School suspends student for refusing to remove personal animation from YouTube, threatens other students for petitioning on his behalf

Jack Christie, a grade 12 student at Donald A. Wilson Secondary School in Whitby, Ontario, has been indefinitely suspended for posting surreal, crude, humorous videos to YouTube. The videos were shown in his Economics and Politics class, where they were thoroughly enjoyed, but when he posted them to YouTube, the school principal gave him a one-day suspension and ordered him to take the videos off YouTube. He refused, and was given an indefinite suspension. Members of the school's student government, including Gavin Russell, the student government's prime minister, took up a petition for Christie's reinstatement, but were ordered to stop collecting signatures or face punishment.

Christie has made an appropriately funny and profane rebuttal to the student council, which I have embedded above for your viewing pleasure.

When I was 18, I was writing short stories, some of them good, most of them awful, and several of them decidedly offensive. I sent them to magazines, sold a few, and had there been a Web to post them to, I would have done so. I can't imagine what impact a similar ban on publishing my creative work would have had on my future development as a writer.

"They've unfairly judged me and judged my character based on something I made for entertainment," he said on Wednesday. "I have the right to post videos on the Internet on my own time." A spokeswoman for the Durham District School Board refused to discuss the case, citing confidentiality laws, but obliquely explained the school's actions: "If something is considered detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school, it doesn't necessarily have to happen inside the school [for us to get involved]," said Andrea Pidwerbecki.

Student cites freedom of speech after suspension for online videos (Thanks, Jesse!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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emmdeeaych

…but were ordered to stop collecting signatures or face punishment.

The subtle differences between citizens and subjects.
Mister44

But… but… that’s in Canada. They aren’t a bunch of freedom hating fascists, like in America.

What exactly was the schools reasoning for wanting the original videos removed?

Also – kudos on the liberal use of Prodigy in the beginning.
Anonymous

I think we need an online petition! I’d love to see the school board try to shut THAT down.
- Anonymous
  
  “I think we need an online petition! I’d love to see the school board try to shut THAT down.”
  
  …or take it seriously!
  - Anonymous
    
    *cough*William Laushua*cough*
    
    It’s all fun and games until people start hiring strippers.
wylkyn

I watched his other videos, and they were very funny. His video “Jack Christie Talks to Children 2: Corporate Whistleblowing” is really funny. But it does have some weird aspects that confuse me.

He starts the video with an insulting reference to the teacher. Later, near the end of the video, the teacher is shown, and is voiced (I believe) by the teacher himself (there was a vague reference to this in the article). Then the kid proceeds to kill the teacher by blowing him up with laser beams from his eyes. So, I have to assume from the limited information provided, that the teacher was aware of the content of this video and was cool with it.

However, I can see how viewing this out of context would cause other people to be concerned. Any video that enacts a student killing a teacher would be disturbing, and I find it strange that the teacher was okay with this and thought it appropriate. I’m not saying the kid was wrong and the administrators were right. I can’t judge that. But viewing the video before I read the article, I was laughing right up to the point where the teacher gets killed. And then I went, “Oh.” It made sense (sort of) after I read the article. But many of the crucial details are fuzzy. I’m not taking a stance on this – just pointing out that it’s not as clear-cut as many seem to think.

I know this isn’t in the tone of many of the “F*** the system!” comments that have been posted so far, and I’m not trying to make anyone feel bad for their righteous indignation. I’m sure I’ll get flamed. It sounds like the administration probably formed their opinion based on too little information. I refuse to do the same.
- Gulliver
  
  I know this isn’t in the tone of many of the “F*** the system!” comments that have been posted so far, and I’m not trying to make anyone feel bad for their righteous indignation. I’m sure I’ll get flamed. It sounds like the administration probably formed their opinion based on too little information. I refuse to do the same.
  
  Well, I won’t flame you. I thought it was a thoughtful well-considered comment.
  
  The only possible way I can see the school having legal authority to do this is if the student surreptitiously recorded the teacher then used that for content in the video. That, however, seems pretty unlikely. To all appearances this looks like a school’s administrators trying to dictate the private life of a student in a way that infringes on the rights of the student and his parents (if he still a minor). To his parents this is basically saying, “Either cede your parental authority to the school or your child looses his education.” They have at least as much reason to be t’d off as Jack.
  
