Student Protesting and Consequences

[LordKiran]

I have two comments about your posts...

First, from a purely civil rights perspective, the purpose of the protest must remain immaterial. So yes, if 50 students wanted to skip a half-day of school to join a local protest about Trump's stupid wall, they have exactly the same rights and protections as these students protesting against gun violence inside their schools.

From an optices point of view, it certainly makes a big difference, but not from a legal one (imo)

Let me try to give an analogy to what I was trying to write. People can categorize "causes for redress" or "free speech cases" with political impartiality. Each set can still be subdivided with impartiality and unbiased, objective methodologies. Here's an analogy: this forum. You have a rule that posts cannot discuss moderation. So this means you can divide posts into at least two types: (1) regular posts and (2) posts that discuss concrete moderation efforts. The distinction is impartial and objective, i.e. fair, not biased toward any particular political persuasion.

Perhaps I am wrong on some specifics of exactly/precisely what the term "content neutral" is recognized to mean in all the case law. I am not sure if it matters. I think what matters is impartiality.

Second, I am going to go back to my point about parental permission - if the 50 kids leaving early to protest for Trump's wall have written permission from their parents, I don't believe that any school anywhere in the U.S. has the right or authority to punish the student with a suspension.

Should young adults have political rights beyond those approved by their parents? To what extent does this affect their rights in school? Moreover, if the school itself is at the heart of the political issue--i.e. such as perceived significantly unsafe conditions--should young adults have the legal right to protest it? Are there other analogies such as worker strikes or prison protests that fall in the same category? Also, green beans. Everything is exactly the same as green beans.

Adolescents are young people comming into their own for the first time. It would sure be nice if their first introduction to the larger world wasn't through the filter of a jailhouse safe space from which they are legally confined in for a set amount of time each day.

I can honestly say I'd rather they live in a chaotic risky world than the one's proposed by the likes of the NRA. I can honestly say next to that I'd rather just do nothing.

 

[LordKiran]

Also its worth noting that "18 being the point at which one becomes an adult with rights" Is a new invention.

It wasn't so long ago that today's adolescents would have been recognized as fully grown men and women. And it is only recently that we've begun to curtail their sense of independance and it started with first curtailing their rights as citizens.

 

[Angry Floof]

This thread has nothing to do with that. It's about school policies with respect to speech.

Bullshit. It's about children not getting shot at school. Something one of you Inspector Javerts here compared to complaining about cafeteria food. Is there anything at all that could give your rigid authority worship pause?

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

No law is absolute, and truancy is not a life threatening problem. School shootings are. What is it about kids demanding safer schools that is so challenging for you? Is it because it threatens your authority-worshiping identity? Do you not notice that your pretend concern about truancy is just an excuse to assert your inhumane punishment mentality? Get a fucking grip. Children are being murdered. How are you so unaware of what you and your ilk are revealing by focusing on punishing these kids? They are not truants. They're not bad students. They're not skipping class for the fuck of it. They are protesting being fucking murdered. You have no moral ground here.

You know what you remind me of? Those sociopathic brats who harassed and chased a woman who was panhandling. When they chased her to her car, which was parked at a McDonald's, these vapid little turds got so excited to report to the McDonald's employee that the woman was parked in their lot without buying something. GASP! The microscopic bullshit unaware petty moralizers will grasp onto and pretend it's important only so they can justify their habitual, mindless hatred is astounding.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Well, fortunately we have a Constitution to protect us from the fascist impulses of totalitarian assholes. Like you.

Well that is a convenient retort in lieu of answering the question. At what point DO human lives matter to you more than worshiping rules?

This thread has nothing to do with that. It's about school policies with respect to speech.

Speech or assembly or both? The content of which is about trauma and survival. Why is it only a singular thing to you?

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

This thread has nothing to do with that. It's about school policies with respect to speech.

Bullshit. It's about children not getting shot at school. Something one of you Inspector Javerts here compared to complaining about cafeteria food. Is there anything at all that could give your rigid authority worship pause?

