Suspended/arrested over 2A T-shirt

[Tronster]

Another example of schools indoctrinating students by suppressing their 1st amendment rights.
http://hhshootingsports.com/WireShots/archives/4340

[tazdevil]

Triple WTF on that one. I can see the school having them not wear the shirts after warning them first, but having him arrested and charges? Ther had better be much more to this than a simple tshirt for that!

[Danger07]

What in the world was he charged with!!??

[Tronster]

He's being charged with obstruction and disruption of the educational indoctrination...er, I mean process.

[Holland&Holland]

May be a hair cut would help.

[photogpat]

Does a student really get arrested and suspended when they "did not become aggressive"? I know plenty of educators (on our side even) who don't push the big red "POLICE ARREST HANDCUFF" button unless its really, REALLY, R-E-A-L-L-Y called for.

The kid had a point on the freedom of speech thing - but depending on his reaction to being confronted, I could potentially also see the educator's response being in context. Its like the exercise of any other protected speech/right/etc -- you get violent in response to a confrontation, and your image and credibility (and that of your message) starts to backslide quickly.

[Heffay]

May be a hair cut would help.

That's the first thing I noticed. I thought to myself "Noone with a hair cut like that who wears sleeveless t-shirts has a spotless record."

[goalie]

Does a student really get arrested and suspended when they "did not become aggressive"? I know plenty of educators (on our side even) who don't push the big red "POLICE ARREST HANDCUFF" button unless its really, REALLY, R-E-A-L-L-Y called for.

The kid had a point on the freedom of speech thing - but depending on his reaction to being confronted, I could potentially also see the educator's response being in context. Its like the exercise of any other protected speech/right/etc -- you get violent in response to a confrontation, and your image and credibility (and that of your message) starts to backslide quickly.

The educators you know don't really reflect upon the ones you don't.

I would hope that it would take extraordinary circumstances for the police to be called, but, sadly, in today's schools, I wouldn't bet serious money one way or the other. They didn't charge him with assault, they charged him with disrupting the indoctrination process.....

[photogpat]

The educators you know don't really reflect upon the ones you don't.

I would hope that it would take extraordinary circumstances for the police to be called, but, sadly, in today's schools, I wouldn't bet serious money one way or the other. They didn't charge him with assault, they charged him with disrupting the indoctrination process.....

True enough. I've guess I've always thought of the primary education system as being "slow" to call for law enforcement intervention, and much more apt to dealing with things "in house". I may need to update my thinking.

[tman]

I've got a couple of useless points to add.

First, this 8th Grader is taller than his dad. Holy crap!

Second, the police confirmed that he'd been arrested and charged. That means they gave out what would, in MN, be private data on a juvenile. I wonder if WV has different laws about that...

[lizard55033]

just unreal!

[Tronster]

I'm not hating on teachers, most of them do a great job and I've been fortunate to have some go the extra mile for me. Even my own Mother in Law has been a 6th grade English teacher for 40 years and all the students love her.

However, there are a few bad apples out there and I wouldn't be surprised if this teacher was a "your opinion doesn't count cause I know better" type. I distinctly remember a 7th grade history teacher that would spend the first 10 minutes of every class telling us how we were worthless dumb kids and would never amount to anything. I still wonder how on earth he kept his job so long.

[gearguy10]

I guarantee the school did not ask him to turn the shirt inside out because it was an NRA shirt, rather they did so because of the rifle depicted on the front. Most schools have policies against wearing clothing that depicts weapons, esp. guns. I was wondering about this story when I first heard about it and the picture of the actual shirt told me everything. The kid and his parents are trying to play it off as a first amendment infringement. The NRA logo or reference to the 2nd amendment have nothing to do with it. The image of a gun is considered a distraction and disruptive to the learning environment the second someone has a problem with it. If a single kid goes to a teacher and says, "Billy's shirt bothers me," the gig is up. The Supreme Court has found that students have limited free speech rights in schools. This is the same reason you can't wear your favorite Lynyrd Skynyrd concert shirt with a Southern flag on it.

And you know this isn't this kid's first rodeo in the office. He walked into school that day looking for a fight because someone told him there's no way the school could fight it and he got his misguided rear end handed to him. To paraphrase an old song: "He fought the law and the law won."

[gearguy10]

I should add that another student doesn't even need to complain about the shirt. If administration even thinks the shirt will cause a disruption they can head it off by disallowing it.

[Lights]

Sure am glad my kids school is more open minded. They have like six t-shirts with guns on them and a couple of Hornady t-shirts with bullets and zombi's. All three of my kids have longer than normal hair and are leaders at school and at Church. Oh ya and I used to wear one of them Lynyrd Skynyrd concert shirt's. So I guess we are looked down on by some because of what we wear and how long are hair is. Do some of you really think before you type?