Parents Sue School Over Use of Wi-Fi Network

Iphtashu Fitz writes "Both news.com and Wired are reporting that an Illinois school district is being sued by parents over their use of a Wi-Fi network at a local elementary school. Apparently the parents of 5 students are concerned about potential health risks to their children by the Wi-Fi radio signals. The parents are seeking class-action status for their suit, which seeks to halt the use of wireless networks but does not ask for monetary damages. The complete complaint is also available for your reading pleasure on wifinetnews.com." I would never have guessed that the emissions from a wireless network are bad, unlike the healthy emissions given off by the now inescapable cell phones that are everywhere in public.

Comments

Sad

[captain_craptacular]

Unfortunately, the school district will now have to expend a significant amount of money to defend themselves against these bogus charges. Money that could otherwise be spent for some better cause such as, lets see, educating our children?

Re:Sad

[scoove]

expend a significant amount of money to defend themselves against these bogus charges

Unfortunately this appears to be what happens when you combine a society fixated with junk science with a political class ruled by trial attorneys.

The State of Missouri had an issue a bit more than a year ago with a state legislator that was trying to get all communication towers banned. The reason? "It might harm children." A few folks did some research on the legislator pushing the bill and guess who one of his largest financial supporters was? Incumbant local telephone companies (the competition to wireless providers). Save the children unfortunately has become code for political and legal system payola.

Unfortunately this poster touches on the reality of the current US legal nightmare: many defendents cannot afford the fight for what is right due to the complete lack of financial accountability of irresponsible plantiff attorneys and their clients. I'm predicting the school will back out and turn off their wireless devices. Their students will lack the access to information that other students might have. Unless other parents get vocal and oppose this luddite activity, they'll further the progress of their children towards a future job at Burger King.

Per the allegation that the school has been ignoring evidence that electromagnetic radiation from Wi-Fi networks poses health risks, I'd invite the luddite parents and their attorneys to have a radiofrequency engineer show them what the airwaves in the classroom (or better, at home) look like. 802.11b/a/g is background noise compared to many of the narrowband signals out there. Better shut off the FM, AM and TV broadcasters immediately. Throw away that cellphone (you don't hold that anywhere *near* your head, do you?) Better start packing candles in the kids lunch bag... those fluorescent lights are little RF monsters ("to quote: while the intentional radiation of fluorescent light tubes lies in the visible light range, such tubes also generate very low levels of microwave and RF white noise (Mumford, 1949)... microwaves? That's not a classroom lit by fluorescents, it's a Easy Bake Oven from Hell!). Lock up the school TV sets - what do you think that gunnplexer is firing at your eyeballs? Get weather, aviation and police radar shut off immediately (sure hope that speeder doesn't crash into the school bus). And god forbid you have one of those Air Force E-4B 747's fly over your home as they do mine... one of those bastards wipes out my TV amplifier every time it flies over my farm! Heck, we haven't even thought about RF experiments like HAARP that can probably melt a human in milliseconds!

Of course, the final step for the trial attorneys and their luddite clients will be banning the ultimate producer of raw RF. Once that's done, we can all rest assured that no RF deathrays will harm us.

*scoove*

Umm??

[dcstimm]

2.4ghz Cordless phones use the same freq! What are these parents smoking?

Re:Umm??

[japhyr777]

Wait until they find out about Baby Monitors... That'll get them worked up..

All those hours of the day the poor baby was taking in the radio waves. Possibly right next to it's head. Bzzzzt..

Tinfoil hats

[Carnildo]

Does anyone have the address of these people? I've got a load of tinfoil hats they can use to protect their children!

This is beyond ridiculous

[MoceanWorker]

Only in this country would you expect to find people sueing a person/company/organization/etc.. for such trivial nonsense.

As I type this post right now, the monitor in my room, my radio, lights, cell phone, speakers are all giving off radiation. Not to mention, objects in my room (i.e. fork) are strengthening these signals.

Radiation is around us.. everywhere.. We can't stop it. The big question on hand is, do we sacrifice technology and all its benefits for the risk of potential radition which may or may not hinder ones health and/or possibly lead to cancer?

Please, out of all those parents sueing.. how many of them smoke, have 5 TV's in their house, drive a car, use a computer, etc.. you get my drift.

I hope there's somebody out there in Illinois who can smack those parents around a bit.. and I think I say this for most of the /.'ers..