Keaton Jones hasn’t returned to school since the now-famous video

In a recent interview with the middle schooler and his mother, Keaton Jones says he’s not been back to school since his bullying video went viral. The pair appeared on the British talk show This Morning on Thursday, December 14th, where they said they aren’t sure when he will return to Horace Maynard Middle School in Maynardville, Tennessee.

In the interview, Keaton echoed his words from the video.“Why do you bully? What’s the point of it? It makes me feel awful."

After an initial outpouring of love from celebrities and regular people alike, the Jones family then faced intense scrutiny as it was uncovered that Keaton’s mother has posted several photos of herself with the Confederate flag on her Facebook page. Things got even more complicated when someone posing as Jones created a GoFundMe page under the guise of raising money for the family, and created a false Instagram account messaging people with racist comments.

Jones since spoke out about the photos, telling CBS News, "The only two photos — the only two photos on [the] entire planet that I am anywhere near a Confederate flag. It was ironic. I’ve said I spent most of my life being bullied and judged because I wasn’t racist.

She also said the posts with the flags were meant to be “ironic and funny and extreme” and that she would take them back if she could. false

The situation became even more complicated in the past day, when reports surfaced that Jones’ estranged ex-husband is a white supremacist who is currently in prison. However, Keaton’s older sister addressed the new development on her now-private Twitter page, writing,

“You all can go look back at every tweet from every father’s & mother’s day to see that all we have is our mom.We have no contact with our dads. BECAUSE of their actions. That’s why all the articles say ‘estranged’ because we don’t talk to them. Leave us alone.

In terms of Keaton currently staying home from school, his mom said, “I’ve struggled anyway especially being this close to Christmas break, but after seeing how big it got, I mean it just seems like maybe we should let it die down a little bit before we made any decisions so that we could kind of have a reality of what life is gonna be like.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYEj9snU838?feature=oembed

While this remains a confusing situation with many moving parts, the one thing we do know for sure — unrelated to any of this — is that bullying is never okay. If you want to help be a part of the bullying-prevention solution, you can visit StopBullying.gov.