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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTeen suspended for flying confederate flag on pick-up truck; ACLU now invovled
Gregory Vied, 17, told News 12 that the giant Stars and Bars flag was waving from the back of his truck as he pulled into the parking lot of Steinert High School in Hamilton Township when officials told him to remove the flag.
The teenager — who claims he’s only trying to promote his Southern heritage, not hate — said he was given a three-day suspension after ignoring repeated warnings from the vice principal to take the flag down.
“Them trying to make me take it down, is unconstitutional,” he told the news station.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/new-jersey-teen-suspended-flying-confederate-flag-pickup-truck-article-1.1737777
The ACLU is now supporting the teen citing the first amendment. After the ACLU wrote a letter to the school, the school cut the student's suspension from 3 days to 1.
The teen's friends and supporters have also begun to go to school with confederate flags on their vehicles to show support. So far the school has not suspended those students.
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tularetom
(23,664 posts)attempting to ban symbols like that, only makes the dumdums try even harder to display them.
Cirque du So-What
(25,941 posts)where I am thankful for the ACLU looking out for all our rights for all of us, but at the same time I detest the action that's being defended. I feel the same way about neo-nazis marching in Skokie, IL - home to many Holocaust survivors - although that case was even harder for me to accept. In fact, I find myself agreeing with this kid when he says 'it's unconstitutional.'
Drunken Irishman
(34,857 posts)What about t-shirts that say, "Lynch N****" or something equally offensive? Would that be a student's constitutional right to wear something like that to school?
It's not always black & white. There is a lot of gray area. I doubt any school would allow an offensive, racist shirt, regardless of constitutional rights.
Cirque du So-What
(25,941 posts)is in a different class of offensiveness altogether. It's more difficult to draw a hard line against flying a flag that has actually been incorporated into some state flags in the former confederacy - even if it is in NJ.
newdemocrat999
(37 posts)but I agree that it's not always black and white
Example we have the right of free speech.
Should a heckler be able to disrupt and yell over President Obama during a news conference question and answer session?
They tried but were escorted out.
Should children in school be able to talk over the teacher?
Should a small group of children be able to yell , laugh and scream and disrupt a classroom test?
Hip_Flask
(233 posts)All they have to do is make an appeal to "safety"
Look to the American flag being banned a few weeks ago out of concern that it might incite violence.
A generation raised to fit within a legally defined norm and taught to never question authority.
newdemocrat999
(37 posts)Hip_Flask
(233 posts)
ProudToBeBlueInRhody
(16,399 posts)The kids in the American flag shirts were looking for a fight, plain and simple, by wearing them that day.
Hip_Flask
(233 posts)"Safety" trumps free speech and I suspect it will be used as precedent.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)I'm nervous about prior restraint in general, but if there's a valid subject of them it's a flag of armed revolt.
Though if he's like most people, it's a modified version of the Confederate Naval Jack, not a "confederate flag" in any historically accurate sense...
delta17
(283 posts)Realistically, I don't think most people who fly a rebel flag on their truck could organize a keg party, let alone a revolt.
Turbineguy
(37,338 posts)How about some Southern Hospitality? How about a nice Cookbook? A guide to great places to hunt even. There are lots of good things about the South to promote.
Skittles
(153,169 posts)
Throd
(7,208 posts)
alp227
(32,027 posts)instead of showing them how they are wrong. This is what creates a generation of right wing cranks: people who feel so wronged by "the system" they never want to be be told their traditions are wrong. They are then attracted to the radical reactionary world of going against invented "Marxist" institutions.
Didn't the confederate flag only become acceptable in the south again during the civil rights movement?
sammytko
(2,480 posts)assistant principal told him to change, but then the principal said he could wear it if he wanted.
I can see that the principal didn't want to draw more attention than necessary.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)Because none of us have heard about this case. If the principal had taken a hard line this would be all over Fox and the kid would be a martyr.
GreenEyedLefty
(2,073 posts)That's all I have to say.
newdemocrat999
(37 posts)
Jgarrick
(521 posts)KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)it's the school making a statement and not an individual > schools are tasked with providing safe havens for learning.
