The Wisconsin School District will not punish students.

Do you remember this shocking photo showing a group of Wisconsin teenagers doing what looked pretty clearly like a Nazi salute? The school district has now stated that Baraboo High School students from 2019 will not suffer any repercussions for their actions that took place before the junior prom. In a letter to parents, Baraboo District School Director Lori Mueller said officials could not "punish students for their actions" because of their first-amendment rights. "As stated before, we can not know the intentions of the people involved in the heart," wrote Ms. Mueller in the letter, which was obtained by The Baraboo News Republic.

The photo was taken in May by a parent who was not hired by the school district to take pictures. The parent, Peter Gust, had the image on his website, but he removed it after it became viral when it was put online by an anonymous Twitter account. Those in the photo include current and past high school students. Despite a 10-day investigation, there are still many things that school authorities do not know. "Despite our efforts, we still have not defined some essential details," the director general wrote on Wednesday.

Gust, who took the picture, and several students insisted that the gesture had never been designed to be a Nazi hello. But at least some students seem to have immediately recognized what was happening. "After a fraction of a second having raised my hand, I thought," Oh, so that's what's going on, "said Jason Ramos, a junior high school student at Baraboo. Ramos, who is now a senior, said he was shocked by the moment "out of nowhere". And the photo has attracted so much attention that even the memorial of Auschwitz official Twitter account commented, noting "it's so hard to find words."

Many were shocked by the news that the students will not suffer any consequences for their actions. The journalist Jules Suzdaltsev, one of those responsible for the dissemination of the photo and spoke of the image to several students of Baraboo, pointed out that the school district seems to have an interesting idea of ​​what is protected or not by the First Amendment. . In a tweet, Suzdaltsev pointed out that the Wisconsin State Assembly had voted last year to automatically suspend students who were protesting hate speech. "So, apparently, in Wisconsin, if you do the Nazi salute at a school event, nothing will happen to you," Suzdaltsev wrote"But if you protest against the Nazis during a school event, you will be automatically deported."