On the Student Press Law Center test covering the First Amendment I scored a 26 out of 30. One of the questions that I got wrong was about whether or not a public school can lawfully enact a campus speech code that prohibits “harassing, demeaning, highly offensive or insulting speech based on one’s actual or perceived race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, disability or other personal characteristic.” I had to take a step back and really think about what this means and how it is and or isn’t a fair practice. My first reaction was how then can a child that is getting bullied verbally at school really have any legal protections? The bully in this scenario would be within his/her legal right to make fun of another student which could lead to depression or suicide by the bullied student. However, the First Amendment wasn’t created so we could sit around talking about who’s lawn is nicer or who has the best looking car at school. The First Amendment was created for us to discuss difficult topics and have the freedom to give our opinions and thoughts without blowback.

The court case that stuck out to me was Brown v.s. Entertainment Merchants Association that was argued on November 2, 2010. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Entertainment Merchants Association overruling a California law that restricted the sale or rental of video games that contain violence to minors. According to the Supreme Court video games are like books, plays, movies and other familiar literary mediums and just because it is considered a newer and different form of communication it still has the same principles of freedom of speech applied to it. When I looked deeper into this court case and its ruling, I do understand to a point why they ruled the way they did. Even though as a parent I would not allow my children to view some of these games, I was exposed to some violence as a child through television and I am not a violent person as an adult.

BROWN v. ENTERTAINMENT MERCHANTS ASSN. (cornell.edu)