What is the core Constitutional right you feel is at stake here? The right of high school coaches to never have anyone say anything mean about them, even under circumstances where they would be unlikely to ever hear about it? You’re gonna have to point out which clause of the Constitution covers that.
If she had submitted that statement in writing to the cheer coach, I would agree with that interpretation. But she didn’t. If I tell the guy on the next barstool that my boss is an asshole, that doesn’t constitute me resigning from my position.
No, if her behavior causes that sort of concern, then she shouldn’t be on the team.
Does saying “Fuck cheer” rise to that level of concern?
I say no.
Yeah, cool, but I don’t care? I’m not disputing that such rules exist, I’m saying I don’t know what the legal reasoning is that squares those rules with the first amendment protections on freedom of association. If the only reason is, “It’s disrespectful,” then I don’t agree that’s a sufficient reason to suspend someone’s civil rights.
That’s literally the opposite of how it works.
The law requires this girl to attend a school. It does not require her to attend that school.
Her parents may prefer her to attend that school, or they may feel that they have no good alternative. But the legal requirement can be satisfied in multiple ways.
The heart of the school’s mission is being able to break the law and not be held accountable for it? What if a student files rape charges against a teacher? That’s certain to cause a controversy that will substantially disrupt school operations. Do you think the school has the right to discipline the student for filing those charges?
True. But if you post it on Snapchat and then someone screencaps that and shows it to the boss, or if you speak it loud enough for others in the bar to hear it, you better hope the boss is a tolerant guy.
But part of this is another important lesson for those involved: online media are not per se private. If it’s on the screen it can be a screencap… and then you’ve got 'splainin to do.
Yeah, you’re super wrong here. The specific question asked by this case is if the student getting kicked off the cheer team violated her constitutional rights. So far as I’m aware, she hasn’t faced any additional punishments from the school other than that.
As a constitutional issue, I would hold that off campus speech is only actionable by the school if they can show that it has an impact on in-school activities.
Here, arguably, that might be the case - if it became a topic of conversation amongst the team, or if it eroded the coaches’ confidence in her commitment, then they should be able to kick her off the team.
But I don’t think some general policy of policing student conduct 24/7 should be tolerable, and I don’t think the mere act of saying something that would be prohibited on school grounds should be disciplinable by the school, if said outside the confines of the school.
Sure. But, unless your boss is the government, there’s no constitutional issue with your boss firing you for saying mean things about him on your free time.
There have been a lot of tangents, discussion of related hypothetical cases like “what if they had suspended or expelled her?”, and discussion of whether the school’s actions were reasonable. But AFAICT nobody in this thread has taken the position that getting thrown off the cheerleading team was itself a violation of her Constitutional rights. Obviously some courts have taken that position, though, or we wouldn’t be talking about it.
Sure, your boss could fire you. But he couldn’t then get out of paying you unemployment based on the argument that your comment in the bar constituted you voluntarily quitting.
I… don’t think they have? The only use of the word “expel” or “expelled” in this thread was in your post, and I don’t recall anyone talking about her being suspended from anything other than the cheerleading team.
I’m very confused now. Was this not you, earlier in the thread?
Yes, but if you read the whole post, I prefaced that part by saying it had been written under the false impression that she had been suspended. When I realized she had only been thrown off the team, my opinion changed.
Ah, right, sorry, I didn’t see that.
Still, I’m pretty sure you’re the only one who was under that misimpression. I’ve certainly been arguing about her suspension from the cheerleading squad, specifically.
Aside, does anyone knwo who is fronting the legal bills of the school in this case? I highly doubt that any school district has enough money lying around to take a case all the way to the supreme court just to justify their decision to kick some bratty kid off their JV cheerleading team 4 years ago.
I know the ACLU can take the girls side but what group is supporting the anti-free speech side.
Sidebar, please.
What is the “Varsity squad” in this context?
Of course they can. The question is whether or not there will be consequences if that disagreement includes the word ‘fuck’. This is an extracurricular, voluntary, enrichment activity made available to students, and one of the concepts, whether spoken, written or not, is that participants will be respectful of the staff, and not disruptive of the activity.
Posting complaints to other participants is potentially disruptive, and suspending a disruptive person from a voluntary activity is a legitimate response.
What she should be learning from this is not to post shit about your supervisor on the internet, because you can lose a hell of a lot more than your position on the JV cheer squad.
Large enough schools often divide their sports programs into varsity and junior varsity squads. The junior varsity squad is basically a training squad for freshmen and others who want to participate but aren’t good enough to be on the more competitive varsity squad. The varsity cheerleaders are the ones who show up at all the big football and basketball games, while the junior squad gets stuck with events like wrestling and swim meets.
Thanks. Why “varsity”? What does that mean?