No Love at Howell High
Painted Over Homophobic Graffiti, Students Suspended
Updated 16 May 2005: ‘Love’ artist checks in, clarifies and corrects article. See bottom of post for details.
A teacher at Howell High in the Howell Public School District watched on as four students covered up some rude anti-gay graffiti in front of their school and then painted their own message, “Love”, on a stone in front of the school. The teacher then reported them for vandalism and they were all suspended for three days.
The affair resulted in about 375 students staging a protest on Tuesday. They skipped class and demonstrated in front of the school.
Principal Margaret Hamill said that she empathized with their position, but that the school was only following disciplinary procedures outlined in the code of conduct.
“Although that (the word ‘love’) is a beautiful message? instead of using sidewalk chalk that we could wash out, they used spray-paint,” Hamill said.
I wonder if the teacher was reprimanded for standing idly by while the students performed a punishable act in front of him/her. The powers of loci parentis do come with some responsibility to monitor and protect, after all.
Three days of suspension for painting “Love” on a rock might seem like excessive punishment but the school is “just following procedures” so don’t blame them. In fact, don’t blame them for heaping even more punishment on the four spray paint vigilantes.
The school is considering how to punish the four students in addition to the suspension. Officials say whatever the penalty the four students will be able to graduate.
If the additional punishment is anything other than “clean the graffiti off of the rock” I would say it is time to turn that peaceful protest into a full fledged boycott.
UPDATE 16 May 2005
Shayna, one of the four students involved in the incident, has commented to correct several facts in the story:
- The rock itself was paintable by students. Originally it held information on the school musical who’s lead is gay. It was then defaced with the anti-gay message which was in turn covered by the “Love” message.
- The students were not observed by a teacher. They were discovered by a police patrol Sunday evening and turned themselves in Monday morning.
- They did not get in trouble for painting the rock but for painting on sidewalks and benches around the school.
- The sidewalks, benches and trees around the school are regularly painted by students. Shayna is unaware of any other students ever being disciplined for doing so and reports that teachers encourage this form of expression.
- The students were suspended for 10 days, not 3.
- The students offered to clean up the graffiti but the school refused.
- The other punishments the school is considering include 20 hours community service, suspension for the rest of the school year, paying 25% of the clean-up cost, and bans from senior activities like senior night, the senior picnic and graduation.
That’s stupid. We had a senior rock outside of our high school and we were allowed to paint it if we wanted to.
> I wonder if the teacher was reprimanded
> for standing idly by while the students
> performed a punishable act in front of
> him/her.
“Well, I would have acted sooner, but I was afraid of what the gang might do to me!”
My high school also had a “senior rock” which was painted each year by the senior class.
On the other hand, if you had spray-painted any other rocks, you probably would have been punished for vandalism. (What the punishment was, beyond paying for the cleanup, I don’t recall.)
Why is it so important that kids “express” themsleves. This is not a zero intelligence thing — tihis is simply a vandalism thing. Otherwise, who gets to decide what a “good” message is?
Exactly - there’s another post here about students getting slammed for the un-PC content of their graffiti. Now you’re arguing that other students shouldn’t be punished because their graffiti was PC. You can’t have it both ways. Vandalism is a PROPERTY CRIME and the message involved is irrelevant. Who gets to decide what graffiti toes the party line, which spray painted messages conform to official orthodoxy?
No, I’m not saying they shouldn’t have been reprimanded for their own graffiti. I’m saying:
1) The teacher should have stopped them BEFORE they spray painted the rock.
2) A three day suspension is way overboard for a spray painted rock.
3) The circumstances should have been taken into consideration when meting out their punishment.
4) Looking for punishment in addition to a three day suspension is retarded.
Jim,
1. Maybe the teacher should have spoken up, but I don’t see enough information about the chain of events to make that a certainty. How many students were there, how late was it, how isolated is the location - i.e. what was the whole personal security picture for the teacher?
2. A 3 day suspension seems reasonable for an act of vandalism. Forget the circumstances - it’s a basic lack of consideration for the limits of action on property that doesn’t belong to the actor.
3. What circumstances are there that aren’t content/message related, and hence, unconstitutional to take into consideration?
4. Agreed, but I’ll withhold condemnation until we see whether they actually choose to apply additional punishment.
The circumstances surrounding the painting was they were covering up “some rude anti-gay graffiti” and then replaced it with the word “love”.
Had they simply covered up the anti-gay graffiti, would they still have been suspended? Isn’t that still “vandalism”?