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

To be fair the op references the first amendment which is about speech and assembly, not just speech. The protestors argue they may be murdered and are constantly afraid. Not green beans. It's a news post, not a confined argument merely to speech. It's latest breaking news. I deliberately posted facts without posting my own argument initially. Others created arguments only looking at speech, others only at truancy, but the real issue is what it is without the need to frame it as a single thing.

 

[dismal]

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

No law is absolute, and truancy is not a life threatening problem. School shootings are. What is it about kids demanding safer schools that is so challenging for you? Is it because it threatens your authority-worshiping identity? Do you not notice that your pretend concern about truancy is just an excuse to assert your inhumane punishment mentality? Get a fucking grip. Children are being murdered. How are you so unaware of what you and your ilk are revealing by focusing on punishing these kids? They are not truants. They're not bad students. They're not skipping class for the fuck of it. They are protesting being fucking murdered. You have no moral ground here.

You know what you remind me of? Those sociopathic brats who harassed and chased a woman who was panhandling. When they chased her to her car, which was parked at a McDonald's, these vapid little turds got so excited to report to the McDonald's employee that the woman was parked in their lot without buying something. GASP! The microscopic bullshit unaware petty moralizers will grasp onto and pretend it's important only so they can justify their habitual, mindless hatred is astounding.

Where have I said kids can't demand safe schools?

More tiresome bullshit strawman arguments. You apparently have no ability to respond to an argument someone is actually making. Zero. None.

 

[dismal]

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

To be fair the op references the first amendment which is about speech and assembly, not just speech. The protestors argue they may be murdered and are constantly afraid. Not green beans. It's a news post, not a confined argument merely to speech. It's latest breaking news. I deliberately posted facts without posting my own argument initially. Others created arguments only looking at speech, others only at truancy, but the real issue is what it is without the need to frame it as a single thing.

The only position I have taken in the thread has been with respect to speech and viewpoint discrimination. If you are debating with me against my position, that I have actually taken, then you are engaged in a debate about speech.

If you imagine you are having a debate with me about something else it's on you. I am not responsible for your strawmen and assorted delusions.

 

[Angry Floof]

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

No law is absolute, and truancy is not a life threatening problem. School shootings are. What is it about kids demanding safer schools that is so challenging for you? Is it because it threatens your authority-worshiping identity? Do you not notice that your pretend concern about truancy is just an excuse to assert your inhumane punishment mentality? Get a fucking grip. Children are being murdered. How are you so unaware of what you and your ilk are revealing by focusing on punishing these kids? They are not truants. They're not bad students. They're not skipping class for the fuck of it. They are protesting being fucking murdered. You have no moral ground here.

You know what you remind me of? Those sociopathic brats who harassed and chased a woman who was panhandling. When they chased her to her car, which was parked at a McDonald's, these vapid little turds got so excited to report to the McDonald's employee that the woman was parked in their lot without buying something. GASP! The microscopic bullshit unaware petty moralizers will grasp onto and pretend it's important only so they can justify their habitual, mindless hatred is astounding.

Where have I said kids can't demand safe schools?

More tiresome bullshit strawman arguments. You apparently have no ability to respond to an argument someone is actually making. Zero. None.

It's about you and your ilk thinking you get to say how they will protest. They are walking out of school for that very reason - because school is where they are not safe. Protesting elsewhere after school would hardly be noticed and would even be hypocritical if they are serious about their schools being safe. They are protesting against some minor rules for reasons that are more important than any rule or argument you have put forth. They're doing it to make a difference on an issue that is actually important, more important than old right wingers yelling at the sky. They're breaking a rule that does not compare to the issue they are protesting. GO FUCKING CRY ABOUT IT.

 

[dismal]

Where have I said kids can't demand safe schools?

More tiresome bullshit strawman arguments. You apparently have no ability to respond to an argument someone is actually making. Zero. None.

It's about you and your ilk thinking you get to say how they will protest. They are walking out of school for that very reason - because school is where they are not safe. Protesting elsewhere after school would hardly be noticed and would even be hypocritical if they are serious about their schools being safe. They are protesting against some minor rules for reasons that are more important than any rule or argument you have put forth. They're doing it to make a difference on an issue that is actually important, more important than old right wingers yelling at the sky. They're breaking a rule that does not compare to the issue they are protesting. GO FUCKING CRY ABOUT IT.

