Arkansas Teacher Fired Over Anti-Charlie Kirk Comments Sues for 1st Amendment Violations
“I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.”
When it comes to this topic, leftists are all suddenly big believers in free speech.
The College Fix reports:
Arkansas teacher terminated for anti-Charlie Kirk comments sues district for 1st Amendment violations
An Arkansas high school biology teacher terminated for lauding the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk on social media is suing his school district for violation of his First Amendment rights.
The Arkansas Advocate reports that on the day of Kirk’s shooting, Joshua Duncan, a “highly decorated” 18-year veteran teacher, posted on his personal Facebook page a quote allegedly from Clarence Darrow: “I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.”
He added “Just seemed fitting today.”
According to his lawsuit, Duncan deleted the post approximately 12 hours later which allegedly was seen by only about 1,200 of his Facebook friends.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports that four days later, Duncan wrote an apology to his principal stating “he would ‘take any corrective steps the District feels are appropriate.’”
Duncan (pictured) also posted an apology on Facebook, writing “I am committed to learning from this mistake and ensuring that what I put into the world reflects my sincere compassion and understanding … I am determined to do better.”
Russellville School District Superintendent Luke Lovins nevertheless recommended to the school board that Duncan be fired based on violations of District Policy 3.45, Licensed Personnel Social Networking and Ethics.
The policy notes in part that posts on social media “could potentially lead to disciplinary action being taken.”
“Staff are reminded that the same relationship, exchange, interaction, information, or behavior that would be unacceptable in a non-technological medium, is unacceptable when done through the use of technology,” the policy reads. “A good rule of thumb for staff to use is, ‘if you wouldn’t say it in class, don’t say it online.’”
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Comments
Fire her for being and obnoxious, anti-American Liberal, then.
First amendment, again.
How about professional misconduct and demonstrated inability to teach without prejudice and thus is incapable of doing his job?
I’m not disputing his 1A rights, but his role requires non-partisanship and thus he’s effectively voided his ability to work. Now if he were a private school teacher in a sympathetic Leftist school, that’d be another matter.
Remember, many employers says that your right to speak is limited so as to avoid bringing them into disrepute.
And that’s precisely what the lawsuit will be about. He says they fired him for expressing his opinion. Either they say that it’s for embarrassing the school by expressing any opinion in public, and they’d have done the same had he posted a pro-Kirk opinion; or they say that it’s because once his unpopular opinion became known to the school body he’s no longer able to be an effective teacher. That’s the usual reason for firing people who say racist things; but it only works for employees such as teachers or beat cops, whose job inherently involves working with the public. It doesn’t work if the employee has no public interaction. Such employees (if they’re working for a government entity) can say anything they like, even the most racist things, or wish for the president to be assassinated, and they can’t be fired for it because the first amendment.
The school district could try the ole ‘[anonymous] students reported that they felt unsafe’ defense. From the article, that sounds like a losing argument.
It’s difficult to imagine why any sentient being would be surprised that a teacher in one of our government-run schools would write something like this. What does he teach his students?
Such positions should be contingent on positive results on mental health testing and cognitive ability, instead of Brandon based DEI garbage.
Gospel of Marx et al.?
Maybe he would have said that in class.
Is he now off the hook?