On the same day (November 2) the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for Schwarzenegger vs. EMA in Washington D.C., students at Pinecrest High School in North Carolina took part in their own reenactment of the landmark videogame case.
Tenth graders from a civics class took part in the faux-trial, with eight students taking on the role of Associate Supreme Court Justices while a local attorney named Bruce Cunningham assumed the role of Chief Justice. Four students argued for each side.
One student, arguing for California, stated that “When you're a child, your brain hasn't developed that part where you don't understand the consequences,” while a counterpart on the EMA side contended that, “Speech, even though it is not pleasing, is still entitled to freedom.”
When arguments were over, the Pinecrest Justices retreated to a hallway for deliberation, eventually returning a 5-4 ruling in favor of the game industry.
Comments
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
I'm surprised the faux ruling was 5-4, considering they're all about 16-17. I wonder how much time they had to prepare their cases?
I was in Mock Trial in High School. It wasn't a part of a class or anything, it was an actual competition. Win Regionals, go to State. Our fictional case had to do with locker searches and their legality vs. children's right to privacy.
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
These days kids can be strip searched for medication because the shccol is nazistic over liability and zero tolerance....
I have a dream, break the chains of copy right oppression! http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/cigital-disobedience/
Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Let's renegotiate them.
---
http://zippydsm.deviantart.com/
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
Never heard of strip searches in schools, but then I've been out of school for more than a decade. That is definitely a violation of personal space and privacy. Strip searches at airports (or patdowns, or body scanners) is controversial enough as it is, but you at least have the option of refusing and not flying. But you're mandated to attend school, and most people can't afford private schools or home schooling. If you have no choice about going to school, it's very much wrong to have strip searches.
I was on the team arguing that lockers are school property, and that student's (false) assumption that they are private is not the fault of the school, since it's outlined in the handbook passed out at the start of the schoolyear (which is true of most real schools. students know lockers aren't their personal space). The fictional case had to do with a student getting caught with drugs in their locker, but the student arguing that the search was "illegal" since no clear evidence was used to justify the search in the first place and they should have needed a warrant (something about some sketchy emails left up on the screen in the school library tipped the teachers off, I don't remember the exact details).
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
There was a guy at my second high school (I moved around a lot in those days) who got caught with drugs in his locker (I think it was a cocaine) and he tried to argue later that the school had no right to search the thing in the first place, but the fact of the matter was that they didn't even need probable cause. The locker was their property, they could do with it as they pleased.
I'm just glad I got out of school before they started in with the metal detectors, drug dogs, and strip searches. I don't think they're necessarily a bad idea, and I myself wouldn't have gotten in trouble, nor would most of my friends (I think :P), but I would NOT have felt good getting up every morning knowing what was in store for me at school. Especially since high school was already an unpleasant experience as it was. I'm surprised I didn't ditch or pretend to be sick more often.
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
The metal detectors weren't all that bad. In the course of my 4 years of high school (graduated in last June), I only went through one four or five times. Never had drug dogs sniff me or my bag, though I'd seen them around the school from time to time.
I was never strip searched either. Interestingly enough though, the school's newspaper (of which I was an editor :) ) did a story over prescription drug addiction. One girl mentioned that she hid her pills in her bra because the guards weren't allowed to search there.
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
That's what fear has done to the people who operate our schools. They have no choice but to be invasive, while at the same time living in fear of organizations like the ACLU breathing down their necks. Schools work in a no-win situation, either they're doing too much or not enough.
What would really go a long way to fixing this problem would be for more parents to actually be grateful for schools taking their brats, err, kids off their hands and attempting to educating them (which seems to be something parents are just never interested in doing themselves), instead of feeling so damn entitled.
This may seem harsh, and a bad idea, and perhaps it is, but I think we'd be better off if we allowed privatization of all schools across the country. Any one of them that wants to get taken over by a corporation, should have every right in the world to do so. And WITHOUT the consent of parents. I think standards would skyrocket, no successful business wants to be caught dead generating a sub-par product, which in that case would be students ready to take on whatever the world throws at them.
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
Mr. Stodern
Interesting you pick on the ACLU before general public and crazy niche group lawsuits.
The schools have chosen the path of least resistance IE the easiest thing they can do and it involves zero thought rules that ban fingernail clipers,nail filers and such when they have sharp pencils. Shoocls, Doctors, ect need to be protected from mundane lawsuits and harassment via the courts. Shcools need it more tho as they are falling apart.........
Basically the government insures them against most harm and regulates via standardized regional boards what moves to court or gets redressed some other way.
Signing a waver would help as well it would absolve the schools of some things(like spanking, issues with a kid bringing something to school,ect,ect) I mean sirously its to the point where someone can sue the shcool for letting a kid with the sniffles into school......
I have a dream, break the chains of copy right oppression! http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/cigital-disobedience/
Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Let's renegotiate them.
---
http://zippydsm.deviantart.com/
Re: North Carolina Tenth Graders Ape SCOTUS, Rule for Game ...
Thats why parents parent..... having government censor for any reason is to dangerous...
I have a dream, break the chains of copy right oppression! http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/cigital-disobedience/
Copyright infringement is nothing more than civil disobedience to a bad set of laws. Let's renegotiate them.
---
http://zippydsm.deviantart.com/