No. Try to follow along: my ilk is saying government can't engage in viewpoint discrimination. This is not just my opinion, it is the law. My ilk includes the Supreme Court justices.

 

[laughing dog]

Where have I said kids can't demand safe schools?

More tiresome bullshit strawman arguments. You apparently have no ability to respond to an argument someone is actually making. Zero. None.

It's about you and your ilk thinking you get to say how they will protest. They are walking out of school for that very reason - because school is where they are not safe. Protesting elsewhere after school would hardly be noticed and would even be hypocritical if they are serious about their schools being safe. They are protesting against some minor rules for reasons that are more important than any rule or argument you have put forth. They're doing it to make a difference on an issue that is actually important, more important than old right wingers yelling at the sky. They're breaking a rule that does not compare to the issue they are protesting. GO FUCKING CRY ABOUT IT.

No. Try to follow along: my ilk is saying government can't engage in viewpoint discrimination. This is not just my opinion, it is the law. My ilk includes the Supreme Court justices.

Do you have any reason to believe these schools are engaging in viewpoint discrimination? If so, provide it. Otherwise, it appears you have simply been adding irrelevancy to the OP.

 

[Elixir]

my ilk is saying government can't engage in viewpoint discrimination.

Your ilk is an idiot. But it is not being discriminated against. It is free to protest - or even walk out of school (Oh, the horror!) if your ilk is regularly being murdered at its desk.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

No, this thread is about school policies with respect to speech. Or at least every post I have made here is. You can start another thread if you want about whether murdering students is good. I probably won't participate. For the record, I think it's bad. Your pathetic act of trying to twist my position about speech into support for murder is tiresome.

It's entirely possible to be against both murder and the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination. Indeed our laws manage to handle being against both.

Now, see if you can actually address what I actually post instead of setting up some silly unrelated strawman to rage against.

To be fair the op references the first amendment which is about speech and assembly, not just speech. The protestors argue they may be murdered and are constantly afraid. Not green beans. It's a news post, not a confined argument merely to speech. It's latest breaking news. I deliberately posted facts without posting my own argument initially. Others created arguments only looking at speech, others only at truancy, but the real issue is what it is without the need to frame it as a single thing.

The only position I have taken in the thread has been with respect to speech and viewpoint discrimination. If you are debating with me against my position, that I have actually taken, then you are engaged in a debate about speech.

If you imagine you are having a debate with me about something else it's on you. I am not responsible for your strawmen and assorted delusions.

No, that isn't the only position you took. You took a position that this is only a free speech issue nothing more.

 

[dismal]

So, I guess it's settled. "Progressives" here want the government to engage in viewpoint discrimination and censor and punish those views that government does not support.

Of course, "government" here is Trump, the Republican White Suptemacists in congress and these Texas school officials who don't support these student protests. At least we've established the government should be able to punish the shit out of these students.

Progressivism always feels so much like fascism.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

So, I guess it's settled. "Progressives" here want the government to engage in viewpoint discrimination and censor and punish those views that government does not support.

Of course, "government" here is Trump, the Republican White Suptemacists in congress and these Texas school officials who don't support these student protests. At least we've established the government should be able to punish the shit out of these students.

Progressivism always feels so much like fascism.

Best response is from you:

If you imagine you are having a debate with me about something else it's on you. I am not responsible for your strawmen and assorted delusions.

 

[Horatio Parker]

If anyone is engaging in viewpoint discrimination, it's the schools threatening protestors with suspension or lockdown.

 

[laughing dog]

So, I guess it's settled. "Progressives" here want the government to engage in viewpoint discrimination and censor and punish those views that government does not support.

I am just wondering what type of person can routinely and consistently come up with the most egregious straw men. Does it indicate a lsupreme lack of intellectual ability or a lack of intellectual honesty?

 

[dismal]

If anyone is engaging in viewpoint discrimination, it's the schools threatening protestors with suspension or lockdown.

So, you're against the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination now?

The government not engaging in viewpoint discrimination would mean they enforce their existing policies on absence, disruption of class, whatever, right?

