptance to the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, as well as losing her spot on the school’s cheer team.
Galligan told the New York Times that he didn’t regret releasing the video, saying, “If I never posted that video, nothing would have ever happened.”
“I’m going to remind myself, you started something,” he added. “You taught someone a lesson.”
The story, however, has sparked the ire of some who say that cancel culture has gone too far, with an American Conservative opinion piece calling Galligan “an example of the kind of moral monsters this culture of ours has created.”
“We will always live in a society that is in need of moral reform. We are human. But it is a monstrous society that doesn’t offer a way for people to turn from their sins and failings, and find forgiveness and restoration,” the op-ed added.
Others agreed with the op-ed’s sentiment, with some taking to Twitter to voice their opinions.
THIS ARTICLE IS HILARIOUS. The kid who held onto the snapchat video for 4 years, waiting to deploy it to destroy a girl’s life, lectured his OWN WHITE FATHER that he can’t say the N-word, even though it’s “thrown around” by their black relatives. https://t.co/XEP4gEFU3e
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) December 27, 2020
She was 15. In a 3-second Snapchat video, imitating a rapper, she said, “I can drive, ‘n-word.’” This June, 4 years later, someone posted it. Twitter mob demanded vengeance. U of Tennessee @UTKnoxville & @nytimes side with the mob. Malice posing as social justice. Thread ⬇️ https://t.co/mjQ32W8Hpv
— Christina Sommers (@CHSommers) December 27, 2020
Great piece by @roddreher – “We will always live in a society that is in need of moral reform. We are human. But it is a monstrous society that doesn’t offer a way for people to turn from their sins and failings & find forgiveness and restoration.” https://t.co/ntYzHRSMsB
— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) December 27, 2020
It’s so depraved to suffuse the popular culture with a particular racial epithet, then turn around and crusade for the destruction of peoples’ lives when they’re found to have used the epithet as oblivious 14-year-oldshttps://t.co/V3lr5bnlJS
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 27, 2020
Groves added in the interview that she regrets using the word, saying she was too young to understand its history.
“At the time, I didn’t understand the severity of the word, or the history and context behind it because I was so young,” she said of the video, adding that “it honestly disgusts me that those words would come out of my mouth.”
