home

TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Control

by TChris

The Supreme Court views public high school administrators as the publishers of school newspapers. Freedom of the press, it is said, belongs to those who own the press, and the school administration has a publisher’s right to withhold content it deems contrary to "legitimate pedagogical concerns." The analysis follows a certain logic, but a public school newspaper belongs to the public, not just the school, and we should be concerned when we allow public officials to censor public discourse.

Administrators at the Oak Ridge (Tennessee) High School rounded up all 1,800 copies of the Oak Leaf because -- horrors! -- the student journalists wrote about topics relevant to their lives: birth control and tattoos.

The birth control article listed success rates for varying methods and gave locations where students could obtain contraceptives. The paper also contained a photo of an unidentified student’s tattoo, and [Superintendent] Bailey said the student had not told her parents about getting the tattoo.

“I have a problem with the idea of putting something in the paper that makes us a part of hiding something from the parents,” he said.

It’s a safe bet that the tattoo picture alone wouldn’t have instigated the paper’s recall. (More here and here.)

< Raw Story: Rove Will Be Charged or Plead Guilty | Bush Does About-Face on Immigration >
  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


  • Display: Sort:
    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#1)
    by Dadler on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    As if a student with the drive and ability to write such a piece ISN'T engaged directly in their own learning/education. Lord almighty. These "adults" in charge are simply uncomfortable and nothing more. And they deal with their discomfort by censoring valuable infomation, rhetorich, and student expression. Counterproductive to say the very least. And selling the student very short.

    Maybe TChris needs to look up the word "minor". While he's at it, he could look up "in loco parentis".

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#3)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    It's the school's paper, they can do what they want. And I'd bet that the school's ignorant thinking is a pretty accurate reflection of the town in which it is situated. All of which is terrible, of course. The best thing that could happen would be for the mere citizens of the Confederacy to take the collective pole out of its rectum just long enough to realize it's being screwed by its corporate overseer. Moreover, maybe JR follow his own advice and get them all started by looking up: "hypocrite," "rube," "redneck," "roundhead, "and "knuckledragger." Etc. (p.s. Don't drool tobacco juice on that high falutin dictionary you'll have to borrow)

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#4)
    by BigTex on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    Generally action like this will drive me bananas, although the school has the right to go to a point. However, this was probabally a case of right decision, wrong reason.
    The birth control article listed success rates for varying methods and gave locations where students could obtain contraceptives.
    Here's where the objection should come in. I'm all for teenagers (and anyone for that matter) getting good info about birth control... it's a better alternative to abortion or raising an unwanted child whose parents may not be ready to care for them. However, the paper likely parrotted the numbers if used correctly. That's spreading misinformation. The paper should run actual success rates, which are lower than the numbers routinely thrown out there. Like I said above, give out the info, only give out the correct info. BTW if anyone has a comprehensive list of actual success rates I'd be glad to be directed to a copy. Regardless, the school did go too far here.
    Grooms said she was told to retrieve "all copies that went home. I picked up one copy from one student.''
    Once the paper departs from school ground it is not the school's property anymore.

    glanton - please explain how my comment is hypocritical in any way. Minors do not, in fact, have full civil rights - parents (and institutions like schools, which act on their behalf) have a fair amount of control over the behavior. If there's hypocrisy, it's getting up in arms about this, instead of over things like speech codes in Universities - where most of the students are not minors.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#6)
    by aw on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    However, the paper likely parrotted the numbers if used correctly. That's spreading misinformation. The paper should run actual success rates, which are lower than the numbers routinely thrown out there. Like I said above, give out the info, only give out the correct info. BTW if anyone has a comprehensive list of actual success rates I'd be glad to be directed to a copy.
    This makes no sense whatsoever. What makes you think the students research is no good, when you yourself have no idea what the right numbers are?

