Korean volleyball twins disqualified for bullying

This is a story that is incredible, from any perspective you want to look at it. It is a story of sport, but not only. It is a story of justice. And bullying. And of the past that comes back to the surface. It is a story that happened in Korea to two very famous champions, but it could happen anywhere.

Therefore: Lee Jae-yeong and Lee Da-yeong they are 24-year-old twin sisters and are the stars of the South Korean national volleyball team. They have just been banned indefinitely, in the sense that the bans have not yet ended.

Justice will decide. The twins were disqualified for bullying while they were in school.

A partner of theirs at the time, with a long post on social media, told of the abuses she suffered when she was part of the same volleyball team at the school where the twins played. Physical assaults in the locker room, beatings, insults, intimidation, threats of all kinds. Until the day Lee Jae-yeong and Lee Da-yeong land they ambushed, pointed a knife to her throat and they asked her for money. The girl tried to free herself, but was eventually punched and kicked by the twins. The post had a great media coverage, other confessions have sprung up. More than one girl has revealed that in those days the twins harassed their more timid companions, in a barracks atmosphere they forced them to clean the floors for them, wash their clothes, buy meals for lunch.

With their backs to the wall – albeit ten years later – and forced to deal with their past by documented and credible testimonies, the twins admitted the abuse and apologized to the victims of that time on their social profiles. “I caused pain to many people when I was immature and irresponsible. I sincerely apologize to those I hurt in school, ”Jae-Yeong said. They thought that was the end of the matter. That it was enough to apologize. But no.

Many of the girls refused an apology. And in South Korea there was a social uprising with more than one hundred thousand Koreans who signed an online petition on the website of the Casa Blum that is the Residence of the Republic. The target? Open an investigation. So it was. The Volleyball Federation of South Korea has disqualified the twins. Also outside the national team, coached by the Italian Stefano Lavarini. No Olympics, therefore. The many contracts with sponsors were also torn up. In South Korea the scandal is enormous. Lee Jae-yeong and Lee Da-yeong are now awaiting trial, sporting and criminal proceedings.

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