Utah middle school faces controversy after student protests allege school allows students to dress like ‘furries’

On Wednesday, many middle schoolers staged a walkout protest at Mt. Nebo Middle School in Payson, Utah. Footage of the protest and interviews of the students were subsequently posted online.

Local Utah resident and commentator Adam Bartholomew posted an hour of footage from the protest where the Mt. Nebo pupils said that the students were pretending to be animals at the school. They alleged the "furries" got preferential treatment and would "attack" other students by scratching them and spraying them with Febreze. Some also claimed that there were "litter boxes" in bathrooms.

Mt. Nebo has denied the allegations of the students acting like "furries." School district spokesman Seth Sorensen told The Post Millennial when asked about the students identifying as animals that the allegation is "inaccurate."

"Have we had students in the past that have worn a headband or something with the ears? Sure. We get that at every school. These students are after all in sixth grade and some students still wear those kinds of things as dress part of their attire, but it's not that they are claiming to be animals," Sorenson added.

Outlets in Utah also got similar statements from the school regarding "headbands" being worn by students that have "ears." KSL as well as the Salt Lake Tribune took the statement as fact, with KSL headlining there was "no evidence" of students identifying as "furries" in the school and the Tribune running a "fact-check" on the claims.

In KSL's coverage, it was reported that Sorenson "added that the school hasn't had any incidents of students wearing masks or animal costumes, nor have any students engaged in biting, licking or any other forms of animal-like behavior."

The Post Millennial spoke to parents of Mt. Nebo students who said that while the allegations of litter boxes in the bathrooms were inaccurate and could not verify that there had been "attacks" as the student protesters claimed, reports of students wearing masks and behaving like animals appear to be accurate.

Students, the parents said, have acted like animals in some cases and will wear face masks.

Pictures of students at the school allegedly identifying as "furries" quickly got posted online after the protest and have been circulating.

One of the parents The Post Millennial spoke to shared a photo of a young girl wearing a cat mask.

Other photos of students wearing similar animal masks allegedly at the school were shared online on Thursday. The pictures were obtained by Eric Moutsos and then shared widely by Libs of TikTok.

Video allegedly showed other students at the school wearing animal masks.

Seth Sorenson told The Blaze after they sent videos from the parents to the school, "None of the video or photographic evidence we have seen shows students dressing up as animals, or acting like animals, as that would not be allowed."

"We can not (sic) even confirm that these videos are of our students and in our schools," he added.

In a comment on a Facebook post about the story shared in the public group, "Payson UT News and Goings on," a woman who said that she was a substitute teacher at the school a few months back also recounted an experience she had at the school. Her comment was written in reply to someone saying the story was "fake news."

She said that it was "not fake" and that kids were meowing in her class and acting and were telling her “they were cats.”

After TPM reached out for comment from the claimed substitute teacher, she changed her comment to include that the students "were not dressed as furries" and that "there were no more problems."