From the Gilroy Dispatch:
Five Live Oak High School students’ First Amendment rights were challenged this morning when they were asked to leave school because they donned American flag T-shirts on Cinco de Mayo. Officials at the school chose not to comment on the situation, but one student said an official called the T-shirts “incendiary.”“They said we were starting a fight, we were fuel to the fire,” said sophomore Matt Dariano….
The five teens were sitting at a table outside during their brunch break about 10:10 a.m. when Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez asked two boys to take off their American flag bandannas. The boys said they complied. In the same conversation, sophomore Dominic Maciel said, Rodriguez told the group to “walk with him to the office.”
Dariano called his mother Diana, who spread the word to the other parents, who all arrived soon after to have a conference with Rodriguez and Principal Nick Boden. The group said they were not instigating anything and did what they always do at break — sit and talk and eat.
The boys were told they must turn their T-shirts inside-out or be sent home — and that it would not be considered a suspension — but that Rodriguez did not want any fights to break out among Mexican-American students and those wearing American flags. Dariano said other students were wearing American flags but since they were a group of five “we were the easiest target to cause trouble” according to Rodriguez, he said….
More than 100 students were spotted wearing red, white and green as they were leaving school. Some had the Mexican flag painted on their faces or on their arms.
Nothing in Live Oak’s dress code policy addresses what transpired Wednesday, but it does state that “the school has the right to request that any student dressing inappropriately for school will change into other clothes, be sent home to change, and/or be subject to disciplinary action.” …
Some Mexican-American students said that their flags were taken away or asked to be put away, but none were sent home for wearing red, white and green. Since Boden would not comment, it’s uncertain if any other students were sent home for what they were wearing on Cinco de Mayo.
Live Oak High School even hosted a group of professional baile folklorico dancers, who waved flags and played traditional music from Mexico.
If there is a reasonably predictable likelihood (not just a bare conjecture) that speech or expressive conduct will cause substantial disruption — which is not clear under these facts — then the school may legally restrict it without violating the First Amendment. That’s the holding of Tinker v. Des Moines Indep. Community School Dist. (1969). (I speak here only of whether the district may legally do this, not whether it should.)
But California Education Code § 48950 deliberately gives students more protection than the First Amendment does. And the high school’s actions, if they were reported accurately, would violate that statute:
(a) School districts operating one or more high schools … shall not make or enforce a rule subjecting a high school pupil to disciplinary sanctions solely on the basis of conduct that is speech or other communication that, when engaged in outside of the campus, is protected from governmental restriction by the First Amendment ….(b) A pupil who is enrolled in a school at the time that the school has made or enforced a rule in violation of subdivision (a) may commence a civil action to obtain appropriate injunctive and declaratory relief as determined by the court. Upon motion, a court may award attorney’s fees to a prevailing plaintiff in a civil action pursuant to this section….
(d) This section does not prohibit the imposition of discipline for harassment, threats, or intimidation, unless constitutionally protected….
(f) The Legislature finds and declares that free speech rights are subject to reasonable time, place, and manner regulations.
The “time, place, and manner regulations” restriction doesn’t apply here, because the restriction here was justified with reference to the content of the expression (and the supposed harm that it might cause). Time, place, and manner regulations must be unrelated to content, and focused instead on matters such as noise, blockage of hallways, and other effects of speech that don’t stem from the message that the speech communicates.
Thanks to InstaPundit for the pointer.
Blue says:
Difficult to see how even a reasonable likelihood standard applies when you have clear viewpoint discrimination at work–Hispanic students were allowed to wear the colors of the Mexican flag while Anglo students were prevented from wearing the U.S. flag.
May 6, 2010, 10:34 amrbj says:
If wearing an American flag is going to cause disruption in an American high school, then that school has very deep problems. That school’s administration needs to go and put competent people in place.
May 6, 2010, 10:38 amwm13 says:
Was that statute discussed in Harper v. Poway? On its face, it seems like it would protect the T-shirt at issue there just as much as the American flag.
May 6, 2010, 10:39 amSImon Jester says:
Re: Blue
Was the ethnicity of the kids noted in the article? Would it matter if some of the kids wearing the American flag were apparently Latino or some of the kids wearing the Mexican flag were apparently Anglo?
May 6, 2010, 10:39 amSImon Jester says:
Would the pledge of allegience be the equivalent of inciting a riot?
May 6, 2010, 10:40 amSImon Jester says:
Also… if the idea was to preserve the spirit of Cinco de Mayo, shouldn’t the school be looking out for students wearing FRENCH flags?
May 6, 2010, 10:41 amkeypusher64 says:
Edited for clarity.
May 6, 2010, 10:47 amkeypusher64 says:
Bravo!
May 6, 2010, 10:48 amTweets that mention California High School Sends Kids Home for Wearing American Flag on Cinco de Mayo: (Eugene… -- Topsy.com says:
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May 6, 2010, 10:48 amUrso says:
Gilroy’s my kind of place. 110 in the shade, but it’s a dry heat.
May 6, 2010, 10:50 amBlue says:
The article specifically makes the distinction between Mexican and non-Mexican students. If there was a state action difference related to race than it would raise an equal protection cause of action in addition to the clear First Amendment cause emanating from the unlawful viewpoint-based censorship.
May 6, 2010, 10:52 amOctavius says:
If wearing an American flag is going to cause disruption, why not send home the kids not wearing the flag who were probably the real cause of the disruption?
May 6, 2010, 10:53 amSuperSkeptic says:
From the Article:
“The boys were told they must turn their T-shirts inside-out or be sent home — and that it would not be considered a suspension — but that Rodriguez did not want any fights to break out among Mexican-American students and those wearing American flags.”
This is typical of the anti-freedom mindset and condescending. Why not simply punish any students who get into fights, because fighting is prohibited generally. Keep the racism, nationalism, and paternalism out of it.
May 6, 2010, 10:54 amChrisHo says:
Typical government school, go after those who are least likely to have their case reported on by the main stream press. In other words, offend those who cry the least.
May 6, 2010, 10:55 amMichelle Dulak Thomson says:
SImon Jester,
Was the ethnicity of the kids noted in the article? Would it matter if some of the kids wearing the American flag were apparently Latino or some of the kids wearing the Mexican flag were apparently Anglo?
At the moment the Gilroy Dispatch seems to be reeling from the Instalanche (and the Volokhlanche?), and I can’t get back to the article now. But I did read it earlier this morning. I don’t remember anything being said about the ethnicities of the five students except that one (surnamed Maciel) was himself half-Mexican. Another student was surnamed Carvalho, which doesn’t suggest “Anglo” (though whether Portuguese or Brasileiro I don’t know). The other three names I don’t remember.
May 6, 2010, 11:04 amWhere the American flag and get sent home from your American school « Conservative Crier says:
[...] Where the American flag and get sent home from your American school Jump to Comments READ STORY [...]
May 6, 2010, 11:04 amerp says:
We’re all equal here in the U.S.A. — equal Americans that is. Mexico is a foreign country just south of us. It’s abject nonsense that our kids wearing our flag and colors should be admonished so as not to offend the sensibilities of those who do not revere it above all other flags and colors.
School officials should be summarily dismissed and any students who want to fight for a foreign flag should be expelled.
Keep up this travesty and people like me who support widespread wimmigration will start to wonder if Mexicans immigrants really want to become part of our country or if they just want to destroy it.
This is sickening.
May 6, 2010, 11:07 amspo says:
EV, I think that you miss one very important point—the wearing of an American flag cannot be a legal cause of a disruption. The cause is the attitude of those who would create the disruption.
And the viewpoint discrimination thing is a huge problem as well.
In a sane society, these administrators would be jailed for violating these students’ civil rights.
May 6, 2010, 11:07 amUrso says:
Yet it was published in a lengthy article in the local paper, on the widely read Instapundit, and now on the internet’s greatest legal blog. So much for the claim that the mainsream media hates white people(not that we’d ever whine about anything anyway!)
May 6, 2010, 11:08 amShelbyC says:
Not sure if there is a rule under which somebody is subject to disciplinary action here, if the kids were just asked to go home without it being a suspension. Not a big fan of the policy though.
May 6, 2010, 11:14 amchristina says:
Some of the boys wearing the American flag colors were latino or half latino. It’s not a matter of racism, or even a slap in the face to Mexican-Americans. It’s a matter of pride for one’s country. Unfortunately, actions like the ones the administrators took cause American people to distrust America. Why love your country if you are just going to be punished for it? Completely rediculous, I am disappointed with my country today. If no one steps up and defends these boys, I don’t know what I’ll even say…I’m disgusted.
May 6, 2010, 11:14 amspo says:
A few years back, WaPo reported that black students in Southern California were the subject of harassment on May 5th. I guess, according to EV, it would have been ok for the school to tell black students to stay home. The rationale is the same.
May 6, 2010, 11:16 amChrisTS says:
while I think the adminstrators behaved stupidly, I wonder if we would be so quick to side with the students wearing U.S. regalia under a different scenario:
It is St. Patrick’s Day, and our school has a large Irish-American population who traditionally ‘observe’ the day by wearing Irish flag colors, shamrocks, etc. A group of students appear on campus wearing Protestant Orange.
If the stars and stripes wearing students often celebrate their U.S. nationality with colors and symbols, I will be happily surprised. I suspect they intentionally wore those colors and sumbols on Cinco de Mayo to express opposition to the Cinco de Mayo celebrators.
Do they have the right to so express themselves? Sure. Are they in the right in doing so? Not so sure.
May 6, 2010, 11:21 amHarvey says:
Other comments are way off base. This is a law blog, so let’s look at the law;
U. S. Code Sec. 176(d): “The flag shall never be used as wearing apparel . . .”
Assistant Principal Rodriguez, a good American, should have been much more strict with the students wearing the U.S. flag. If some others wished to desecrate a foreign flag, so what? I, myself, find that red, white and green works well for a doormat.
May 6, 2010, 11:22 amAnonAgain says:
I think it’s fairly obvious that the school officials crossed the line, by a lot.
But a tangential question–when did using the flag as bandana change from a sign of disrespect into one of patriotism? (Same as with the use of the flag as a napkin, paper plate, etc.)
May 6, 2010, 11:23 amRoyLitmus says:
OK…I get how wearing a t-shirt with the confederate flag on it can cause disruption especially in school districts that have a heavy African American population. I can even get the logic used by some courts finding school districts justified for banning it, although I don’t necessarily agree with some of those decisions.
But, come on now people. If wearing a depiction of the flag of a sovereign nation state of which you are a resident and citizen is enough to cause a violent disruption then I think it begs quite a few questions. This isn’t Mexico. I don’t care if Mexicans (legal or illegal) celebrate their cultural heritage. But, they are living in the United States, not Mexico. We have a separate system of laws and symbols. If you can’t tolerate even seeing the flag of our sovereign nation state then maybe you ought to reconsider living here.
May 6, 2010, 11:23 amTK75 says:
Political correctness will be the death of this country. The day that the American flag is seen as inflammatory symbol (yes, even in the Bay area) is a sad day indeed.
Isn’t one of the distinctions between mankind (yes MANkind) and animals our ability to control our emotions and not act out on them? No matter how provocative a t-shirt, or even spoken words, might be a civilized human being should not respond with violence. Now wouldn’t that be a good lesson to teach students?
This whole freaking country is going down the toilet as we have produced a generation of students molded by the 60s generation of politically correct, sensitive, liberals – from Bill Ayers to our Apologist-in-Chief.
May 6, 2010, 11:24 amAnderson says:
That’s an absurd statute. Presumably I could wear, off-campus, a t-shirt saying PRINCIPAL SMITH IS A CUNT.
Or, I RAPE CHEERLEADERS (AND THEY LOVE IT).
So I have to be allowed to wear it on-campus? Stupid Californians.
May 6, 2010, 11:25 amSteveR says:
Years ago in my son’s HS in Arlington, TX, he and two friends happened to be wearing hunter’s plaid shirts and were sent home (under police escort) because some black kids objected.
I called the principal, and he told me the black kids felt that hunter’s plaid signified white supremacy. He said he had never heard of that, but sent my son & friends home anyway on the word of the black kids (who had threatened to kick some A if the offensive kids weren’t removed).
One of the kids that objected had a X” t-shirt (Malcolm X). That was ok.
May 6, 2010, 11:27 amSmooth, like a Rhapsody says:
1. Has anyone seen any comments from the administrators; or the ACLU, or La Raza, for that matter, on this?
2. What the hell is a “brunch break”?
May 6, 2010, 11:27 amAnderson says:
What the hell is a “brunch break”?
Coffee break for the teachers?
May 6, 2010, 11:28 amsashal says:
§176. Respect for flag No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
* (a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
May 6, 2010, 11:36 am* (b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise.
* (c) The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free.
* (d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed to fall free. Bunting of blue, white, and red, always arranged with the blue above, the white in the middle, and the red below, should be used for covering a speaker’s desk, draping the front of the platform, and for decoration in general.
* (e) The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.
* (f) The flag should never be used as a covering for a ceiling.
* (g) The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.
* (h) The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.
* (i) The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever. It should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper napkins or boxes or anything that is designed for temporary use and discard. Advertising signs should not be fastened to a staff or halyard from which the flag is flown.
* (j) No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform. However, a flag patch may be affixed to the uniform of military personnel, firemen, policemen, and members of patriotic organizations. The flag represents a living country and is itself considered a living thing. Therefore, the lapel flag pin being a replica, should be worn on the left lapel near the heart.