As for the “senior rock”, I doubt that one could be accused of vandalism when the rock has been designated a place for such paintings. (Any more than the kids that paint halloween scenes on store windows as part of a contest are “vandalizing” those windows.)
hello…so i am one of these 4 students that you speak of and as much as i love seeing something i did on your website i do need to correct you. this story is not all together acurate. first of all we are allowed to paint on the rock. the anti gay message was painted on the rock over the message we had painted telling peolpe about the school musical…the lead happens to be gay. me and my 3 friends saw this and decided to paint over the rude message on the rock. this is not why we are in trouble. we are in trouble beacuse we got a little out of hand and continued to paint the word love on the side walks and benches all around the school we didnt know we were doing anything wrong beacuse the side walks, benches, trees and light posts had been painted on many many times before and no one had ever been punished. infact teachers had encouraged it. another thing…there was no teacher watching us. the cops found us late sunday night while driving past the school. we turned our selves into the shcool on monday morning. and its not just 3 days its 10 days and now we are going to a hearing with the shcool board where they will decide if they want to put the following punishments on us or not: 20 hours community service, susspended for the rest of the school year, not being able to participate in any other senior activites such as walking at graduation, the senior picnic, the senior all night, etc. and paying 25% of the restitution. we have said that we are willing to pay the 25% and take the 10 suspension but find the rest to be to exsesive seeing as we didnt know we were doing anytyhing wrong and that no one has ever been punished before us. also they would not allow us to help clean any of it up…so the idea of maing us clean it up as part of our punishment is out of the question beacuse they did not allow it even though we offered many times. that is the true story…
Shayna,
When you say the benches, etc., had been painted in the past and no one had been punished, do you mean the parties who painted them were known/caught/turned themselves in, or was the lack of punishment more a matter of failure to catch those responsible?
“At Howell Public Schools, we commit all our energy and resources in support of our students while they’re with us,so that they will shine in the world when they leave us.”
Well, Shayna, since the stated mission of your school district is to commit EVERYTHING in SUPPORT of students, it sure sounds like the school board needs to consider the case in a helpful, supportive manner, and take into account all the circumstances you’ve described.
no they had been seen/caught painting before infact teachers had sent students out during class time to paint…it was never a secret…they just seem to want to make an example of us. i agree that they do need to have a look at the mission statement.
I go to Howell High School and I wanted to let everyone on this post know that the students are now supsended for the rest of the year and as of right now, not allowed to walk at graduation. They are still in the appeals process, but it isnt looking good. The students who painted the sidewalks and benches before had not necesarily been caught, but they painted thier names and did it during school hours. If the school cared that much they could have been caught and punished.
Also, during the protest, a counterprotest formed and the 25 or so kids involved shouted obscene hateful things to the protesters. The security guards for the school stood and watched as the peaceful protesters shouted obscenities of the worst kind. Imagine “f-ing fs!!!”In our code of conduct on page 60, obscene language is listed as having a punishment of 10 days suspension or more. Hate crimes are listed on the first page as a reason for expulsion. The langueage they used was hate language, it was a hate crime. Guess what the students recieved as punishment??? 2 days suspension and teh seniors are allowed to walk at graduation. Ask the school board why the students promoting love recieved a code of conduct outlined punishment and why the hateful people recieved a small punishment even though they deserve expulsion…
I don’t need to ask - that part is obvious. It sounds like an outdoor protest, outside the jurisdiction for schools to restrain speech. Let’s see, spoken words vs. painting on property one doesn’t own - seems pretty clear.
The more I read, the more I wonder what we are NOT hearing about this situation. If we are to take everything Sian and Shayna said at face value, then the only possible reason there isn’t a lawsuit filed yet would be for the parents of all the suspended students to be morons. Clearly, if the ACLU isn’t jumping all over this, there’s an aspect we’re not hearing about.
I thought the protests took place in front of the school. That’s still school property and school rules should still apply.
Hey Sian! Great to see someone I know here! Don’t worry about all of that too much they lawyer knows about that and we plan to use it at the hearing tomorrow! But they haven’t said that we are out for the rest of the year yet…we will know for sure tomorrow.
Dear dweeb…the protest took place on school property therefore what they do or say is completely punishable by the school. Seems pretty clear to me that if they can allow for security guards to stand outside and watch the non-peaceful protestors while they say these hateful and inappropriate things, not to mention the guards were socializing with these students then it must be within their Jurisdiction. It happened on school grounds during school hours. The peaceful protest was Okayed by the Principal; as long as it stayed peaceful. The counter protest was neither okayed nor peaceful! As for you calling my parents morons I do have to strongly disagree…all 3 of our parents are dealing with this the schools way first. Seems logical to me…they haven’t given us any punishment other than 10 day suspensions. We will know if there is more after tomorrow’s hearings with the school board! So there is not a reason for a law suit yet. As for the ACLU, there is no reason for them to be involved either…if at some point there is I’m sure it will happen but I must tell you that we have not told them about it so it is possible, slightly, that they don’t even know about it…why bring more people into the situation then necessary?
dweeb -
As you probably already know, a number of constitutional rights that most Americans take for granted (your free speech comment suggests being only one) are lost by students once they enter (enter meaning under the jurisdiction of the school at the time and the protest protest fits in this category) a public school. As for the no lawsuit, more info is needed but with what is posted, what would the cause of action be? Anti-gay comments are NOT hate crimes (or any other type of crime) in many areas (although in many areas thay are) and there is really nothing that can be done specifically about those types of tasteless (IMO) acts.
second point - both the protests and the wrting on the rock are types of “speech” - again, the school setting limits this and the painting, again depending on the facts (e.g. teacher endorsement of painting) is vandalism.
Observer, you’re missing something - I’m not talking about hate crime issues - hate crime laws are the worst assault on the constitution.
