Did the punishment fit the crime?

Written By:
Ebony Turner

Published:
Jan. 06 2010

No matter where you work, or who you work for, one is always faced with a person they may not particularly like or enjoy being around. That is inevitably the way of the world and has been in that motion for quite some time. Students in high school are not an exception to that in any way, seeing as just like every other human being, they feel the same things. The only difference in a student and an average adult living in the boundless, law-abiding world is that we are expected to learn how to express those feelings in am appropiate way and at the right place and time. Whether it is through humor or through harmless ranting, freedom of expression is a right that is given to those who are able know the difference in threatening someone and possibly risking someone’s feelings being hurt . Everyone who lives in this world must understand that expressing ones opinion is not only encouraged in the media, hence the opinion section in every published form of newspaper around the United States, but even in politics. As long as one’s personal safety or character is not being attacked and the place it is done is appropriate, what is the problem? Two Springbrook students were suspended for expressing their opinions about a member of our administration on the popular social networking website, Facebook. A group was made that at the time acclaimed 300 members. The opinions were expressed in the leisure of their own home which ultimately raises the question of whether it was fair to suspend them. Their opinions were expressed in the appropriate way and were expressed at a place fitting for the nature of their opinions. This is not the first time a group has been made expressing some form of an opinion about a member of Springbrook’s staff and faculty, and it unfortunately will not be the last. Students are human beings, and they will exercise their rights to congregate with other students about how they feel about their surroundings, whether it be the school in itself or an actual faculty member; that is how they feel. Cyber bullying is when one makes threats to another that make a person feel their safety is at risk. This act was not cyber bullying seeing as though no one was threatened. It is the responsibility of every person to be able to mature to a point where one is prepared to be talked about or criticized; that is a growing process that lasts a lifetime. Regardless of where one is at in that growth process, the world will not wait for you to grow up and take criticism in the appropriate way. Abusing one’s power and reprimanding a person for expressing how they feel is not fair, and if every person in some position of power did that, we would live in a nation similar to Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship prior to him being overthrown. We live in a nation where we are allowed to say how we feel, and exercise rights that other nations could only dream of. It is vital that we take advantage of that on all fronts and not hinder or make others feel those rights are restricted.