Court Rules Schools Can Ban Clothing Featuring ‘Let’s Go Brandon’
“The Constitution doesn’t hamstring school administrators when they are trying to limit profanity and vulgarity in the classroom during school hours”
Do you think there’s a court in the land that would ban clothing that’s critical of Trump?
The College Fix reports:
Appeals court rules schools can ban ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ attire
The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Tuesday that schools can ban clothing emblazoned with the popular political slogan “Let’s Go Brandon.”
The phrase originated in 2021 from an NBC reporter interviewing NASCAR driver Brandon Brown after his first victory. The crowd was chanting “F*** Joe Biden,” but the reporter told Brown “You can hear the chants from the crowd, ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”
The phrase has since become synonymous with “F*** Joe Biden.”
In the first few months of 2022, a pair of Michigan middle school siblings wore hoodies with “Let’s Go Brandon” on them. Assistant Principal Andrew Buikema and teacher Wendy Bradford both warned the pair to remove the hoodies as they violated the school dress code.
The code states school personnel can “determine [if] a student’s dress is in conflict with state policy, is a danger to the students’ health and safety, is obscene, [or] is disruptive to the teaching and/or learning environment by calling undue attention to oneself.”
Of note, however, Principal Joseph Williams had said “he was not aware that the school had experienced any disruption from students wearing ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ apparel.”
Nevetheless, a year ago Western District of Michigan Judge Paul Maloney sided with the school, saying “If schools can prohibit students from wearing apparel that contains profanity, schools can also prohibit students from wearing apparel that can reasonably be interpreted as profane.”
Maloney said school officials could ban apparel that reads “F#%* Joe Biden” or uses “homophones for profane words … [such as] ‘Somebody Went to HOOVER DAM And All I Got Was This DAM Shirt.’”
The Sixth Circuit has now agreed with Maloney in a 2-1 decision. The majority opinion, authored by Trump appointee John Nalbandian (with Clinton appointee Karen Moore concurring), said the case is indeed “about the vulgarity exception.”
“The Constitution doesn’t hamstring school administrators when they are trying to limit profanity and vulgarity in the classroom during school hours,” Nalbandian wrote. “Again, students do not ‘shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate’ [Tinker]. But neither are school administrators powerless to prevent student speech that the administrators reasonably understand to be profane or vulgar.”
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Comments
This is BS. The statement is neither profane not vulgar. This is a purely political decision dressed up in lawyerese.
The statement is certainly profane and vulgar, since its entire point is to signify a vulgarity. As the original judge wrote, how do you distinguish it from “this dam shirt”?
However, what does this do to “fuck the draft”? Are we to conclude that while the Tinkers’ schools were required to allow their black armbands, Cohen’s jacket was acceptable only in a courthouse but not at a school?!
But you’d already have to be educated on the presence of the vulgarity in order to understand there was one there.
What’s next — we can’t refer to military lifesavers as “Mae Wests” anymore?
I don’t have nearly the fun wearing the Rice Owls hat as I did the Oregon State Beavers hats and jackets,
To be fair, I think a little censorship leads to more creative writing, such as the classic Squeeze lyrics:
She like to go to discos, but she’s never on her own.
I’m invited in for coffee and I give the dog a bone.
“Signifying” a vulgarity does not make something a vulgarity itself. Otherwise literally any attempt to not be vulgar can also be banned. That way leads madness.
Well, I found the answer to my own question. In Bethel v Fraser the Supreme Court indeed ruled that “the First Amendment gives a high school student the classroom right to wear Tinker’s armband, but not Cohen’s jacket”.
Note that in Fraser the speech in question didn’t use any actual dirty words. But it deliberately evoked sexual imagery, and that was enough for the Court to hold that the school could ban it as vulgar and offensive.
Here, “let’s go Brandon” deliberately evokes the word “fuck”, which the courts have said schools may ban. They can ban not only “fuck” but also “f*ck”, “FJB”, “FCUK”, etc., just as they can ban signing “fuck” in ASL, or in semaphore or morse code. And that’s what “let’s go Brandon” does.
I’m not happy with this decision, but then I’m not happy with Fraser either, or with the “Bong Hits for Jesus” decision. I’m sure this will be appealed, and we shall see what SCOTUS has to say. However if it does get to SCOTUS I can almost guarantee that Thomas will vote to uphold this decision.
Nudge, Nudge, Wink, Wink, say no more, Jiminy Cricket, Golly Gee Willikers, Fiddlesticks, Fer Cryin’ Out Loud. Son of a Biscuit, Dagnabbit, Crikey, Holy Moly, Jeepers, Shoot, Heck, Snap, Geez, Gosh Darn It, Dillweed, Beaver, Oh Fudge, Fricking, Fracking, Freaking and What the Fork are also minced oath euphemisms which allow speakers to express themselves without resorting to strong language,
This is beyond idiotic. Schools can ban you for wearing ‘Lefts go Brandon tops’ they can ban you for saying ‘there are only two genders’ but anti-Trump, transfascist or or any other offensive Woke crap is protected speech apparently!
No, they can’t ban you for saying there are only two genders. They can’t ban you for expressing any opinion whatsoever. But they can punish vulgar and indecent language. See Bethel v Fraser, which I linked above, expressly endorsing the view that at school a student has the right to wear Tinker’s armband, but not Cohen’s jacket.
“Surely it is a highly appropriate function of public school education to prohibit the use of vulgar and offensive terms in public discourse.”
“No, they can’t ban you for saying there are only two genders.”
Wrong again.
Well, they can’t legally do it. That school did it and got away with it, and the Supreme Court decided it had better things to do with its time than to smack them down, but as a matter of law the school was wrong. In this case, according to Fraser the school was right, and thus the Sixth Circuit is right. It’s bound by Fraser, and I don’t see how you can meaningfully distinguish the two cases. It would be nice if the Supreme Court were to overturn Fraser, but I think it at least as likely that it would make it worse.
There are two issues, only one of which was addressed in the report. The Courts have said that schools administrations do not violate the constitutional when it regulates school attire. The opposite conclusion would enable the anarchy in the schools.
The second issue is whether the school administration is fairly and reasonably enforcing its dress regulations. If “let’s Go Brandon” is singled out while other slogans like “From the River to the Sea,” are allowed then the school administration is regulating speech, not otherwise objectionable conduct.
No, neither of those are at issue here. Yes, schools can have uniforms, but this one doesn’t. Schools can regulate school attire, but only in ways that are consistent with the first amendment. They cannot ban political messages, such as the Tinkers’ armbands, but they can ban vulgar language, such as Cohen’s jacket, and that includes not only explicit use of the Seven Dirty Words, but also sexual innuendo, such as Fraser’s speech.
This ban was not about the fact that the shirt criticized Biden, but only about the fact that it indirectly used a vulgar word to do so. The school would have allowed a shirt that said “Biden is a bad president”.
I wonder how they would rule on “Subduction leads to Orogeny:”