Bryan Chmielewski a student at Thomas More High School was required to put an art exhibit up for his final exam. Bryan chooses to make a political statement. He put up some drawings, including one of a person lying down dead. On that drawing, he wrote: "Swallow what you're fed, and we'll all lie dead." And he underlined the word "lie.” He also hung several American flags upside down, with messages on them. One read: "Land of the Thieves, Home of the Slaves, Terrorism: The American Way." On another one, he wrote U$A. He wrote "Truth" on a third. The teacher said they must write a statement describing their work. Bryan wrote and I quote "I do not hate America or encourage people to hate America. I'm simply trying to expose the other truths that people don't see."

The next day Bryan said "I came to school, and my art teacher said, 'You're going to have to take your artwork down.' I said I wasn't going to do it. Then she said, 'We're going to have to talk to the assistant principal,' "

The teacher sent Bryan to speak to the Assistant Principal. The principal was not in his or hers office so the teacher sent him to talk to the guidance counselor Rich Dorn. According to Bryan, Dorn told him: "You've got to take it down because that's not what people want to see after Sept. 11."

Dorn asked Bryan to draw pictures of police officers of firefighters and "heroes" hold up the American flag. Bryan quotes "I told him I wasn't going to do it, and I said, 'I put all my heart into it, and if you want to take it down, you're going to have to do it yourself.' "

The staff finally did take the flags down. The assistant principal was the one reported to take the flags down.

Bryan says "They gave me all my flags back, but they left the artwork up," Bryan says. "So basically what I did was I turned all my artwork backwards, and I took pieces of paper, and I wrote sayings on it: 'This is freedom.' 'Keep turning your heads, and swallowing the lies, and nothing will ever change.' "

The next morning, "All my artwork was gone," he says. "Someone had come in at night and taken it down."

The assistant principal says "Basically, this is a private institution. We have values that we accept and values we don't accept."

If it was a pulic school, I would say no sir, and sue until I found out who took it down.

Theres a difference between freedom of speach and harassment, slander, etc.

JWB can you tell me what you mean by harrassing. And tell why you think this is slander and what you mean by etc.

Call the ACLU!!! :D

is this a private school?
if it is, they have every right to tell u what u can and cannot do. if u choose to go there, they can tell u what to do.

The teacher said they may do whatever they like for the finial exam as long as it reaches everything she said and that he did. He just made a political statement. You said it is a private institution and teachers can tell him what and what he can't do but he was only doing what the teacher told him.

Well if its a private school then they can tell you that you got to kiss their feet otherwise leave, they do not have to accomadate to the standards that normal schools do. But most private schools do more than public schools thats what makes me wonder so much

[quote:6e0618d186="VBallAngel4377"]
is this a private school?
if it is, they have every right to tell u what u can and cannot do. if u choose to go there, they can tell u what to do. [/quote:6e0618d186]No one has the right to screen, filter and weed out your opinion - private institution or not. There's no school who doesn't want homosexual people, now is it? They can easily say "we do not want homosexual people to attend our school". I have yet to see one.

If it was a public school, the student, unfortunately, has every right to show that artwork.

However, a private school [i:3a9ff72605]can[/i:3a9ff72605] tell one what to do; they have more control over their students, just as a mail-man cannot tell a person's children what to do as well as the parents themselves can.