The American Civil Liberties
Union (ACLU) took two Tennessee public school districts to court for
using an online filter to block information about lesbian, gay, bisexual
and transgender (LGBT) issues, on behalf of a few students and a high
school librarian.
The websites belong to a category
simply labeled “LGBT” by a statewide computer network, part of Educational
Networks of America (ENA). According to ENA, the sites that fall into
this category, and the ones that as many as 80 percent of Tennessee
school districts chose to block, are those that "provide information
regarding, support, promote, or cater to one's sexual orientation or
gender identity including but not limited to lesbian, gay, bi-sexual,
and transgender sites,” reported eSchool
News.
The filter does not include pornographic sites, which appear under their
own “Pornography” category.
Sites that don’t appear
in the “LGBT” filter, and sites that the same school districts allow
students to access, are those that condemn homosexuality and promote
“ex-gay” ministries and “reparative therapy” – messages which
American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association,
the American Medical Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics
condemn as harmful to young people.
The ACLU website posted
a list of LGBT
organizations whose pages are included in the ENA’s filter:
- Parents, Families,
and Friends of Lesbians and Gays
- The Gay Lesbian
Straight Education Network
- Human Rights Campaign
- Marriage Equality
USA
- Religious Coalition
for the Freedom to Marry
- The Gay and Lesbian
Alliance Against Defamation
- Dignity USA (an
organization for LGBT Catholics)
"Allowing access to web
sites that present one side of an issue while blocking sites that present
the other side is illegal viewpoint discrimination," said Catherine
Crump, a staff attorney with the ACLU First Amendment Working Group
and lead attorney on the case.
According
to Karyn Storts-Brinks, a librarian at Fulton High School in Knoxville
(and one of the plaintiffs in the suit), the restrictions also hinder
students’ school work, since those who are doing research on current
events can only hear from one side of the argument.
Tricia Herzfeld, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Tennessee, says the filter violates both
the First Amendment and the Tennessee state constitution, which only
requires schools to restrict information that is obscene or harmful
to minors.
“When I found out about this
web filtering software, I wasn’t looking for anything sexual or inappropriate,”
said Andrew Emitt, a 17-year-old senior at Central High School in Knoxville.
“I was looking for information about scholarships for LGBT students,
and I couldn’t get to it because of this software. Our schools shouldn’t
be keeping students in the dark about LGBT organizations and resources."
The ALCU sent a letter
dated April 15
to Tennessee public school officials giving them until April 29 to come
up with a plan to restore access to the sites by the beginning of the
2009-2010 school year and threatening to file a lawsuit if their deadline
wasn’t met.
The plaintiff didn’t hear back until May 6, when it received a letter
from Mary E. Johnston of the legal department of Nashville saying that
they were still examining the “ramifications of the request,” many
of which revolved around extra costs to the school districts.
To the plaintiff, extra costs
to the school district are not nearly as important as protecting the
rights and resources of the students – especially since, as OhMyGov! reported
earlier this week,
granting certain rights such as gay marriage might actually bring new
money into the states.