We have previously discussed the ongoing controversy over the confederate flag as well as past cases of student speech being curtailed. This story combines those themes after Jordan Beattie, a student at Cossa Academy in Wilder, Idaho was banned from flying the confederate flag that his girlfriend had given him. He was told that the flag was interpreted to be a gang symbol.
Schools officials said that they found an image of the flag on a gang site used by the local police but the Caldwell Police Department Gang Unit told the media that it was unsure as to where the school received that information. Caldwell Police Department Captain Frank Wyant said “We don’t look at the Confederate flag as a gang symbol. We don’t encourage anybody to take it down. Those are their rights and that’s what we’re here for is to protect and uphold those rights.”
Caldwell Police Department uses information from the website http://www.idahogangs.com. which lists the Confederate flag as an identifier of possible gang ties for “Aryan” gangs though it can also be simply a confederate heritage symbol.
I fail to see the basis for the decision. This is clearly not being used as a gang symbol and anyone with a Confederate flag could be similarly barred because some group happens to sometimes incorporate the symbol. It is also a symbol used by others for cultural or historical identification.
We have previously discussed cases where students were punished for displaying the Confederate flag, including cases involving flags on cars. There is a growing presumption against student free speech, particularly when it comes to unpopular or divisive symbols. This extends in this cases and earlier cases to symbols on cars in a parking lot — outside the school building or classrooms. I find that troubling from a free speech perspective.
What do you think?
Source: Scripps Media
SWM, when the majority of the conservative base identifies with what Trump is saying, I’d say it was time for another major “postmortem”…. a ‘premortem’ so to speak?
SWM right on cue. What your ilk does not understand is how fed up people are w/ PC. I have long said this country needs more choices and we are ripe for a demagogue. Well, here he is. You can thank the duopoly, and your ilk is more responsible, because of issues like this and the PC campus thread today. That is the nerve is striking.
Donald Trump: “Only An Idiot Opposes The Confederate Flag”. Guess support for the confederate flag and hatred of Mexicans is a winning message this year for republican voters. Today, Trump tweeted something about Jeb Bush speaking “Mexican” and not English.
Annie
Mexicans live here and fly their flag in rememberence to their heritage even though they lost a war with the US.
Many of those generals who whupped them went on to fight for the south so really Mexico is the ultimate JV team.
One of my dad’s favorite movie lines is from The Three Godfathers where John Wayne tells his compadre,” Don’t talk Mex in front of the kid.”
Funny thing is, though, didn’t Obama make a comment about the “Austrian” language?
pinandpuller – some of the top commanders of the Civil War were junior officers during the Mexican-American War.
No need to destroy history, teach and remember all the bad parts, don’t revere them and lament about the good old days, maybe they weren’t so good.
Ooops… Lynyrd Skynyrd I think I spelled it right this time
😐
Seriously, we discussed this in another thread. Why do we condemn ISIS for destroying history, when we encourage it and condone in our own history?
Hypocrites much?
http://www.newsweek.com/oklahoma-teachers-are-not-too-pleased-about-bill-ban-ap-us-history-308129
Oklahoma teachers weren’t to happy about the banning of the AP History course. We had a discussion back then about the wrongness of whitewashing history to remove all the icky parts.
“Oklahoma’s legislative committee on education voted 11-4 Monday to pass a bill prohibiting public schools from teaching advanced placement United States history amid accusations that the course is not patriotic enough, and Oklahoma teachers are fuming.
House Bill 1380 was introduced by Representative Daniel Fisher, a Republican and member of the Black Robe Regiment, a group that seeks to dismantle the “false wall of separation of church and state.” Fischer said the AP history course focuses on “what is bad about America” and fails to teach “American exceptionalism,” the Tulsa World reports. If passed by the Legislature, the bill would cut off funding to the course.”
Olly, Olly, Olly! The line is malleable. It changes daily. Hell, just the other day “Anchor Baby” made the “naughty list”[reference to the flick, Elf].
Olly, LOL! I think a good number of Californians are “comfortably numb.” How else could you have a Governor Moonbeam?
For all you moral relativists out there; where is the line to be drawn so that we can know what is acceptable?
Since you put it that way Nick then sign me up! 😉
I know……Why don’t we invite ISIS to come in and blow up all the Civil War historical sites and burn down any building that was ever associated with any person who ever fought in the Civil War on the side of the South……I suppose that the Northern war memorials would be safe……for a while. While they are at it they should rip up any street that has a name that might be construed to be Southern sympathizers.
If we don’t LIKE history…..let’s just blow it up and pretend that it never happened.
Amirite?
Sorry Lynyrd Skinner….you guys are just going to have to be silenced and probably beheaded. Whew. Good think we have ISIS on the jobs to erase all that icky Confederate History.
Olly, When the “less than perfect self” and all offensive micro aggression are eliminated, we will elevate our consciousness to where we are in a perfect state. All thoughts will be pleasant, all hate eliminated. Now, there can be no light w/o darkness, no love w/o hate, so we will be “pleasantly numb” in the words of Pink Floyd. Sound OK w/ you?? LOL!
Schools are public institutions for learning, and as such there are different rules for administering them as opposed to being in general public places. If the courts can ban the US flag as they did in CA when some students had them on shirts on Cinco de Mayo, then they sure as hell can ban the stars and bars. This is a tempest in a tea cup, but given the racially charged nature of the symbol, and its close association with the KKK and other hate groups, I support this action. If the student wishes to fly it when he leaves school property, FINE, but when on school property, the teachers have sway.
Nick,
How do we advance as a culture towards that “more perfect Union” if we erase all evidence of our “less perfect self”? Isn’t this why we amend and not edit the constitution, to retain the history of our republic’s cultural evolution?
Julianne Moore is a great actress, consumed w/ the new liberal activity, rewriting and obliterating history. We see Ken Burns rewriting the history of the Civil War. Ms. Moore was an Army brat, attending 9 different schools. One of the schools was J.E.B. Stuart School in Falls Church, Va. She went there for 2 years and is now haunted by the fact that she attended a school named after, hold your breath…a Confederate general! She wants the name stricken immediately! After the Civil War history is rewritten and all offensive tributes obliterated ala ISIS, then on to other items. I’ll give them a hint on one, Werner von Braun Center and all history of that Nazi being key in NASA history being stricken from history books.
From the Declaration of Causes of Texas’s secession from the United States:
We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.
That in this free government all white men are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights; that the servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations; while the destruction of the existing relations between the two races, as advocated by our sectional enemies, would bring inevitable calamities upon both and desolation upon the fifteen slave-holding States.
https://www.tsl.texas.gov/ref/abouttx/secession/2feb1861.html
We shall not forget the 1st self-evident truth”
“that all men are created equal”
What “rights”?
” that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
What “ends”?
“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,”
Shhhh! Quiet Nick, we are busy “progressing” towards the 4th self-evident truth:
“That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”