* (k) The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning.
h2u says:
When I was in high school this was referred to as “nutrition.” It was a short break — about 10 minutes — between your second and third period classes to be used for snacking purposes. The idea behind it being that the healthiest eating habits involve numerous small meals…
May 6, 2010, 11:37 amRonald C. Den Otter says:
Very interesting topic. I didn’t know that California law is more protective of the free speech rights of students than the U.S. Constitution is. There doesn’t seem to be much left of Tinker. Rightly or wrongly, it seems that public schools are free to engage in all sorts of content and viewpoint discrimination as long as their actions are “reasonably related to a legitimate pedagogical interest,” which seems to be just about anything school officials say it is. I also take these comments to mean that most of you would disagree with the Roberts Court’s decision in the “Bong Hits for Jesus” case a few years ago. That was unarguably an example of viewpoint discrimination as well.
May 6, 2010, 11:37 amAnderson says:
Sashal, I suspect very little of that survived Texas v. Johnson, so it’s not going to help much in trumping the absurd California statute.
May 6, 2010, 11:39 amr gould-saltman says:
Ok, I’m going to be REALLY interested in seeing how many folks who rush to the defense of the “quasi-suspended” students here were arguing strenuously for a “flag desecration amendment” to the U.S. Constitution a few years back.
Of course, such an amendment would have permitted criminal prosecution of these students, while presumably having no effect whatsoever on the 1st Amendment rights of other students to wear flags or parts of flags of any OTHER country or organization.
Didn’t Abbie Hoffman appear on one of the late-night gab-fests in the 60′s in a flag shirt, which the network promptly covered with a primitive special-effects black box?
Me, I’m at least a consistent absolutist, all the time, on this stuff; flag shirts for everyone!
May 6, 2010, 11:40 amAnonAgain says:
Anderson-
May 6, 2010, 11:46 amI don’t believe there’s ever been a penalty (at least not recently) for failing to abide by the Flag Code. But it’s quite odd that many (presumably genuine) self-identified patriots treat the flag like it’s toilet paper.
mikeyes says:
Cinco De Mayo is not an universal holiday in Mexico, it is more like St. Patrick’s Day (which is not a high holy day in Ireland, either) the product of US commercial interests combined with ethnic pride. Mostly it is a day to have fun.
The school did miss a big point, however. If the Battle of Puebla had not occurred, there was a fairly good chance that French run Mexico would have sided with the Confederacy in the Civil War. Lincoln was aware of this and after the war was over the US sent all sorts of help to the Mexican rebels (Benito Jaurez led rebels) including troops under the guise of volunteers. The French were ousted in 1867 in part because of US help.
So the juxtaposition of Mexican and American flags on May 5 has an historical basis – something the school, had they been knowledgeable and creative enough, might have taken advantage of. I suspect that very few persons in that school are even aware of the complex relationship of the US and Mexico in the mid nineteenth century. (After all it took me almost a minute to find it on Google.)
May 6, 2010, 11:48 amShelbyC says:
Yeah. And performing a briss off campus is protected by the first amendment. But in class? Not to mention setting up a giant billboard. Or an industrial size printing press. Or assembling to hear mass.
May 6, 2010, 11:51 amwm13 says:
Rising above the various snarky, too-clever-by-half attempts to score political points, it is sociologically interesting that American mores have evolved such that wearing clothes with flag prints, using napkins with flag prints for Fourth of July picnics, etc. is felt to be respectful and patriotic, which apparently wasn’t the case in the mid-twentieth century. (I have a few such t-shirts myself, some with truculent mottoes like “Try Burning this One.”)
May 6, 2010, 11:52 amThe Drill SGT says:
1. So on one hand we have viewpoint discrimination because of “threats of violence, but
2. instead of dealing with the folks who might threaten violence, we restrict the folks that are acting peacefully?
3. Mexican Flags are encouraged, American Flags forbidden?
This story resembles that separate and unequal discrimination story from Ann Arbor the other day. School districts are fixated on self esteem issues for racial groups rather than focusing on the traditional roles of public schools which were education cultural (civic) assimilation.
May 6, 2010, 11:59 amRicardo says:
I’m fairly sure the school would have started out the morning of May 5 just as any other morning: by having all the students stand up, face the American flag and say the Pledge of Allegiance.
If there is an actual threat of violence from wearing a national or ethnic symbol of any kind, the long-term solution would appear to be to ban those symbols in a content neutral manner. ChrisTS’s example of Orangemen on St. Patrick’s Day is a good one: it’s exactly the kind of thing we should avoid. Mercifully, India’s Independence Day falls in the regular summer break — otherwise we could look forward to heavily South Asian school districts having Pakistani students sporting Pakistani flags and Indian students wearing Indian flags on August 15. Wouldn’t that be peachy.
Or maybe some smart-aleck kids in a school with lots of Jewish students will decide to wear Syrian or Egyptian flags during Yom Kippur. If the administrator was right and violence is an issue during certain ethnic or national celebrations, a content-neutral ban on certain kinds of clothing seems the most sensible thing.
Whoever decided flag t-shirts or bandannas were considered patriotic clothing in the first place? It’s a flag — it’s not traditionally meant to be worn.
May 6, 2010, 12:00 pmJavert says:
As were the Twin Towers.
May 6, 2010, 12:01 pmBob from Ohio says:
If the kids here had French flag shirts, your comparison might work.
May 6, 2010, 12:01 pmwfjag says:
Anderson says:
While you’d be safe in school, don’t go to court (at least in the mid-west) wearing a shirt that says “I have the pussy, so I make the rules.” Judge holds woman in contempt for wearing offensive T-shirt, Chicago Sun-Times (May 5, 2010) http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2238170,CST-NWS-logo05.article
May 6, 2010, 12:02 pmMartinned says:
Because they sent home the smallest group whose removal would (in their view) defuse the situation? If you have 100 kids with Mexican flags and 5 kids with US flags, it makes sense to remove the latter from the mix.
May 6, 2010, 12:03 pmAnderson says:
But it’s quite odd that many (presumably genuine) self-identified patriots treat the flag like it’s toilet paper.
It is very difficult nowadays to convey any glimmer of the notion that putting something on a t-shirt is disrespectful. You might as well tell kids that men must wear hats outdoors (or take them off indoors).
May 6, 2010, 12:03 pmray_g says:
What this really sounds like is an overly PC administrator seeing a non-existant problem. As a resident of CA, I’ve noticed that Cinco de Mayo has been adopted by Anglos as
May 6, 2010, 12:04 pmanother excuse to party, much like St. Patrick’s Day attracts folks whose only connection to Ireland is a love of Guiness Stout (that would be me). May 5th celebrations have been going on all over California for years with no problems. Now, a French flag might be different – but that probably would have united the Anglos and Latinos against a common enemy. (That’s a joke, son!!) IOW, the administrator is an idiot.
Monkberrymoon says:
I used to do that at my school — but nobody noticed.
May 6, 2010, 12:05 pmPeter says:
Perfect example of why 1) control over schools should be taken away from centralized state bureaucracies and returned to local communities, and 2) collective bargaining, union contracts, civil service protection for public employees should be banned.
These all prevent what should be the outcome in this case: the school officials involved get fired, and are unable to wallow in the public trough…err, get a job in the public sector, again.
May 6, 2010, 12:05 pmRicardo says:
He appeared at Congress wearing the shirt and was arrested. Jerry Rubin wore a Viet Cong shirt and wasn’t arrested — he accused the police of being Communists for discriminating against Hoffman. Not exactly the model of intelligent discourse, I have to say.
May 6, 2010, 12:06 pmrobc says:
I generally wear orange on St Patrick’s Day. I dont think anyone has ever even gotten what I was doing. However, the catholics in my city are primarily of german descent, so YMMV.
May 6, 2010, 12:09 pmSeamus says:
I think you meant to say “U.S. Code, title 36, sec. 176(d).” There are 50 titles in the Code, and a section citation without a title citation is as useless as a citation to “Encyclopedia Britannica, page 382.”
May 6, 2010, 12:11 pmAnderson says:
While you’d be safe in school, don’t go to court (at least in the mid-west) wearing a shirt that says “I have the pussy, so I make the rules.”
Interesting. In Cohen v. California, Cohen removed the offending jacket while in the courtroom, and the judge declined an invitation to hold Cohen in contempt. So there’s no direct conflict there — the judge’s power to conduct his courtroom is pretty broad.
One can only wish the judge had said, “Madam, I have the robes, so *I* make the rules.”
May 6, 2010, 12:12 pmAnderson says:
I generally wear orange on St Patrick’s Day.
Never thought of that, and I’m glad I haven’t done so accidentally.
May 6, 2010, 12:13 pmSeamus says:
A “friend” once sent me a St. Patrick’s Day card printed on orange paper, with the message, “One king, one crown/No pope in our town.” Trust me, I’d have gotten what you were doing.
May 6, 2010, 12:14 pmray_g says:
That is either (1) encouraging – no one cares, (2) sad – they don’t know history, or (3) hilarious – because of option (2). I’ll take door number 3.
May 6, 2010, 12:15 pmRicardo says:
Not too long ago, certain individuals were encouraging Americans to indulge in a two minutes hate against France for certain foreign policy decisions of the current government. Of course it’s the case that America might not have become independent in the first place if it wasn’t for the French military assistance Benjamin Franklin helped secure against Britain during the Revolutionary War. More than one group of people tend to forget history that happened more than 50 or 60 years ago.
This is just to say perceptions are more important than facts when it comes to unruly teenagers in high school. Was there a threat of violence? If no, the administrators were obviously wrong. If yes, they should consider insisting that clothing not represent any ethnic or national symbols (neither Mexican nor American nor Armenian nor Turkish). Teenagers love being rude to people who aren’t quite like them and administrators have to clean up the resulting mess afterward.
May 6, 2010, 12:17 pmNorman says:
Kids are such a-holes these days, but the school way overreacted on this one. Really whatever happened to just calling in a parent to deal with a kid being a jerk? Though apparently common sense seems to be going by the wayside in our society: http://lawblog.legalmatch.com/2010/04/30/preliminary-thoughts-on-the-arizona-immigration-law/
May 6, 2010, 12:20 pmRowerinVA says:
Um, what? How do you assume Eugene Volokh would have supported telling black students to stay home if they were the victims? I read him to say that people doing the harrasing should be punished, not the targets of the harassment.
Or is your point that the mere display of an American flag is “harassment” that should be banned, and the wearers should be punished? In which case, wow.
May 6, 2010, 12:27 pmray_g says:
Actually, like Monkberrymoon’s experience with orange on St. Pat’s day, I doubt anyone would even notice a French flag (unless someone went out of their way to call attention to it). From my experience in CA (and I suspect most places), the vast majority of folks of whatever ethnicity or national origin see Cinco de Mayo as a party day, not a political event.
May 6, 2010, 12:27 pmCalderon says:
And if there were 100 anti-gay students and 5 students advocating for gay pride, I assume in your view it would still make sense to remove the latter from the mix? Or 100 Tea Partier students and 5 vocal communists? I’m not sure about how the principle applies in schools, but the First Amendment in the US adult world doesn’t allow for a heckler’s veto.
May 6, 2010, 12:27 pmRPT says:
Aren’t we talking about a newspaper article talking about the events?
May 6, 2010, 12:31 pmwfjag says:
Anderson says:
Actually, in the case discussed in the Sun-Times article, the correct statement is “the judge’s power to conduct her courtroom is pretty broad.”
Never mess with a mad woman who’s got a hammer in her hand.
May 6, 2010, 12:32 pmAngus says:
A few things to take away from this:
May 6, 2010, 12:33 pm1. The school official overreacted and sent the kids home (but there were no suspensions)
2. From interviews, the 5 kids normally do not wear such clothes and did so on that day to make a statement against Cinco de Mayo
3. Such a statement by the 5 kids should be fully protected by the 1st Amendment
4. The District overruled the school and all the kids suffered was 1/2 day off school and some insta-fame, a win-win scenario for them
5. Conservatives are overreacting and portraying this incident as some sort of organized campaign to destroy America
SImon Jester says:
The decision in “Bong Hits for Jesus” was truly awful. Perhaps the American flag gathers more sympathy among the masses.
May 6, 2010, 12:35 pmRowerinVA says:
You’re both jumping to conclusions. There was no disruption. What this is really about is penalizing speech that is disfavored.
We don’t know that there would have been any disruption. If there were a disruption started by 100 kids wearing either flag, or 1000 kids, or whatever number, the disruptive kids (not the victims of the disruption) would be the anti-free-speech bad ones, and yes, send them home until they obey the law.
Penalizing the victims empowers the perpetrators. What’s next, send home the kid wearing a yarmulke because the skinheads are more numerous and might pick a fight? That’s exactly the same thing.
And let’s call it what it is: evil.
May 6, 2010, 12:36 pmTK75 says:
Ricardo
This is the perfect example of the pathetic moral relativism of liberals. This is the United States of America. To ban wearing our own flag or national symbols is disgraceful. It is indeed different from any other foreign nation, especially because the USA does not stand for a single racial or ethnic identity. Aren’t schools supposed to teach civics and pride in THIS country? Yes by all means respect every nation on the earth (or at least their people in cases like Iran or North Korea), but ours should stand first.
Do you really not comprehend the distinction?