 

[ronburgundy]

I think that the idea isn't merely about First Amendment but the First Amendment as it applies to the current location of the walk out. So, it's like saying "This place isn't safe. I am going to use my free speech and free peaceful, assembly to walk out of this unsafe place and demand policy change to make it safer."

So, to repoman, if a million students believe they need a wall to make their schools safe, then they might organize a similar protest. That would make the analogy better. Of course, you might also show some evidence of kids dying in school due to not having a wall to help your case, but it isn't clear that is necessary.

I am not really seeing a response to this.

So there appears to be a meme here of content neutrality or "if they can protest a particular x in X, then they can protest any x in X."

My comment was meant to indicate that X might be a smaller subset of the world of politics, in this case such things that the students think directly affects their survival in school.

So, if the school beats them every day, then they might walk out in protest. Or if the school does not provide lunch, recess, and toilet paper then they might walk out in protest. This sort of set of things is much less than the set X. It's a subset lesser than X, an X' if you will. So maybe we're talking about X' c X. And we're talking if they can protest particular x in X', then maybe they can protest any x in X', which is a different question than the meme from detractors.

To give some more concrete examples... Suppose there was a church in town that beat the students. Ought the students walk out of school to protest? That would be an x in X, but not an x in X'.

This is actually a non-political functional difference that remains content-neutral.

So far:
*crickets*

It's complicated. I agree with what these students are protesting for, but there is no way to deny that it is a political protest and if the school treats it differently than any other protest, it is taking a political stand and a partisan position.
Changing the rule for this protest is not content neutral, because protests are inherently political. They are not protesting the mere lack of safety. That would be silly and like protesting reality. No one wants them to be unsafe, except the shooters, so they wouldn't be protesting to anyone if that were their message. And objectively they are safer in schools than when they leave to protest, go home, or almost anywhere else. Overall violence and other threats to safety in schools are lower now than in the past, despite an increase in the threat posed specifically by mass shootings (which is a tiny % of the violent threats students face).

The same government that makes the laws they are protesting are who you are saying should decide whether the students have a valid political point. And if the school were to use objective facts, then the facts would be that the kids are far safer being in class than outside of it. Although being the victim of a mass shooting at school in more today, school is still on of the safest place for kids, and overall safer than it was in the past. If they were fleeing an actual shooter, then your analogy to a church beating its students would be valid. But they are not, they are actually reducing their safety by leaving class in order to make a political point about specific policies they want changed in order to reduce one specific type of safety threat that they personally have near zero chance of actually encountering.

Again, I agree that they should protest, and that even most the teachers and administrators should protest as well. However, that is separate from whether the consequences of such protests should be any different, which would mean that the body determining those consequences is punishing political speech based on content.

 

[Horatio Parker]

If anyone is engaging in viewpoint discrimination, it's the schools threatening protestors with suspension or lockdown.

So, you're against the government engaging in viewpoint discrimination now?

I'm not aware that I was ever for it. Got a cite? Or do you prefer to swing wildly?

The government not engaging in viewpoint discrimination would mean they enforce their existing policies on absence, disruption of class, whatever, right?

Which means that protest related infractions can't be punished any more harshly. If an unexcused absence doesn't normally warrant suspension, school authorities can't single out protesters.

 

[Toni]

Why should skipping school by a young adult for a reasonable reason be a black mark at all, if they are willing to make up the work?

Indeed. And why must there be any reasonable reason? And who decides what is reasonable. Let them skip. And if they areate with their assignment or fail the exam at the end of term, that's on them. Let them make their own decisions and accept their own responsibility. If they can skip and still pull off an A good for them, and if they skip and wind up failing, that's their own damn fault.

In the US, school boards and administration decide what is reasonable. Parental and teacher input is accepted if not always decisive. Students in upper grades also have input about what is reasonable. There is no single, central repository of school rules in the US. These are determined locally, at the school district level, although there is often a tie in to school funding that is based upon average daily attendance of students (sometimes broken down by demographic groups).

For example, I am relatively certain that survivors of school shootings are given a great deal of latitude with regards to school attendance so that they can have their own physical and emotional wounds tended, see counselors, and attend funerals of classmates.

Personally, I appreciated my school's flexibility when my mother was hospitalized for 6 months and sometimes, I missed a day of school due to this and related family issues.