Who disagrees with this woman's right to wear that shirt on that flight?

http://www.local6.com/irresistible/5066135/detail.html

but freedom of speech is only protected against laws prohibiting it - e.g., the gov't can't stop it.  One can be fired for saying the wrong thing.  Sports figures are fined for saying something the league or team prohibits.  A restaurant can throw someone out for their language.  

I am not a lawyer, but it seems to me she has the right to wear it (e.g., she can't get arrested for it) and an airline probably has the right to refuse her passage because of it.  

A tee-shirt that uses the word "fuck" will get you tossed out of several places, regardless of its object of scorn.  ("You have the right to waer it.  Just not in here.")

It seems like the decision was made more because of the use of the word "Fu*kers" than the fact that it was and anti-bush statement.  I think if the original word had been left unchanged the message would have been understood by adults but children wouldn't have been presented with the 'F' word.  I know I would not want to have the situation if I had my grand children with me.

I think it was probably more to do with the word than with the sentiment.

She wasn't refused the serice when she got on and the airline rep saw it. It was halfway  through the flight after some whiney assed passenger complained the airline decided she must remove it or remove herself from the flight.

I agree, if the airline had refused her service at the beginning, then no sweat... but to apparently have changed the policy midway through the flight is simply wrong.

the airlinewill have to pay up on this one.

there's no freedom of speech in a private establishment, only in public areas.  

OTOH, an airline is a common carrier, so highly regulated that it's as much a public highway as a private business.  Question if a "Fuck terrorism" shirt wearer would have been tossed off?  Are we talking about their right to prevent riots, or what?

Hard call.   I recall the case from the Vietnam era where a punk was stopped in a court passageway for wearing a shirt that said "Fuck the Army".  Supremes ruled rightly that this was the essence of political sentiment.

OTOH, what if he had been *IN* the courtroom?  Does the need to preserve order trump bad taste here?

Was the plane airborne or still on the ground?

"In regard to the recent news coverage about Southwest’s decision to deplane a female passenger in Reno for refusing to cover up a t-shirt that contained inappropriate and vulgar language (she was repeatedly asked to put on the sweater she was carrying), Southwest would like to offer the following statement:

Southwest Airlines supports the right of freedom of speech in the United States. Southwest also supports the rights of our Customers when traveling on Southwest and our Employees to not have to be confronted with offensive, even inciting profanity displayed by another Customer onboard a Southwest flight.

Southwest's Customer Contract of Carriage states that: "Persons whose conduct is or has been known to be disorderly, abusive, offensive, threatening, intimidating, or violent, or whose clothing is lewd, obscene, or patently offensive" may be denied boarding.

This situation does not concern politics or political views. Rather, the Customer wore a t-shirt displaying language that is so offensive that for example, by federal regulation it cannot be aired by public broadcast or printed in a newspaper."

Without a few more details from actual witnesses all we have is the fact she was removed from the plane and she was wearing a shirt that people found offensive-and SouthWest's contract terms that say you can be denied service.

You raise a good point about why she was allowed on, but note that SWA mentions she had a sweater. Perhaps she was wearing the sweater at boarding, which would explain why nobody caught her shirt.

I find it more interesting that people are going to try and push this as an issue. Notice taht SWA mentions they repeatedly asked her to cover the shirt, thus NOT denying her right to wear the shirt.

The strident "free speech" people merely reinforce that sad decline our society has experienced, where courtesy and respect for others is irrelevant and secondary to the "it's all about me" attitude now prevailing.

You see the same stupidity here on the discussion boards when people get all pissed off that they cannot post anything they want, and cry about being moderated.

Sadly, I suspect that when the ACLU scumbags (attorney's) get involved, SWA will cave in and settle the matter.

and therefore she does not have unlimited rights on it.

She has the right to free speech, but on her own time and not on someone else's property.

we're not in the 17th century anymore, when law was last that simple.

yeah, it's too much too expect leftwing fanatics to exhibit any modicum of decency....

How many people would've been offended if she just stood up and took it off?  In other words, was she cute?  If some ugly woman had a shirt on saying fuck anything, I'd be offended.  I don't want ugly women fucking, period.  It just leads to creating more of them.

wmblake is precisely correct on this.  If memory serves, the Supremes held in Miller v. California that an individual had the right to wear a "F*** the Draft" logo in a state courthouse, but that was public property.  Southwest likely has the authority to do what it did.  And I, too, suspect that this had more to do with the expletive than the political aspect, i.e., if the shirt had had pictures of Michael Moore and Babs Streisand (which would have been funnier), or John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, it would have elicited the same response.  And should have.

It is PRIVATE PROPERTY used for transport. You can not compare this to a city subway system, which is run by the government. This is a private enterprise.

how heavily regulated they are?

I know, it's a rheotrical question.

The argument of "private property"  does not carry carte blanche to use it however you see fit.  You have a weapon - you will go to prison if you misuse it.  You own a piece of land - if you run a public nuisance on it, you may also go to prison, and/or wind up bankrupt.  

Do I have to go on?