SCOTUS sides with cheerleader who mocked her school

[Ferguson97]

https://twitter.com/lisadnews/status/1407706380815974401

[WindowPhil]

Surprised that Amy Coney Barret doesn't want to ban the F word.


Why did Thomas dissent?

[SteveRogers]

Surprised that Amy Coney Barret doesn't want to ban the F word.


Why did Thomas dissent?

Thomas believes that public schools aren’t state actors for purposes of the 1st and 14th Amendments for esoteric reasons that have nothing to do with anything. 

[I’m not Stu]

Surprised that Amy Coney Barret doesn't want to ban the F word.


Why did Thomas dissent?

Thomas is nothing but a totalitarian who hates democracy and freedom.

[soundchaser]

Reading the decision now, and it's pretty clear-cut, especially this bit:

Second, from the student speaker’s perspective, regulations of off-campus speech, when coupled with regulations of on-campus speech, include all the speech a student utters during the full 24-hour day.  That means courts must be more skeptical of a school’s efforts to regulate off-campus speech, for doing so may mean the student cannot engage in that kind of speech at all.  When it comes to political or religious speech that occurs outside school or a school program or activity, the school will have a heavy burden to justify intervention.

(Side note: I really hate that the Supreme Court decisions have two spaces after every period.)

[soundchaser]

Thomas's dissent (unsurprisingly) doesn't make a whole lot of sense. He relies mostly on an obscure precedent, keeps invoking the concept of "subversive" speech (which is protected by the First Amendment, as I understand) disrupting school order,  and basically ignores the entire concept of in loco parentis meaning limited regulatory authority.

I especially hate this line of reasoning:

Second, the majority fails to consider whether schools often will have more authority, not less, to discipline students who transmit speech through social media.  Because off-campus speech made through social media can be received on campus (and can spread rapidly to countless people), it often will have a greater proximate tendency to harm the school environment than will an off-campus in-person conversation. Third, and relatedly, the majority uncritically adopts the assumption  that  B. L.’s  speech,  in  fact, was off-campus. But, the location of her speech is a much trickier question than the majority acknowledges.  Because speech travels, schools sometimes may be able to treat speech as on campus even though it originates off campus.

So if a student gives an off-campus speech considered "subversive" that gets covered by a local newspaper and then transmitted back to the school, is the student liable for the method of transmission? That seems a dangerous precedent to set.

EDIT: Alito gets feisty about some of this thinking:

...even if flinty Vermont parents at the time in question could be understood to have implicitly delegated to the teacher the authority to whip their son for his off-premises speech, the same inference is wholly unrealistic today.

[dead0man]

good news!

I wonder how Biden is taking this loss.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Actually surprised by the sole dissent. Alito tends to be more anti-First Amendment than Thomas. Thomas was actually kind of non-terrible on free speech issues back when his buddy Scalia was still around because Scalia was in fact actually pretty good on free speech issued but without his guidance Thomas has just gone off the deep end apparently.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

good news!

I wonder how Biden is taking this loss.

Probably fine because the decision doesn't impact the ability of schools to handle things like e-bullying which was the main concern in regards to the case. The decision basically says that schools have to meet a pretty strict criteria to discipline off-campus behavior, but not that it can't be done at all.

[WindowPhil]

good news!

I wonder how Biden is taking this loss.

Probably fine because the decision doesn't impact the ability of schools to handle things like e-bullying which was the main concern in regards to the case. The decision basically says that schools have to meet a pretty strict criteria to discipline off-campus behavior, but not that it can't be done at all.

Explain further why Biden sided with the school.

Because without any further context, it looks like "Joe Biden hates students having freedom of speech".

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

good news!

I wonder how Biden is taking this loss.

Probably fine because the decision doesn't impact the ability of schools to handle things like e-bullying which was the main concern in regards to the case. The decision basically says that schools have to meet a pretty strict criteria to discipline off-campus behavior, but not that it can't be done at all.

Explain further why Biden sided with the school.

Because without any further context, it looks like "Joe Biden hates students having freedom of speech".

The Biden Administration expressed concerns that a broad decision against the school could limit the ability of schools to discipline for things like e-bullying that happened off grounds. It was more concern over precedent than this specific case.

Also I doubt Biden himself thought much about the case. He's taking a somewhat hands off approach to the Department of Justice.

[Motorcity]

Good

Schools should have the power to regulate and stop e-bullying outside of school (and bullying in general). But not to stop criticism of the school. These are two different things and the Supreme Court made this clear. Bravo

[darklordoftech]

good news!

I wonder how Biden is taking this loss.

Probably fine because the decision doesn't impact the ability of schools to handle things like e-bullying which was the main concern in regards to the case. The decision basically says that schools have to meet a pretty strict criteria to discipline off-campus behavior, but not that it can't be done at all.

Explain further why Biden sided with the school.

Because without any further context, it looks like "Joe Biden hates students having freedom of speech".

I’m not sure if Biden sided with the school. It could have been DOJ bureaucrats left over from Trump that Biden hadn’t replaced yet. I know Garland hadn’t been appointed yet.

[John Dule]

Schools cannot be held accountable for actions their students take off-campus, so it stands to reason that they cannot discipline them for those actions either.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Schools cannot be held accountable for actions their students take off-campus, so it stands to reason that they cannot discipline them for those actions either.

Exactly.

[NewYorkExpress]

Good Decision. Random cursing over the internet is dramatically different from hate speech.