High school vs free speech

[aneeshm]

How would it be if some boys started wearing t-shirts to parody this , saying " I [heart] my dick , and my dick [heart] your vagina " ?

I'd say they would be suspended/punished . And that would destroy the credence the girls have - because they don't really have any .

 

[Mario Feldberg]

Yeah...

On the other hand, it's Mario Feldberg here, so I would take his description of what happened with a handful of salt.

If you weren't French I would feel insulted

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[anarres]

I don't think that is appropriate.

It's one thing to disagree with somone, but you can't just call the French a load of cheese eating surrender monkeys, or we start on the "2 world wars and 1 world cup" chant again.

 

[Mario Feldberg]

I don't think that is appropriate.

It's one thing to disagree with somone, but you can't just call the French a load of cheese eating surrender monkeys, or we start on the "2 world wars and 1 world cup" chant again.

I didn't call anyone anything! I just posted a picture of a cute monkey
BTW it's not about disagreement here, Akka personally attacked me. Of course I really don't care so I didn't report him but I still want to have a little fun

 

[Nobody]

at my school, 7th formers (last year 17 and 18 year olds, a few 16 and 19) were allowed to where mufti (no uniform) but we had rules that all shirts had to have arms, it was so funny the head girl ) ) got in trouble for wearing a a top with no arms. that cloths werent skanky or anything. same with belli showing tops, they were out lawed.

 

[Akka]

I don't think that is appropriate.

It's one thing to disagree with somone, but you can't just call the French a load of cheese eating surrender monkeys, or we start on the "2 world wars and 1 world cup" chant again.

It just shows the kind of character he is, which is quite revealing and give support to what I said above about him.

 

[Quasar1011]

Wearing a T-shirt is not speech. Saying to someone else, "I love my vagina" is free speech, sure. But, communities have the right to set their own standards. Drawing the line at wearing a T-shirt that many would find offensive, or distractful to studies, is quite acceptable. After all, if this is permissable, what next? An "I love my anus" campaign? Both genders could get behind that.

My ex-girlfriend today told me a story. She was at a conference, and they held a talent show. Various performers got up on stage in front of 800 people, and sang, danced, and did other routines. Then one guy got up on stage and began rapping. He used the F-word, and was loudly booed. A bit later, he used the F-word in the song again, and he was booed off the stage! This is an example of the community standard at work.

 

[Yom]

Wearing a T-shirt is not speech.

Sure it is. In fact, spending your money as you see fit is free speech as well, as per Buckley v. Valeo.

Saying to someone else, "I love my vagina" is free speech, sure. But, communities have the right to set their own standards. Drawing the line at wearing a T-shirt that many would find offensive, or distractful to studies, is quite acceptable. After all, if this is permissable, what next? An "I love my anus" campaign? Both genders could get behind that.

Community standards only apply if you can prove that the material is obscene. To be obscene, it must pass the Miller test from Miller v. California. The three standards that must be met is that it is prurient, has absolutely no redeeming social value, and that the average person, using community standards, would find the material patently offensive. You would have trouble proving the first (just using the word "vagina" doesn't constitute prurient), you couldn't prove the second, and the third doesn't apply to the community of high schoolers (though it may to the entire community of the town - SCOTUS was silent on which community's standards should be used).

My ex-girlfriend today told me a story. She was at a conference, and they held a talent show. Various performers got up on stage in front of 800 people, and sang, danced, and did other routines. Then one guy got up on stage and began rapping. He used the F-word, and was loudly booed. A bit later, he used the F-word in the song again, and he was booed off the stage! This is an example of the community standard at work.

That's not an abridgement of free speech or a definition of its limits, as it is not a public venue. On someone else's property, your free speech rights do not necessarily apply.

 

[cegman]

Mabye I am biased for the problems we had here with the "Day of Silence", but I support her. I think that this is pretty stupid thing to do. I don't see any problem with it. She should not be stopped. Mario F. do you think that was the right thing?

 

[Perfection]

Well, there's certainly limits to free speech in a public school. It all comes down to the question is if it impedes with other people's studies. If some people can justify that they find that innapropriate or offensive to the point where they are distracted from thier studies or they made to feel like they're in a hostile environment, then it's the school's responsibility to rectify the situation. It's the same reason you can't swear in school.

 

[newfangle]

Meh. Its a public school so anything goes. They may as well force the two girls to wash bathrooms.

 

[Riesstiu IV]

You wouldn't believe how much trouble I got myself into for questioning the belief of my histroy teacher that the white man is to blame for all evils in the world and that the negros in Africa are more civilized than we ever were...

Goddamn, I'm happy I'm out of school...

Wow... What kind of school did you go to? In my history classes we rarely talked about Africa (except for Egypt and a little bit of African slave trade) and focused more on American and European history. Didn’t bother me though, I love European history.

 

[amadeus]

Africa must be a European thing, we talked about the "Native Americans" (who are not native, they crossed from Russia and they have reservations they call their own nations, so they're not Americans, either...)

 

[Ayatollah So]

Schools are where young people are supposed to learn critical thinking skills and how to participate in society, right? While a bit of math, history, science, and language is obviously very important, so is learning about the exercise of constitutional rights, political action, and social mores. Call this a lab exercise for the latter - I think the students are actually learning far more about being good citizens by observing/participating in this controversy than from weeks of reading the US Citizenship 101 textbook, although I doubt that such was the intent of the school administrators.

IglooDude for President! And Taliesin for VP. Or vice-versa.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

It has already proved the point that it is inappropriate - it has taken a great deal of focus off the main purpose of school - to work, study and learn. The girls, by description high achievers not in previous trouble, are now endangering their schooling, and have certainly taken become eminently distracted.

It is not a matter of free speech or rights. A school should not be a forum for all manner of beliefs and loudly proclaimed opinions outside of the relevant lessons.
It grabs attention for the girls, and takes attention off what needs to be done. It is a very good example of the value of school uniforms and dress codes - it circumvents all this nonsense of wearing provocative pins or shirts, and also the competition of who has the most fashionable civvies.

 

[CurtSibling]

I didn't call anyone anything! I just posted a picture of a cute monkey
BTW it's not about disagreement here, Akka personally attacked me. Of course I really don't care so I didn't report him but I still want to have a little fun

Didn't Germany surrender in WW2 as well...?

.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

You didn't, Herr Ritter von Sibling. You simply pulled on your school uniform, jumped in your souped up Silbervogel and flew down to lay low at my place until 1954...I still want those elephant skull mugs back, by the way.

 

[Mathilda]

It has already proved the point that it is inappropriate - it has taken a great deal of focus off the main purpose of school - to work, study and learn. The girls, by description high achievers not in previous trouble, are now endangering their schooling, and have certainly taken become eminently distracted.

In this case the studies weren't disrupted by the pins the girls wore, but the teachers who made such a fuss of them.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

The teachers would not have been able to make a fuss, or have to, if the girls did not wear them in the first place. Their choices and actions were the root cause of this and set off the chain reaction. According to the Principal, others found the buttons offensive, and this created a disruption in the school environment, hampering others right to learn, the right of the teacher to teach, and their right to learn and develop.
Hopefully part of this learning is of the value of restraint, timing and discretion - all very useful in the adult world.

The girls started this kerfuffle, and will wear the consequences unless they finish it. A school is not a place for unrestricted dress, language, behaviour or speech. There is a time and a place for wearing silly buttons and clothing that may be construed as offensive and that is university. Once they progress from university, they will discover that their opinions are like servants - everybody has them, but you do not whip them out in public all the time.

 

[Taliesin]

Everybody has servants? I must have misplaced mine.