May 6, 2010, 12:36 pmAngus says:
This has pretty much always been the case. When William Lloyd Garrison almost got lynched for his abolitionist writings, the police arrested him rather than the angry mob. When the Freedom Riders were attacked and beaten by the KKK, the FBI arrested the small group of Freedom Riders rather than the more numerous KKK members. There are dozens more famous examples, and I’m sure hundreds of thousands of less famous examples.
May 6, 2010, 12:37 pmMartinned says:
I would support “removing the 5 students from the mix” in each case. Surely the answer to this question cannot depend on whether you agree with the 5 or with the 100?
May 6, 2010, 12:37 pmRPT says:
Is the Gilroy school administrator an employee of the state or the county?
May 6, 2010, 12:38 pmUrso says:
I’d settle for “removing whoever starts the fight,” whether he’s in the 5 or the 100. If X does something that Y doesn’t like, and Y throws a punch, Y seems more blameworthy to me. Even if X was being rude.
May 6, 2010, 12:41 pmRPT says:
Wearing of the flag is already banned per the previously cited statute. That is the conservative position.
May 6, 2010, 12:41 pmBlue says:
You really don’t get the whole free speech thing, do you?
This is an open-and-shut case of illegal state action even under the husk of Tinker. While K-12 administrators are granted significant power to restrict speech on their campuses, the simple fact is that when faced with two competing political statements, agents of the state eliminated the free speech of one side of a political argument. This is so unconstitutional that it makes my fillings hurt.
May 6, 2010, 12:42 pmMartinned says:
Whether there was an imminent disruption is not something I can judge from several thousand miles away. As a result, it isn’t a very interesting question to focus on. If there wasn’t, the case is open and shut. The only really interesting question here is what to do if some degree of disruption is to some extent imminent.
May 6, 2010, 12:45 pmCalderon says:
I was more curious to see whether your answer to the question depended on whether you agree with the 5 or the 100. Though since your rule would allow the majority to get a minority suspended or otherwise discplined for their speech in every case, I’d suggest re-thinking the rule.
May 6, 2010, 12:50 pmMartinned says:
Been near a school lately? Ideally, in a school environment, one would like to nip a disruption in the bud before anyone throws a punch. If the first amendment requires that the school administrators wait until someone actually gets punched, the Constitution really is a suicide pact.
May 6, 2010, 12:51 pmTK75 says:
That may be the letter of the law, but it is hardly enforced and the reality on the ground is that anything goes onto a t-shirt. The debate seems to be more focused on the judgment of the school authorities, who have significant discretion. My problem is with anyone who declares the symbol of our nation to be a provocation or inflammatory.
Have we really come to the point where an American flag is just another symbol, and we no longer accord our own nation a position of primacy above others?
May 6, 2010, 12:51 pmkeypusher64 says:
Kindly do not try to define the conservative position, thanks.
Do we have to pretend that the flag code gets enforced anywhere, against anyone? That the school administrators were acting to enforce the flag code? That the flag code is even constitutional? That anyone, including yourself in particular, gives a damn about the flag code, except as a rhetorical prop?
May 6, 2010, 12:51 pmManju says:
If this was their rationale, then their actions are even more problematic on 1st amendment grounds. One of the major rationales behind the first is to protect minority viewpoints from tyranny of the majority by providing equal protection to all viewpoints.
If you single out a viewpoint because it’s the minority one, even if your motives are purely practical, you’re probably on a collision course with the 1st; since minority views are now provided lesser protection in such a regime.
May 6, 2010, 12:55 pmMartinned says:
Wait, ho, stop! I consistently wrote “remove from the mix”, which I deliberately intended as a neutral term that did not imply any kind of punishment. The two groups need to be split up, and in extreme cases one of them may need to be removed from school property for the day (i.e. sent home). Whether anyone should be punished is an entirely separate matter, and one that depends on what individual students may or may not have done.
May 6, 2010, 12:55 pmCheckEnclosed says:
Interesting that 36 U.S.C. §176 almost exclusively uses “should” and “should not”, rather than “shall”, “shall not” or “may not”.
May 6, 2010, 12:55 pmChrisTS says:
I’m astonished. Perhaps I should have gone with my 1st thought, along the lines Ricardo mentioned: my college’s Hillel is celebrating Israeli Independence Day and some students show up wearing [what they now seem to regard as] Palestinian scarves. Is there anyone who would not ‘get’ that??
May 6, 2010, 12:56 pmRowerinVA says:
No, I disagree. You would set up a terrible incentive. The more X acts as if the disruption is imminent, the more Y is penalized. And this is in fact how the outrage game is played on high school and college campuses today. The less responsible and adult X acts, the more Y gets silenced by the authorities. This makes the manufacturing of outrage valuable, and we should not be surprised that it increases output. Simple economics. Want less outrage? Stop catering to it.
If a disruption is imminent, call the police. If those independent police, who are trained to deal with hostile crowd situations, are truly certain that Y needs to be removed for his own safety, OK, but penalites on X should follow; if not, the police should remove the disruptive student and jail them in appropriate circumstances. Here, the school official got to act based on his opinion, alone, of Y’s speech. Allowing that administrator to claim “imminent disruption” with no third party review did, and will in the future, lead to more abuses.
May 6, 2010, 12:58 pmDG says:
First, the flag code is advisory and everyone knows it.
Second: {Or maybe some smart-aleck kids in a school with lots of Jewish students will decide to wear Syrian or Egyptian flags during Yom Kippur.}
No Jewish student would ever see that flag because they wouldnt be in school. If they did, they wouldn’t care. Try again.
Third: It is very disappointing to see ostensibly liberal commenters take an anti-civil liberties position.
May 6, 2010, 12:58 pmBlue says:
They did recieve punishment–they were kicked out of school for the day. That’s state action and it was clearly illegal.
May 6, 2010, 1:00 pmSuperSkeptic says:
It most assuredly does: The “fighting words” exception. It’s the same rationale as this principal’s, i.e., someone is going to hit these people for their viewpoint – so halt the viewpoint to prevent the violence.
May 6, 2010, 1:00 pmBlue says:
Er, “fighting words” is not a defense for illegal state action. It is a defense against a criminal complaint.
May 6, 2010, 1:02 pmMalvolio says:
All of them wrong. The police shouldn’t be neutral between the law-abiding and the law-breaking, any more than the fire department should be neutral between the fire and the people trapped in a building. Even ignoring the tyrannical aspects of deliberately punishing innocent people, enforcing the heckler’s veto creates a grievously perverse incentive.
I don’t know how a ban that violates settled Constitutional law is “the conservative position”. My guess is many the conservatives would oppose desecrating the flag, but no one is accused of doing that here.
May 6, 2010, 1:04 pmMartinned says:
I’m not sure if “lesser protection” is the correct way to look at this. As a practical matter, two groups who are about to come to blows in some way (which is still what I’m assuming) need to be separated somehow, and the school administrators should have wide latitude in figuring out what is the most practical way to do that. (Given that the threshold requirement of impending doom has been met.)
May 6, 2010, 1:05 pmAlast says:
So adopting heckler’s veto is better? I think not.
May 6, 2010, 1:06 pmray_g says:
The two situations are not equivalent. To most folks in the U.S., the Irish conflict is either not important or ancient history (I’m not commenting on whether that is good or bad). The Israel/Palestine thing is more recent, so it is more likely that folks would be aware of it.
May 6, 2010, 1:07 pmSuperSkeptic says:
ChrisTS,
The palestinian scarves as well as the protestant orange should be worn and graciously permitted, without question. Violence should, however, be utterly intolerable.
Enough with the first amendment denigrating prophylaxis out of fear.
May 6, 2010, 1:07 pmBlue says:
Where’s any evidence at all that violence was imminent?
May 6, 2010, 1:07 pmMartinned says:
From the article in the OP:
Given that these are all responsible and reasonable young adults, I’m sure they would consider being sent home a punishment even if it wasn’t a suspension, simply because it took away from them a valuable day’s learning…
May 6, 2010, 1:09 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Alright, but what’s your point?
May 6, 2010, 1:10 pmRPT says:
Everyone is offering opinions based on insufficient information and the luxury of separation. It is easy to pontificate in your air conditioned office that the flag wearing kids are right, as they probably are, but you’re not there on the scene, in 100 degree weather, trying to manage the school in a challenging context, including the controversy over the AZ statute. School violence does occur from time to time around the country. This is much like second guessing law enforcement encounters.
May 6, 2010, 1:10 pmManju says:
the suicide pact refers to issues of national security, like Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus. kids potentially getting into fights doesn’t trigger an exception to the bill or rights, unless the violence or lawlessness is immanent, as in fire in a movie theatre.
generally you have to actually wait until a crime is committed before you punish someone for the crime. prior restraint is frowned upon b/c its can obviously be abused. see pentagon papers.
May 6, 2010, 1:11 pmMartinned says:
Where’s any evidence that there wasn’t?
It doesn’t matter. For the legal issues of the case it is irrelevant, just like in most appellate cases it is irrelevant which party wins, unless you’re one of the parties. That said, we can have a conversation about “how imminent” the disruption has to be to qualify under Tinker. (Though I’m not sure if the English language has vocabulary to deal with such a conversation. Wittgenstein, etc. etc.)
May 6, 2010, 1:11 pmRowerinVA says:
No, no, no. That’s entirely wrong and you only need to edit to see why:
That’s what is really going on. “Come to blows” implies mutual combatant status. The allegation, as I understand it, is that the anti-speech students were the only ones likely to attack. In which case, they should be the only ones expelled.
May 6, 2010, 1:12 pmBlue says:
Martin, they were kicked off the school grounds. That is a punishment. Their constitutionally protected free speech was SILENCED. That is also a punishment.
May 6, 2010, 1:12 pmBlue says:
How about that they were sitting eating lunch? That’s not the thing one tends to be doing when violence is “imminent.”
May 6, 2010, 1:14 pmSuperSkeptic says:
On second thought, actually, I think I disagree anyway.
May 6, 2010, 1:14 pmray_g says:
As far as the flag code: traditions change. While it may bother traditionalists, unlike the Vietnam war era, when wearing the U.S. flag was intended as mockery, today most folks who wear flag patterned T-shirts, bandanas etc. do it to announce their pride in the U.S. flag and what it represents. It is not obvious to me that is disrespectful, unless you want to induldge in a kind of idolatry where the flag is concerned.
May 6, 2010, 1:15 pmMartinned says:
I know. Wasn’t my turn of phrase clever, though?
May 6, 2010, 1:16 pmManju says:
if they are about to come to blows, ie making threatening gestures at each other, then you send both home (equal protection). if they’;er not at the stage of gesturing then violence isn’t immanent and you have other options, like calling a meeting, besides censorship.
May 6, 2010, 1:16 pmpete says:
I would fine with that approach as long as the actual instigators are expelled afterwards. If the situation was such that one group of students was threatening “impending doom” to another group or individual, then I am ok with the administrators removing the t-shirt wearers temporarily and the students threatening to assault them permanently. I think most people would not be complaining if that was the end result, but most likely the students who are threatening violence will go unpunished and learn that the administration will only punish the minority and that threatening mob violence works.
May 6, 2010, 1:16 pmkeypusher64 says:
There needs to be an SB 1070 proviso added to Godwin’s Law, I think. Also, it’s a pleasant 60 degrees in Morgan Hill at present.
May 6, 2010, 1:17 pmspeedwell says:
The moron in the post above (talking about the flag as wearing apparel) who said he found that red, white, and green make a good doormat… let’s just hope he doesn’t know any Hungarians, eh…
May 6, 2010, 1:18 pmMartinned says:
Under Dutch law, there are only a handful of days when you’re allowed to fly the flag.
May 6, 2010, 1:18 pmEugene Volokh says:
Blue: The “fighting words” doctrine allows the government to restrict a certain narrow range of speech, basically face-to-face personal insults (see here for more). It does not provide a legal defense against a criminal assault charge; if someone insults you and you beat him up, you can’t plead as a defense that you were provoked by his insults. (In some jurisdictions, such insults might be provocation that mitigates what would otherwise be a murder or attempted murder into manslaughter or attempted manslaughter; but that doesn’t apply to assault and similar crimes.)
May 6, 2010, 1:19 pmMartinned says:
Agreed.
May 6, 2010, 1:19 pmBlue says:
I learned something new and potentially important! Thanks EV.
May 6, 2010, 1:22 pmManju says:
would you rather be clever or be a defender of freedom hitting below the mendoza line.
May 6, 2010, 1:24 pmCalderon says:
Two points. First, the fighting words doctrine is not about viewpoint. It’s literally about a narrow class of words that you can be punished for using. If I use various epithets to express the idea that all US citizens should emphasize that fact rather than celebrate the place of their heritage, I might be able to be disciplined/punished for use of fighting words. If I express the exact same viewpoint using the Queen’s English, punishing me is a First Amendment violation. Wearing an American flag is never going to be fighting words under any definition.
Second, and Prof. Volokh may have an actual empirical basis for saying this, but the fighting words doctrine does not seem to have any vitality in current cases. Yes, you learn it in law school and it still gets mentioned as a First Amendment exception. But you virtually never hear of someone actually being arrested simply for using fighting words.
May 6, 2010, 1:31 pmBob from Ohio says:
Interesting. Why the restriction?
May 6, 2010, 1:32 pmUrso says:
I doubt Martinned is a devoted follower of honkbal (this is seriously the Dutch word for baseball!)
But in light of the cinco de mayo discussion, isn’t it more than a little racist that our slang term for “terrible baseball player” just so happens to be Hispanic? Surely there were white guys who hit .211!