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#7)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    JR: First, I too oppose campus speech codes, but I love how you parrot people like Mike Adams and Ben Shapiro in trying to push the huge lie that campus speech codes are this runaway train of some kind. It makes me think you haven't spent much time on a university campus. I have spent much time. Let me put it this way: If campus speech codes and the "war on Christmas" are the best you people can do right now, that's pretty damned pathetic. Merry Christmas. Second, while your comment about minors has nothing to do with hypocrisy, your implicit alignment with the attitudes and convictions of the people running that school very much aligns you with their hypocrisy, their rubeishness, their redneckishness, their knuckledraggerness, etc., as well. Again. It's their paper they can do what they want. Doesn't make them or their stance any less backward or ridiculous.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#8)
    by BigTex on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:29 PM EST
    Because stats are kept for ideal use and typical use. I have a partial list, but would like to augment that to make a complete list.

    "Second, while your comment about minors has nothing to do with hypocrisy, your implicit alignment with the attitudes and convictions of the people running that school very much aligns you with their hypocrisy, their rubeishness, their redneckishness, their knuckledraggerness, etc., as well." My implicit arguments? How about you limit your critique to what I actually said? As to speech codes, I'm merely pointing out a critical difference - University students are not minors, so attempts by (in the case of public schools, government authorities) to censor them should not be laughed off. In the case of minors, it's not nearly the same thing. Parents routinely censor what their children are allowed to watch on TV - this isn't terribly different. The only thing that pressed TChris' buttons was the hot issue of birth control. Had the censorship not gotten into that, he wouldn't have cared, or noticed. Meanwhile, I'm still wondering if he knows what the two terms I brought up mean.

    The only thing that pressed TChris' buttons was the hot issue of birth control.
    Have you been taking mind-reading lessons from PPJ? The two of you would make a great team on stage, The Amazing Whizzy and Whiffy. Of course, if this took place in a community of Christian Scientists, and the info was about where to obtain medical services in general, you'd have had no problem with that, JR?

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#11)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:30 PM EST
    Darkly - Nice ad hominem attack. But I am glad to know that I am on your mind to such an extent that you make a personal attack in a thread in which I haven't previously commented. Do you think that such attacks might be over the top? Et al - The school administration works for the school board who is elected by the citizens. I don't agree with them, but believe that K-12 should remain under local control. It may be censorship, but it is their censorship. I also agree with Tex that the stats are probably wrong. The real issue is that if you have a failure the result can be a pregnancy or a STD. So along with the stats, I'd like to see someone reminding the kids that they are engaging in something that can have life changing consequences.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#12)
    by jen on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:30 PM EST
    I seriously doubt these kids have never ever ever heard the downside to having sex. I seriously doubt no one has ever ever told them abstinece is good. Not telling them how to protect themselves? That isn't the way to teach personal responsibility. A person has to be informed to make responsible decisions. Yet they are expected to.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#13)
    by Slado on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:30 PM EST
    What's ridiculous is to think that any of these students haven't already figured out what their options are regarding sex. I mean they watch the O.C. and MTV don't they? The time to tell someone the difference between birth control and abstinance is in middle school. By High School it's way to late. Most of these students have already experimented and either decided to become sexually active or chosen not too. While I'm all for abstinance this reaction from the school board while well within their rights was over the top. I'm sure the student body took that as a message to remain sexually abstinant and not as an overhanded sign of parents not "getting it". Seems like the grownups are living in a fantasy world if they think keeping this paper of the shelves is going to keep these students from being exposed to sex...available 24hours a day on T.V. and the internet.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#15)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:30 PM EST
    You know what, JR you're right. You have done nothing on this particular thread to merit my associating you with the attitudes and decisions of the backward TN School and Citizens I am commenting on. I apologize. Now, I have a question for you. Sonce we both agree the school and citizens are within their rights to control the subject matter of the newspaper: What is your opinion of the decision we here see the school making? Moreover, what is your opinion on the general issue of kids in secondary schools learning about birth control, STD's, etc?