  Oh…and fuck the system! :D
  
  At least the part of it that thinks it’s power is whatever it wants.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  It’s the difference between a comment saying, We should nuke Afghanistan, which I would remove, and a comment saying, I say we take off and nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure, which I would leave. Blowing someone up with eye lasers does not constitute a credible threat.
Anonymous

Maybe the school administration wants to make this kid famous. He’ll probably get a scholarship somewhere, or get picked up by comedy central or something. Who knows.
mraverage

Re: the school principal
There were people like that in the school (and every) bureaucracy when i was his age. They had sucked their way up the primate dominance ladder to positions of power over children. In our turn, some members of my generation found solace and meaning in being pricks. Now children of my peers are filling the ranks of the self important. 20 years from now some of their spawn will be in positions to force not just their narrow world view, but their will on everyone around them.
There will always be scum like that. It fills the ranks of the police, politics, religion, the ethnic-cleansing armies. We all see them in middle management where we work. They are the floating stools in the toilet bowl of life.

In case you don’t get that reference: floaters indicate the presence of fat and/or hot air.
Anonymous

Here’s the publicly listed email address of Martyn Beckett, Director of Education at Durham District School Board:

bcktt_mrtyn@drhm.d.n.c

and the email I just sent him:

Dear Mr Beckett,

On reading the web blog BoingBoing (www.boingboing.net) this morning I hear of your school boards decision to suspend a student for posting videos he created on YouTube.

I speak of Jack Christie, a grade 12 student at Donald A. Wilson Secondary School in Whitby, Ontario.

I am shocked and dismayed at this approach to education, and the lessons this sort of behaviour is giving to the pupils in your charge. I had a much higher opinion of the Canadian education system and Canadians in general. I work, here in Australia, in education where we believe in encouraging student creativity and in asserting their moral and legal rights to engage in open criticism of all aspects of our society, and the commonly held “Australianism” of opposing authoritarian pomposity and self-importance wherever it appears – it is clear your school board does not follow this approach, and has a sadly limited vocabulary in defining its own “moral tone”.

Shame on you.

Regards etc.
Anonymous

This just tells me that my decision that my kids won’t be taught by any of the idiotic, archaic, “brick in the wall” schools is the right one. Internet school and free thinking for my children, thank you.
millrick

dear canada.
please stop being afraid of your children…

the Durham District School Board called the cops on this kid???
why are they so scared of this kid that they feel the police should be involved???

a quick check of the Canadian Criminal Code…
http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/
… reveals a section on “OFFENCES AGAINST PUBLIC ORDER” which has laws against piracy and duelling but not much at all about kids with a questionable sense of humour.

someone please give Jack an entrance scholarship the animation school of his choice.
Anonymous

I read grade-12 as 12 years old… I was really confused for a while.
AnthonyC

And the school thinks the *videos* are inappropriate?

I can understand that sometimes schools need to be concerned about what students do outside of school. If a teacher notices drug problems, or signs of abuse, then the school should get involved. This is not one of those times. I don;t understand how the school officials think they could possibly have the authority to demand that a private citizen remove legally produced and uploaded material from the internet. His student status is irrelevant. The school doesn’t own the content. It wasn’t made with school resources or as part of a school assignment.
AudioTherapist

May I be the first to call Streisand Effect on this.

And shake my head in wonder and pity at the mentality of the unutterable douche bags who are trying hard to stifle such creativity.

#MakesPowerSign#
- putty
  
  May I be the first to call Streisand Effect on this.
  
  QFT. If the school administration hadn’t bothered with the suspension, nobody would know who this guys is and nobody would be clicking on these videos.
  Any potentially detrimental effects to the “moral tone” of the school from those videos were multiplied by their attempts to gag him. Furthermore I would argue that the school administration has revealed their own “moral tone” which boils down to something like this: Obey our unlawful requests or we will call the cops.
  Clearly the decision makers at this school have no understanding of either the nation’s laws or adolescence in general and should have all of their activities scrutinized for other signs of incompetence or abuses of their authority.
daev

“If something is considered detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school, it doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside the school [for us to get involved],”

Ummm… Yes, asshat, it does, actually.
Anonymous

YAY FOR MORAL THOUGHT POLICE!

oh and his rebuttal was to the school board, not to the student council supporting him.
Drabula

I’m so tired of this kind of fascism-lite crap. I could barely tolerate teachers looking over my shoulder while I was AT SCHOOL. Good lord if they had tried to meddle in my home life I would have gone ballistic.
Anonymous

I think that Jack is going to be pretty happy with how the URL got shortened – school-supsends-stud.html

