The Supreme Court is rebuffing an appeal from a Michigan woman fighting a school district’s ban on shirts with the phrase “Let’s Go Brandon,” a jab at then-President Joe Biden with a coded reference to profanity.

The mother of two boys says their First Amendment rights were violated when they were told to take off the sweatshirts she bought them for Christmas in 2022.

A lower court disagreed, finding that the veiled vulgarity of the phrase, which functions as a stand-in for “F-— Joe Biden,” allows schools to ban it.

The woman’s attorneys argued that the decision wrongly gives school officials wide latitude to squelch political speech based on their personal ideas of what is vulgar. The phrase itself doesn’t contain any swear words or sexual implications, they said.

The school district urged the justices to reject the case, arguing that messages with lewd implications have no place in school, even if they touch on political topics. There has been evidence that some students wore clothing that read “Make America Great Again” or had messages supporting President Donald Trump, a Republican who lost the 2020 election to Biden, a Democrat.

  • LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    They are citizens with their rights suspended when they go to school. Otherwise the schools would have to have a warrant to search backpacks/lockers/cars for drugs. Also the students would be able to come and go as they please, because you can’t just detain people who have rights.

    • eurodyne@piefed.world
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      9 days ago

      They are citizens with their rights suspended when they go to school.

      Incorrect

      Otherwise the schools would have to have a warrant to search backpacks/lockers/cars for drugs.

      Many schools do this already, and have for decades

      Also the students would be able to come and go as they please, because you can’t just detain people who have rights.

      They certainly have the right to. The school may have certain rules around this, including consequences for breaking those rules, but students are not prisoners while they are at school.

      • LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
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        9 days ago

        New Jersey v. T.L.O. (1985).

        The supreme Court ruled kids 4th amendment right to require a warrant was not eligible to be upheld in public schools.

        So when a student steps onto the property of a public school that right is suspended until they leave.

        As for being able to detain a student they absolutely can within reason. The courts have decided that the rights of a parent extend to the schools to detain a child do to the fact that the parents are not there.

        Thus the “right” to go where you want does not truly exist for a minor whether they are on/off a public schools ground.

        Kids have “rights” just not the same rights as an adult.

        • eurodyne@piefed.world
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          9 days ago

          You have cited a court case which addresses one specifically held legal right, but that does not translate into the broad acquiescence of all legal rights as your argument suggests.

          You are wrong.

      • 🇨🇦GreenBeard🇨🇦@lemmy.ca
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        9 days ago

        Minors have full citizen rights, but until they reach age of majority, certain rights are held in trust by their presumptive guardians, who are empowered to limit and guide the exercise of said rights until they are considered fully competent citizens. Schools assume temporary guardianship while a student is in their care, which means they have the latitude to determine what is and isn’t an appropriate exercise of a minor’s rights. “Suspended” might be a bit of an exaggeration but the OP is roughly correct.

        • eurodyne@piefed.world
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          9 days ago

          None of that negates what I said. And none of that, most certainly, erases the rights of the students.

          I’m sorry that you have been fooled into believing otherwise. I suggest you check the laws.

          • 🇨🇦GreenBeard🇨🇦@lemmy.ca
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            9 days ago

            No one argued they don’t have rights. I don’t see anyone in this entire thread making that argument. What ghost are you shadow boxing with?

          • hraegsvelmir@ani.social
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            8 days ago

            Until and unless you have a rebuttal to the concept of In loco parentis, you may as well just shut up, unless your aim is to continue making a fool of yourself. This is broadly applied through the compulsory levels of education in the US, and while it doesn’t automatically invalidate students’ rights, it does give schools broad authority to limit those rights in the place of students’ guardians, who are unable to constantly be present and assent to the school’s every decision, and upper courts have already held that this is sufficient in cases where there exists a compelling interest to do so in order to further the school’s basic purpose as an educational institution.

            This is entirely in line with the way minors cannot sign legally binding contracts without their parents co-signing, in most instances. Similarly, see curfew laws and local rules aimed at minors, they’re inability to legally consent until they reach the age of majority, and any other number of situations in which the rights of minors are temporarily curtailed in the name of their own best interests. The notion that minors have the same full civil rights as adults do in all circumstances is entirely devoid of any basis in reality. Indeed, even adults can have their rights abrogated in certain circumstances. You can argue whether it’s right or wrong that someone can lose their right to vote or to bear arms as a consequence of a felony conviction, but absent new laws (such as some of the efforts recently to restore the right to vote to felons in several states), this is a fairly settled matter in law. To act as though this doesn’t occur with full legal sanction in schools on a regular basis in the US is disingenuous, at the very least.

            • eurodyne@piefed.world
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              8 days ago

              This proves nothing other than you have no actual argument and you just want me to “shut up“ because your argument is empty.

              • hraegsvelmir@ani.social
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                8 days ago

                Quite the contrary, you’re just sticking your fingers in your ears and going “I can’t hear you” when faced with settled legal precedent that shows your claims are baseless, but it’s your business if you want to suck even at being a low effort troll.

                • eurodyne@piefed.world
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                  8 days ago

                  Now you have to imagine fictional fantasies to support your “argument”

                  Tell me: what else do you imagine me doing? Do you imagine me undressing? Do you imagine me in the shower?

                  Even your imagination is a creep

                  • hraegsvelmir@ani.social
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                    8 days ago

                    Just tell me how you imagine a 13 year old opening a bank account without a guardian present, or purchasing a firearm on their own, and I’ll be happy to concede your point that minors never have their rights restricted by the government in light of them being below the age of majority and unable to fully exercise their civil rights in all circumstances an adult would. This is a settled matter legally, yet rather than citing anything to the contrary, you’ve just resorted to saying “No, you’re wrong” to my initial comment, and inventing delusions in your most recent post to try and keep anyone from noticing you have nothing of substance to back up your claims.