What I’m talking about is that there appears to be a differential in punishment based on the ideas being expressed, not the time, manner or language used in expressing them, which is a CLEAR free speech issue.
Shayna, I’m not trying to insult your parents, but if they haven’t consulted a lawyer yet, they’re seriously behind on this. If you think the school’s actions are justified, why not roll over and surrender? Clearly you don’t - and thus, yes, you should already be pursuing this more aggressively.
Dear Dweeb-
I have to ask you to not make comments when you are not fully aware of the situation. As a matter of fact the parents of the students DO have a lawyer. I know because I am one of the four students who has been suspended for “vandalism”.
Something that you have to understand about Howell High School, up until now it has been perfectly acceptable to paint on the sidewalks and benches, as Shayna pointed out. So it seems odd to me that we’re being punished at all, when no one ever has before.
Another thing that people should be made aware of is that our school has special rules for Seniors in their final quarter, which the three (out of four) of us who are facing severe consequences are. The school administrators have been hiding behind this section of our code of conduct telling us that all they are doing is enforcing that.
However they have shown no consistency in doing this. A student came up to the ticket sales table for Pippin, our Spring Musical, and told students there that he was not going to pay money to “see some fag sing and dance on stage” this student was suspended for only two days. He is a graduating senior in his final quarter, just like us. Why is our punishment worse?
According to the school’s code of conduct, any act of hate (which INCLUDES hateful comments) is grounds for expulsion. This is one of our main issues with our punishment. It doesn’t fit the crime and other students have done worse and gotten off with less of a punishment.
Also the school officials have lied to us and exaggerated their authority over us. They threatened to make us do 20 hours of community service, which they have no authority to do, and they told us that if there was a protest they would hold it against us. When we told them that we had no power over whether or not the other students protested, they told us that we could tell them not to, because you no how much good that would have done.
It should also be mentioned that the four of us who have been suspended all have unblemished records with the school. We are all “good kids”. We have never been in trouble with the school before in any way. Whereas the student who made the hateful comment about my friend has an extensive record with the school. Another Student, who is the prime suspect of the original hate message (seeing as people have heard him claim that he did it) has barely been investigated at all. Because he’s the star of the football team.
In the case of the Assistant Pricipal who wrote our suspension forms, this is most definately a case of Zero Intelligence. However, I don’t know that all the administrators are as lacking in brain power as he is. He is the one who lied to us about his authority and as I sat making my arguments to him and looking him straight in the eye, I said to myself, “There is nothing going on in there”.
Vinnie, most people here have only what you, Shayna, and other locals tell us. If you don’t state the situation clearly, that’s no one’s problem but your own.
One problem I see is you seem to be basing your defense at least partially on your message being more worthy than that of your opponents, and that just won’t fly. ‘Hate,’ as you call it, is every bit a protected set of beliefs in this country as whatever you stand for. The very existence of the school’s anti-hate rules are just as much an injustice and insult to our constitution as anything that has happened to you. That football player has every right to get his message out that you do to get yours out, and given that you had the school auditorium and production facilities to promote ‘love,’ he can demand equal time to promote ‘hate.’ In that sense, it could be argued that his painting of the rock was more permissible than yours. This is the problem you run into when you base your defense on the value of your message - who is to say which message is more valid? Certainly not a government run school.
If there is any sound basis for your defense, it lies in a message-neutral comparison of ACTIONS, i.e. applying paint to public property, and showing that your ACTIONS didn’t differ from those of others who were not punished. This means showing how your actions are just like those of the football player, not differentiating them, because the minute you claim immunity because your message is ‘better’ than his, you open the door for the school to declare just the opposite, that his is ‘better’ than yours.
Hi from Ireland… congrats to the students for standing up to homophobia.
Dweeb-
The point of me telling you not to comment on things you don’t understand, was to get you to ask questions before you went and made yourself seem stupid. Too late.
We are not basing our defense on the purity of our message. And we didn’t have the use of the auditorium to promote love. We had it to do a play. If we wanted to do our own Love ceremony in the auditorium the school would have charged us one thousand dollars.
Our defense IS based on the similarity of our actions to those who came before us. But not to the people responsible for the Hate message. The only reason I mentioned the Code of Conduct’s ruling on acts of hate was to show that the school administrators are not enforcing the code equally.
As far as saying that they had the right to make that hate statement. That is false. They have every right to believe whatever they want. But they can’t paint it on our Rock. Producing hate literature is a Hate Crime, and Graffiti counts. I noticed that you said you hated Hate Crime Legislation, and I can see where you were coming from. But nobody should have the right to make my friend go through what he went through for this. And if Hate Crime laws are the only way to ensure that those responsible are at least punished, than I for one am all for them.
P.S. Thanks Fintan for your Support.
P.P.S. Sorry for calling you stupid Dweeb.
Vinnie and Shayna and the two other students who did this with you: much love from NYC!
dweeb,
I’m going to have to agree with Vinnie in all of this…mainly because I am also in the center of it and actually know what’s going on. Before I go on I would like to inform you of a few current events. First of all my mother has now written to the ACLU. this happened after the school administration passed down its final decision, the 3 of us will not be walking at graduation, we cannot attend any senior activities, we cannot go back to school for the rest of the year, and we have to pay restitution which is about $350 each.
