Speech Codes

I believe that the behavior the students showed should be banned for so many different reasons. Beta Theta Pi and Beta Theta Pi always included people of all colors and relgions and when those students wore KKK clothes and dressed as african americans being hung, they destroyed that image. Another thing is what about the african americans that go to the school. When they show up to the party and there are people in white robes walking around fake lynching people I would think that either they would be very angry or scared. I'm jewish and if I went to a party and saw people dressed up as nazis and KKK members I would be offended and scared to think that maybe they are anti semitic and would not want to go to that school surrounded by people like that. I believe that it is the school's responsibility to keep their students safe from hate crimes like that. Here are some of the pictures from the part https://docs.google.com/present/viewid=0AVf_DLqQA9ovZGZ2bTR3ZmdfMGZ6M25iNWc2&hl=en_US

I decided that I would like to go to Iowa State University and their speech codes are pretty good. Iowa State belives that there should be no sexual harassment and discrimination in the school, but they believe that students should be able to encourage"...the intellectual and personal growth of its students as scholars and citizens..." so they are not strict on freedom of expression. I believe the codes are to protect the students from being bullied and to make them feel like they can express their opinion without gets attacked. I believe that speech codes should be allowed in all schools because they don't hurt students. A group called FIRE help students find out if the college they are looking at have speech codes and if they are aggresive about it. I am glad that we have FIRE because it helped me see some things about college that I never thought about looking at.

The Pledge of Allegiance

I believe that schools should not force students to say the pledge of allegiance because it goes against students freedom of speech."...One nation, under god..." If schools are using religion in schools then they are breaking the first ammendment. I understand that the flag represents freedom and by saying the pledge you are showing that you are an american citizen and proud of it.  Not everybody believes in what the flag stands for so they should not be forced to say it. I personally say the pledge because it shows respect to the people that do say the pledge but not everyone wants to say it because they aren't like me. I am thankful that our soldiers fight to protect our rights and other countries rights for freedom but if the government is taking our freedom to not say the pledge then isn't that being hypocritical? I remember when my friend chose to sit down during the pledge and a teacher told him he has to stand up and he kept on saying no. Eventually they walked outside and talked and came back in and he was allowed to sit down, so he got what he wanted but why does he have to explain himself to a teacher? I believe you shouldn't have to do that, unless they are talking and being rude while others are saying the pledge.