No Law Against Love?

From Autauga County, Alabama, via Drudge: Student reprimanded for consoling friend who lost parent

The debate of public displays of affection in school is hitting home in Alabama. The mother of a student in Autauga County says her daughter was disciplined for simply hugging a friend...

"It was made to be something ugly and it wasn't," Muir said.

She says the hug wasn't meant to be sexual. She says her daughter was consoling a male friend who recently lost a parent.

For doing the right thing, for doing something that I'm sure school officials would want if they were in the same grief, this girl was given a detention under the overly-broad interpretation of the district's behavioral code, prohibiting "inappropriate public displays of affection, including but not limited to embracing and kissing." What is so inappropriate about comfort for those in mourning? What problem do the school board's Bible-thumpers have with this?

If this girl's mother will do nothing beyond pointing out the obvious callousness of the district's policy, the boy's family should take up the cause in court. The district has caused him emotional damage, by stigmatizing his friend for trying to do the right thing.

Posted on Nov 7, 2007 at 10:24:56 AM EST.