[Tasl] ACLU Sues To Stop Tennessee Schools From Censoring Gay Educational Web Sites

[Bruce Hester]

This has been in the news for the past couple of days but I thought I should
share this with you folks. ACLU lawyers sent this to me on Tuesday. The one
librarian mentioned (not by name) in this press release is a TASL member. I
have again been asked by two news sources and SLJ to provide a statement on
behalf of our association and I will do so. Our board has been looking at
this for a couple of months and we¹ve come up with a statement that closely
resembles the position of AASL and ALA in matters like this. As librarians
we have the commitment to provide equitable access to information regardless
of the topic. I know the topic in this instance is a Œhot button² issue for
some and I do understand. However, our main responsibility is to provide
access to information. Not just one viewpoint or idea but all views and
ideas we can find on a subject. I want to give you a chance to read over
this mull over some things in your own minds and let me know what you think
either personally or professionally before I reply to the media. Please
share your thoughts with me if you want and in a day or two I¹ll send to you
what the board has come up with. But I want you to look at this and think
about it before I tell you what we¹ve come up with at our board meeting.

ACLU Sues To Stop Tennessee Schools From Censoring Gay Educational Web Sites

Filtering Software Allows Anti-Gay Sites
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 19, 2009

CONTACT: Rachel Myers, ACLU National, (212) 549-2689 or 2666; media at aclu.org
                 Hedy Weinberg, ACLU of TN, (615) 320-7142 or 480-5572

NASHVILLE, TN – The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Tennessee
sued two Tennessee school districts in federal court today, charging the
schools are unconstitutionally blocking students from accessing online
information about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues.
Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools, Knox County Schools and as many as
105 other school districts in Tennessee use Internet filtering software to
block Web sites containing pro-LGBT speech, but not Web sites touting
so-called "reparative therapy" and "ex-gay" ministries. The "LGBT" filter is
not used to block sites containing pornography, which are filtered under a
different category, but it does block the sites of many well-known LGBT
organizations including Parents, Families, And Friends of Lesbians and Gays
(PFLAG), the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network (GLSEN) and Human Rights
Campaign (HRC). 

"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. "This discriminatory
censorship does nothing to make students safe from material that may
actually be harmful, but only hurts them by making it impossible to access
important educational material."

The school districts block the Internet filtering category designated
"LGBT," which includes sites that "provide information regarding, support,
promote, or cater to one's sexual orientation or gender identity." They do
not, however, block sites that condemn homosexuality or promote "reparative
therapy," a practice purporting to "cure" LGBT people that is denounced as
dangerous and harmful to young people by such groups as the American
Psychological Association and the American Medical Association.

The ACLU filed the case in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District
of Tennessee against Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools and Knox County
Schools on behalf of two high school students in Nashville, one student in
Knoxville and a high school librarian in Knoxville who is also the advisor
of the school's Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA).

"Students need to be able to access information about their legal rights or
what to do if they're being harassed at school," said Keila Franks, a
17-year-old student at Hume-Fogg High School in Nashville and a plaintiff on
the case. "It's completely unfair for schools to keep students in the dark
about such important issues and treat Web sites that just offer information
like they're something dirty."

The lawsuit charges that blocking LGBT sites violates students' First
Amendment rights by only allowing access to sites that present an anti-gay
point of view on the rights of LGBT persons on issues such as anti-gay
harassment, marriage, employment discrimination and the military's "don't
ask, don't tell" policy while blocking access to sites that support LGBT
rights. Further, the filtering hinders the ability of GSAs and their members
to facilitate club activities and keeps students from accessing important
information about scholarships for LGBT students or doing research for
school-related assignments.

The ACLU first learned about the discriminatory filtering from Andrew Emitt,
a Knoxville high school student who discovered the problem while trying to
search for LGBT scholarships. Internet filtering software is mandated in
public schools by Tennessee law, which requires schools to implement
software to restrict information that is obscene or harmful to minors.
However, the "LGBT" filter category does not include material which is
sexually gratuitous and already included in the "pornography" filtering
category. 

"While schools may have an interest in using filters to block material that
could be harmful to minors, blocking access to information about LGBT issues
while allowing anti-gay information is unlawful and potentially dangerous,"
said Tricia Herzfeld, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Tennessee. "There is
no place for this kind of unconstitutional censorship in our public
schools."

In addition to Crump and Herzfeld, attorneys on the case are Chris Hansen of
the ACLU First Amendment Working Group and Christine Sun of the ACLU LGBT
Project.

The plaintiffs are Nashville students Keila Franks and Emily Logan,
Knoxville student Bryanna Shelton, and Karyn Storts-Brinks, a Knoxville high
school librarian and faculty sponsor for her school's GSA.

More information about the case, including the ACLU's complaint and a video
featuring one of the student plaintiffs, is available online at:
www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/39346res20090413.html
<http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/39346res20090413.html> .

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