opinion

ACLU attorney: Caesar Rodney, government can't censor social media

Early this week, the ACLU of Delaware received a number of reports about censorship on Caesar Rodney School District’s Facebook page. The district superintendent announced on the page that he would oppose planned student demonstrations about gun safety.

Students are planning to walk out of class to show solidarity with efforts to stop mass shootings. The superintendent said his opposition to these student protests was necessary to “keep them safe.”

In return, he got an earful about the double standard seemingly being applied to this particular reason for missing class. Critics also pointed out the irony of keeping students safe by preventing them from demonstrating in favor of their own safety.

Or, rather, he would have gotten an earful. But instead the district deleted all of the critical comments, going so far as to block some people from the district’s social media pages because of their criticism.

Whether or not the people who were censored pursue legal action, this unfortunate incident should serve as a wake-up call for all Delaware state and local agencies. Blocking people or deleting their comments from official social media accounts because they criticize the government is bad policy, and in many cases, unconstitutional.

Social media is an effective and efficient way for the government to communicate with the people it serves. It makes it easier to distribute important information and provides a transparent forum for feedback.

But when government agencies use their social media accounts to create this kind of public forum, there are limits on what they can do to control or limit speech there.

Excluding people from Facebook or Twitter because they criticize a government agency, or deleting criticism while endorsing praise, is a form of censorship. Such viewpoint discrimination is a particularly egregious First Amendment violation.

Blocking people from accessing Facebook or Twitter accounts also denies them access to important government information and from cheap and effective communication with government officials. Just last year in Virginia, a federal court found that the Chair of the County Board of Supervisors violated the First Amendment by banning an individual from the Chair’s Facebook page for criticizing her colleagues in the County government.

The court noted that “criticism of official conduct is not just protected speech, but lies at the very heart of the First Amendment.”

Censorship is particularly troubling coming from a school. It teaches students that dissent is dangerous and that the government should suppress it.

In reality, what’s dangerous is the idea that schools or any other government agency should be in the business of picking and choosing whose voice is heard. It is particularly unfortunate and ironic to exercise such censorship in the context of a debate over whether and how students should protest government policy.

Every state and local agency should review their social media policies to ensure they are not engaging in censorship. Agencies that do not have a policy governing the use of social media platforms should develop clear guidelines for agency staff and users that does not discriminate based on viewpoint. Government officials should not be blocking users or censoring posts to suppress criticism.

Ryan Tack-Hooper is the Legal Director of the ACLU of Delaware, an organization that works to defend the civil liberties of Delawareans through litigation and political advocacy. You can find him on Twitter (@rtackhooper), where he will not delete your criticism.

RELATED EDITORIAL: Students have First Amendment rights. Let them protest.