My apologies–it sounded like you were saying this was an honest mistake on their part, but on second reading, it looks like you’re defending them by saying there are facts not come to light. Is that a correct reading?
If you don’t allow gang sings then you can’t allow parodies, this should be obvious. Preppy white kids throwing up gang signs should be suspended just as long as black thugs doing it.
Other than that I said “probably”, yes. There are probably facts that we are not aware of relating to why one kid was initially singled out.
This is more likely than that one black kid was singled out from among many black and white kids due to racism, as you suggested.
for the win.
Be! Repressive!
B-E-Repressive!
Word.
That’s fucked up.
Not sure how that fixes anything. The discriminatory horse is out of the barn.
The point is that, even if these were gang signs, a suspension is not the appropriate punishment. The appropriate punishment was to tell them to stop making the sign before the picture, or making them have to take the picture again if they didn’t catch it when they should have.
And, BTW, my junior yearbook actually contains a photo of three girls making this sign–or at least a variation with the middle and ring figure crossed. And we were so obsessed with gangs that we had rules against wearing gang colors in a town that has no gangs. In fact, the half of the dress code was devoted to gang stuff (the other half being devoted to modesty).
I bet students treated this way end up forming actual gangs.