Anti-bullying "clarification" or license to bash in Tennessee?

If the Family Action Council of Tennessee has its way, at some point in the near future, a young man can enter his Tennessee high school classroom, stare directly at a gay or lesbian student, and declare loudly for all to hear, "Faggots will all go to hell!"

On a daily basis. 

Without any fear of discipline.

Gay and lesbian groups decry the effort by F.A.C.T. to amend the "anti-bullying law," calling it a loophole to allow bullying based on a victim's sexual orientation -- so long as it is couched in religious or political terms -- but the organization claims that such is not their intent.  According to the organization's president, David Fowler, the bill to amend which is currently before the Tennessee legislature, would simply mimic what the courts have already decided vis-a-vis a student's right to free speech. In a CNN interview on Friday, Fowler stated that "bullying is wrong, period," but defended the amendment as necessary to protect speech based on a student's religious or political beliefs, citing Tinker, a U.S. Supreme Court case, and "Zelnick" (after a long search, discovered to actually be Zamecnik v. Indian Prairie Sch. Dist. from the 7th Circuit) as justification.

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