May 6, 2010, 1:32 pmray_g says:
I have often thought that sometimes we in the U.S. over do it a little, and risk diluting the meaning of displaying the flag, but like I said, traditions change. I do think intent matters, and nowadays, nearly all using the U.S. flag image on clothes, etc. intend no disrespect.
May 6, 2010, 1:35 pmSuperSkeptic says:
So, are you saying one could never get a justification instruction based on what would otherwise also be unprotected fighting words?
May 6, 2010, 1:36 pmMartinned says:
Clever how you worked that Latino reference in!
Actually, in this case I don’t like the rigidity of the 1A-first position. Maybe Justice Thomas’ in loco parentis approach in Morse v. Frederick went a little bit too far in the other direction, but – “defender of freedom” though I am – I don’t like the extreme rigidity with which the first amendment in particular is applied. Some balancing of the state’s interest in keeping the peace against the free speech interests involved surely wouldn’t extinguish freedom as we know it?
May 6, 2010, 1:36 pmMartinned says:
To protect the sanctity (there has to be a better word, but it won’t come to me) of the flag. I.e. the same reason as why you’re not allowed to hang it so that it touches the ground or a wall, why you have to take it down at sunset, etc. In general, Dutch people tend to find American style overt patriotism quite distasteful. (Even 65 years on, the memory of the Nazis with their flags still lives on.)
May 6, 2010, 1:40 pmSuperSkeptic says:
To your two points: first, whether one admits it or not, accepting something as a fighting word is inherently viewpoint based. Secondly, whether one is technically charged for fighting words or not is mostly irrelevant because most statutes under which people are arrested are broad and vague, encompassing so-called fighting words and much, much more.
[oh, and my original purpose in bringing up fighting words was not to say that it was applicable here, but rather to rebut someone's claim that "adult" First Amendment law has no heckler's veto, which it does: fighting words.]
May 6, 2010, 1:41 pmTK75 says:
Apparently I am the only one who is outraged that the symbol of our nation is being viewed/treated as inflammatory, or trivialized as if it were just another flag or gang color.
These kids were not wearing British colors on an Irish holiday, it was the freaking flag of our country! That should never be problematic, ever…
May 6, 2010, 1:43 pmMartinned says:
Manju was kind enough to include a wiki-link in his comment, so I could immediately look up what the reference meant. And yes, while I don’t understand the etymology either, the Dutch word for base is “honk”, so that baseball becomes honkbal. The only Dutch players who are any good at it tend to be Antillian (like Andruw Jones, who actually is/was the Netherlands’ best paid athlete, ahead of about 100 football players.)
May 6, 2010, 1:43 pmCalderon says:
Well, I guess we’re reaching “agree to disagree” territory. For the first point, yes, being able to use epithets is a viewpoint of sorts (South Park shows this), but it’s not what is generally meant when talking about viewpoints under First Amendment law. You can take any political, social, economic, etc. viewpoint and express it without using fighting words. For the second point, if police are not charging people solely because of fighting words but are basing the arrests on other acts, that shows the doctrine is not all relevant to current practice. The Supreme Court cases holding that there is not a “heckler’s veto” supports both of these points.
May 6, 2010, 1:48 pmA. Zarkov says:
While the legal issues here are important, they are secondary to what’s happening to California– the state is on its way to becoming a de facto northern province of Mexico. When your child’s school official calls the American flag, “incendiary,” you should get the message. The Live Oak High School is 44% Hispanic and 49% white according to Public School Review. The white-Hispanic ratio for Live Oak is 1.11 versus a ratio of 0.7 for the state as a whole, so this particular school is 60% more non-Mexican than the state as a whole. Yet this student is appropriately dressed. Can you imagine the furor if Laura Ponce had been sent home? A shift in demographics leads to a shift in political power. That’s the real story here.
May 6, 2010, 1:52 pmMartinned says:
Maybe you should move to France or Germany.
May 6, 2010, 1:53 pmJMA says:
“It most assuredly does: The “fighting words” exception. It’s the same rationale as this principal’s, i.e., someone is going to hit these people for their viewpoint — so halt the viewpoint to prevent the violence.”
Does that plan make anyone else sick?
May 6, 2010, 1:54 pmMartinned says:
You can also “take any political, social, economic, etc. viewpoint and express it without” burning a flag, but that doesn’t mean that flag burning isn’t protected under the US Constitution. (Though again one can wonder whether it should be.)
May 6, 2010, 1:55 pmbailey says:
What’s the “American” part of the anti-US flag group? Certainly, it doesn’t appear they have any loyalty to or respect for this country. Of course, Arizona’s the problem, not the open borders gang that creates situations like this.
May 6, 2010, 1:55 pmSeamus says:
Are you sure about that? What federal law could the FBI claim the freedom riders had violated? (The FBI doesn’t have authority to enforce state law.)
May 6, 2010, 1:57 pmbailey says:
There was a nice article I saw yesterday about a grade school in Ann Arbor that had A-A only field trips (and A-A girls were the ones excluded when the seats were all filled). It’s typical and about what one would expect.
May 6, 2010, 1:57 pmMartinned says:
Yes, the brownies are taking over the country!
But seriously, you may want to take into account that it was Cinco de Mayo, which is, more than any other, the day for a bit of Mexican nationalism. (If I understand it correctly.) Think of it as 4th of July for Mexicans, only they don’t get the day off.
May 6, 2010, 1:58 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Zarkov, what’s wrong with that appropriately dressed Irish girl? ;)
May 6, 2010, 2:01 pmTK75 says:
Martinned I actually support the right to burn a flag – that is a specific political protest and a form of free speech, an act that recognizes the importance of the flag as the symbol of our nation and government (whether you like it or hate it).
What this principal has done (and some posters here have written) is to downgrade the American flag to just another symbol, no different from gang colors, that is capable of inciting violence. To view students wearing the symbol of our nation as inciting violence with respect to students who are supporting a foreign nation – that is disgusting. Take pride in your heritage, but here in the USA our own country should always come first. Unless of course you are one of those people who really believes that the nation-state is a primitive relic and we should just become one big worldwide collective…
May 6, 2010, 2:02 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Makes me sicker than sick, super sick if you will, which is why I’ll oppose the fighting words exception (among others) until chaplinksy has a red flag next to it on westlaw – no matter how often it is currently invoked or used.
May 6, 2010, 2:04 pmwfjag says:
Urso says:
It does? There’s plenty of slang and examples of “terrible baseball player[s]” involving “white guys” (and several other races, too). See, e.g., YOU STINK! Major League Baseball’s Terrible Teams and Pathetic Players By Michael Aubrecht and Eric Wittenberg.
Terrible Teams:
• 1889 Louisville Colonels
• 1898 St. Louis Browns
• 1899 Cleveland Spiders
• 1904 Washington Senators
• 1932 Boston Red Sox
• 1935 Boston Braves
• 1916 Philadelphia Athletics
• 1942 & 1961 Philadelphia Phillies
• 1950-1954 Pittsburgh Pirates
• 1962 New York Mets
• 1969 Seattle Pilots
• 1973 San Diego Padres
• 1988 Baltimore Orioles
• 1991 Cleveland Indians
• 2003 Detroit Tigers
[Late additions: 2009 Washington Nationals (record losses) and Pittsburgh Pirates (17th consecutive losing season) ]
Hall of Shame:
• Worst Season: 1884 Wilmington Quicksteps
• Worst Pitch: NY Yankees Ralph Terry to Pittsburgh Pirate Bill Mazeroski
• Worst Investment: $100M 2008 Seattle Mariners
• Worst Ending: Bud Selig and the 2002 All-Star Game Tie
• Worst Season Collapse: 2007 New York Mets
• Worst Post-Season Collapse: 2004 New York Yankees
• Worst Playing Field: The Battlefield (Civil War)
• Worst Pitching Staff: 1930 Philadelphia Phillies
• Worst Line-Up At-Bat: 1956 Brooklyn Dodgers vs. Don Larsen
• Worst Sportsmanship: Banning of Jackie Mitchell
• Worst Moment: Untimely Death of Lou Gehrig
• Worst Scandal: 1919 Black Sox
• Worst Call: Maris’ 61 Asterisk
• Top 10 Worst Plays:
• Worst Players:
http://www.pinstripepress.net/USTINK.htm
May 6, 2010, 2:05 pmsyrupandhoney says:
Don’t you mean this “raises quite a few questions”?
May 6, 2010, 2:06 pmgrrzzly says:
Are you telling us it would be alright to punish people displaying a Mexican flag on the 4th of July? Maybe it’s fine in the Netherlands but not in the US.
May 6, 2010, 2:08 pmUrso says:
Do you really want to argue that a national flag – any national flag – is not capable of inciting violence?
May 6, 2010, 2:09 pmFrank Drackman says:
I once got suspended for taking a “Frito Bandito” eraser to school…
May 6, 2010, 2:13 pmwell THEY said it was cause I threw it across the room…
Martinned says:
I am, actually, but that’s not the point. (At least not today. On Sunday, it is Europe Day, the 60th anniversary of the Schumann Declaration, and the perfect day for discussions about the future of the Westphalian system.)
I also think that flag burning should be protected, and at least partly for the reasons you indicate. But my preferred way of thinking about such things would at least be open to the possibility that there might be a sufficiently compelling state interest in forbidding it. (That’s why I linked to the wiki-page on flag burning: apparently a ban on flag desacration is permitted under ECHR law.) Personally, I don’t think the state’s interest in literally defending the flag is very compelling, which is why I think people should be able to burn it.
May 6, 2010, 2:13 pmmischief says:
Oh, yes, I’ve run across your type.
The sort who had me punished in school because the other kids attacked me.
It makes sense to send those hoodlums home before they cost us even more money in jail.
May 6, 2010, 2:16 pmmark says:
Absolutely
May 6, 2010, 2:16 pmdisgustingto be expected.DougInSanDiego says:
This being California
I GUARANTEE none of the school administrators involved in this charade will suffer any consequences aside from embarrassment. Perhaps not even that.
May 6, 2010, 2:18 pmMartinned says:
No, but if this is taken as some eternal disgrace for American patriotism, I’d simply argue that Zarkov should calm down and remember what day it was.
May 6, 2010, 2:18 pmTK75 says:
Urso, I want to say that the flag of a nation within its own borders should never be viewed as the cause of the problem. If the flag is going to cause a problem, then whether it is 1 or 5,000 students – the focus should be on those people who have a problem with the flag of the nation in which they reside, and not on those who wear the national symbol. I pledge allegiance to the flag…
This is the United States of America, right?
Your logic and that of many here follows the same line of reasoning that counsels submission to Islamic radicals – that we should compromise our principles out of fear of offending someone who might take violent action, no matter who is right or wrong.
May 6, 2010, 2:18 pmMartinned says:
Do you really want me to explain the superiority of a Continental gymnasium versus an American High School? When I went to school, nobody was ever attacked.
That’s why I made a distinction between the problem of defusing the situation and the subsequent punishment.
May 6, 2010, 2:25 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
One of the kids wearing the American Flag was of hispanic origin…
May 6, 2010, 2:26 pmFederal Farmer says:
It is not a flag, but an image of a flag. I’m sure their shirts were not made from flags.
May 6, 2010, 2:26 pmUS MARINE VET says:
I lost over 5 friends to the current wars – many brothers mothers and fathers have lost sons daughters and husbands.
Today two Americans died in Afghanistan – protecting these kids freedom to wear that shirt and done the American Flag.
Send the principal to Afghanistan.
May 6, 2010, 2:28 pmSean says:
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. We need to go our separate ways as states. I don’t want to be part of a country with these people. They clearly hate the US, so why are we part of the same country anymore?
The good thing about Barack Obama is that he is going to speed up the dissolution of the US of A, by a combination of fiscal bankruptcy and making crystal clear the cultural differences between those of us that love America, it’s Constitution and the morals the nation was founded upon; vs that of the la Raza, whitey’s wrong about everything Democratic party crowd.
In 10 years the US will be about 5-7 separate countries, and we’ll all be much better off.
May 6, 2010, 2:30 pmMartinned says:
Didn’t they also die to protect kids’ freedom to wear Mexican flags? Or does the US army only defend freedoms that you agree with?
May 6, 2010, 2:30 pmThomas says:
I’m frankly surprised nobody has thought to declare the California state flag — the “Bear Flag” adapted by the gringo filibusters who briefly set up the California Republic during that awful racist genocidal (that from one of my USC law school classmates) Intervencion Norteamericano — to be incendiary and exclusive. Because it celebrates the taking of California from Mexico (thus probably saving the Mexican economy, by allowing the creation there of a functional civilization capable of absorbing dysfunctional Mexico’s excess population and returning billions of dollars in remittances — that’s gratitude for you!)
May 6, 2010, 2:32 pmUrso says:
As I understand it, European high schools are highly tiered, so you would go to a school with people of your own intellectual level. I assume this means you went to school with the smart kids only – surely fighting is rare there.
That doesn’t mean that fights didn’t happen, they just happened in other schools where the kids were not high achievers.
May 6, 2010, 2:33 pmmikeyes says:
What if it is someone’s Russian grandmother wearing a babushka? Or a conservative Catholic woman in a place of worship?
Most of these arguments seem to be in the same vein as that fellow who was reading the book on how Notre Dame defeated the Klan and was suspended from work because it offended some of his African-American co-workers. It is my understanding that offense in the eye of the beholder is still not a capital crime.
