Limiting Cyber-Bullying

(c) 2007 Associated Press
(photo by Mel Evans)

By Alex Suskind

According to the Free Expression Network, New Jersey State Attorney General Anne Milgram (shown left) recently sent a letter to all universities and colleges in the state of New Jersey, requesting that each school now include cyber-bullying into the schools code of conduct.

The Free Expression network defined cyber-bullying as “stalking, bullying, and/or sexual exploitation" via the Internet. Milgram referred to websites such as Juicy Campus, which have become forums for harassment by students. The website allows users to anonymously post gossip related messages about people or organizations on their respective campuses.

In her letter, Milgram further requests that the school issue a statement regarding its policy on cyber-bullying and make the necessary resources available for students who have been the victims of cyber-bullying.

According to the Free Expression Network, the request by Milgram is a first for the United States. Currently, only grade schools have been known to punish students due to cyber-bullying.

In response to Milgram's letter, three free speech organizations, the Student Press Law Center, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, and the New Jersey chapter of Society of Professional Journalists, sent a responding letter, warning colleges and universities that limiting speech under the term "bullying" could violate the First Amendment.

• According to Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, speech is not protected when "by [its] very utterance [it] inflict[s] injury or tend[s] to incite an immediate breach of the peace."* According to this definition, would speech on Juicy Campus be protected under the First Amendment?
  

• What arguments can Milgram make, in which the prevention of cyber-bullying would not be a violation of the First Amendment?

*Quoted from Communication and the Law by W. Wat Hopkins