Also the students who painted the original anti-gay message on the rock have been caught. 2 students came forward with an audio confession from the 2 freshman boys who are guilty. They have been expelled for 10 days and are facing possible prosecution from the school and expulsion. We have to wait and see if the school goes through with that or not but I’m sure we will keep you posted.
I need to clear up everything about Pippin. It seems that the general idea is that the musical is about a gay boy. Wrong. The musical is about the fictional son of King Charlemagne and his search for absolute fulfillment in his life. It has nothing to do with anyone being of a different sexual orientation. The student who was cast in the part of Pippin is, in reality, openly gay. That is why people were saying they wouldn’t buy tickets for the show, which is why they painted “god hates fags” on the rock over where we had painted an advertisement for Pippin. So as Vinnie pointed out, we did not have the auditorium to promote love.
as for blaming your ignorance about the situation on us…that’s crap because you could taken the time you spent writing your not-so-knowledgeable comments to us and gone on Google and looked up every single newspaper article there is on the subject, and there are many, and tried to understand the situation for yourself.
saying that ‘love’ is equal to ‘hate’….oh man I almost smacked my head on the desk when I read that…when you say that the schools rules against hate messages is unconstitutional you are not fully understanding public school. The school itself cannot allow for students to send messages of hate, they are seen as a form of a threat. And we all know that threats are not good. Schools are supposed to be a safe place for everyone and if they were to allow students to be threatening everyone and telling everyone all sorts of hateful things all the time then it wouldn’t be a safe environment. Parents wouldn’t send their kids there and then the school wouldn’t have students or money and would have to close. As it is schools don’t have money even when they do have students. It’s like if you were to send your child to day care and you found out that the employees were yelling obscenities around the kids, you probably wouldn’t send you child there anymore.
We are not saying our message is more valid. We are saying that our message is not listed under things that are grounds for expulsion, their message is. Also we are not saying that our actions were the same as the 2 freshman’s. We are saying that in times before this one people have spray painted the side walks for many other reasons, not hateful reasons, and had never been punished.
Shayna and Vinnie,
You both need to study the meaning and history of the First Amendment more. It doesn’t just protect ideas and messages that make you feel warm and fuzzy inside, it also protects ideas and messages that make you burn with anger, or feel sick to your stomach, or make you feel like crying, and if it didn’t, it would be meaningless. Sorry, but you can’t legitimately defend your actions without defending the actions of those two freshmen. The ONLY difference between what you did and what they did was the IDEAS and VIEWPOINTS of your message. The Constitution requires the government, and by extension the schools, to respond in a viewpoint-neutral manner.
In this, yes, hate and love ARE equivalent - they are both ideas. If we can ban the expression of hate, we can ban the expression of other ideas you might have more affinity for. Hate is not a threat. To say “I hate you” is no more a threat of violence than to say “I love you” is a threat of rape. Hatred is a protected belief structure, just like any religion or philosophy. Making hate speech a grounds for expulsion is to say that people who hate are less worthy of the freedoms we have in this country.
The purest form of the principles embodied in the First Amendment are found in Voltaire’s statement “I despise what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Shayna, you mentioned that your mother contacted the ACLU. Are you aware of some of the speech they’ve defended? Now it’s your turn to do a Google search - search on “ACLU Skokie Illinois” and read how the ACLU sued to allow nazis to march through a Jewish neighborhood with the most Holocaust survivors of any neighborhood in the USA. Why do you think nice people like the ACLU would stand up for something so downright nasty?
Vinnie, about the auditorium: Apparently, some students had the impression that your production, by virtue of the casting, amounted to promoting a viewpoint. Now, both you and Shayna have defended the suppression of hate speech based the impression of someone seeing/hearing it that it amounts to a threat. If we can suppress hate speech based on the impressions of some viewers, why can’t we ban your play from the public property based on the impressions of some observers? That’s the thing about free speech, it cuts both ways, and to be meaningful, it has to.
Vinnie, every American has the right to SAY whatever they want to your friend, and if it upsets him, that’s HIS problem. There is no right not to have your feelings hurt. When you called me stupid, that was your right. It’s up to me whether I let it bother me. “Sticks and stones” is where the line is drawn.
We all have to choose in life how much we’re going to conform to the expectations of others, and accept that they may not like us or be nice to us. That’s life. If you OR your friend don’t like peoples’ words, can use your own words to respond, and its apparent you have a good enough command of the language to do that. The response to speech is more speech, not the bludgeon of government.
Your responses don’t surprise me. Recent polls indicate high schools really aren’t teaching the First Amendment very well, with students believing that the media should have all news stories approved by the government.