May 6, 2010, 2:33 pmSean says:
“If there is a reasonably predictable likelihood (not just a bare conjecture) that speech or expressive conduct will cause substantial disruption — which is not clear under these facts — then the school may legally restrict it without violating the First Amendment.”
What you are saying is, if person A threatens to become violent when person B expresses their opinion, then it fair, right, wholesome and constitutional to restrict person’s B’s rights because threat of violence from an unreasonable person trumps what is in our Bill of Rights.
Fine. The message is clear. People who love America need to start becoming violent so that we are allowed to speak. Message received, loud and clear asshole. Violence on the way.
May 6, 2010, 2:34 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
One of the kids wearing the American Flag was of hispanic origin…
No doubt he’s an employee (with a 6-figure salary and benefits, tenure and civil service protections) of the school district.
May 6, 2010, 2:35 pmDan says:
Stories in the local paper and blog posts by Glenn Reynolds and TVC reach a few hundred thousand people. After the AP, NPR, NYT, Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC have reported this, then you can talk about MSM coverage. If the kids had been sent home for wearing the Mexican Flag, then you can be assured that all those outlets would be running stories.
May 6, 2010, 2:37 pmA. Zarkov says:
I would not have expected this kind of childish snark from you.
Cinco De Mayo is not an American holiday. The students are supposed to be Americans, not Mexicans who have gone to “El Norte.” Perhaps you don’t think the de-nationalization of your country is a problem, but some of us do. Suppose the U.S. were to go to war with Mexico. Whose side would the school officials and the parents of these students take?
May 6, 2010, 2:38 pmStephen Lathrop says:
What a setup for a curmudgeon! Mandatory school uniforms are the answer. Plus a clear understanding that K-12 students enjoy no free speech rights whatever while in school. But can say or wear anything they want off the school grounds. Once the rule is established, it can be relaxed as needed to serve educational needs.
I can not understand why it is constructive to grant more expressive freedom to children in school than their parents get in their places of employment.
The justification in the case of schools is that you need that degree of control to guarantee a fair educational opportunity to all students. School disorder is too often discussed in terms of the rights of the disorderly. The rights of the victims of disorder need the priority. Why confront the flag issue? Just sidestep it.
May 6, 2010, 2:39 pmcwp says:
Wearing of the flag is already banned per the previously cited statute.
It’s not obvious to me from reading the code that wearing apparel bearing the image of the flag is prohibited by it, as opposed to wearing the flag itself as apparel (e.g., a toga).
May 6, 2010, 2:39 pmgrrzzly says:
Any day is a perfect day for a citizen of this country to demonstrate his feelings for the US. On the other hand, the Dutch can be ashamed of their country on every single day, perhaps if I were Dutch I’d feel the same.
May 6, 2010, 2:40 pmMichael Chaney says:
Of course, as usual we have a law restricting what governmental officials may do that excludes any punishments for breaking said law.
This crap stops when the law includes a simple section that describes what level of misdemeanor or felony such actions constitute and it’s enforced. With no threats of punishment these people have no reason to respect such “laws”.
May 6, 2010, 2:41 pmMartinned says:
Indeed. (I wasn’t trying to make an particularly subtle point there. Mischief made some strange and vaguely ad hominem remarks in my direction, so I simply said something more or less clever in return.)
You do realise that the quote you started with is EV’s summary of the Supreme Court’s 40 year old precedent in Tinker?
Either way, I have to say I’m not following your comment. I literally have no idea how you go from Tinker to the bit I’m quoting here. Maybe I should retake remedial English.
May 6, 2010, 2:42 pmMoneyrunner says:
Since someone mentioned the Dutch I thought I would jump in here. As a Dutch immigrant with an understanding of European history I thought it was virtually my duty to wear orange on St. Patrick ’s Day, considering the history of the Dutch king that the English imported. I only did it once and got a few looks, but that’s about it.
With the exception of lending their rulers to other countries and part of the 17th Century, the Dutch have always been a weak reed. Easily over-run, the best they could manage to do was contribute troops to Napoleon as he fought to take over Europe, managed to stay neutral in WW1 (and provide a home to the Kaiser afterward), and surrender after a few days in WW2. The Dutch had a fairly large population of Nazi sympathizers during the war, known by the initials NSB.
Today it’s only a matter of time before Islam becomes the dominant culture (it already is the dominant religion) in the Netherlands, thanks to the importation of “guest workers” who never left. My elderly relatives are afraid to go out and the Dutch government is prosecuting Geert Wilders who does not approve of the transformation of the country into an Islamic ghetto.
The courage of the Dutch was exhibited when people in the apartment building where Ayaan Hirsi Ali was living asked her to move after the murder of Theo Van Gogh caused excitable followers of Islam to threaten to kill her also. She eventually moved to the US to find the kind of personal protection that the Dutch were not willing to provide. Freedom of speech is not much of an issue to the Dutch, and just like the school principal in this case, believe the way to get along is to remove the people who irritate people who are prone to violence.
May 6, 2010, 2:42 pmSev says:
Martinned,
Mexican independence day is in September. May 5 celebrates a battle won by a debtor to avoid a collection attempt by his creditor. Like Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day it’s a retailer’s holiday. Like St. Patrick’s Day to Ireland, most people in Mexico don’t celebrate the gringo invention.
What I get from this is: (1) punishing the putative victim is cowardice but what do you expect, bureaucrats weren’t bred for courage; and (2) I am resolved to wear a French flag on every May 5 and Prostestant orange every St. Patrick’s Day.
May 6, 2010, 2:44 pmChuckO says:
Am I the only one to read the flag code as referring to the actual flag, as opposed to the image of the flag printed on something? A T-shirt bearing the image of the flag is not the flag, it is a T-shirt. A flag with a hole cut in it and worn as a poncho is a flag being used as wearing apparel. I’m not a lawyer, but this seems like a pretty clear distinction (though I admit the distinction can be less clear in other cases).
Regardless, the school administrators acted stupidly. (And I feel stupid for even using that phraseology… how does the president get away with it?)
May 6, 2010, 2:44 pmSun Tzu's Nephew says:
One of the kids wearing the American Flag was of hispanic origin…
No doubt he’s an employee (with a 6-figure salary and benefits, tenure and civil service protections) of the school district.
Which is why the Dutch people will require other, more patriotic and competent nations, to save them again.
May 6, 2010, 2:46 pmMartinned says:
Why do they have to give up their Mexican identity when they come to the US? (Or give it up on behalf of their unborn children, etc.) Since when is that part of the deal? Can’t one be Mexican and American at the same time? If the US goes to war with Mexico, I’d imagine all right-thinking people to be on the side of justice, whichever side that turns out to be.
That’s Thomas’ in loco parentis rule.
I assure you, we are generally quite pleased with ourselves. (Or, as Belgians would say, smug bastards.) We just don’t feel the need to prove this patriotism with ridiculous flag displays, lapel pins, etc. (Except on Queen’s Day, of course, when the entire country turns orange.) It would be a sad day indeed when any politician not wearing a flag pin would automatically be assumed to be unpatriotic.
Isn’t that what 28 USC 1983 is for?
May 6, 2010, 2:48 pmPhilistine says:
Link
I see AP, MSNBC, FoxNews, NBC, ABC, a number of major papers, etc.
Now can we talk?
May 6, 2010, 2:50 pmUrso says:
Sorry, but this story is not worth front page New York Times treatment. It’s just not that a big deal. It’s worth front page Volokh space, because it’s the kind of thing we talk about. Or maybe New York Times page E7.
These kinds of counterfactuals sound great, because they can never be disproven. But it’s not even slightly convincing.
May 6, 2010, 2:50 pmChuckO says:
I guess I’m not the only one… cwp beat me to it.
May 6, 2010, 2:50 pmpete says:
Unfortunately Martinned, the reality is most public schools in the US is that school employees do little to prevent violence. Either they can’t because of legal/policy reasons or they won’t because it is a hassle and they lose money when they lose students or figure the assaulters are better off in school than somewhere else.
I was not attacked much at school and was never seriously hurt, but it did happen. Almost every male was attacked at some point in my junior high or high school, usually by the same repeat offenders that the admnistration knew about. And I went to what would in general be considered safe and well run schools.
May 6, 2010, 2:50 pmSteve in Colorado says:
So “Rodriguez did not want any fights to break out among Mexican-American students and those wearing American flags”. And his solution is preemptive surrender of our natural rights guaranteed by the First Amendment. The crisis in education appears to be deeper than we thought.
May 6, 2010, 2:51 pmpete says:
You forgot yahoo and drudge
May 6, 2010, 2:51 pmrichard40 says:
I wonder, if it was St Patricks day, and some students showed up wearing Irish flags, and some wore US flags, would the students wearing US flags again be told to hide them? I would love to see both the principle and assistant principle fired, or at least formally reprimanded, but knowing the power of the CA teachers unions, and their devotion to PC, I know that wont happen.
May 6, 2010, 2:53 pmTom R says:
I think you misunderstand the US code.
Wearing an actual flag as an article of clothing is considered disrespect to the flag. Clothing that has a diagram of the flag on it is not considered disrespectful.
May 6, 2010, 2:54 pmray_g says:
Go look up Cinco de Mayo. It is NOT the equivalent of July 4th, that would be Mexican Independence day, which IIRC is Sept 12. It commemorates a particular battle during French occupation of Mexico. It is not universally celebrated in Mexico, one could argue that it is more celebrated in the United States than in Mexico. I had never heard of it until I moved to California 30 years ago.
It is an excuse to have a party. Bars offer special happy hours, food etc. Folks drink Mexican beer, tequila and eat Mexican food, but there is nothing special about that in California. If there is any potential for political or “ethnic” strife (and in 30 years living in California I’ve heard little or nothing about that in connection with Cinco de Mayo), it is a recent phenomenon and a creation of the usual race grievance promoters. Lacking any solid evidence of any plans for fights or whatever (and I’ve seen no mention in any news reports), the school official had no reason to do anything. He is an overly cautious, paranoid idiot or a PC obsessed fool, or likely both.
This is madness. If we ever have a race war in this country, it will be because of the race grievance industry. The vast majority of Californians of whatever ethnic group or national heritage see Cinco de Mayo as a reason to hoist a few beers and share guacamole recipies. It is, or at least has been, a true example of American diversity – celebrate some group’s national heritage and have fun while doing it.
May 6, 2010, 2:56 pmJR says:
Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez and Principal Nick Boden should find other jobs or study history a little better and teach the young men that the US helped by sending troops after the Civil war.
May 6, 2010, 2:56 pmMartinned says:
Let me just start with this one: She wanted the government to pay for her bodyguards indefinitely, which they refused once she was no longer a member of parliament and no longer living in the Netherlands. Is the US government paying for her bodyguards now?
By whom? The Netherlands has been conquered exactly twice in the last 400 years, by Napoleon and by Hitler.
“fairly large” meaning what? More than other occupied countries? That can’t be what you mean, since that is certainly not true. Please clarify.
Sure, in a thousand years, who knows?
Why shouldn’t we provide a home to the Queen’s cousin? (Or second cousin, I forget.)
Yes, we’re very proud of Pete Hoekstra. We have a lot more Christian fundamentalists like him. You can have them if you like.
What can I say? We’ve had freedom of speech since the time of Spinoza and Descartes, so I guess we take it for granted.
See? I’m patriotic enough to defend my country when others write lies about it! What I wouldn’t do, though, is deny other the right to repeat them. (Unless they’re defamatory, I guess.)
May 6, 2010, 2:58 pmMartinned says:
The US is certainly big, which is useful in times of war. Whether it is also more patriotic and more competent is something I’ll leave for wiser men to judge.
For the record: Here in the Netherlands we just spent two days remembering the sacrifice the allies made to free us from the Nazis, with a memorial for the dead on May 4 and a big celebration on May 5. So yes, we’re very grateful.
May 6, 2010, 3:02 pmDr. Deano says:
It may have already been mentioned, but if the principal has some reasonable basis for his alleged fears for the safety of the flag wearing students, then by failing to deal with whomever formed that basis, i.e., the potential perpetrators of that violence, he hands those potential perpetrators and their supporters a victory for their views and threatened thuggery.
Though I hope against it, I would not be surprised to see an increased level of tension and increasing potential for real violence at the school since the administration has punished students who did no wrong and empowered a thug element of the student body. And such actions will reasonably and understandably generate anger, fear and trepidation in that part of the student body who might not support the thug element.
May 6, 2010, 3:03 pmSuperSkeptic says:
Stephen Lathrop as Justice Thomas!
May 6, 2010, 3:04 pmMartinned says:
I only said they were equivalent in the sense that they are both an excuse to bring the flag(s) out.
Amen.
May 6, 2010, 3:04 pmPaul A'Barge says:
Stop for a moment and think of the context here. It’s Califonia. It’s Gilroy, which means inland from the coast, closer to the farm belt of the San Joaquin Valley. Which means lots of agriculture, which in turns means just loads and loads of Hispanics (farm pickers, laborers, etc, etc).
Now remember that Hispanics love to engage in gang activities, including drugs and gang fights, gang banging, etc. Imagine that you are in a public high school awash with Hispanics. Not just the students but the unionized teachers and administrators as well.
Doing anything that might remotely set off the Hispanic high school students is not just likely to trigger an ideological debate in the halls. It’s likely to trigger all out gang-bang warfare, starting in the schools and spilling into the community. This is the kind of behavior that can be expected from Hispanics in California (and elsewhere).
You have to understand what the principal and vice principal (himself a Hispanic) were up against. These administrators know the incipient, flash-rage violence typical of Hispanics in their school. Hispanic students Pwn these administrators.
