Public schools can ban hate shirts

A U.S. appeals court ruled last week that public schools can ban clothing that have hateful slogans. The case was originally brought by a student who wore a shirt that read: Homosexuality is shameful. The Poway High School student wore the shirt in response to a “Day of Silence�—a protest organized by the school’s Gay-Straight Alliance.
School officials made him take off the shirt and he subsequently sued, claiming they violated his free speech rights.

Writing for the panel’s majority, Judge Stephen Reinhardt affirmed a lower court’s decision against an injunction against the school and said schools may bar slogans believed to be hurtful.
Students “who may be injured by verbal assaults on the basis of a core identifying characteristic such as race, religion, or sexual orientation, have a right to be free from such attacks while on school campuses,” Reinhardt wrote.
“The demeaning of young gay and lesbian students in a school environment is detrimental not only to their psychological health and well-being, but also to their educational development,” Reinhardt added.

Good stuff, but it’s upsetting that this shit was an even an argument. The outcry among conservative Christian groups is that the kid should be able to wear the shirt because being anti-gay is part of his religious beliefs. Please. What’s truly shameful is using religion as an excuse to hate. Would this case have come so far if the shirt had carried a racist message instead of a homophobic one?