Dweeb,
I don’t currently have enough time to fully respond to this right now but I will find time latter…but I needed to quickly tell you that we are not supporting the school in the fact that they call “hate Speech” grounds for expulsion we are merely saying that they are throwing the code of conduct at us so we are going to throw it right back after reviewing everything it says. if they wish to give us the maximum punishment for what we did excessive or not than they need to give the full punishment to everyone’s crimes, wrongs, mistakes, etc. as a matter of fact I know plenty about the first amendment I cant say that I know all about it but I know well enough that it supports ALL speech. In regards to the ACLU I was telling you that my parents had done this because you had used the fact that the ACLU was not involved as a reason to prove us to be not giving the full story. I don’t know about the ACLU nor does it matter my mom wrote to them, not me.
Dweeb-
I know what you are saying and i agree with some of it. However, The first amendment does NOT protect ALL speech. And more importantly, we’re not talking about the first amendment. We’re talking about the rules laid down by the school in the Code of Conduct. That’s what is important.
I am not even going to go in to whether or not the school has the authority to do half of the stuff that it does, I’m just going to argue based on their own rules. They’re the ones who are saying that hate comments or Literature are reasons for expulsion. I am just asking for that to be upheld, just as our punishment was.
To be honest dweeb it seems to me as though you are just playnig devil’s advocate here, and to be honest I don’t understand why. Do you agree with the original message? Do you really think we deserve to have all of our senior rights taken away? Our right to education in general? Or ARE you defending the side that you don’t agree with just for fun?
P.S. Thanks Eliot
To all those who say hatred of homosexuality is equally valid to acceptance of homosexuality, consider this. How can two ideas/statements that contradict each other BOTH be valid.
Thank you T.J., that’s an excelent point. As for Vinnie…you’r just plain awsome!
T.J. - I don’t believe anybody actually offered an opinion that hatred of homosexuality was as valid as acceptance of homosexuality. The point being made was that the statements of each opinion are equally valid and equally protected.
I guess my comment was a little light on explanation - let me elaborate. It isn’t difficult to establish that one of these viewpoints is superior (take a wild guess which one it is). There is no rational reason to hate homosexuals simply for the fact that they are homosexuals. No good could possibly come from holding such an attitude. In fact, much evil can come (and has come) from certain people who hold these attitudes. It is a well known fact that freedom of speech does not apply to speech that violates the rights of others. I don’t suggest that hate messages be censored by the government, but don’t expect me for one second to think that a hate message should ever be as EQUALLY protected as a non-hate message.
P.S. :
Sorry for drawing so much focus to the viewpoint aspect of the situation. From what Shayna and her friends say, it is clear that even in a viewpoint-neutral evaluation, the punishments recieved were excessive.
(Usual disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, and not a Constitutional expert, either.)
> To all those who say hatred of homosexuality
> is equally valid to acceptance of homosexuality,
> consider this. How can two ideas/statements that
> contradict each other BOTH be valid.
Because they are both ideas. Taking that statement to an absurd (yet somehow real) extreme, “how can two religions that contradict each other BOTH be valid?”
> but don’t expect me for one second to think
> that a hate message should ever be as EQUALLY
> protected as a non-hate message.
To paraphrase some great statesman of long ago… “popular speech doesn’t need protection”.
Getting back to the original issue, it shouldn’t matter what the message is that’s written. Either students are allowed to paint messages on the rock, or they’re not. Unless it’s an actual threat (”kill the fags” / “death to fags”), as opposed to a “hate message” (”I hate fags”), it probably falls under the “free speech” argument. An expression of one’s beliefs, as opposed to an incitement to action, certainly qualifies as protected speech.
Of course, the school could certainly place some restrictions on who can paint the message, such as “a senior class ‘paint the rock’ committee”, when the rock is designated the “senior class rock”. However, I doubt that “white boys only can paint the rock” would qualify as a legitimate restriction.
I’m glad to see that those who painted the original “hate message” have been caught.
Of course, now we’re back to the whole point of the ZI website… Shouldn’t circumstance play a part of the punishment? Or, should everyone who has ever painted the rock get the exact same punishment?
Sorry Ken, but it doesn’t matter if they are ideas; if they contradict each other then they cannot both be true (same goes for religion, although there is really no objective way to determine which religion is valid).
In all fairness, people do have the right to say what they want. I don’t want government intervention; I just want people to stop and THINK. I get so peeved when a belief that is so obviously wrong is treated as if it’s credible simply because “it’s a viewpoint”. By all means, say anything you want, but having a viewpoint shouldn’t make you immune to criticism.
We have gotten lost somehow on this particular board. The question is not whether or not we should be able to paint the rock…we know we can they have told us through out the process that we can and encourage it. The question isn’t even what we can paint on the rock. We know that we can’t paint anything…unless outlined differently in the code of conduct, which in the case of the “god hates fags” comment, it is. It is listed specifically in the front cover of the code of conduct that any hate speech/writing is grounds for expulsion. Whether or not this is allowed under the first amendment has no bearing on the subject because it is not an argument we can make without causing more fighting and more money. It is not a battle we choose to fight, it will not help us. Another thing, just because you have a viewpoint does not mean you can express it freely on a public school’s campus. You may be able to run around telling the world that gay people are bad and going to hell in a lot of places but school grounds are not included. It would be the same if I drew and inappropriate picture on the rock or wrote something like ‘sex with donkeys is cool’. The school would hunt me down and punish me. Well they did hunt these students down now the question remains…how will they punish them? They threw the code of conduct at us and gave us everything they could; if they don’t do the same for the other 2 students then they will have proven our point that they are not equal in how they use the school punishments. They will prove that people who come forward and admit what they did are punished more harshly than those who hide and let someone else take the blame for what they have done.
