CBS Boston reports:
Two high school students in Taunton have been suspended after they posted a photo of themselves holding Airsoft rifles. Thousands of people have leapt to their defense online, but their school isn’t backing down.
The Airsoft rifles look dangerous, but they shoot plastic pellets. Tito Velez, 15, often competes with a team as a hobby.
Last Friday, Tito and his girlfriend Jamie Pereira posed with the Airsoft rifles before the Bristol Plymouth Regional Technical School homecoming dance. The post got them suspended from school.
“This isn’t dangerous, you can’t kill someone with it,” Tito said Tuesday. “We didn’t shoot anyone; we were pointing them at the floor.”
“I understand but I think they took this way too far,” Jamie said. “Suspending us for 10 days and possible expulsion is way too much.”
Apologies to Miss Pereira, but I don’t “understand” at all. Leave aside that the two were holding BB guns and that Tito Velez is involved in airsoft as a sport, and presume for a moment that the weapons were real. In fact, presume for the sake of argument that they were super-fully-semi-automatic machine-assault-military-death-weapons that shoot fire out of their ends, have flick knives stuffed into every available orifice, and randomly launch grenades at babies in cots. Presume, too, that the guns have “Schoolsweeper” emblazoned on their sides, were bought from a KKK-sympathizing heroin dealer, and that the children’s parents not only dislike President Obama but believe fervently that he was born in Kenya to terrorists who had contributed to America’s poor performance in Vietnam and who wanted to ban steak on the grounds that it reminded them too much of the Star Spangled Banner. So what? What can possibly justify the school having such a strong opinion about a private photograph?
The answer, per the district, is that the photograph was tagged with the words “Homecoming 2014.” Per CBS:
Many argue that the Facebook post is protected by the Constitution, even in light of recent school shootings. But when the teenagers put the caption “Homecoming 2014″ on the photo, it tied the rifles to a school function.
“These students know what is provocative,” Superintendent Dr. Richard Gross said. “To tie that to one of our school events kind of puts it over the top which brings us into it.”
There’s a lot to consider here: the Constitutional right to freedom of speech; yet, on the other hand, there is the implied threat whether it’s real or not.
Exactly what role the First Amendment plays within the grounds of America’s public schools is a tricky question. The current standard is derived from Tinker v Des Moines (1969), which held, per the Bill of Rights Institute, that in order to punish a child for his speech a school must demonstrate that that speech represents “a material and substantial interference with schoolwork or discipline.” Personally, I cannot see how a photograph taken outside the school and linked only with a caption comes remotely close to meeting the standard established in Tinker. There was no mass panic. There are no reports of lessons or playgrounds being interrupted or disrupted. The photograph prompted no violence. The police were not called, and nor was the “Homecoming 2014″ event canceled. By the time that the school had even considered the question, the dance was over. This is a post-hoc reaction, and one that seems more and more likely to occur in the age of the Internet. Moreover, this was no aberration. As the media has learned to its horror of late, many Americans like to pose for their yearbook or homecoming or graduation photos with firearms — and often real firearms, too.
Nevertheless, for the sake of fairness, let’s say that I’m wrong on the constitutional question, and that the school is not prohibited from punishing the two children. Well, that still does not justify its electing to do so. Here, supposedly responsible adults in Taunton have been presented with a choice. Do they punish two kids for an entirely legal photograph that they took in their home, and that caused no trouble to anybody? Or do they stay the hell away from the issue? That they not only chose the first course, but imposed a serious sanction as well is a bad sign for those of us who want schools to act as schools, and parents to act as parents. Don’t Tread on Me, says the flag. Give us your children, says the state.