Vivvo CMS 4.1 PRI: Public Radio International http://www.pri.org/ &copy;2010 Spoonlabs d.o.o. PRI: Public Radio International http://www.pri.org/files.php?file=rss_682409203.gif http://www.pri.org/ Cyber bullying troubles Indiana middle school http://www.pri.org/stories/politics-society/tt-cyber-bullying-troubles-indiana-middle-school-9763.html Politics and Society Tue, 08 May 2012 08:00:00 -0500 Griffith Middle School in Indiana is the newest battleground in the dispute over cyber bullying. After three students were expelled for using Facebook to describe plans to kill other students and one teacher, the ACLU sued the school for infringing on the students&#039; freedom of speech. BernardFerrell Politics and Society Tue, 08 May 2012 12:30:07 -0500 I understand not wanting schools to not overstep their boundaries outside of it&#039;s classrooms, but in this case I believe it is totally justifiable. Have not any of the prior school shooting incidents that have occurred in years past not taught us anything valuable? Past events have similar correlations regarding postings on the internet--whether it be a blog, a tweet, Facebook, or even an old fashioned journal entry. A lot of the previous tragic events were portented and alluded to on the internet prior to the actual events. I even recall a case where a student(s) was/were suspended,expelled,and/or arrested because of journal entries found by the parents themselves. <br /> <br /> How would this one event at Griffith not be any different than a threat made online on the President of the United States (Beside the obvious fact that one is a federal crime.)?<br /> <br /> In a court of law, these facebook postings would be used as evidence against the students had anything ever transpired. Why not set the precedent now to prevent this from happening again by imposing severe punishment to discourage such behavior? I don&#039;t think it would be an infringement upon our civil rights at all. We are not allowed to incite riots by falsely declaring fires, not allowed to falsely or truly declare we have a bomb at airports--these involve our freedom of speech. A theater is a privately owned business and yet we don&#039;t frown upon or scowl at the government concerning regulating our speech when it concerns inciting the public.<br /> <br /> Hopefully it will be just obvious and common sense that will prevail in this Griffith incident. PRI: Public Radio International