Also, I’d just like to say that as a high school teacher myself, I am TERRIBLY impressed by the administration at his school. Since they are taking the time to address young Mr. Christie’s videos, I can only assume that they have already effectively eliminated the bullying, petty cruelty, and low-level hazing that one sees so often in the high school arena. The positive moral tone of the school must be truly astounding.
Anonymous

OK, its pretty sucky that they didn’t like his video and told him to take them down. Blah blah blah, oppressive school board blah blah. But did I miss the part about why they called the police? was there anything illegal in the video? Is it now considered illegal to piss off officials of your local high school?
Anonymous

Clearly, the board is filled with officious toss flaps with nothing better to day than interfere, harass, officiate. Don’t they have a better mark to over step? Can this Canadian pupil invoke something akin to the Americans’ right to bear speech freely?
Anonymous

Spread the video, tell your friends. Thank you boingboing, thank you Mr Christie, and thank you Flash. I am astounded at the spreading insanity that is the people of my own age as the years bulldoze onward. Separation of church and state, and the emasculation of our civil rights are becoming a global phenomenon, and anathema to an open, and stable society.
Anonymous

yeah well maybe they are right, he shouldn’t go to that school anymore… put him into uber-animation-space-high-school!
Anonymous

“If something is considered detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school, it doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside the school [for us to get involved],” said Andrea Pidwerbecki.

And censorship forced upon students’ personal art is obviously supportive of the positive moral tone of the school.

Schools are obviously oppressive institutions. Thanks for the reminder!
awjtawjt

He’s awesome. There are other schools that won’t step on his creativity. I suggest that he keeps producing new work and also look for a new venue for his talents. His old school is full of scoundrels and the only way to deal with that is to get away from them and find a friendly, supportive environment. Hopefully his parents are on board and haven’t been drinking the school’s poison about their own creative son.
William George

Parents go apeshit at schools all the time. They can’t summon up some banana-flavored anger over this?
dqm

I would just like to add that Jack Christie is an awesome name and the kid could probably coast through life on that alone.
bcsizemo

+1 for the use of Prodigy as your musical choice.

BUT why did you have to kill the puppet????what ever did it do to you…
- rebus
  
  Puppets and their masters are the scourge of the Earth. He did the right thing.
Fidoh

Just too bad his videos aren’t that interesting.
aldous

Every, ahem, artist, needs a little friction in his developing years, ideally from humorless oafs.

Based on his repeated references to his ‘films’ and quivering tone of righteous teenage indignation (with appropriately gleeful jackassery), I think Jack Christie is going to be just fine, folks. After all, he’s getting ‘hundreds more hits’ now.

Getting worked up over this is like getting mad at the principal in “Rock’n'Roll High School”.
Planeswalker

I instantly loved this guy. Jack is a rare example of style and aplomb. He knows where he stands and won’t be silenced, but doesn’t raise his voice or lose his temper. I can respect that in anyone, moreso in a teenager.
- millie fink
  
  What’s wrong with voice-raising?
JustOk

There seems to be a very strong correlation between the increase in examples of school and business administrators and management abusing and misusing their authority and the banning of smoking in public places.
Twist of Lime

With all the extra FUCKING time off Jack now has I would expect him to improve the FUCKING content of his FUCKING boring animations.

Sorry, Jack Christie got inside my FUCKING head.

KABOOM!
T Nielsen Hayden

“If something is considered detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school, it doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside the school [for us to get involved],” said Andrea Pidwerbecki.

Fine. Let the school clearly demonstrate the damage done by having the animations available on YouTube that wasn’t done by showing them in class.

That damage doesn’t exist. The only difference is that while the school administration doesn’t care what happened in class, having the videos up on YouTube means that someone important might see them.

It’s a boneheaded move on the school’s part. They have now guaranteed that hundreds of thousands of people will hear about the videos, and some fraction of that number will watch them.

Claiming that having the videos on YouTube is “Detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school” is a serious piece of BS. They’re not pursuing the good of the school. This is about their personal prejudices and interests.
- Anonymous
  
  Very good points. If the videos have already been shown in school, then they were shown with the permission of the school (through the teacher conducting the class). As such, they’ve been approved by the school for consumption by the students who attend the school. In other words, there is no damage to the “moral tone of the school”.
  
