Whether the school’s reported refusal to allow Mueller to wear a MAGA hat is unconstitutional or not, I’m not sure. After all, schools do have certain rights to determine their dress codes. What I am sure of, however, is that it is stupid — and that it’s especially stupid if it is in fact being banned on the grounds that it might make students feel “unsafe.”

The truth is, we are very lucky to live in a pretty safe country — and it’s also true that a hat, provided that it does not have a bomb attached to it, is not enough to compromise that safety. Honestly, Avants’s comparing a MAGA hat to “shouting fire in a crowded theater” is so completely ridiculous that I cannot even begin to understand where her comparison is coming from. How does she think they are at all the same? Because to me, seeing a hat with some words on it seems pretty damn different from thinking that you are potentially about to be burned alive at the movies. One of them is an example of a situation where you might have a legitimate fear for your safety, and another represents a time when you just happen to be in the same room as a hat you might not like.