So enough with all of the free speech stuff…its public school, even though we should have rights the school tends to revoke them, we know, we have been going through it for the last 12 years. I don’t disagree that people are welcome to their opinion, it’s just when they spread that message with the intent to be hurtful that I find it to be a problem.
Wait a second Shayna. Are you saying sex with donkeys is NOT cool? What’s wrong with you?
P.S. the above was a joke, an ironic musing if you will. I have not, at any point in my life had sex with a donkey . . . yet.
Nice but keep your goat, i mean, donkey stories to yourself…
Hey Vinnie, an extra note here…T.J. has been adding a link to his name recently…you should take a look at it. There seems to be something about Dweeb that may be worth looking at.
Vinnie and Shayna,
It seems to me you’re saying you want to accept your rights being trampled, as long as you can make sure the OTHER people’s rights are equally trampled, a sort of “misery loves company” thing.
What does that accomplish? My point is, based on the clarifications you’ve made, NO ONE should be getting punished in this situation, and those of you who have already suffered punishment are due some sort of remedy.
The validity of the school’s code of conduct under the 1st Amendment is absolutely an issue.
It’s a public school, and they are bound by the Bill of Rights.
Shayna, this statement:
“Another thing, just because you have a viewpoint does not mean you can express it freely on a public school’s campus.”
shows you clearly do NOT understand the First Amendment. This is directly counter to the Tinker ruling. you ABSOLUTELY have the right to express any viewpoint on campus - the school can only limit HOW you express it, and only when you express it in a manner that directly and materially disrupts the educational process.
T.J. this isn’t the forum for you to grind your axe about the merits of moral viewpoints. Suffice it to say, where the GOVERNMENT is concerned, both sides of a morality question are equally valid. The GOVERNMENT is not allowed to take sides. I can express the opinion that slavery, cannibalism, child molesting, ethnic cleansing, genocide, etc. are OK, and the GOVERNMENT (and by extension public schools) can’t suppress that message or take sides in the debate it engenders. We get it, the thought that anyone might not approve of certain lifestyles makes your blood boil, and, in your OPINION, is right up there with saying the Earth is flat, but guess what, you can walk around a public high school wearing a shirt that says the Earth is flat, and the 1st Amendment protects that.
It’s pretty simple - ALL reasonable people accept the idea of a boundary between morally acceptable sexual behavior and morally unacceptable. The spectrum runs from the Shakers, who believe it’s NEVER acceptable - they don’t marry, they don’t reproduce (that’s why there are only three of them left in the world) to those who say only within marriage, to those who require some sort of commitment, to those who require it to be with someone of the opposite gender, to those who place some arbitrary minimum age on both participants, to those who say do no harm to those who only require mutual consent, and there are even people who don’t even think consent is necessary. It’s a broad range of opinions on a question that is essentially undecidable without appealing to some transcendant belief system. The debate you want to have is about over about a 10% variance in where the line is drawn, and no, it’s just not objectively decidable. You’ve raised this one before, and, ultimately, your position depends upon your beliefs. Both sets of students here expressed their beliefs - you like to think of yourself as tolerant, but you’re the one here arguing for the suppression of an idea because it conflicts with your beliefs. You think the punishment was too harsh; I think there should BE no punishment. Consider this, T.J., if the people like you had prevailed 30 to 50 years ago, the position you keep flogging here would never have been expressed.
What Shayna, T.J. and I have argued over HIS pet issue before? So what. Why don’t you peruse ALL the comment threads? You’ll find I defended the guy who wore a dress to Prom, and several others on both sides of the culture wars, because ALL viewpoints are equal before the First Amendment. T.J. on the other hand, wants to ban the expression of viewpoints that offend his beliefs.
This has been my point - make this a question of whose ideological ox is being gored, and you gain nothing, and everyone in the country loses a little bit of freedom. Imagine, instead of just expulsion, etc., you were looking at prison time - would accept that, as long as the guys who painted the message opposing yours were in the next cell, or would you fight for your freedom? You and those freshmen are clearly on opposite sides of one significant issue, but you also have something in common; you are both facing the prospect of persecution for expressing your beliefs (you’re just further through the process than they are.) The stance you’re taking is like two beer lovers letting prohibition be re-enacted while they argue over “tastes great” or “less filling”
Egad Dweeb, can’t there be too much of anything? Even free speech? Like a malaprop’ing friend once said, I think you’ve beat this one with a dead horse…
dweeb, I am done even reading what you come here to say. Go ahead and keep saying it, its your right to do so. But, I am personally tired of the comments. You make valid points but they have no bearing on the fact that we have been punished and there isn’t anything we can do about it. As much as I wish the school would allow us to have all of our freedoms, the fact of the matter is that they don’t. I’m not saying that is right or even legal for them to do but that is not an argument for us to bring to them unless we decide to take this to court which currently we are not. We probably never will beacuse we wont get a desision in time for graduation anyway. as for your comments toward T.J. to me I do not know him nor do I know you. So the comments are unimportant to me. Thank you for your opinions and thank you for playing devil advocate for a while. You have turned the issue into something much bigger than it needs to be.
