Similarly, obscenity, threats, commercial speech, and personal attacks can likely be regulated with less concern for First Amendment violations. The racist epithets of Facebook-posters can quickly be deleted without much concern. Obviously, there are some instances where the speech itself will not enjoy the protections of the First Amendment. Thus, schools should not remove posts or ban users just because comments are negative or critical.
In order to remove postings made by the public, schools need to ensure that their decisions are reasonable and content neutral.Ĭontent neutral means that the content or viewpoint of the speech does not factor into the decision to remove the post. However, participation by the public transforms a school Facebook page into a “limited public forum,” meaning the space is designated for speech by certain groups or for discussion of certain topics. Often, those types of sites will constitute speech by the government. These concerns compound when the site provides for and encourages participation from the public.įor school social media accounts that are not interactive (think Twitter), there are fewer First Amendment concerns.
The internet, and particularly, social media sites such as Facebook, have opened up an entirely new frontier of First Amendment concerns. The First Amendment protects citizens’ free speech from censorship by public entities such as schools.
The reason for all these lawsuits about comments you would typically scroll past on your own news feed? The First Amendment. Finally, the Indiana city of Beech Grove settled with the ACLU for an undisclosed amount after removing negative comments from its Facebook page. In 2015, a Florida Sheriff’s Department had to settle with a citizen after it deleted his Facebook comments and banned him from further postings on their page. On occasion, however, insulting comments or comment wars spill onto the Facebook pages of public entities, such as schools.įor example, the Honolulu Police Department recently settled a lawsuit for $31,000 over deleting negative Facebook comments. Often these word wars take place on private pages. In today’s hostile political arena, we’ve all witnessed or become a part of a Facebook comment war: initially the comments provide constructive criticism, but inevitably dissolve into insults.
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