What were the administrators supposed to do? Stand on American principles and values and let the peaceful students wear their American flag T-shirts and exercise their freedom of speech? Only to be slaughtered in a roaring gang-bang rage of violence perpetrated by Hispanics? Not bloody likely. The administrators might have done the “wrong” thing vis a vis the First Amendment, but those 5 high school students are alive today to complain.
Had the 5 students been allowed to wear their American flag T-shirts they would have been given a near certain death sentence and subjected to horrible beatings by Hispanics in their school.
This is California, people. Coming soon to a high school near you. If you don’t want your children injured, don’t provoke Hispanics.
May 6, 2010, 3:06 pmtwgin says:
Ah the memories ! I grew up in Gilroy and used to deliver the Dispatch each evening on my trusty Schwinn three speed. I have to point out that Live Oak High School is in Morgan Hill, up the road from Gilroy about 15 miles. They were in a different athletic league, but we played them every year for bragging rights ! Not that this couldn’t have happened in Gilroy, the demographics are similar as is probably the nature of the school administrations. Last time Gilroy was in the national news was a couple of decades ago when the school district made a controversial decision to remove junk food from the vending machines, a first in the nation at that time. My dad spent his career in the Gilroy School District; teacher, principal, assistant superintendent but retired many years ago. Gilroy (and California) was a great place to grow up in the 50′s and 60′s…
May 6, 2010, 3:08 pmRetiredE9 says:
And the wind chill drops that down to 108
May 6, 2010, 3:10 pmPhilistine says:
I’ll first put the caveat that I think what the administration did was legally and morally wrong.
That being said–as others have pointed out–cinco de mayo is a holiday that is particularly celebrated by Mexican-Americans (and not particularly by real Mexicans–kind of like St. Patrick’s Day and the Irish). Reading between the lines, it seems like (at least for the group of 5 kids) the wearing of the US flag was done for the purpose of harassing or belittling those celebrating (much like a “F*ck the Irish” tee-shirt worn on St. Patrick’s day).
If true–it’s a pretty poor use of an American flag to try to provoke or harrass others.
I could see the administration believing this particular group having an intent to provoke a confrontation–especially if there were some history.
That all being said–still not an appropriate reaction, to my mind.
May 6, 2010, 3:11 pmBohemond says:
Ah- so the bigger mob wins, to hell with right and wrong.
May 6, 2010, 3:12 pmDaniel says:
“Dariano said other students were wearing American flags but since they were a group of five “we were the easiest target to cause trouble” according to Rodriguez, he said….”
There is a back story that we are not getting, maybe because privacy laws do not allow the school to tell its side of the story. Why this five and not the other students wearing American flags. While I find it difficult to come up with a scenarion that justifies the school’s response, I think it is a mistake to simply believe this five did nothing to provoke. Maybe they were just sitting in the lunch room all day keeping to themselves with their mouths shut, maybe not.
May 6, 2010, 3:16 pmOpenVolokh says:
What a ridiculous decision by the school. Some people are really lacking in common sense.
May 6, 2010, 3:18 pmmariner says:
It’s not surprising to me.
Many “liberals” simply favor “Free speech for me (and my friends) but not for thee.”
May 6, 2010, 3:18 pmMartinned says:
When it comes to such a level of disruption (or likely disruption) that this kind of intervention is necessary, everybody loses.
May 6, 2010, 3:18 pmCalderon says:
The things you learn on VC. I wonder how much (if any) that tiering explains of Europe’s superior academic performance. Back when I was in high school a few decades ago, the focus in my public high school actually was on “untracking,” or putting everyone in the same classes regardless of intelligence. Needless to say, this bored the smarter people to tears.
May 6, 2010, 3:20 pmTed says:
Absolutely. The hecklers’ free speech should be trampled on, because the state has a legitimate interest in keeping the peace. Thus, if two groups have different view points, and violence or substantial disruption is expected, the those who threaten violence or disruption should be punished. This aligns the interests of the state with the freedom granted by the constitution in a pragmatic way.
But I wonder if this is what you really meant…
May 6, 2010, 3:20 pmA. Zarkov says:
They have to give up their identity when that identity conflicts with the dominant culture. If they don’t want to do this then they can return home. Instead we see the Mexican leadership in California wanting Hispanics to become the dominant culture. In other words, the U.S. is supposed to adapt to Mexicans.
You give yourself away here. I note that you don’t expect Mexican-Americans to fight for America, but for “the side of justice,” which is a concept that’s so elastic it’s meaningless.
We expect that people who migrate here to be loyal Americans, and fight against its enemies irrespective of who they think is on the side of “justice.” That’s the deal. If you don’t like the deal, then don’t come. Stay home. Is that so hard to understand? Stay home.
May 6, 2010, 3:21 pmMartinned says:
As opposed to conservatives, who never seem to have that problem.
[/snark]
May 6, 2010, 3:21 pmMartinned says:
Again: Since when is that part of the deal?
That is very scary. You apparently expect Americans, as in: all of them, to support the government no matter what they do. If the US invades Mexico without a lawful reason (i.e. not in self-defence or defense of others, and without a Security Council mandate), I’d expect all American citizens to protest the criminal acts by their government. No government is entitled to our unconditional support; they only get it as long as they don’t break the law too badly.
Were we contemplating a draft? OK: Any possible draft law should apply to all Americans, rich and poor, equally. If your number is up, you should go and fight.
That said, I’m not sure what the procedure would be for dual citizens. They ought to fight, but I’d imagine the army wouldn’t want them.
May 6, 2010, 3:28 pmteabagger says:
So it’s settled then. No one favors free speech.
May 6, 2010, 3:28 pmMandingo says:
Justice demands that the administrators be publicly flogged.
May 6, 2010, 3:34 pmMartinned says:
Virtually everybody does. But putting your money where your mouth is, i.e. not just supporting free speech as a general principle but also in a specific instance, is a lot easier with speech you approve of. That’s just human nature.
May 6, 2010, 3:35 pmThomas Wells says:
Did the school fly the flag of the United States from its flag pole?
May 6, 2010, 3:37 pmBack in The time when Francis Scott Key wrote the National Anthem, the flag was “causing trouble” with some people who also did not like what it stood for.The American’s of those days were not afraid to take actions to defend freedom. Good for those young adults who are following in the noble footsteps of patriots. As for those politically correct treasonous party-line walkers,they can go to…Baltimore.
Martinned says:
I can see how defending your right to wear a US flag T-shirt is an “action to defend [a] freedom”. But why do I get the impression that you had a much broader principle in mind?
May 6, 2010, 3:41 pmCJColucci says:
While I hold no brief generally for school administrators, having had plenty of run-ins with them in my wild youth, we should at least be open to the possibility that the administrators on the spot had a better grasp than we do about the potential for disruption.
May 6, 2010, 3:45 pmZ` says:
The ACLU will be right on this situation. To defend the school district.
May 6, 2010, 3:51 pmKen Arromdee says:
First of all, that’s actually possible, believe it or not. Not every student is a blithering idiot.
Second, it’s possible that when sent away from school they would be receiving zeroes for any tests and classwork done that day. Schools often don’t let kids make up work missed because of suspension, and they probably don’t do so for non-suspension suspensions, which effectively turns every suspension into a double penalty.
May 6, 2010, 4:06 pmNarr says:
1970.
May 6, 2010, 4:07 pmr gould-saltman says:
Z’: I gather you aren’t a member, haven’t ever been a member, and probably don’t know any members personally…
May 6, 2010, 4:07 pmFil says:
In England you can’t sport the English flag because it angers the immigrants.
In America you can’t sport the American flag because it angers the immigrants.
Across Europe there are “no-go” places where Europeans cannot go because it angers the immigrants.
Apparently in America, instead we have “no-go” times that belong to immigrants. May 5 is one. White Americans are expected to behave, and Black Americans are expected to vanish.
Tell me again why we want [a critical mass of] third-world immigrants here?
May 6, 2010, 4:08 pmlibertariansoldier says:
Martinned
May 6, 2010, 4:12 pm“I assure you, we are generally quite pleased with ourselves”
No doubt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srebrenica_massacre
“I only said they were equivalent in the sense that they are both an excuse to bring the flag(s) out.”
No you didn’t:
“But seriously, you may want to take into account that it was Cinco de Mayo, which is, more than any other, the day for a bit of Mexican nationalism. (If I understand it correctly.) Think of it as 4th of July for Mexicans, only they don’t get the day off.”
And as far as getting the day off–maybe they do, in Mexico. Although perhaps they only get off their equivalent–Independence Day, which as commentators have noted is in September.
I am thinking the Belgians are on to something–and not just because they make better beer.
ray_g says:
Almost totally off topic, but to lighten up things: Gilroy fancies itself the garlic capital of the world. The first time I went through Gilroy it was a cold morning, I was coming out of the hills on my motorcycle, and the smell of garlic hit me and cleared my sinuses up instantly. It was actually kind of refreshing.
May 6, 2010, 4:20 pmMoneyrunner says:
Note how Martinned cherry picks my comments. Let’s face it, neither free speech not the right to life is much of a concern of the Dutch these days. Geert Wilders, an unusually brave Dutch politician, is being prosecuted for “inciting hatred of Islam” for his film “Fitna” which is available on the Internet. Free speech is no longer a Dutch principle no matter what early Dutch free-thinkers are invoked. They’ re dead and probably would be brought to Dutch courts if they were alive today and pissed off the wrong people.
The Dutch have also acquired the quaint habit of offing their elderly when it is determined they are no longer competent. It’s undoubtedly the wave of the future in the US since killing granny is one very good way of “bending the cost curve” in the right direction as Obama is fond of saying.
I’m not sure of the proportion of NSB (Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging) to patriotic Dutchmen during WW2, but they were popular in the 1930s and ran the show during the occupation. Of course the membership developed amnesia afterwards and today people will deny it was much of a movement at all.
And that “thousand years” that Marinned is referring to reminds me of a certain Austrian Corporal’s establishment of a thousand year reich. The fact is that native Europeans are not reproducing themselves fast enough to maintain their population, Fertility rates for the Dutch is about 1.7, well below the 2.1 births per female to replace the current generation. On the other hand, birth rates among other populations is very much higher. A thousand years? It is to laugh.
May 6, 2010, 4:22 pmJoseph Slater says:
As a liberal type, I’ll say I think the school administrators were wrong (I also think Angus made some good points way upthread).
But here are the fascinating things I’ve learned from this thread. First, that this is somehow the fault of unions and collective bargaining (thanks Pete and Paul!), even though the decision-makers here, as administrators, almost certainly weren’t part of any union. Second, that the Dutch are EVIL!
And third, most importantly: there really was a baseball player who was famous for being a horrible fielder whose name was Tony Suck? Really? Suck?
May 6, 2010, 4:23 pmAnderson says:
The ACLU will be right on this situation. To defend the school district.
Everything you know about the ACLU, you learned from Fox News, right?
May 6, 2010, 4:24 pmCowboy says:
Fire them all. Every single one of this school’s admins, to the last man or woman, regardless of whether they were a party to this decision or not.
There’s no call for continuing to mess around on stuff like this. Send a clear, unambiguous signal: fire them all. Every one of them.
May 6, 2010, 4:26 pmAngus says:
If I can hazard a guess as to what Thomas Wells is saying here by his reference to “the time Francis Scott Key wrote the National Anthem.”
During the War of 1812, there was a riot in Baltimore where a pro-war crowd attacked the publishers of an anti-war newspaper. The crowd brutally tortured the anti-war publishers, ending with one of the tortured men dying of his wounds.
http://mason.gmu.edu/~shurter/hist697/printers/images.htm
Shorter Thomas Wells: anyone I consider to be insufficiently American should be tortured and killed.
May 6, 2010, 4:31 pmMary in LA says:
Urso says:
You must not have read the Wikipedia article carefully. The point is the opposite: Mario Mendoza was not a “terrible baseball player” at all! He was an excellent and highly valued shortstop; he just couldn’t hit well. The “Mendoza line” is the point at which the reasons for keeping a given player (e.g. great skills in the infield) outweigh the reasons for letting him go (e.g. a poor batting average). Is it racist? I dunno — ask George Brett, who is said to have invented the expression.
May 6, 2010, 4:34 pmgeokstr says:
Wowee!! Printed in a local newspaper and picked up by conservative blogs. How about we watch the reaction from all the major MSM next time a kid gets suspended for wearing a confederate flag shirt to school. And with good reason of course, because that would prove that all the tea partiers are racists.
Yessirree. Based on their strong and prominent featuring of this case, it totally proves without a doubt that that the mainstream plays it right down the middle.
Pardon me while I go throw up.
It’s sort of like African-Americans kids who actually study and don’t speak ebonics getting derided for being Oreos. All the peer pressure forces them to idolize sports stars and rappers. What an wonderful system of incentives we’ve managed to get for racial minorities in America.
May 6, 2010, 4:40 pmluxurytwist says:
As for the question of, “When did using the flag as bandana change from a sign of disrespect into one of patriotism,” I’d guess the ’80s, based on my own high school experience. Not only was it the time of Reagan, but it was also when (anecdotally) the majority of teachers shifted from schoolmarm types to Mr. Van Dreesen hippie types. So punks like us figured out quickly that nothing would piss off a school administration more than unironic patriotism.
Also, as far as the flag code issues go, I suppose it’s in the nature of “taking something back”, like African-Americans using the N-word. Maybe you’re not really supposed to wear a flag bandanna, but the pro-U.S. people want to take it from the anti-U.S. types.
