October 18, 2011 was the second annual Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity. The international event asked students around the world to wear red duct tape over their mouths with the word ‘LIFE’ written on the tape. It was estimated that thousands of students from hundreds of schools participated in the event.
Prior to the Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity, a student at Dixon High School in Dixon, Missouri, displayed a poster for the event on the school bulletin board. The same bulletin board displayed posters promoting the Gay-Straight Alliance ‘Day of Silence’ along with posters containing edited photos of students to make them look like blood drenched zombies.
School officials removed the Pro-Life Day of Silence Solidarity poster and tore ripped it into pieces. They defended their actions by saying the poster was offensive.
Matt Sharp, litigation staff counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund say that the school’s actions are a clear violation of the First Amendment rights of free speech and has filed a lawsuit against the school district. Sharp points out that the school cannot pick and choose which posters they will allow and won’t allow based upon which views they support or don’t support. If you allow one, you have to allow all.
He issued the following statement,
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