SYRACUSE -- Facebook is the center of controversy in states across the country. From New York to Pennsylvania and Florida, serious legal questions are popping up about what's punishable and what's protected by free speech. So what do the rulings in other states mean for a local Facebook case?
Locally, a Roxboro Road Middle School student was recently suspended for posting comments about a teacher online, and 33 other students received detention. From the moment she heard about it, it didn't sit well with Barrie Gewanter with the New York Civil Liberties Union. "There is a disturbing trend for school authorities to begin trying to punish students for speech they engage in out of school, off school hours, off school grounds," Gewanter said.
Gewanter is watching the case closely, along with many others across the country. One case is in South Florida, where a student was suspended for creating a Facebook page, criticizing her teacher. The student later sued the principal, saying the suspension violated her rights to free speech. Then, earlier this month, a federal judge ruled the suit was legal.
There was a similar situation and yet a very different decision in Pennsylvania, where a student was punished for creating a fake profile of a principal online, calling him a pedophile and sexual addict. In that case, the judge ruled the discipline was appropriate, given the lewd and vulgar speech.
So we wanted to know, with those cases potentially setting precedent in other incidents involving free speech and social networking, what implications they might have for our local case.
"It is really difficult for me to imagine that a school could punish a student for what a student had on a Facebook page or was emailing unless the words are truly threats," said David Rubin, professor and former dean of the Newhouse School at Syracuse University.
Rubin is keeping a close eye on the cases as they relate to free speech an says whether the local case is punishable really depends on the words. "So the question is do the words cross a line where they cease to be nasty or comment or opinion about a teacher's performance and actually become threatening words," Rubin said.
We know the Facebook postings in North Syracuse were sexual in nature, but the superintendent won't say anymore than that. What we do know is that these are unchartered waters, as judges begin to wade through similar cases of the First Amendment and how it applies to Facebook and schools. Do free speech protections stretch into the world of social networking when students and teachers are involved? That remains to be seen.
With technology constantly changing, it's a debate that will likely rage on.
