Do you think you'd get a years suspension as a 14 year old if you'd said "fuck this team" to a friend after losing a match? And do you really think that would have been an appropriate response?
You can't compare her venting to threats of throwing games or intentionally under-performing.
"You can't compare her venting to threats of throwing games or intentionally under-performing."
You seem to be missing the fact that these are one in the same for her scenario. Dragging down school spirit and pride through her comments is exactly the opposite of the cheer squad's function. Note that she was not kicked off the softball team.
I think you're right that it's unreasonable to expect a 14 year old to always represent an organization well, but, that's kind of the point of both being in the organization and punishing poor behavior. The child, who isn't ready to act like we expect an adult to, gets lessons in how we expect adults to act. The cheer leading program is a great way to teach that, provided you don't go too extreme with it, like banning the girl for a year.
Imagine going through school learning that you're allowed to say whatever outside of school and can't be punished for it. Then you get a job and talk shit about it on social media the same way you've been taught is perfectly acceptable, and... You get fired. Conversely, imagine being a student in a student org and getting scolded and minor and increasing punishments for acting inappropriately and you come to understand what's expected of you. I think the latter student is better equipped for the real world.
A 24 hour self deleting vent to a personal circle of friends should be treated similarly.
As someone else in this HN thread eloquently said:
> It's not just that it was expressed off campus. It was expressed privately. Her speech on its own never reached the school. It was deliberately recorded and rebroadcast. The disruptive speech was the replaying of what she said, not her saying it. There is a huge difference.