Suppressing speech you don’t like is a lousy way to encourage tolerance

By David McElroy · June 23, 2012

If you’re a high school, what’s the best way to demonstrate tolerance? If you said that the best way to be tolerant is to shut up those who disagree with you, you might already be qualified to be principal of Wolcott High School in Wolcott, Conn.

In April, Wolcott High set aside a “day of silence” to promote tolerance of gay, lesbian, bisexual and “transgendered” people. Student Seth Groody is opposed to gay marriage and didn’t like the school’s promotion of a specific point of view.

So Seth wore a t-shirt with a slash through a rainbow to express his disagreement. (The picture of the front of the shirt was provided by the family.) On the back of the shirt was a graphic with stick figures of a male and female, along with the words, “Excessive Speech Day.”

That’s all he did. He didn’t bully anybody. He didn’t disrupt classes. He didn’t hold protests. He merely had the gall to have a belief that was contrary to what the school wanted him to believe.

“Tolerant” school officials sent Seth to the office, forced him to remove his t-shirt and forced him to wear another shirt instead. In other words, they suppressed speech they didn’t like — in the name of tolerance.

Seth’s family contacted the Connecticut ACLU, which has contacted the school (PDF) to ask for assurance that this won’t happen again. The group’s legal director makes it clear the ACLU disagrees with Seth’s position about gays, but defends his right to express his opinion.

“The First Amendment was written to protect unpopular speech, which is naturally the kind of speech that will always need protection,” Staub said. “The ACLU has fought hard for same-sex marriage and we couldn’t agree with Seth less on that issue, but he is absolutely correct about his right to express his opinion.”

It seems that the legal case is very clear. A school promoting a point of view about a social issue can’t stop a student from expressing his disagreement. The thing that’s frightening is that the case even has to be made.

Most people say they believe in freedom, but when it comes right down to specifics, it appears that most of them simply believe in people having the right to agree with them. I see hypocrisy from most every political group about this at one time or another. It’s not just social liberals or social conservatives. It’s almost everyone.

I don’t see any reason for a school to insert itself into a social issue in the first place, especially since it destroyed effective student participation for the day from the “day of silence” kids — who were allowed to wear tape over their mouths all day. I also don’t see any legal or moral justification for a school to ban a message from someone who disagrees with the popular or accepted opinion.

This issue has nothing to do with accepting gays as human beings and treating them just as anybody else would be treated. The issue is about a government agency dictating what opinion someone is allowed to express.

Official suppression of speech is wrong, even if you hate the point of view being expressed. I’m glad the family is fighting back, and I’m very pleased that the people at the ACLU are taking this position in favor of freedom instead of taking the position that would have been easier and more politically convenient for them to take.

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I got a note today from a woman who lives on the other side of the country and has a young son: “[Young son] says that we should meet you sometime. He just said of your profile picture that he likes your face. I have shared photos and videos of Lucy and the cats since he was really little.” This made me profoundly happy. I trust the intuitive judgment of children about people. Little ones tend to read character very well. Adults are easy to fool, but it’s much harder to fool children about who you really are. I hope I do get to meet this young man and his mom one day.

I’m in the McDonald’s near my house, sitting near the play area. There’s one little girl — maybe 5 years old — who’s here with her father. He’s about my age, so he’s older than the typical father of a 5-year-old. Even though she’s the only kid here, the girl is giggling and having fun by herself. She periodically cries out, “Daddy, look!” And then she shows off something she thinks is impressive. Then, just a moment ago, she called out very sweetly, “Daddy?” He patiently said, “Yes, sweetheart.” And then she said, “Daddy, I love you so much!” And then she went back to playing as her father looked on with happiness and love.

When I first discovered the idea of unschooling, it was so radical that I had trouble finding people who even knew what it was. Today, the idea is mainstream enough that major media outlets sometimes cover the topic in a favorable way. The Sunday newspaper supplement called Parade had a strongly favorable article about unschooling a couple of weeks ago which explained what it is and how it’s different from homeschooling. It’s less structured. There’s no curriculum. There’s plenty of flexibility. And there are no tests and grades. (Most people today are shocked to learn that testing and grading didn’t exist in schools through history until the last couple hundred years.) If you want your children to think for themselves instead of following the herd mentality that pervades every school I’ve been part of, you owe it to yourself — and to your kids — to consider taking control of your children’s development back from governments. Just because you and I survived institutional schools doesn’t mean it’s the wisest choice. Start by reading the Parade article. It might open your eyes.

In the Birmingham suburb of Hueytown, the Golden Gophers of Hueytown High School had just defeated the Eufala Tigers in the second round of the state playoffs Friday night. It’s not a game that will mean a lot to anybody outside those two communities, but it meant everything to the players and coaches involved. After the game, Hueytown defensive coordinator Trent Campbell was celebrating with his victorious players when he noticed Eufala offensive lineman Dallas Ingram distraught and alone. Campbell left his players to console the distraught Ingram and photographer Dennis Victory caught photos of the pair together. “My reaction was to go see about him, because I’ll see my guys on Sunday and next week and the rest of their high school careers, but that’s a young man we watched on film for a week and studied and he’s a fantastic player,” Campbell said later. “And it wasn’t too long ago when I played my last high school football game and I know what that feeling is and you sort of never forget that. I went to tell him what a great player I thought he was and what a great game I thought they played and I wish nobody had to lose that night because it was an incredible game.” This is what sports at the high school level should be about. Winning is great and winning is fun. But humanity and decency last longer.

I have changed radically about some things over the years, but probably none of those changes have been as great as the ways that I feel about people who are viewed as evil or criminal. When I was young, I was eager to see criminals or foreign political enemies killed. Today, I don’t view such people though rose-colored glasses and I don’t view them as blameless folks who are going to turn their lives around if we just think happy thoughts. But I can’t celebrate the death of anybody, even if he might deserve it in some ways of thinking about it. Even if it’s sometimes necessary to kill someone — and those cases are often debatable — I regret the death of someone who will now never have a chance to discover love and change his life. There are some evil people in this world, but I can’t celebrate their deaths.

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