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#16)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:31 PM EST
    Darkly - Yes, I do hope that everyone reads the thread, rather than the out of context quote. Because:
    An Ad Hominem is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument.
    The thread shows comments before and after the comment you find offensive that directly relate to the argument and directed to “ankle.” So all you are doing is trying to create a false impression. So you can say that I made a snarky zinger, but not an ad hominem. Now, want to see an ad hominem on someone who hasn't even posted a commented on the thread?
    Have you been taking mind-reading lessons from PPJ? The two of you would make a great team on stage, The Amazing Whizzy and Whiffy.
    Wait. I know. You can do anything you please. Including ad hominems. BTW - Now who hijacked a thread? Glanton - The problem is that kids do as we do, not as we say. When Hollywood "stars" are having children out of wedlock, becoming pregnant is not as socially unacceptable as it should be, and for the non-millionaires among us, it is a one way ticket to a future of poverty. So the issue isn't what they know. Heck, they know everything. The issue is in changing a society that claims to encourage restraint while providing information about how to be sexually active "safely.”. The issues go far beyond Oak Ridge.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#17)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:31 PM EST
    Jim, you cite facts of life in our culture which will never change. Long gone are the days of the Victorian-style "scandal." Even the most rabid of the GOP base must deep down know that it will always prove unable to turn back the clock to that extent. So, there's reality. Now. Do kids see all the promiscuity and feel more or less culturally sanctioned to emulate it? Yes. Good point. But what does that mean? Does it mean we should just throw in the towel and expect our kids to be promiscuous? Of course not. And by the same token, neither should we throw in the towel on encouraging minors who are going to have sex, to at least use protection when doing it. In my view the public school is a great place to make sure the information on contraceptives is accessible. You write, "Heck, they know everything." I sincerely take issue with this. In small towns like Oak Ridge you just don't find a lot of kids using contraceptives, and I argue that this is because in such towns the practice is especially tabooed. Again, I in no way dispute the school's right to exert full editorial control of its paper. And again, I call them the hypocrites and rubes that they are for exercising their control in this way. Hypocrites because most of them were scrogging in high school themselves, several of them used contraceptives and (gasp!) got abortions, and yet now they want to be Cotton Mather (a pretty disgusting aspiration in its own right, but there you have it).

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#19)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:31 PM EST
    As a counter to the censorship the students are going to wear "Censorship Got Me Pregnant" T Shirts.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#20)
    by BigTex on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:31 PM EST
    aw - here is th ebest list I could find on ideal versus actual use failure rated on contraception use. The paper could have run actual failure rates. If they did, then I reverse my comment about right decision wrong reason. However, from what the links sounded like it sounds like they ran ideal rates, not typical rates, which creats a false impression of safety.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#21)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:31 PM EST
    Tex, I would suggest the reason there is a difference between ideal v actual is that knowledge isn't being disseminated.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#22)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Glanton writes:
    In small towns like Oak Ridge you just
    Glanton, Oak Ride is suburban Knoxville. I would guess the metro has a population of around a million plus. And my only comment is that to fix the problem we need to change the culture. Will we? Neither of us will be around long enough to answer that. Darkly - No, you thought you could take something out of context and not be challenged. You did. You were. And you lost. As to your problems with TL you should take them up with her and not involve others.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#23)
    by BigTex on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Okay Sailor... for discussion sake I'll agree with that. That brings the logical next question of so what? We probabally agree that good information on how to properly use contraceptives needs to be given, but that doesn't change the analysis of what the administration did. The paper would have to give info on correct use in order to drive down typical failure rater to ideal failure rate levels. That isn't what the paper was doing. The paper in all likelihood was running ideal numbers, not typical numbers. Had the numbers been typical failure rates, or the article been about typical failure rates then I'd be criticizing the administration. Either act would change the analysis to something that was beneficial to the student body. Giving propoganda rates though only gives the students false information, which goes back into the right decision wrong reason category.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#24)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Tex, then maybe instead of censorship, the admin should have published all the info.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#25)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Yes, Oak Ridge is essentially adjacent to Knoxville. But is Oak Ridge a metropolis? I think it's more than a stretch to call it one, regardless of what it is near. I also stretched things a bit to call it a small town, but I did so because when you're there, you sure feel like you're in a small town. But then Knoxville always felt the same way to me; it's Depression Era this-city-feels-much-smaller-than-it-really-is feel has always been part of its charm as well as its bane, for me. Anyway, the backward taboo attitude towards contraceptives and sex in general is the meat of my posts on this thread, as you undoubtedly know. Such backwardness is a problem in small towns and "metropolises" like Houston or Dallas or Knoxville. As for the "culture change" position, I don't see the relevance. There will be no going back in time to the Oscar Wilde days, Jim--neither in our lifetimes or after them. Period. On the other hand, what there will hopefully one day be is an elimination of provencial resistance to contraceptives in the United States, a far broader, more active recognition among the sexually active that if you don't want to get knocked up or sick, you'd better slap something on the monster, take a pill, etc. To teach that there's nothing to be embarrassed about when you buy such things. But that day, too, is long in coming.