Shayna,
I understand that most of the punishment has already been received, and you’re right, at this point you’d need to sue in order to correct that injustice, but with any halfway competent lawyer, you could get a court to order them to let you walk at commencement in one day, especially if you have public opinion on your side - remember, school board members are elected. The other thing you might consider is that years from now, people who have to make decisions affecting your life may only see in the records that you were expelled for vandalism, without any other explanation, and you may not have the opportunity to tell them what really happened. Clearing your name in the official record is a valuable goal even if you don’t get to go to graduation.
Of course, if you want to let them get away with this, that is your choice to make. What bothers me is that you lack the will to defend your own rights, but seem to have plenty of time and energy to devote to making them persecute others along with you. The only positive I see in that is the people who painted the opposing message may have the will to defend their rights, and could bring about positive change.
By the way, I’m not playing devil’s advocate.
I’m opposed to the school’s trampling ANYONE’S rights.
“T.J. on the other hand, wants to ban the expression of viewpoints that offend his beliefs.”
No, I don’t. Just saying that sometimes, moral issues can be objectively argued.
Dweeb-
Do you think the school should have punished us so extremely? Are you arguing opposite to that belief? Then you’re playing Devil’s Advocate. By the way there’s nothing wrong with that, beliefs are strengthened most when you have to defend them.
We have defended our rights, by the way. I’m sorry but i have to agree with Shayna. I think you’re ignoring the real issue and just making up ones so that you have something to rant about. Sorry Dude, but i just don’t have the will power to put up with you anymore.
Vinnie,
NO, I do not believe you should have been punished AT ALL. There may be some confusion here - I didn’t start out with that opinion.
After you and Shayna clarified the history of allowing painting the rock and other landscape features, I changed my mind. It started out looking like a vandalism issue, but your information made it an expression/viewpoint issue. You changed my position on this by providing me with relevant information. Now, my concern is that you’re not aggressively seeking to overturn the punishment. It appears that Shayna, at least is resigned to the punishment, and your efforts are aimed at making sure others receive similar punishment.
T.J.
You have openly argued for the school to take sides in moral debates by restricting the expression of one side.
As for moral questions being argued objectively, it’s not possible. You can argue them civilly, and on an evidentiary basis, but in the sense that objectively means not appealing to a belief structure, it’s not possible. You’ve argued this particular question on the grounds that people should be tolerant - why should they be tolerant? Why is love better than hate? Why should we strive to be fair? Why should there be liberty? None of these questions is answerable without appealing to a belief system.
Why should people be nice to each other, rather than a full blown Darwinian competition for survival? There really isn’t any good reason outside of SOME sort of belief system about the nature of the universe.
dweeb,
there is a post in the April archives called “Site Move Notes”. Let’s discuss this more in that comment section (I don’t want to add too many more comments on this or other posts).
Dweeb-
I am not just trying to get others unfairly punished, my point in saying that the school should give them exactly what the Code says, is that they should be consistent in their punishments. In our case they did not take circumstance or our records, or anything into account before they punished us. So if they’re not going to do that for us they shouldn’t do it for anybody, to show that they are consistent, I know that they are not consistent and that the two kids will probably not be expelled. It was a point i was trying to make.
We are not resigned to our punishment, there is simply nothing more we can do, legally speaking. We don’t really have the money, nor the time for a full court case. We are keeping our story fresh in the news and monday 40 people from the community went and bitched out the school board on our behalf. The Board, however is very stubborn and does not seem to care.
Dweeb - Please read the following and see what exactly Vinnie and I are talking about from another source. We didn’t write this article and we didn’t go to the school board meeting beacuse we are not allowed on school grounds. We didn’t even tell people what to say. I know I didn’t even know half the people that my father said spoke at the meeting. please read it and I hope it helps you understand more.
Prosecutor gets report about anti-gay graffiti
By Christopher Nagy
DAILY PRESS & ARGUS
A police report on the two Howell High School freshmen accused of painting an anti-gay slur on a rock at the school has made its way from the Howell Police Department to the Livingston County prosecutor’s office, according to Howell Police Chief Roger Goralski.
Prosecutor David Morse said he had yet to review the report, adding that he didn’t want to speculate on any charges that may or may not be filed against the teens until he understood the details surrounding the case.
While it’s not clear whether or not any charges will be filed against the two freshmen who allegedly painted the slur, it’s also not clear whether the Howell Public Schools filed a police report against the four Howell High School students who covered the slur with the word “love” as well as spray-painted the word “love” around the school grounds.
However, what is clear is that the discipline given three of the students - all seniors - who painted the word “love” is not sitting well with some members of the community.
The ordeal over the graffiti painted at Howell High School in early May continues to simmer, and bubbled over into the Howell Public Schools Board of Education meeting Monday night.
