The right to freedom of religion, speech, press and... Facebook??

Is your “Facebook Speech” protected as Freedom of Speech?

As social networks expand at increasingly high rates across the globe, online communities are becoming almost equivocal to real life communities.  Naturally, individuals in real life communities are to expect freely exercise and also be protected by their Constitutional

The sun never sets on a Facebook bully

 Bill of Rights; which includes their First Amendment right to freedom of speech.   Although this statement may be obvious when analyzing “real life” scenarios, the lines tend to be blurred when we enter our digital communities.  Since social networking sites such as Facebook act as a public forum for individuals to express their opinions and beliefs, one would expect they would receive the same rights as they would if they were doing the same in a real community.. right?  A recent ACLU case says yes, you have the right to exercise free speech even if it may initially come across as “cyber-bullying.”   However, would we treat it the same way if the speech were to be said in a similarly public forum like over the load speaker at our local shopping mall?

In a 2011 case (found here), a student was suspended for posting an angry comment about his biology teacher, stating that he was a “fat ass who should stop eating fast food, and is a douche bag.”  The school justified that it was “cyber bullying”, as well as disruptive behavior, and suspended the student.   This is the part when the ACLU stepped in, and challenged the school’s disciplinary actions with the claim that they were violating the student’s first amendment right to free speech.  Although it is not clearly stated in the article, one could conclude that the reasoning for the school’s initial response to the post was because it involved a school faculty member and being “cyber-bullied” by a student (a reasonable issue for their concern) and that it occurred in such a public manner that it could likely lead to disruption of the learning process (since students would likely talk about it at school). 

I think the best way to analyze this case is to try and translate it into an equivalent scenario that could happen in the real world; What if the student had gotten a megaphone and stood at town hall saying the same thing he had wrote on Facebook?  Then would it be a reasonable cause for discipline by the school? 

For this specific case, I believe it was clear that the student's speech was protected, due to the time, place, and manner standards that are often looked at when analyzing free speech.  Since the posting was created in the students home (not on school grounds) and the statements (although vicious) were a matter of opinion, the student’s
speech was protected.    Although it may have created some disruption in school, by the right of the First Amendment, the student should be allowed to express these thoughts outside of school.  And as for the cyber-bullying?   Well, the legal definition  of “cyber-bullying” (according to legaldefinition.us)  is “the use of information and communication technologies to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behavior by an individual or group, that is intended to harm others.”  So, since the student did not repeat it, I’m not sure if I would deem it as a cyber-bullying attempt.

On the flip side of things, one could reason that the school (who did end up dropping the suspension) had the right to act in the best interest of keeping a healthy learning environment between students and faulty.  Although it is true that if the student went on his rant (as long as not threatening or defamatory) at a physical place that was off school grounds he would be protected, there is certainly a difference between that and Facebook.   The difference between posting something on Facebook and announcing something on a loudspeaker is the sheer permanence of the postings as well as the huge impact they can have.  A posting is accessible for the entire world (or at least your network) to see until you choose to delete it (which even then doesn’t guarantee it cant be found again).  The permanence of your interactions on Facebook often have a greater impact because of this, since it’s always available for people to read.  Also, postings are able to reach a considerably larger audience, causing them to have a greater impact due to the fact that you’re reaching a MUCH larger audience.  If I wanted to go and verbally bash my teacher over a megaphone, I might get my message across to a few people, but if I want to go and bash my teacher on Facebook, I’m going to get it across to at least 200 or more.  Suddenly my desire to express my opinion could end up being much more destructive than I thought.

A posting like this can very easily be taken as a threatening.

I also believe that the nature of this case, since it is in a school environment, slants my perspective on it slightly.  In a school setting, incidents like these belong being monitored carefully.  If they are not, it can very likely become disruptive to the learning process.  Many time children do not fully grasp just how much of an impact the click of their mouse can be, that every single photo and posting can eventually come back to haunt them.  Posting something lewd, vulgar, or threatening in the heat of the moment can eventually cause legal recourse to be taken, potentially ruining a students future in just a few strokes of a keyboard.  Cases like these, although debatable, are a good way to show youth that their virtual decisions do have an impact and can cause them to be in some potentially scary situations.

The ultimate conclusion I can draw in regards to Freedom of Speech on websites like Facebook, is that they need to be treated like any other freedom of speech issue.  If a false statement is made about an individual, people should be held liable for defamation; if a threatening statement is made, people should be held liable for harassment.  With that being said, individuals need to understand the forum that they are choosing to express their opinions and beliefs.  Although you may feel as though your Facebook is a private domain where you can say anything you’d like, the reality is that you are leaving a permanent and very public record of these thoughts.  Thus, a decision to post on Facebook that “Bob is a crack addict” can very quickly and easily turn into a defamation suit.   Facebook is NOT the same as ranting to a small group of friends, and the decisions you make on it can have REAL consequences.