Schools not only couldn't make that statement as a whole, they have an interest in protecting students' from hate speech/threats.
A confederate flag could be seen by some minority students as not just inflammatory but potentially threatening.
Someone may actually not consciously consider a confederate flag as hate speech… but it still is.
I am pretty much playing devil's advocate here.
Although I will admit I'm not quite the free speech absolutist many other DU'ers are.
I think there's a more to consider than just saying everyone is entitled to say whatever they want, wherever they want.
newdemocrat999
(37 posts)individual protected rights.
Orrex
(63,215 posts)Same basic mindset, though.
Codeine
(25,586 posts)and one probably shouldn't read too much into the stupid shit they do.
I remember getting in trouble for my Dead Kennedys "Nazi Punks Fuck Off" t-shirt in high school. My principle actually reversed the decision a teacher made to kick me off campus because he felt I had the right to wear it.
B Calm
(28,762 posts)but he has that right to do it.
MineralMan
(146,317 posts)This kid is giving everyone the finger. Clearly, he is a moron of the first order. And yet, there is the First Amendment. Always a dilemma. Schoolkids on school grounds don't have exactly the same set of rights adults do on their own property. And yet, there is the First Amendment. It even allows people to give the finger to other people, with some limits. That can also be considered "fighting words," and result in an acquittal of the person offended enough to give the finger-waver a bloody nose. The Confederate battle flag is much like giving the finger to everyone at that school of color or who may have had ancestors die fighting for the Union Army.
So, what to do? I'm not sure. If I were another student at that school, I might well consider something like flying a different flag of the same size on the back of my pickup and parking right next to the Stars and Bars flyer. Maybe a Rainbow flag, or a Union Army banner of some sort. You know, to honor one's heritage or something like that.
And yet, there is the First Amendment. I suppose we have to let morons say moronic things and give people the finger. Maybe the answer is to ignore this display of moronic splendor. Maybe we will all want to do something, say something, or fly something one day that a lot of people don't like. Maybe we'll want to use the First Amendment to do something unpopular, too.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)If he saw that nobody was rising to the bait he would soon get bored and stop flying that flag. Unfortunately he got exactly the reaction he was hoping for.
LuvNewcastle
(16,846 posts)NuclearDem
(16,184 posts)I'm glad the ACLU is taking the case and not playing favorites with Constitutional issues, but...
Jake Stern
(3,145 posts)It's not hard to see how such an amendment can be abused. Everybody with a grudge will be hauling people before some board or commission tasked with carrying out the terms of the amendment.
Look at Canada's Human Rights Commission where they've levied sanctions over, I'm not making this up, "hurt feelings".
I despise Neo-Nazis but I firmly believe that the First Amendment protects their right to be an asshole.
Hip_Flask
(233 posts)Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)I am very happy that it does not. This would be a shocking weakening of the First Amendment.
Tom Ripley
(4,945 posts)GiveMeMorePIE
(54 posts)They certainly are not our friends on a lot of issues.
EX500rider
(10,849 posts)
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Even if what you're saying makes you an asshole.
Popular speech needs no protection- it's popular.
rdharma
(6,057 posts)They did help Occupy... but they also help neo-Nazis.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)LittleBlue
(10,362 posts)This is why. They aren't a partisan hack outfit, they genuinely care about constitutional ideals.
Why the right attacks the ACLU I'll never know, they defend right-wingers as often as anyone else.
Wolf Frankula
(3,601 posts)He would have shot you. "Secession is treason."
Wolf
Boom Sound 416
(4,185 posts)
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)
tarheelsunc
(2,117 posts)
Lunacee_2013
(529 posts)Most of the rest of the U.S. hates it and it makes you look like a damned fool, not a rebel. Plus, it represents the slave owning, bigoted, mostly rich traitors who damn near broke America. How anyone can wave that flag and the real American flag is beyond me.
Wolf Frankula
(3,601 posts)It is that poor white men shall fight and die, so rich white men may own slaves, and look down on poor white men. That is the Alpha and Omega of secession.
Wolf