Students and parents criticized the school district for the punishments meted out to the three high school seniors who were suspended for the rest of the year and denied participation in graduation ceremonies for painting the word “love” on sidewalks, benches and driveways around the high school grounds.
The word, which was painted more than 50 times around the high school grounds, was a reaction by the three seniors and a sophomore against the anti-gay message painted on the rock in the high school courtyard. Because of those circumstances, many who came out to the school bard meeting Monday night felt the punishment didn’t fit the crime.
“The damage that was done to the sidewalks was nothing compared to the damage that was done to the community by the way the whole situation was handled,” said Howell resident Marc Van Gyseghem. “There was not a single parent (at the meeting) who agreed with the way the incident was handled.”
The school district stuck by the policies outlined in its code of conduct when dealing with the punishment of the three seniors. The district has special penalties for violations of the code committed by seniors in the last quarter of the school year. The idea is to have a disciplinary system in place where seniors can face punishments, such as not being able to participate in year-end senior activities, even as the last days of the school year wind down.
Van Gyseghem, whose daughter is a junior at the high school, was one of the parents who spoke up at Monday’s school board meeting against the punishment to the three seniors. He said the impression he walked away with was that the students don’t feel their concerns are being heard or addressed by anyone of authority in the district.
Former Howell school board member Bart Hellmuth was also in the audience at Monday’s meeting for an unrelated topic, but he said the students spoke “eloquently.”
“The biggest complaint I heard at the meeting from students and parents was the inconsistencies in discipline,” Hellmuth said. “My fear is that many other students are getting fed up because of the inconsistencies.”
Van Gyseghem suggested that the district have a community liaison for students - “someone the kids can trust and who the kids feel they can come to freely,” he said. “I’d be willing to be that person and offer my time to it.”
Howell Superintendent Charles Breiner and Lynn Parrish, deputy superintendent for labor relations and personnel for Howell Public Schools, could not be reached for comment.
Vinnie, there are organizations like the ACLU that will handle it at no cost to you. I get that you and Shayna are talking about consistency of punishment, but the problem is that the policies you’re asking them to enforce consistently are unjust, thus you’re asking them to be consistently tyrants, consistently despotic, and consistently deny students’ rights.
Consistency doesn’t make things any better. The USSR was marvelously consistent in persecuting its citizens. Consistency doesn’t make what happened to you any more acceptable
In fact, their current inconsistency only HIGHLIGHTS the injustice, and makes the case for rescinding your penalties stronger.
Ask yourself, what are you seeking to accomplish here? If the others get the same punishment you did, how does that make the situation any better?
You still miss graduation, you still have a tarnished record, the school board still gets to persecute students and deny their First Amendment rights - what’s the improvement over the status quo? Oh, right, you get to see someone who you disagree with suffer alongside you. If that’s the greatest satisfaction you take away from this, I count that as a loss.
Shayna,
I see no new revelations in this article. What was it you were trying to say?
Dweeb - The point of the article is not going to be understood by you. I can see that now, after reading your message to Vinnie. You simply do not understand what we are saying, and I don’t think you are even trying. I understand what you are saying and your right making them punish those other students won’t help us, that’s not what we are trying to get to happen. The point we are making is that the zero tolerance policy dosent work. There are always factors that make each case different. Our point is that they didn’t even bother to look into those factors with our case. Oh man, I am so sick of trying to explain this to you. I give up your just to thick headed to understand our point, your point is not what we are talking about. I’m done here. its not worth it, I don’t know you and your opinion won’t change anything here anyway so think what you want to think.
Shayna,
“The point we are making is that the zero tolerance policy dosent work”
I get that. I agree with it. The school is wrong, 110%.
“There are always factors that make each case different. Our point is that they didn’t even bother to look into those factors with our case.”
That’s where you’re wrong; in the case of students painting the rock, when there is precedent that painting it is permissible, you’re 180 degrees off course here. THEY DID LOOL AT THE CIRCUMSTANCES, and that’s the problem. It’s OBVIOUS that the school administration found the message of those two freshmen more acceptable than your message. Although I don’t like how they stated it, I’m probably of a close philosophy to them, too, but that doesn’t mean I’ll stand up for their abuse of power. They punished you because they didn’t like your message, AND THAT’S THE PROBLEM. They LOOKED at the circumstance that your message was pro and the other was anti- tolerance, and they judged that special circumstance, and you came up on the short end.
Dweeb,
You appear to be very educated to me, it’s a shame the students are not understanding what you are saying. It is clear to me that you are on their side when it comes to their injustice as well as the fact that they are putting all their focus on the fairness of everyones’ punishment while you are focusing directly on their injustice. Are you a lawyer? you sure sound like one…by the way I love your analogies.
Bystander,
Thank you. I’m not a lawyer, but I’m told I think like one.
My main issue with these students is that they don’t understand WHY punishing them was wrong. Although they’ve acknowledged several points about free speech, they still seem to still hold the idea that something is wrong with the situation because their message was more “worthy.” As long as they cling to this, they only serve to justify what happened to them, and the disparity in their punishment. If they support the idea that their message is eligible for special consideration, they’re also supporting the idea that someone else’s is.