May 6, 2010, 4:41 pmunlawyer says:
Would you mind clarifying this? I can imagine all sorts of actions that might be encouraged in one culture, but rejected by another culture to the extent that there are laws against those actions. In such situations, I expect immigrants to give up that part of their identity.
May 6, 2010, 4:42 pmglenn says:
Puebla, Schmoebla, it’s a marketing device for Dos Equis and Corona. And Tortilla Chips. Ask any five Mexicans or Mexican Americans and you’ll be lucky to find one who knows what CdeM signifies. But I think it’s safe to say the Vice Principle stepped on his crank big time. And that the kids who wore the Red, White, and Blue were engaging in that highly regarded High School sport, “Thumbing Your Nose at the Squares”
May 6, 2010, 4:46 pmUrso says:
Someone needs to get a copy of Moneyball.
May 6, 2010, 4:46 pmak138 says:
Why would those celebrating students find the American flag offensive? How exactly is the American flag the equivalent of wearing a F*ck the Whatever t-shirt?
Someone on another blog made an excellent point. He/she noted that at St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in the US, there are always Irish and US flags. The two flags are often shown crossed, e.g., on emblems and whatnot. And in StPD parades, the US flag still always takes precedence.
May 6, 2010, 4:53 pmArthur Kirkland says:
It has always bugged me to see car dealers displaying huge flags for holiday sales, political candidates featuring flags on campaign signs, supermarkets placing flags in circulars, etc.
My state’s law — which I stumbled upon during law school — similarly prohibits commercialization of the flag. Freedom of expression probably trumps (or should trump) these prohibitions, in my judgment, but much of the flag-related conduct among Americans — an in particular Americans trying to sell insurance or attract votes — is shabby.
May 6, 2010, 4:53 pmpete says:
When did I say this is the fault of unions and collective bargaining?
May 6, 2010, 4:56 pmray_g says:
The “Mendosa line” concerns an individual, not any group. And if you look at the context, the coining of the phrase seems like a case of good natured hazing.
Considering the large number of excellent and popular Latino/Hispanic (whatever the right term is) players have been on Major League Baseball teams over the years, I highly doubt anyone with even a little (and I have very little) knowledge of the game would equate Hispanic with “terrible ball player”. I highly doubt George Brett thought that.
This nonsense is what you get when your view of the world is dominated by group identity politics.
May 6, 2010, 4:59 pmChris Travers says:
Some wise words from Plutarch:
Plutarch recounts a story where an Athenian man approached a Spartan king and said, “I want you to know that among my friends, I’m known as a friend of Sparta.”
To which the king replied, “It’d be better if you were known as a friend of Athens.”
May 6, 2010, 5:02 pmMary in LA says:
Urso says:
Someone (you) needs to stop seeing racism in an eponym, which was actually my point.
May 6, 2010, 5:18 pmJoseph Slater says:
Pete:
My mistake. I had you mixed up with “Peter,” who posted the following:
Peter says:
Perfect example of why 1) control over schools should be taken away from centralized state bureaucracies and returned to local communities, and 2) collective bargaining, union contracts, civil service protection for public employees should be banned
Speaking as someone with a fairly common name (Joe), I should have been more careful. Apologies.
May 6, 2010, 5:20 pmMary in LA says:
Well, naturalized U.S. citizens take the Oath of Allegiance:
May 6, 2010, 5:26 pmLeft_Wing_Lock says:
I’m OK with the principal’s decision for this year. Now next year, the rule will be it’s OK to wear an American flag on Cinco de Mayo and anyone wearing a Mexican flag will be thrown out of school for the day.
We’ll just alternate years.
May 6, 2010, 5:40 pmtehag says:
Students, please write an essay on the changing nature of racism in multicultural America: In 1957 President Eisenhower ordered the 101st Airborne division to protect Black students enrolled in an Arkansas from racists. In 2010 Assistant Principal Rodriguez denied an education to five students for wearing American flag apparal because it might offend racists. Discuss how American racism oppressed the Arkansas students and the Principal Rodriguez (20% of your semester grade).
May 6, 2010, 5:42 pmJoseph Slater says:
In 2010 Assistant Principal Rodriguez denied an education to five students
Oh for Pete’s, or maybe Peter’s, sake. I think the decision to send them home for an afternoon after they refused to reverse their shirts was dumb/wrong, but “denied an education” to them is a bit hyperbolic, no?
May 6, 2010, 5:50 pmDonna V. says:
They have to give up their identity when that identity conflicts with the dominant culture.
Martinned:
Again: Since when is that part of the deal?
“It’s part of the deal” unless you see your country as nothing but a big hotel, requiring no shared ideals, values,beliefs or loyalties, other than timidity in the face of threats. I realize that that is how many Europeans think these days, which is why Geert Wilders is on trial for committing the great crime of (basically) hurting feelings. I note that despite Martinned’s evident satisfaction with the arrangement, certain parts of Europe are running into a spot of trouble with immigrants who share none of their ideals, values, beliefs or loyalties. In fact, they seem to have nothing but contempt for their host countries – and can you blame them?
America was founded on an idea – not on shared ancestry or blood ties. Therefore, yes, giving up your identity when it conflicts with the dominant culture is necessary, or else we’ll end up like the Balkans, only on a much larger scale.
May 6, 2010, 5:56 pmJmeister says:
Simple solution, fire anyone associated with telling the kids to leave the school premises. Nuff-said!
If my kids had been involved with this, I would have been all up in the faces of the administrators and my kids would not have been sent home. I would also be out right now getting even more flag based clothing and then asking if my kids were going to be sent home every day for wearing such clothing.
The kids sent home better not have anything noted in their files about this. Actually, yes they should, it should note that they are pro-American and proud of it.
Maybe we can get Arnold to step in a relieve the un-American administrators from their jobs? That should be something that NCLB should make a mandate of!
BTW Cinco De Mayo is not any different that any other nationality based celebration. Is the US flag banned during St Patrick’s Day or Bastille Day?
If anyone is to be subjected to a punishment here, it should be all the administrators that back the choice to address the kids wearing US flag type garments. How about they get a 30 day suspension without pay for violating the 1st Amendment? Sounds fair to me.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinco_de_Mayo
http://www.aclu.org/
May 6, 2010, 6:08 pmCato says:
Well, you weren’t whistling “The Protestant Boys” and “The Boyne Water”….
May 6, 2010, 6:20 pmMichelle Dulak Thomson says:
Jmeister,
BTW Cinco De Mayo is not any different that any other nationality based celebration. Is the US flag banned during St Patrick’s Day or Bastille Day?
It’s a rare US public school that is in session on Bastille Day.
May 6, 2010, 6:22 pmwfjag says:
tehag, which language(s) is the essay to be written in? (English, Spanish, Eubonics, etc.?). May I give an oral presentation instead? If so, like Hillary Clinton, should my language, grammar and diction change to reflect the audience?
May 6, 2010, 6:38 pmA. Zarkov says:
It was always part of the deal. For example in China, people are allowed to eat dogs. In the U.S. dogs and cats are domestic animals and enjoy legal protection. If you come to America you can’t eat dogs. We don’t care what you do at home you can’t do that here. Similarly for cock fights, and bull fights. We consider that excessively cruel to animals and we don’t allow it. If Mexicans want bull fights they can’t have that here. No.
You seem to trouble understanding the idea of a migrant to a domininat culture. The migrant does not ge to decide, he must follow. If he cannot follow then he is not welcome.
May 6, 2010, 6:41 pmMary in LA says:
Michelle Dulak Thomson says:
But what about summer school? :-)
May 6, 2010, 6:43 pmShelbyC says:
Geez, man, you sound like a Frenchman. It’s a free country, if any of us choose to act like Mexicans we are free to do so. I remember hearing about my Grandpa driving down to North Carolina to visit his brother in a POW camp, that’s how things go.
May 6, 2010, 6:46 pmHugh says:
Smart kids only? Maybe not.
May 6, 2010, 6:55 pmA. Zarkov says:
If “acting like Mexicans” means doing things like staging cock fights, then no you are not free to do.
I do expect immigrants to lean English and conduct business in English. One sure way to erode social cohesion, is to have a multi-lingual nation. Look at Belgium where Flanders and Wallonia speak different languages, and the two regions live separate existences. This is something we can control and we should, or else we will pay a steep price in the future. If California becomes truly bi-lingual then the Hispanic population will become even more isolated and separate then it is now.
May 6, 2010, 7:06 pmShelbyC says:
Well, I guess not, though I don’t know if staging cockfights is Mexican or not. Nor were my relatives free to make grappa. I don’t know if they were free to make wine or not. But they did anyway, and the country survived.
May 6, 2010, 7:19 pmA. Zarkov says:
Why not take about seconds to find out. From Wikipedia
This entry was listed under the obscure title: “cockfight.”
May 6, 2010, 7:25 pmShelbyC says:
I know a few people who teach in french public school. Don’t y’all have a pretty prevelant rape problem?
May 6, 2010, 7:32 pmTed says:
No. Many state constitutions provide a right to public education. Indeed, many states require attendance by law. Preventing students from attending regularly scheduled classes, or even scheduled school-sponsored events, denies them this right no matter how brief. You’re willingness to look the other way for “minor” suspensions is abhorrent. It’s like overlooking a “slight” infringement of free speech, equal protection, due process, or freedom of religion. The government should bear to the burden to conform its conduct to the law and the constitution. Any transgression should be subject to correction by the aggrieved, no matter how slight. Now, in terms of remedies, I agree that this is not a million-dollar violation of the students’ rights. But matching the remedy to the infraction is different than overlooking the infraction entirely; the former is just, the latter is unjust. I would recommend that a judge award $1 to the kids and reprimand the principal…oh, and of course, the district pays the kids’ attorney fees. (The poor lawyers need to eat too!)
as an aside, I haven’t taken the time to look up the relevant statutory, administrative, or local definition’s of “suspension,” but how is sending kids home from school not a “suspension?” What am I missing? Why are people totally cool with the idea that principals can send kids home, but it’s not a suspension — any maybe not even a punishment — if its not a “real” suspension?
May 6, 2010, 7:33 pmTed says:
Citation please!
May 6, 2010, 7:36 pmA. Zarkov says:
I’ll bet your relatives didn’t harbor an animus against the U.S. for having stolen a part of their country either. I don’t think your relatives would have considered Americans to have “disrespected” them by wearing an American flag image on the Italian holiday of the Epiphany.
May 6, 2010, 7:38 pmA. Zarkov says:
How many restaurants in the U.S. serve dog? How many markets sell dog meat? This is a little game people play by asking me to prove every little thing no matter how obvious. But ok, California Penal Code 598b,
May 6, 2010, 7:45 pmAllen says:
So you seriously consider the American flag equal to Protestant orange? This is a ridiculous analogy. A better one is, would you feel the same if a group of students wore an image of the American flag on St. Patrick’s Day? The obvious answer is neither the latinos on Cinco de Mayo or the Irish on St. Patrick’s Day should be offended. The difference being that the Irish would not feign offense or claim to be “disrespected”. Anyone who is offended by the American flag needs to be escorted to the nearest border, sooner rather than later.
May 6, 2010, 7:46 pmChrisTS says:
A. ZARKOV:
As a rule, I try to not respond to Zarkov’s posts, but this is truly mind-bending.
May 6, 2010, 7:51 pmShelbyC says:
And it’s almost certainly not “fine” in Mexico.
May 6, 2010, 7:51 pmsteveH says:
Morgan Hill is a bit upwind of Gilroy, which is actually a little unfortunate during the garlic harvest/drying season. You can still expect 110º, but not ’til late summer.
I see that the Live Oak staff hasn’t changed much since my son attended there a few years back. Which is unfortunate.
May 6, 2010, 7:53 pmShelbyC says:
He means because they won’t need to learn English, which is probabaly true. But from what I’ve seen, the pattern is typical of every group:
1st gen, a broad range from no English to pretty good English
2nd gen, usually bilingual, but speaking English at a native level with maybe a little domestic 2gen dialect
3rd Gen, if the speak grandparents language they learned it at high school or college.
May 6, 2010, 7:55 pmsteveH says:
One of the boys quoted in the article was surnamed Maciel, which would appear to be either Hispanic or Filipino. We’ve got lots of families of both groups in the area.
May 6, 2010, 7:57 pmsteveH says:
Most likely Portuguese, since so many emigrated to this area starting in the 1850s, particularly working in agriculture and fishing. Most of them are as Portuguese these days as I am Irish. Better family recipes, though.
May 6, 2010, 8:03 pmThat Guy says:
It’s simple holiday celebration. If they want to wear the clothes of their home country they can. They have the freedom to do so. There’s no discrimination in it. Only five students were selected to remove the subjected clothing-because they were provoking a fight. Regardless if they say they weren’t that was what there true intention was. Besides Hispanic are now the backbone of American society-without them you can forget about the current recession we’re in-our current economic standing would be sent spiraling into another Great Depression. And the article clearly states that the Hispanic students were asked to remove their own flags and etc. Learn to read and review with a political common sense next time.
May 6, 2010, 8:04 pmOctavian says:
Very true. I am a son of first generation Peruvian immigrants and can hardly speak any Spanish unless I have been in a Spanish-speaking country for more than couple of weeks, after which time I can start to speak the language. (English was my first language.) The next generation in my family cannot speak any Spanish at all unless they take Spanish classes in High School. Not a whole lot different from the Italian immigrants, Polish immigrants, Irish immigrants, etc., who preceded Hispanic immigrants.
