Teens Arrange Beer Cups In Shape Of Swastika, Play Drinking Game

Southern California high school students played a swastika-themed drinking game and did Hitler salutes at a party. Image by James Rogers/Twitter
A southern California school district sent a letter to parents apologizing after images spread on social media showed students partying while giving Nazi salutes and playing drinking games with cups arranged in the shape of a swastika.
“We were recently made aware of social media postings involving some students who created inappropriate anti-semitic symbols, and possible underage drinking,” a letter from the leaders of the Newport-Mesa United School District said. “While these actions did not occur on any school campus or school function, we condemn all acts of anti-semitism and hate in all their forms.”
The president of the school district told local news station KCAL that they had had an emergency meeting on Sunday to address the incident, which involved students or recent graduates of Newport Harbor High School.
Newport Harbor student Bianca Lutz told the Los Angeles Times that some of her Jewish friends were scared by the incident, and that she was “extremely disturbed by the ignorance of those at the party.”
The Anti-Defamation League runs educational programming at several area schools but not at Newport Harbor, the organization’s regional director confirmed to the L.A. Times.
In the past school year, high school students in Minnesota and Wisconsin have been disciplined for doing Nazi salutes and posting photos of their actions online.
Contact Aiden Pink at [email protected] or on Twitter, @aidenpink
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 2
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 3
Culture How two Jewish names — Kohen and Mira — are dividing red and blue states
- 4
Opinion Mike Huckabee said there’s ‘no such thing as a Palestinian.’ It’s worth thinking about what that means
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
-
Fast Forward Yarden Bibas says ‘I am here because of Trump’ and pleads with him to stop the Gaza war
-
Fast Forward Trump’s plan to enlist Elon Musk began at Lubavitcher Rebbe’s grave
-
Film & TV In this Jewish family, everybody needs therapy — especially the therapists themselves
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.