O PIN IO
9
The Paradoxical
A 30-YEAR-OLD SUPREME COURT DECISION CONTINUES TO RESTRICT SCHOOL PRESS
BY AUTUMN BEREND
EDITOR IN CHIEF
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Roughly 30 years
ago th e U n ited
S ta te s S u p rem e
C o u rt
m ade
a
decisive choice in a very
important ruling that would determine just
how much freedom you or your family have
in school.
In 1988, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled
on Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier.
The case was about the student journalists
who were to publish two articles. The first
was about a divorce where the girl blamed
the father and never notified him o f the
piece, making it unethical journalism, and
the second was regarding a story on teen
pregnancy where the sources had their names
changed to protect them.
B efore th ese could run, the school
p rin c ip a l, R o b ert E ugene R ey n o ld s,
removed the stories after the journalism
advisor submitted the stories for approval^
something that was customary at the time.
R eynolds’ reasoning was that the first
story, as stated, was unethical, and the
second was inappropriate for students, even
though, ironically, alm ost every student
knew about sex, many would have already
had sex, and it was journalistic in nature to
publish ju st that.
censoring is still unconstitutional. I am of
course referring to the Tinker v. Des Moines
Independent Community School D istrict
case of 1969.
This case ruled that the students’ First
Amendment rights were violated when they
protested the Vietnam war and that their
rights as U.S. citizens don’t end at the gate
o f the school grounds.
Why is it that when that case ruled we as
students, be it in high school or college or
any grade, still have our rights on campus,
that the principal thought he had the right
to censor a rather important story?
The reason for this case is because it was
a curriculum and was subject to censorship,
and it was not treated as a free and able body
o f the press like we at the Clackamas Print
are. But these stories, which are important,
being cut was censorship and it d id n ’t
matter if it was curriculum or a club, it was
censorship o f the press, which is flat-out
illegal. They were still a source of news and
still student journalists and this sickly type
o f case ruins the job of student journalists
in most of the country.
I ask you, dear readers, how would you
feel to have content cut because someone
thought you w ere not fit to read it? I
challenge anyone on campus or the world
to present me with a single being who they
think is worthy to tell them what they can
and cannot read.
Who is to decide what I am to read, write
or hear? The answer is no one. You, my
dear readers, should be w ary o f anyone
who claims to speak for you. You speak for
yourself, no one else.
As such; the U. S. Supreme Court must, I
call, go over this case again and rule against
the former choice. It’s as bad as the Yiddish-
speaking socialists jailed by our people for
using their right to speak against President
Woodrow W ilson’s participation in World
War I. This was ruled when they handed out
their leaflets in a language most people did
not havefthe a b ility to read and the horrid
Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes had argued
against them and was the birthplace o f the
infamous line, shouting fire in a crowded
If “South Park’s” PC Principal had been
theatre.
real, it would be Reynolds.
This ruling is nptjusthpcajisej’m a college
This case created a; paradoxical issu e;,
since a previous case ruled th at^tu d en t’s journalist; heavens no. This is important
because it’s a process o f an Orwellian ripple
constitutional rights do riot end at the gates
effect where our rights are torn away, one by
o f the school, rather they continue and
one without even the slightest protest, but
still exist in that school, and silencing or
w e’ll protest President Donald Trump and
waste our valuable time tweeting at him in
earnest rage.
D on’t think your rights will be taken
away, even slowly?
I suggest a few cases to read and a few books
for my fellow readers. Read Thomas Paine’s
“Common Sense” and the introduction to the
“Age of Reason,” then consider John Stuart
M ill’s work “On Liberty” and finally John
M ilton’s “Areopagitica.”
These three English gentlemen, one being
one o f the less known and arguably the
most im portant member o f the Founding
Fathers, laid out the im portance o f free
speech, intellectualism and free press.
F inally, p ick up a copy o f G eorge
Orwell’s “ 1984,” a masterpiece by Orwell
on a totalitarian society with Big Brother
watching you.
Now since I know others will charge me
o f scrupulous conspiracy theorizing, my
last project for you, reader, is to Google
Japanese internm ent camps in A merica.
Citizens who were law-abiding were locked
in camps because of a war we fought against
people that looked like them. Because they
happened to be Japanese.
I allow the late and brilliant George Carlin
to explain this for my ending:
“Just when these American citizens needed
their rights the most ... their government
took them away, and rights aren’t rights
if someone can take them away. They’re
privileges.”
H e a rt A M ind vs. S e lf
Who is to decide what
i am to read, write or
hear? The answer is
no one. You, m y dear
readers, should be wary
o f anyone who claims to
speak for you. You speak
for yourself, noone else.
Clackamas Print
theclackam asprint.net
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NOVEMBER 29, 2017
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