May 6, 2010, 8:11 pmA. Zarkov says:
I’m happy you don’t reply, because you seem to prefer insults to dialogue.
May 6, 2010, 8:14 pmTed says:
I’ll be damned! I figured it was just a taste/availability problem. What is criminal about eating dog? And I suppose Guinea Pig qualifies as well? I’m a international culinary criminal!
Oh, and thank you for the citation. I’m really surprised it’s an actual law.
May 6, 2010, 8:16 pmOctavian says:
July 28 is Peruvian Independence Day (I think). As a kid growing up in the Midwest, I fondly recall Peruvian immigrants from all over the greater Chicagoland area convening in Grant Park or Foster Beach every year on July 28 to celebrate not only Peru’s independence, but also our adopted country. Hence, both Peruvian and American flags were waved together at these celebrations.
I think it is an absolute shame that these five HS kids were sent home simply for wearing a US flag on Cinco de Mayo. I think it is even more shameful that anyone would criticize these five HS kids for wearing America’s colors on any day of the year, regardless of whether such a day happens to be another country’s holiday.
May 6, 2010, 8:21 pmsteveH says:
County, if not exactly directly; the local school district operates under the County Office of Education.
The Morgan Hill Unified School District cover nearly 300 square miles including Morgan Hill, San Martin, portions of San Jose, and unincorporated areas of the county; Gilroy’s not part of the mix.
Poking around in the local websites, it surely does begin to look like we’ve got a bunch of layers of bureaucrats getting paid. And that doesn’t count the teachers.
May 6, 2010, 8:29 pmTed says:
Who is “provoking” a fight allegedly caused by passive expression; the speaker or the aggressor?
So, a speaker’s expression means what someone else says it means? And do tell, what were the Mexicano’s “true intentions” in participating in the fight? What motivation did they have to (possibly) elevate the situation to violence or disruption?
May 6, 2010, 8:29 pmOctavian says:
I also happen to think the HS administrators who sent the five HS kids home for wearing American colors are being very demeaning, insulting, and condescending toward the Mexican-American students because they assumed that the Mexican-American students would feel so insulted by the display of American colors that they would actually beat up any HS student that dared to wear such colors. Apparently, the HS administrators think that Mexican-American students are thin-skinned and can’t control their Latin tempers upon the mere display of American colors.
May 6, 2010, 8:31 pmsteveH says:
Yes, but the pollen count is up.
May 6, 2010, 8:31 pmA. Zarkov says:
Ok, I see now that you were asking a serious question.
Domestic pets enjoy legal protection in most U.S. jurisdictions. Some cities, such as New York, have an actual animal police squad. And those guys are serious. I remember one case where someone was arrested for cutting the whiskers off a cat. That would not seem to be serious since the Vet accidentally cut off some of my cat’s whistlers during oral surgery. He was fine, they grew back.
A word of advice to foreigners: don’t mess with people’s pets in America. You could get yourself seriously hurt because to many people, their pets are like their children.
May 6, 2010, 8:40 pmThomas Hazlewood says:
Is it ‘Cinco de Quatro’ already????
May 6, 2010, 9:07 pmMoneyrunner says:
I never called the Dutch evil, I’m Dutch myself. However, you may want to consider how you would characterize a society who euthanize their elderly and ally with the Nazis while having – as a major tourist attraction – whores displaying their wares in shop windows. Is that a good thing?
Dutch cheese, on the other hand, is superb and definitely Good.
In all seriousness, I used this occasion to allow you to see that the Europeans on this, or other blogs, are a thin-skinned people who have no trouble at all telling Americans how they should run their country but who get very, very defensive when their own countries are criticized. Imagine being proud of the fact that in 400 years you have only been conquered by Napoleon and Hitler. Let’s not discuss the history behind the wars of the Spanish Succession. (American high school or college students would not understand the reference).
That may be because I’m Dutch, not English. You really, really should learn a little history before you make a fool of yourself again. Use Google if needed.
May 6, 2010, 9:20 pmMoneyrunner says:
Apologies to CATO for misreading the reference. I take back my comment directed at you.
May 6, 2010, 9:33 pmJohn C. Randolph says:
Looks to me like this section is unconstitutional on its face. First amendment trumps a statute.
-jcr
May 6, 2010, 10:12 pmJoseph Slater says:
Ted:
It’s still hyperbole. I said and believe this action was dumb/wrong, so I didn’t “look the other way,” but nobody was denied an education — they were sent home for an afternoon and then the decision was reversed. People should object to this treatment, and it shouldn’t be repeated. But the post I was responding to implicitly comparted this to the fight against racial segregation in U.S. schools in the 1950s. If you can’t see why that’s hyperbolic, then you’re the one turning a blind eye to something.
Moneyrunner: I’m not Dutch, but I’ve spent some time in Europe, and I’m thinking that this might be something of a ridiculous overgeneralization: allow you to see that the Europeans on this, or other blogs, are a thin-skinned people
May 6, 2010, 10:13 pmnewscaper says:
Martinned, this is nonsense:
“Why do they have to give up their Mexican identity when they come to the US? (Or give it up on behalf of their unborn children, etc.) Since when is that part of the deal? Can’t one be Mexican and American at the same time?”
No one here is really saying they do – problem is that *they* are expecting/demanding non Mexican Americans to give up *theirs* for a day. The article talks about M-A students interviewed claiming ‘disrespect’ (which the admin pandered/caved to).
Someone else’s analogy of wearing orange on St. Patrick’s day (in the US) is similarly weak. This is more like a Muslim visiting the Vatican and demanding that Catholics not wear their crucifix necklaces.
This is like the Iron Bowl with the big game in Tuscaloosa, and Bama students being told to take off their Crimson Tide shirts because some Auburn students are present on their campus. Insanity.
May 6, 2010, 11:15 pmThomas says:
How dare they send those students home! Oh sure, its *REALLY BAD* that these boys were wearing *OUR* flag. I mean, its terrable that we have freedom of expression and that the boys showed patriotism.(sarcasm) If the mexican americans are so proud of their country, why do they risk their lives to hop the fence? And why would they have a riot over a holliday that they dont even celebrate in mexico exept one town, because some guys were wearing a t shirt with a flag of the country they are living in? If anything, that Principle should be sent home. I swear, next year I am going to get a United States Flag T Shirt just for Cinco de Mayo, and I am going to play 101 String Orchestra “God Bless America” in our ‘After School Program’. Just for the record, I am a Junior this year. I am so angery right now, that I cant even spell right!
May 7, 2010, 12:01 amIf you agree with me, and are not a submissive whimp, do what I am going to do and BE PROUD OF OUR FREE COUNTRY! Dont let some cowardly bully get you down. Do what our Founding Fathers did, when england tried to oppress them(bully them), THEY FOUGHT BACK!
KICK, SCRATCH, SPIT
but most of all
DO NOT LET OUR FLAG FALL!
Don C says:
I think some of you folks must be Lawyers, because you are swallowing elephants and choking on gnats.
The American Flag is a rectangular piece of cloth, intended to be flown as a flag (duh!)
Two of the T-shirt did not even symbolically show a flag, or part thereof. They were merely red, white and blue ‘patriotic graphics’. I also believe that way back in the 60′s, the courts indicated that a fabric that contained red and white stripes and blue background with white stars was NOT a FLAG, if its original purpose was meant to be something other than flown on a flag pole.
I certainly hope so, as I have had several red, white and blue pair of swim trunks, (with the stripes and stars logos) and never considered them to be flags, just swim trunks. Likewise, I believe our patriotic kids at this school considered their t-shirts and bandannas to be just that, not flags.
On the other hand, the picture of one of the Fifth of May celebrators was indeed draped in a Mexican Flag. Frankly, after the May Day celebrations, sanctifying the idols of communism, I am not particularly bothered by the Mexican celebration.
Being a descendant of Scotland, I probably have the proper background to wear orange on St. Patrick’s Day; however, it is an American event celebrating Americans of Irish descent, so I would never do anything so boorish.
May 7, 2010, 12:37 amRandom_Numbers says:
I see the idiots are out screaming, “You’re wearing a flag as apparel! HYPOCRITES!!!!!1!!11!eleventy-one”
If I were to take a flag and wrap it around myself as a toga or wear it as a cape, that would be wearing a flag as apparel. A PICTURE of a flag on your clothes is not the same thing. At least that is how the attorney from the JAG office at the Coast Guard Academy explained it when the question of shoulder patches and t-shirts came up.
A flag may not be worn as apparel. A flag patch or picture MAY be worn and on many uniforms MUST be worn.
May 7, 2010, 12:43 amMoneyrunner says:
Part of that sounds like the line that ends with “… but last night I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express.”
I merely wanted to demonstrate that Martinned, as an example of a person from Europe with values common to those cultures, who has no trouble criticizing mainstream American values, can get very huffy and defensive if his country’s values come under attack. Exhibition of a thin skin. QED.
May 7, 2010, 8:12 amJoseph Slater says:
Moneyrunner:
I like the Holiday Inn Express reference.
Let’s just say that people from pretty much all countries (or at least the U.S. and European nations I’m familiar with), often have little trouble criticizing other countries with sweeping, inaccurate generalizations, yet at the same time get huffy and defensive if their own country is under attack — especially if the attack comes from someone from another nation.
May 7, 2010, 8:47 amsardonic_sob says:
The attitude of the police toward this sort of thing can be summed up as follows:
“The police are like your parents. They don’t want justice. They just want QUIET.”
This metaphor often helps people who don’t understand why police don’t try to figure out “what really happened” in disputes that get noisy and disruptive and how it’s usually the noisiest, most obnoxious participant who goes to jail even if “the other person started it.” If you watch “COPS” and other shows like that it’s a fairly common occurrence. (ironically I absolutely cannot watch legal dramas or crime dramas because I can’t suspend disbelief, but I love COPS.)
It’s not right, and it’s not fair, and if they can most police and other safety-regulating sorts do try to handle things with fairness. But if you’re looking at five people who may become the nucleus of a riot at any moment, you don’t think clearly.
I think the real problem here is that the administrator in question could not discern between “imminent riot” and “muttering in the hallways.” But from their point of view, would you rather get sued for sending some kinds home (without suspension) or for allowing violence to occur on your watch?
May 7, 2010, 9:50 amsardonic_sob says:
I was going to say, IIRC my Boy Scout uniform (Yes, I was. Ordeal member of the Order of the Arrow, too.) had a flag patch on it. *Google-fu* Yes, yes it did and the placement is still the same. If the Boy Scouts do it, then there is ZERO problem with it, Flag-Code wise. It goes from God, to Congress, to the Boy Scouts. You cannot *wrap* yourself in the flag (boy, if that was enforced on the metaphorical level there’d be some fun!) but you may wear pictures or representations of it.
May 7, 2010, 9:55 amJan McDaniel says:
I enjoyed reading this thread and learned a lot.
It seems clear to me that the new Arizona law and the desire to reverse the outcome of the Mexican-American war have more to do with the Latino students’ attitudes than anything else.
May 7, 2010, 2:11 pmKev says:
Fire. That. Principal. Now. (And take away his “teaching” credentials–not that he’s likely to have taught in a decade or more, if he’s this out of touch–so that he can never sully the halls of a school again.)
Correct; the kids had on Old Navy T-shirts with the flag on it, not shirts made from the flag.
Wow. I really hope that Paul was making a gross over-generalization here. But if what he’s saying were true, that would be a pretty good argument for the new Arizona law on a wider basis, right?
May 7, 2010, 9:32 pmDavid says:
The school administrators were trying to prevent retaliation against the flag-wearers, though I’d have demanded that a student wearing The Flag as a “Dew Wrag” remove it or leave, regardless…the local police are on ‘alert’, fearing gang reprisals against the those kids as it is…shouldn’t your child’s school administration do EVERYTHING within their power to prevent him/them being hurt?
May 7, 2010, 11:26 pmTweets that mention The Volokh Conspiracy » California High School Sends Kids Home for Wearing American Flag on Cinco de Mayo -- Topsy.com says:
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May 8, 2010, 2:48 amSent home from school for wearing the American flag?!?!? WTF? - Page 11 - U.S. Politics Online: A Political Discussion Forum says:
[...] are under the supervision of adults. Period. The ACLU says differently. So does Prof. Volokh: The Volokh Conspiracy California High School Sends Kids Home for Wearing American Flag on Cinco de*M… So does the Superintendant of the school system in question. You keep claiming that "Children do [...]
May 8, 2010, 4:44 pmdave says:
The boys were not wearing or desecrating the US flag. The tee shirts have the image of a US flag on them
May 10, 2010, 11:08 amozball says:
Wow, so much talk about a simple thing.
Cinco De Mayo is not a US holiday, it’s not even a significant Mexican holiday, that it deserves so much respect or sober commemoration, extensive discussion, and legal analysis, like the Holocaust, Bosnian genocide, Rwanda, etc.
Furthermore, Cinco de Mayo is about a insignificant skirmish between the French army and the Mexican militia, not between Mexico and the US. So there is no reason to drag the the US flag into this.
This is just like the Arizona non-issue, where morons (spelled VP Rodriguez & Shakira), exercise their right to be an a-hole and a dumbass, respectively.
Cinco de Mayo is just another get drunk day, where Americans contribute to Mexican economy by drinking their beer. Let’s keep it that way, and move on.
May 11, 2010, 11:38 am