COLUMN: Where do we draw the privacy line?
There’s an interesting battle brewing in neighboring Barrow County over a teacher who resigned after school officials confronted her about material on her Facebook page.
Ashley Payne, 24, resigned in August from Apalachee High School after the principal called her in to say that a parent had complained about photographs of Payne where she was holding alcohol and that she used the word “bitch” on her Facebook page.
Payne resigned that same morning, but has since said she was pressured into the resignation and is suing the school system. The system says that much of Payne’s story is false and that she voluntarily resigned and was not forced into the resignation.
This incident has garnered a lot of attention worldwide and has been broadcast on CNN. It raises a lot of interesting questions about personal privacy in the age of Internet exposure.
In the Payne case, she had several hundred photos of a trip to Europe and some of the photos showed her holding glasses of wine or beer. The photos made public so far are rather innocuous; she wasn’t dancing on the table.
So where does her right to post personal photos on the Internet intersect with her job? Where does her privacy end and her job begin?
There are so many issues here that it’s almost impossible to sort them out. Here are a few of the kinds of issues this brings to mind:
• Teacher Jane Doe is sitting in a local restaurant on a Saturday night with friends and is drinking a beer with dinner. A student comes into the restaurant, sees her teacher and whips out a cell phone for a photo. The student then posts that photo of Teacher Doe quaffing a beer on the student’s Facebook page. Should the school system have the right to discipline Teacher Doe, even though the teacher was doing nothing illegal and had not herself posted any material to the Internet?
• Teacher Doe and her boyfriend, John Doright, fly to Las Vegas for the holidays. They take a copy of their local newspaper with them and have someone make their photo holding it up while standing next to the Paris hotel with the lights of Las Vegas in the background. The local newspaper publishes the photo as part of its “take us on vacation with you” series. A parent sees the photo and complains to the school that the teacher should not be gambling and should not be traveling unmarried with her boyfriend. Should the school system have the right to discipline Teacher Doe for having made that trip and the photo published?
• Teacher Doe is a liberal. She likes Obama and thinks his health care plan is a good idea. She writes a letter to the local newspaper supporting the plan and it’s also posted to the newspaper’s website. Superintendent Goodwin is a conservative. He hates the Obama plan. He sees the teacher’s letter and becomes upset. Should the school principal have the right to tell Teacher Doe not to write any more letters on political issues because the superintendent doesn’t like it?
• Teacher Doe was once young and foolish. While in college, she let a boyfriend make photos of her in various states of undress. But that was five years ago and the boyfriend is just a memory — until he creates a Facebook page and posts those old photos of a young Doe. A mutual friend tells Teacher Doe about the photos, but it’s too late, a school board member has already heard about it and complained to the principal. Should the school have the right to discipline Teacher Doe for the photos which she didn’t post and over which she now has no control?
• Teacher Doe is now in her 50s and is a well-respected member of the school and community. But she writes a personal memoir about her life and posts it online. She grew up as a middle-class child who ran away from home in her teens and went to San Francisco in the late 1960s to join the Hippie culture. In the memoir, Teacher Doe tells all — lots of drugs, from weed to LSD; lots of sex with lots of people; shoplifting to get money; and even an abortion. When the Hippie movement died, she went home, cleaned up her life, went to college, got married and moved to Georgia where she has been a teacher for 25 years. Should the school system have the right to admonish her for having revealed unflattering details about her life that might be a bad example for today’s students?
Where is the line between private lives and public image?
Mike Buffington is editor of The Jackson Herald. He can be reached at mike@mainstreetnews.com.
Payne resigned that same morning, but has since said she was pressured into the resignation and is suing the school system. The system says that much of Payne’s story is false and that she voluntarily resigned and was not forced into the resignation.
This incident has garnered a lot of attention worldwide and has been broadcast on CNN. It raises a lot of interesting questions about personal privacy in the age of Internet exposure.
In the Payne case, she had several hundred photos of a trip to Europe and some of the photos showed her holding glasses of wine or beer. The photos made public so far are rather innocuous; she wasn’t dancing on the table.
So where does her right to post personal photos on the Internet intersect with her job? Where does her privacy end and her job begin?
There are so many issues here that it’s almost impossible to sort them out. Here are a few of the kinds of issues this brings to mind:
• Teacher Jane Doe is sitting in a local restaurant on a Saturday night with friends and is drinking a beer with dinner. A student comes into the restaurant, sees her teacher and whips out a cell phone for a photo. The student then posts that photo of Teacher Doe quaffing a beer on the student’s Facebook page. Should the school system have the right to discipline Teacher Doe, even though the teacher was doing nothing illegal and had not herself posted any material to the Internet?
