Welcome to the Texas Tech School of Law, where we’re training the next generation of legal minds to be as delicate as a West Texas tumbleweed in a hailstorm. Meet Ellen “Ellie” Fisher, a third-year student who is currently suing the university because she dared to have an unauthorized emotion in public. Apparently, being “loud, happy, and celebratory” following the news of conservative pundit Charlie Kirk’s demise is a violation of the school’s Honor Code. Who knew “joy” was a billable offense?
The Honor Council (which I assume is just a group of people who peaked in student government) decided that Fisher’s reaction made some folks “uncomfortable.” Never mind that this happened in a Race and Racism class, a place famously known for being cozy and stress-free. While other students and faculty were yapping about the news all day, Fisher was the only one singled out for a monthslong investigation. I guess at Tech, the law is blind, but it definitely has very sensitive ears.
The best part of this academic circus? While the school was busy hand-wringing over Fisher’s “unprofessional” tone, someone decided to scrawl a racial slur on her car while it was parked on campus. When she reported it, Tech officials allegedly told her it was “irrelevant” to her disciplinary case. It’s good to know the administration has its priorities straight: mean words on a car are “background noise,” but being too cheerful in a hallway is a threat to the very fabric of jurisprudence.
Now, Fisher is looking at a permanent mark on her record that she has to explain to the Texas Board of Bar Examiners. Because nothing screams “unfit for the bar” like being accused of having a personality that isn’t strictly stoic. Her lawyer is calling the whole thing “infantilizing,” which is a polite way of saying the law school is treating its students like toddlers who forgot to use their “inside voices” during nap time.
Since when did “making people uncomfortable” become a disqualifier for becoming a lawyer in a state where the Attorney General spends half his time trying to sue the literal concept of gravity?
If being “loud and unprofessional” is now grounds for a character investigation, how has the entire city council not been disbarred from existing?
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