A 16-year old teenaged girl is suing her assistant principals after they sent her home for wearing a tee shirt they did not approve of.
A Northern California teen is suing two administration officials who sent her home for wearing a tee shirt that said, “Nobody knows I’m a lesbian.”
The teen, identified in the lawsuit as only “T.V.,” says an assistant principal and a vice principal both violated her rights under the state and federal constitutions and the California Education Code. She and her mother filed the lawsuit in federal court, claiming censorship.
T.V. says she was told her tee shirt was “promoting sex” and was “an open invitation to sex,” Courthouse News reports. “T.V. says she fears she could be expelled if she wears the shirt again.”
She says vice principal Greg Leland told her “that she was not allowed to display her ‘sexuality’ on clothing.”
In her lawsuit, T.V. says she explained to assistant principal Dan Beukelman “that sex and sexuality had different meanings,” but  “Beukelman told T.V. she was wrong and claimed that sexuality fell under the category of sex.”
T.V. was forced to explain to the administrators what the school district’s dress code actually said, and was told they could amend it if necessary. She says she told them she had not violated it.
Nevertheless, T.V. says she was told “that regardless of the dress code, she was not allowed to display her ‘personal choices and beliefs’ on a shirt,” and one of the administrators “also claimed that her shirt violated the dress code because it was ‘disruptive’ and could be ‘gang related,'” her Oct. 15 complaint states.
T.V. is being represented by the ACLU.
“Public schools can’t censor the political beliefs of students, and free speech is not subject to the whims and biases of school administrators,” attorney Christine Sun of the ACLU of Northern California said. “This student’s school should be teaching her to think for herself, not punishing her for being herself.”
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