High schools shouldn’t control photos outside of school

Editorial Board, Editorial Board

Dogs, books, basketballs, guns, bats, clubs — all things that could pertain to hobbies of high schoolers throughout the nation. However one has caused debate and even been the grounds for suspension in several schools — guns.

Recently in different towns throughout America high school students have been punished for posting photos online posing with guns before homecoming, as well as prohibited from taking senior portraits with guns. The Mentor editorial board discussed whether or not such regulations were valid or necessary and came to the conclusion that they are not.

Often shooting or hunting is a leisure activity — a passion even — and if other students get to take photos with props relating to their hobbies, why should a marksman or hunter be denied the same right? It’s unfair for a school to prohibit such photos because a weapon is involved. Many things used for sports could be, and have been, used as weapons of assault. The pictures posed with guns are not promoting violence in anyway, but simply making a statement of that particular student’s individual interests and nobody should have the right to restrict them expressing themselves. If a school wishes to ban such items from photos they have to ban all props; if not it just becomes a form of discrimination. Students and their interests outside of school have nothing to do with the administration on any level. They aren’t committing or encouraging any type of crime, so why should they be punished? The school having rules prohibiting the possession of firearms on campus is, by no means, a defining factor in how they may or may not pose for a photo.

After discussing all of these aspects of the situation, the editorial board came to the consensus that high schools don’t have the authority to control the photos students take outside of school and off the campus and trying to have such authority is oppressing and inappropriate.