Viral online educator Ms. Rachel delivers commencement speech
Ms. Rachel, a popular YouTube educator, delivered an inspiring speech during a commencement ceremony at NYU’s Steinhardt School.
Popular children’s content creator Ms. Rachel says that criticism for her continued advocacy for Palestinian children is unfair and that it “should be controversial to not say anything.”
Ms. Rachel, whose full name is Rachel Griffin Accurso, addressed the backlash she has gotten in recent months for her advocacy during an interview with journalist Mehdi Hasan, on his independent publication Zeteo.
“It’s sad that people try to make it controversial when you speak out for children that are facing immeasurable suffering,” Accurso said in the interview, posted May 12. “The idea that caring for a group of children in an emergency situation means you don’t care about other children is false.”
Accurso said that her experience as a mother of two young children influenced her to raise awareness for the traumatic events being experienced by children in Gaza.
Accurso is known online for her YouTube series “Song for Littles,” with a channel amassing just under 15 million subscribers. Her videos focus mainly on teaching children nursery rhymes, and basic concepts like colors, shapes and words.
Accurso’s advocacy work
Accurso has teamed up with Save the Children, a humanitarian nonprofit.
Last year, she posted a video on Instagram detailing the extensive online bullying she received after holding a fundraiser for Save the Children’s emergency fund for kids in conflict zones across the world.
“Palestinian children, Israeli children, children in the U.S. — Muslim, Jewish, Christian children — all children, in every country. Not one is excluded,” she said on Instagram.
In recent months, Accurso used her platform to highlight the stories of various Palestinian children. In one post, she shared the story of a 3-year-old Palestinian child who lost both legs in an airstrike.
“When I saw pictures of Rahaf in Gaza on the hospital floor, I saw the devastating consequences of endless bombing and continuous violations of children’s human rights,” Accurso said.
Accurso has been deeply criticized
Her continued work has seen Accurso being attacked by pro-Israeli groups. Last month, in a post on social media, the advocacy group StopAntisemitism asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate if Accurso was “being funded by a foreign party to push anti-Israel propaganda to skew public opinion.”
The group accused the content creator of being an “amplifier of Hamas propaganda,” saying images that she shared of children in Gaza were manipulated.
During her interview with Hasan, Accurso said that her advocacy does not come from a place of antisemitism but rather a sense of empathy for children around the world.
“I’ve been blessed to get this platform. And kids feel that I care about them all deeply, and that’s why I have the platform. Because they feel it through the screen, because it’s genuine,” Accurso said.
Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected] and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.
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