    Maybe TChris needs to look up the word "minor". While he's at it, he could look up "in loco parentis". Meanwhile, I'm still wondering if he knows what the two terms I brought up mean.
    JR, they're not nearly as hard-hitting as you seem to think. Unless it's illegal for minors to have sex with each other (it isn't) then... you have no point. As for in loco parentis, I'm sure there were some parents who favored this information. It seems to me that the proper, not to mention conservative, solution would be: do nothing at all. Nobody is being forced to read or believe this article. You are a bookburner. I cannot respect that.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#28)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Darkly - You provided a link, but posted only what you wanted people to believe, as many do not use the link. That is dishonest. As for TL, why do you keep claiming you can do what you please and asking me to complain? It's her blog, and I have never challenged her post selection or her comment policy. So keep on making false claims. We all know you are merely trying to pick a fight.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#29)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Glanton - I don't see this as a gay sex issue. Perhaps it is, I just don't see it. To me it is a free speech issue. I have already said I find the school wrong. And an "honesty" issue by those who wrote the article. If they want to be "journalists" then they should include the facts that bad things can happen to be good people, so you all be careful out there. As to the culture of Knoxville, I really see no need to go there. My comment was merely to remind you that it is a big metro place. If you think that all million plus are red necks, I'll let you explain that to them. ;-)

    PPJ:
    Darkly - You provided a link, but posted only what you wanted people to believe, as many do not use the link. That is dishonest.
    Dude, seriously....that pot/kettle/black thing is wearing down to the belts with you. Go easy on it from here on in, would ya?
    As to the culture of Knoxville, I really see no need to go there. My comment was merely to remind you that it is a big metro place. If you think that all million plus are red necks, I'll let you explain that to them.
    While the Knoxville area may be "a big metro place," Glanton's characterization of the area's mentality is dead-on. The east/west stretch between Nashville and Knoxville is proud to be home of the most profound of the "evengelical" sect, along with their inclination to view contraceptives and/or sex education as an impediment to their ability to cram Jesus down everyone's throats. I grew up and continue to live in that general area of the country. In 7th grade I was the one who got in trouble for disagreeing with a "science" instructor who stopped a film on geology to explain to the class that the narrarator was a liar because the bible says that the universe is only 6,000-some-odd years old. I got suspended for three days for "disobedience" (go figure); that "teacher" is still in the classroom. That sort of nonsense is typical for this part of the country.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#31)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Jim: I invoked Wilde for figurative reasons: I meant for him to be a trope not just for gay sex scandals, but for the SEX SCANDAL in general. A la the Knoxville comment, ClayP does a better job than I of saying what I was trying to say. And I still stand by it, in substance. Nevertheless, Jim, your last sentence was magnificent: touche. And overall, we seem to be in agreement on this thread, with the difference being that I am, sadly, behaving unreasonably misanthropic on this thread--for some reason wishing to be extra harsh towards the people and the school in Oak Ridge, whereas you simply want to respectfully disagree. I cede to your gentler handling on the situation.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#33)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    ClapP - Sounds like you were in very small school system. Evidently it didn't crush your spirit... I still think you are being too harsh on the neighborhood. As for DA, perhaps I am, but that really was a needless attack he made at 06:55 when I had not even commented in this thread.

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#34)
    by jimakaPPJ on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Darkly - You protest too much. Again, a few quick facts and on to other things. Your 8:29 comment was not accidental, and not in passing. It was a totally unprovoked attack. You know it, I know it. Speaking of bandwidth, as I read the thread, I see that you never made an on subject comment after your brief comment to JR in the 8:39AM attack. And thanks for the milk. Could you get some good scotch to go in?

    Re: TN School Censors Student Article on Birth Con (none / 0) (#35)
    by Johnny on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:06:32 PM EST
    Scotch and milk? You heathen... I laugh my a$$ of at people who still believe ignorance will result in enlightenment.