A Tennessee student is suing his school district after he was suspended for posting memes making fun of his principal.
The 17-year-old student shared three memes that he made and published online with the principal’s face cut out on different backgrounds.
One meme showed the principal as a cat in a french maid’s outfit. The stunt resulted in a three-day, out-of-school suspension for the student.
But the Tullahoma high school student and his advocates called the punishment a violation of the first amendment, the constitutional right to free speech.
With support from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (Fire), he recently filed a lawsuit demanding the removal of the suspension from his record and a halt to the policy that led to the punishment.
The brewing case could be the latest to test the concept of free speech in schools.
In a landmark 1969 decision, the US supreme court ruled in a case titled Tinker v Des Moines that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate”.
Yet schools are generally understood to have the right to enforce reasonable rules which aim to limit disruptions on campus.
In a complaint filed on 19 July, Fire asserted that “high schools cannot punish a student for satirizing the principal on social media when the satire occurs off campus and does not cause substantial disruption at school”.
“A principal’s pride is not an exception to the first amendment,” the complaint added.
Lead attorney Conor Fitzpatrick told the Guardian: “One of the main things we’re trying to do here is cement the rights of American students to express themselves on social media, without fear of censorship, as long as what they’re expressing doesn’t disrupt the school day. The school has no business jumping in and acting as a censor. If something they post … might be inappropriate, that’s a matter for their parents – not the government.”
Meanwhile, the Tullahoma high school maintains a social media policy which prohibits students from posting images that embarrass, humiliate or discredit staff members or other students.
The policy reads: “Participation in activities, groups, and teams is a privilege at Tullahoma high school. Using social media by a student ‘unbecoming of a Wildcat’ may result in discipline, including suspension or removal from the activity, group, leadership position, or team.”
Fire countered that the policy – which refers to the Wildcats nickname used by Tullahoma’s sports teams – is “vague” and “unconstitutional”.
The student plaintiff argues that his memes – which he posted while off campus – did not cause any disruption at his school, and he intended for them to be interpreted as satire, which is a constitutionally protected form of free speech.
Tullahoma city schools did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
