Posted on 07/28/2008 2:39:23 PM PDT by wagglebee
July 28, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A judge in Holmes County, Florida, has ruled that the school board cannot forbid students from "wearing or displaying t-shirts, armbands, stickers, or buttons containing messages and symbols which advocate the acceptance of and fair treatment for persons who are homosexual."
The case that led to the ruling surrounded incidents at Ponce de Leon High School in Holmes County. According to court documents, a 12th grade student - called "Jane Doe" by the court - went to school officials last year to complain that she was being taunted by a group of middle schools students because of her homosexuality.
The complaint was passed on to the school's principal, David Davis, who met with the student after school on September 10, 2007. Davis allegedly questioned Doe about her sexual orientation, and in the process told her that it was "wrong" to be a homosexual. Davis also stated his intention to inform Doe's parents that she was a homosexual.
The day after Davis' encounter with the student, a false rumor began to spread that the principal had suspended Doe because of her homosexuality. A number of students began to organize various acts of protest, ranging from initiating a petition drive, to the wearing of various t-shirts and armbands with slogans such as: "Gay? Fine By Me," "I Support My Gay Friends," "God Loves Me Just the Way I Am," "Pro-Gay Marriage," and "Sexual Orientation is Not a Choice. Religion, However, Is."
Some of the students also arranged to walk en masse out of a morality assembly that they falsely believed had been convened to address the question of homosexuality. In the end they did not follow through on their plan to walk out, after the speaker did not address homosexual issues.
After the assembly Principal Davis met with approximately 30 students who had been most heavily involved in the protests, and forbade them from wearing the shirts and armbands. He also forbade students who said they were homosexual from discussing their homosexuality.
Davis was supported in his decision by the School Board, which stated in a letter that the "phrases, symbols or images" displayed by the students were forbidden, due to the fact that "the expressions indicated membership in an 'illegal organization' prohibited by School Board policy and were disruptive to the educational process."
Shortly thereafter Davis suspended 11 students for their involvement in the pro-gay protests.
One of the students who was suspended was the cousin of another student, Heather Gillman, who subsequently, with the help of her mother and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), sued the school for violating her constitutional free speech rights.
Justice Richard Smoak, in his decision against the Holmes County school board - which he called Davis' "alter-ego," in that it fully espoused the principal's actions - discounted Davis' claims that the pro-homosexual protests were disruptive. Smoak took issue with Davis' concerns that the middle school students would prematurely be exposed to mature themes such as homosexuality. As the judge observed, the library at the school routinely carried magazines with numerous sexually explicit articles and images, such as Vogue, Seventeen and Cosmogirl.
"The innocuous expressions of tolerance and acceptance inherent in the banned expressions are far less inappropriate for middle school students than the sexually explicit articles in those magazines and the sexual content to which children are exposed daily in the popular culture," he wrote, also observing that numerous books have been written and are widely in use that introduce young children to "alternative" families and lifestyles.
Smoak argued that "Davis embarked on what can only be characterized as a 'witch hunt' to identify students who were homosexual and their supporters, further adding fuel to the fire."
"Davis's conduct, in the capacity of a role model and authority figure," he wrote, "is particularly deplorable in light of studies which confirm the vulnerability of gay and lesbian students."
Justice Smoak ordered that the school board "shall take such affirmative steps as are necessary to remedy the past restraints of expression of support for the respect, equal treatment, and acceptance of homosexuals."
According to a report from the ACLU, Principal Davis has since been replaced at Ponce de Leon High School.
To read the complete decision, see:
http://www.aclu.org/images/asset_upload_file980_36150.pdf
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Education Ping
Lord have mercy on us all.
This type of horsecrap is why our chidren are not getting a proper education. Too much time and money spent on outside crap.
Simple solution. Ban all t-shirts and armbands and buttons. Heck put them in uniforms.
If the kids had to spend more time learning real educational subjects (English, math science etc. instead of much of the physco babble that passes for education, this Nation would be better off.........
Sexual Orientation is Not a Choice
Of course it is.....
All sexuality is a choice. Everything is a choice.
No ones is forcing these people to be homosexual.....
Some brave students need to retaliate with pro Jesus armbands, t-shirts, buttons and placards. No anti-homosexual just pro Jesus. It would make an interesting test case to keep Jesus out and homos in. Might just excite the torches in pitchforks crowd.
Then...by default, the school board cannot forbid students from "wearing or displaying t-shirts, armbands, stickers, or buttons containing messages and symbols which advocate the acceptance of and fair treatment for persons who are NOT homosexual."
I think it is high time for a campaign by some clever students at this school to do just that. Let the games begin!
I thought the pincipal did just that. You want to ban people from wearing arm bands and the like who were not wearing them because of the misconduct by those who did wear them? Your answer is not the solution. Ridding the courts of the homosexual symphathisers is the answer. Or, ignor the courts. If enough people ignor the courts what can they do?
The student was ordered by administration to either change shirts or be suspended from school.
There was no such directive to those wearing the pro-gay shirts, however.
SO it’s educationally disruptive to speak out against having an immoral lifestyle crammed down your throat, but it’s NOT educationally disruptive to do so?
What does it have to do with getting an education one way or another?
Since when did school and govt. decide they have the authority to socialize the population?
Meanwhile in California, the court found it illegal to wear a “Be Happy, Not Gay” tee shirt....
Government schools though are forever having cases before a court! Why? Answer: Government schools freedom of conscience and the First Amendment are utterly **INCOMPATIBLE**!!!!
The school must make a binary decision:
1) Allow the tee-shirts and armbands. If the principal does that, he is allowing other students to proselytize on an issue that is in complete contradiction to their religious belief.
2) If he forbids the armbands, he is then trampling the free speech of the homosexual activists.
The school can not resolve this...and,..This is only one example of thousands of issues in which schools must make a binary decision. Those decisions are **not** religiously neutral.
By the way, now that the judge has ruled that the arm bands tee-shirts are OK, I wonder how many Christian teachers will cooperate. Likely every one of them will aid, assist, and push forward this godless worldview. When students rightly conclude that Christians are hypocrites, they will be right.
The government school is in the position of having to make a binary decision. No matter what decision it makes it will establish the religious worldview of one side, and trash that of the other.
Government schools never were, are not now, and never can be religiously neutral!
Government schools are a First Amendment and freedom of conscience abomination!
NOT Proselyting"
Proselyting is active recruiting!
That school is not far from where I live. It is a rural community and one of the most conservative areas in the country. It is a little disturbing to learn there are a significant number of students there who have been influenced by the pro homosexual agenda the media has been pushing for the last 20 years or so.
Exactly so wintertime.
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