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US Ed Dept Demanding Principals Censor More
Toe, The writes "Education Department officials are threatening school principals with lawsuits if they fail to monitor and curb students' lunchtime chat and evening Facebook time for expressing ideas and words that are deemed to be harassment of some students. Under the new interpretation of civil rights laws, principals and their schools are legally liable if they fail to curb 'harassment' of students, even if it takes place outside the school, on Facebook or in private conversation. When children are concerned, where is the line between protection and censorship?"
What kids do outside of school, in their own time with their own equipment, is no business of the schools. It's down to the parents.
Worked in (UK) education for 7 years. I offer advice and training to teachers to introduce safeguarding and online safety into the curriculum, and so far have positive feedback. What the kids do at home, however, isn't our business.
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On the one hand we teach kids about the Constitution and Bill of Rights. On the other hand, we tell them "Hey johhny - what you say can get you in trouble if you make fun of that fat kid in the playground...
To be fair, they'll face the same thing when they get jobs and try to use facebook there.
And finally, doesn't the Dept of Ed have ANYTHING else to deal with besides this BS?
Maybe not with their budget? Saying "crack down on hate speech on facebook" probably doesn't cost as much as buying new textbooks.
Whatever happened to "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me?" Have we become such a bunch of pussies that we can't even deal with having people call us bad names? What ever happened to "hey - here's two pairs of boxing gloves - go behind the gym and work it out?"
Joking aside, I hear what you're saying, but TFA points out the suicide rate among gay and lesbian students is 4 times that of straight students. I'm not saying that justifies trampling on free speech off school grounds, but saying "work it out" is a little simplistic.
Before the hysteria reaches epic proportions, the advisory itself can be found here (pdf). It's a pretty quick read, only 10 pages, and sadly enough lacks any mention of enforcing rules outside of school, forced indoctrination, political correctness, or secret Muslim plots. TFA however makes for some nice slanted coverage, if anyone is looking for a chuckle I encourage you to read it.
Oh yeah, kids have limited consitutional rights - especially in education.
That "behavior" was frowned upon in the past because people used to be even more pig-headed and blinded by their fucking sky-fairy stories than they are today. There is absolutely no reason that being openly gay ought to come with any cost. Being the ones who assess that cost (the bigots) against gays and lesbians needs to become very costly. I'm not going to say that homophobia ought to be criminally prosecutable, but it ought to be considered totally unacceptable on the social level. Make anti-gay slurs at school? You get suspended for a week. Do it at work? You get fired. We really need to stop the bullshit now.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Oh for crying out loud. This is what passes for news at lame wannabe Tucker Carlson's attempt to mimic Politico? The guidance letter was published in October 2010 and you can read it here: http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-201010.html
Well that document did give them the power to make those decisions.... so.... Yeah. There.
Not really, took over a hundred years and a bit of pretzle logic to get to that point. I expect the newer courts will wake up and realize that the ICC(interstate commerce clause) is not a catch all for whatever the govt. wants to do. See Thomas' dissent of Gonzales v. Raich.
I laughed at the weak who considered themselves good because they lacked claws.
If kids weren't beating the fuck out of each other in school and torturing and harassing each other in school, I doubt it would be an issue outside of school, either. In a lot of these instances, the online "harassment" is merely an extension of the viciousness that is occurring inside the walls of the school eight hours a day. Perhaps they'd be less inclined to do that outside of school if they weren't allowed to get away with it *inside* of school, too. The problem is that teachers and administrators look the other way. Trouble makers get away with it and at worse are "disciplined" but kept in school. Then parents excuse it as some sort of insane right of passage or character building exercise. The parents that do take it seriously reach a roadblock when nobody else engages with them and they're forced to send their kid to a violent prison for eight hours a day with no recourse to protect them.
I remember a specific incident when I was in junior high in the 90s. There were two teachers right in front of me in the hallway and a large eight grader at the end of the hallway walked passed a small seventh grade student and in one swift motion, slammed his head directly into a wall for no reason. The kid passed out and had a concussion. The teachers didn't respond. They just kept walking and turned at the next bend in the hallway. The kid who did it was a trouble maker and had a lot of detention. Was never expelled or removed from being a threat to the rest of the school.
Unrelated, but interesting, I remember when I was in grade school and I was walking down a hallway. I was running my outstretched arm against the wall as I walked down the mostly empty hall. One of the special-ed kids was coming the other way . . . and at the last second, moved to the side and took a fucking BITE OUT OF MY ARM.
Schools are fucked up places. At no other time in my life have I been forced to surround myself with sociopaths, criminals, and the insane.