  It’s pretty clear the school is bringing down the hammer because it’s embarrassed by what it previously allowed. Yet rather than punish the teacher and admit its mistake, it would rather blame the innocent student. That said, if the student had been pulled aside after class and told not to post them because in retrospect the school had mistakenly allowed him to show them in class – and he did so anyway – that would have been a violation of the school code.
Improbus

This kid is the definition of awesome. The administrators and officials are the definition of stupid AND wrong. People in authority should get it through their thick skulls that their actions can be potentially seen by the ENTIRE WORLD. This isn’t the 1950s you dummies.
risuther

And this is the public board! Can you imagine the size of brick the Separate (read: Catholic) Board would shit if this kid had gone to the school across the street? Why are the representatives of the public board acting like religious nutjobs from the Catholic Board?
BabsonTask

“If something is considered detrimental to the positive moral tone of the school, it doesn’t necessarily have to happen inside the school [for us to get involved],” said Andrea Pidwerbecki.”

I imagine that this will have all the students quizzing their teachers about possible ex-marital affairs, petty crimes in their youth etc.
ausPPC

Jack Christie has clearly missed the point of institutionalisation. If he doesn’t learn to shut up, think and do as he is told before he is granted the full compliment of legal rights when he turns 18, then he may well become a troublesome adult.
Francesco Fondi

(If this is a true story) this is definitely the post of the Year!
#JackChristie
Daemon

Censorship is detrimental to the moral tone of just about any educational institution. Not to mention that it’s the diametric opposite of education.
Anonymous

Take them down and post them under a pen name. Claim someone else reposted them.
- Anonymous
  
  Well, taking them down and re-posting under a pseudonym would get his videos out, but would not make his point, would it?
roninthewriter

Jack:

Keep up the good work!

Noli nothis permittere te terere!
Doran

Jack Christie says he’s been suspended for the rest of the year. He can take his final exams and was apparently able to attend the prom (with some conditions) last Friday. It looks like the school isn’t backing down, but also isn’t answering any media requests.
- knoxblox
  
  That’s too bad. I’m not really blown away by his form of creativity, but he still has the right to do what he wants outside of school.
  
  By the way, School Board, I advise you prepare yourself for the reprimands that are sure to come for doing whatever you do for enjoyment outside of your jobs. So few of you realize that most of these proverbial streets go both ways.
nixiebunny

Having been suspended from high school myself for a creative work, I can see where Jack is coming from.

I didn’t bother getting involved with the school board, because they have no more sense of youthful righteousness than the person who suspended him in the first place. Instead, I took my lumps and applied my talents to getting ahead in life.

I’m sure he’ll do just fine, as he clearly has a lot of talent, even if it is a bit raw.
Anonymous

Here’s a link a web page you can use to send the school messages in support of Jack Christie:

http://wilson.ddsbschools.ca/contact-3.html
Cocomaan

My hat goes off to this kid for standing his ground and facing the consequences.
jtegnell

Essentially what has happened here is that the school board feels painted into a corner. They feel if they back down, their authority will have been undermined, so they continue to double down.
- Laroquod
  
  That is a good explanation of their motives but you have left out the sheer stupidity that led to them standing in that corner in the first place.
nemryn

Student government was ordered to stop collecting signatures for the petition? Okay, fine. Stop collecting signatures, and start a new petition protesting the school’s attempt to quash petitions…
zyodei

Free speech does not exist in schools.

Schools do not treat people to be free citizens, they treat them to be prisoners. The original idea behind public schools was to give people just enough basic education, along with several years of indoctrination and propaganda during impressionable formative years, that they would be docile factories workers and nothing else.

Thus the absurd assumption that A) We MUST attend school and then B) That when attending this compulsory school, we relinquish our basic human rights.

The best ‘reform’ for public schools involves gasoline and matches.

Or for local citizens militias to take them over, emancipate them from any autority outside the community, and run them how they see fit.
Anonymous

Charles Bukowski and Dan Simmons both say that you need to have your stuff censored by an authority figure at some point in order to be a serious writer. If you’d gotten censored, you’d have taken it as an order of validation.
Anonymous

I love this. Streisand Effect always screws over those trying to censor free speech. I hope he sues the school for violating Canadian law.
Robbo

Jack Christie, you are fucking awesome!

Never apologize, never retract, never back down.

School authorities need to remember they are running (not ruling) institutions of learning – not prisons. Students are citizens. This kind of horseshit always crops up in those schools run by pinheads and self-important tossers. The best defence against this kind of petty tyranny is to be loud and public about your rights – and Christie has done just that.

Well done. Fuck ‘em!
Anonymous

His video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_15SCfH25yY is completely banned from getting broadcasted in Germany due to “Unfortunately, this SME-music-content is not available in Germany because GEMA has not granted the respective music publishing rights.”

Welcome in the modern world of corporate censorship!