The case raises thought-provoking questions not only about one student’s quest for civil rights, but also the nature of education itself.
Couch had no idea he was about to kick off a national controversy when he wore the T-shirt last April as part of a national day of silence to protest bullying and intolerance of gay and lesbian students. “I simply knew I had the right to wear that T-shirt, and that it’s more than a T-shirt,” Couch explained. “I’m standing up for myself and for other people who are depressed about being themselves, even scared to be themselves.”
During English class April 15, 2011, he was called to the principal’s office. “I was freaking out — what did I do wrong?” he recalled.
Principal Randy Gebhardt said fellow students complained about the T-shirt, saying it made them uncomfortable. Gebhardt asked Couch if he would consider wearing the T-shirt inside out. Couch complied that day, but after researching his rights, soon came to feel that he was within his legal rights to wear the T-shirt.
What happened next is in dispute. In an April 2 federal lawsuit, Couch claimed Gebhardt violated his First Amendment rights by forcing him to remove the T-shirt. The lawsuit claimed that Gebhardt threatened disciplinary action, including suspension, when he wore the T-shirt a week later.
Wayne Local Schools Superintendent Patrick Dubbs said Couch wasn’t threatened with suspension. “That’s not the way it happened,” he said. “We’re not pro- or anti- anything and we’re not taking sides. But First Amendment rights are not without limits. You can’t wear just any T-shirt. We believe that differences of opinions on hot topics, such as sexuality and religion, doesn’t fit in with what were trying to do. We want to keep kids focused on our real mission, and that is education.”
Couch is represented by Christopher Clark of Lambda Legal, an advocacy group that fights for civil rights of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people (LGBT). In a letter to Clark, school district attorney William Deters II stated, “It is the position of the Wayne Local School District Board of Education that the message communicated by the student’s T-shirt was sexual in nature and therefore indecent and inappropriate in a school setting.”
The district is permitting Couch to wear the T-shirt on Friday — this year’s Day of Silence — but Clark said that doesn’t go far enough. “Constitutional rights are rights you have every day of the year, not just on a single day,” he said.
Dubbs said Couch was never told the T-shirt was indecent or sexually explicit, describing the statement as a communication between lawyers.
The only graphic on the T-shirt is a rainbow-colored fish symbolizing Christ. Clark said that describing the T-shirt as sexual in nature shows how the district is missing the point.
“That response reflects an ignorance about lives and experience of LGBT people. It shows how people are always trying to sexualize gay people — that being gay is only sexual in nature. It’s demeaning to Maverick’s message and not an accurate representation of what the shirt says and it’s not a defense that the law will or should recognize.”
Dubbs countered, “We do want students to be tolerant, and we don’t want people to be harassed and abused. I don’t think that’s the issue here.”
Clark said he expected media attention, but is surprised by the scope, including coverage in news outlets in 47 states and three foreign countries, not to mention stories in The Huffington Post, CNN, MSNBC and a mention in Conan O’Brien’s monologue.
Dubbs said the district was blindsided by the lawsuit and by Couch’s press conference in Cincinnati.
“They have gotten in front of us,” Dubbs said. “We had no idea the lawsuit had been filed or that the press conference had taken place. We were disappointed that it came to this point, with little or no conversation. It casts Waynesville in a negative light, when we’re an outstanding community, an outstanding school district who are well- behaved and perform well academically and athletically. We are very proud of our student body, and Maverick is one of those kids of whom we are the most proud.”
Dubbs is justly proud of his student body. Couch said that none of his fellow students have harassed him since filing the lawsuit. But I believe the superintendent should be proud of Couch because of the way he is standing up — not in spite of it.
In the 1960s, no doubt, a T-shirt promoting desegregation and civil rights would have made fellow students uncomfortable. It might have been regarded as a distraction.
But there was a lesson there — as there is now — that society disregarded at great cost.
“It’s symbolic,” Couch said. “I’m not trying to disrupt education. But I don’t want one more person to commit suicide for being taunted because of who they are. I’m trying to make the point that there are people who are bullied and harassed and called mean names every day, and they don’t say anything.”
Couch looks forward to the day when his struggle will seem as archaic as the days when blacks were forced to ride at the back of the bus: “When I’m old, I predict that people will ask me, ‘Why did you have to fight to get married? Why did you have to fight to wear that T-shirt?’”
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