Your Diversity is Ruining My Tolerance!

The next time someone tries to tell you how ostentatiously progressive people are much more fabulously tolerant than the rest of us, ask them how they explain this: Students disciplined for praying can sue

Two students who were threatened with suspension at the College of Alameda after one of them prayed with an ailing teacher in a faculty office can sue the community college district for allegedly violating their freedom of speech, a federal judge has ruled.

The students, Kandy Kyriacou and Ojoma Omaga, said college officials at first told them they were being suspended for "disruptive behavior," then held disciplinary hearings and sent them letters warning that they would be punished if they prayed in a teacher's office again.

Disciplinary hearings over this? It's hard to imagine how anybody praying could be "disruptive." Were they speaking in tongues? Handling snakes? Speaking approvingly of Sarah Palin? 

The case dates from the fall of 2007, when Kyriacou and Omaga were studying fashion design and merchandising at the two-year college and took breaks from class to pray with each other and other students on a balcony, according to their suit.

Kyriacou prayed with the teacher, Sharon Bell, at an office Bell shared with other teachers, on two occasions in November and December 2007. The second time, a day when Bell was feeling ill, another teacher entered the office and told Kyriacou, "You can't be doing that in here," and the student stopped praying and left, the suit said.

Run! It's the American Taliban! Right here in Alameda!

The above is, of course, a perfect example of how quickly state agents can become actively involved in the suppression of free speech and free expression. It's also an example of how little respect there is for people's values and their privacy. The teacher is simply described as "sick," but I'll bet she didn't just have the sniffles. She had something that two of her students felt demanded a moment of prayer. That is an act of compassion and communion, not the vanguard of the New American Theocracy. The fact that some busybody felt entitled to barge in and announce that they "couldn't do that here" shows how little she respected their privacy. Sure, they were on public property, but does that give state agents the right to monitor exactly what people are doing in every part of the building? I hope not, but it looks like many would disagree.