• Teacher Doe and her boyfriend, John Doright, fly to Las Vegas for the holidays. They take a copy of their local newspaper with them and have someone make their photo holding it up while standing next to the Paris hotel with the lights of Las Vegas in the background. The local newspaper publishes the photo as part of its “take us on vacation with you” series. A parent sees the photo and complains to the school that the teacher should not be gambling and should not be traveling unmarried with her boyfriend. Should the school system have the right to discipline Teacher Doe for having made that trip and the photo published?
• Teacher Doe is a liberal. She likes Obama and thinks his health care plan is a good idea. She writes a letter to the local newspaper supporting the plan and it’s also posted to the newspaper’s website. Superintendent Goodwin is a conservative. He hates the Obama plan. He sees the teacher’s letter and becomes upset. Should the school principal have the right to tell Teacher Doe not to write any more letters on political issues because the superintendent doesn’t like it?
• Teacher Doe was once young and foolish. While in college, she let a boyfriend make photos of her in various states of undress. But that was five years ago and the boyfriend is just a memory — until he creates a Facebook page and posts those old photos of a young Doe. A mutual friend tells Teacher Doe about the photos, but it’s too late, a school board member has already heard about it and complained to the principal. Should the school have the right to discipline Teacher Doe for the photos which she didn’t post and over which she now has no control?
• Teacher Doe is now in her 50s and is a well-respected member of the school and community. But she writes a personal memoir about her life and posts it online. She grew up as a middle-class child who ran away from home in her teens and went to San Francisco in the late 1960s to join the Hippie culture. In the memoir, Teacher Doe tells all — lots of drugs, from weed to LSD; lots of sex with lots of people; shoplifting to get money; and even an abortion. When the Hippie movement died, she went home, cleaned up her life, went to college, got married and moved to Georgia where she has been a teacher for 25 years. Should the school system have the right to admonish her for having revealed unflattering details about her life that might be a bad example for today’s students?
Where is the line between private lives and public image?
Mike Buffington is editor of The Jackson Herald. He can be reached at mike@mainstreetnews.com.
I remember in High school the teachers would go into the teachers Lounge and smoke. Lets take you smart people back to school The Webster Dictionary defines a bitch as A FEMALE DOG.
People have to be careful on Social Media sites. Wackos, such as the parent above, will search out stuff like this and use it to bully others. They have nothing better to do with their lives..
WHAT HAPPENED TO MY AMERICA!
MERRY CHRISTMAS YA'LL
It is a sad reality that school boards and administrators are fearful of being sued for just about anything that happens which is remotely connected to the school, but over which they have no control, nor should they! Just because some person's standards/sensibilities may have been broached by a school-connected person does not necessarily mean the students at the school are being mis-guided, mis-led, or mis-whatever.
Granted, there are some examples of teacher behavior which is truly detrimental to the students in whose care they have been entrusted. But that is an area which is well-defined in both law cases and stated school policies. Your editorial addresses an entirely different realm of conduct.
With the increasing trend of litigation, it makes one wonder why anyone would even contemplate becoming a teacher or serving on a school board. Those who do enter this important arena should be allowed to do what is best for the students and not have to waste time, energy, and money on “outside issues”.
Respectfully,
Lindsay Cleveland - Maysville
The teacher was a high school teacher, so I am guessing that the parent has a teenager at home. Now if seeing a photograph such as just described is ground for teacher counseling and pressure to resign, then we can only hope that this teenager is as well protected from seeing something much worse: violence on everyday television.
It is pretty well established that regularly viewing violence on television can do some awful things. Like numbing young viewers to the horror of violence, like accepting violence as a way of solving problems, like imitating the violence seen on television, and like identifying with violent characters. Maybe this parent has seen the telltale behavior?
In similar manner, it seems to me a slippery slope from seeing that photograph to wanting to have a drink while on vacation, wanting to travel in Europe, and, oh goodness, wanting to become a teacher.
I reckon that Ms Payne will have some success in suing the pants off the school system. I hope to see that photograph on the front page.
Unfortunately this moronic parent that complained about the horrific photos of an adult having a beer, gets to voice their opinion just like a parent with an actual IQ score.
As for privacy. There is very little anymore. You can protect yourself by not posting anything questionable. But you cannot stop others from taking your photo and posting it online. You can make your facebook page private and only viewable to friends but a "friend" can get mad than copy your pictures and share them with the world.
True privacy can only be gained by never leaving your house.
Parents need to take back control of their kids if you want to protect them from seeing stuff like this there is such a thing as parental controls on computers where you can set to allow certain websites and they can't go to others. They need to be parents and stop trying to be best friends?
AND since when do we hold a public school teacher to a higher standard than the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?