When Winona, Minneapolis, teens Carrie Rethlefsen and Emily Nixon went to see the hit show The Vagina Monologues, they got the crazy notion that it might not be such a bad thing to bring the issues of female sexuality and sexual assault to the fore. Both took to wearing Monologues-inspired pins that read "I (heart) my vagina." Vagina, they believed, isn't a dirty word. Unfortunately their school administrators saw things differently and ordered the ladies to remove their pins or face suspension.

"I believe in free speech," insists Nancy Wondrasch, principal of Winona Senior High School, adding that the pins "could be construed as offensive or harassment."

Rethlefsen told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that she's yet to be offered an explanation as to how the pins are offensive, and has continued to wear hers.

According to one student, administrators "saw the word vagina and got freaked out." He says students who wore shirts commemorating Hitler's birthday weren't reprimanded. Other students say they've seen explicitly sexual T-shirts worn without repercussion.

» Scott Saxon