The Doninger Case: A Loss For Free Speech
What a horrible lesson to teach students.
The case originated in a dispute last spring about the Burlington school’s Jamfest, a battle of the bands that Doninger helped coordinate. Frustrated that it was not going ahead as planned, Doninger wrote on her livejournal.com Weblog that “Jamfest is canceled due to the douchebags in central office.” She encouraged others to write or call Schwartz “to piss her off more.”
Jamfest wasn’t actually canceled, and was later rescheduled. Administrators found the blog entry about two weeks after Doninger wrote it, and Niehoff told Doninger to apologize to Schwartz, show her mother the post and stop seeking re-election as class secretary.
Doninger agreed to the first two, but refused to withdraw her candidacy. Though Doninger was not allowed to run, enough students wrote in her name that she won. She was barred from serving.
The appeals court based much of its analysis on the 2nd Circuit case Wisniewski v. Board of Education of the Weedsport Central School District in New York, in which a student was suspended after creating an instant-messaging icon that suggested his teacher should be shot. The court upheld the suspension last year, saying it was reasonable to expect the icon would come to the attention of school authorities and could create a risk of substantial disruption to the school environment. The Hartford Courant.
I admire Avery Doninger’s fight for free speech.
I think her attorney Jon L. Schoenhorn got it right when he said the ruling could “emasculate the first amendment rights of students.”
Avery Doninger may not be able to speak at graduation but she is welcome to post her graduation speech on this blog.
