Students allowed to display anti-gay stickers

Associated Press

INDIO, Calif.

Students who placed anti-gay stickers on their identification badges at a Southern California high school have the right to wear the symbols, just as others can sport insignia supporting gay rights, administrators said.

Both symbols are allowed as a matter of free speech, as long as they do not cause a disruption at Shadow Hills High School in Indio, a city outside Palm Springs, administrators said in a statement emailed to staff last week.

The anti-gay stickers, which show a small rainbow inside a circle with a line through it, showed up about two weeks ago and raised concerns, The Desert Sun newspaper reported.

But administrators warned that students cannot interrupt class to express their beliefs.

“We all have a right to freedom of speech, but students also have a right to be educated without fear. This has always been our policy, and we will continue to enforce it,” according to their Wednesday statement.

Schools have settled legal disputes over messages on clothing they banned to maintain order. In 2013, a Connecticut school district agreed to let a high-school student wear a T-shirt with a slash mark through a gay pride rainbow after facing the threat of legal action from the ACLU.

But federal courts have allowed some limits on student speech, allowing schools to prohibit items such as banners and T-shirts that mentioned drug use or came at a school with racial strife.

“Sometimes people can be uncomfortable because of an opinion, but that doesn’t mean it’s bullying,” said Laura Fisher, assistant superintendent of personnel services.