A Michigan high school student was sent home for two days this week for wearing a sweatshirt to school with the image of a hunting shotgun on the front.

Bedford High School junior Anthony Burtscher told WTOL he’d worn the sweatshirt to school once or twice a week for the last two months, but a teacher took offense on Monday and insisted he turn it inside out.

“She said because it promoted violence and I told her there’s nothing on it that flat out is promoting it at all. It’s just the saying, ‘Yee Yee’ with a gun underneath it,” Burtscher said.

The teen said he refused to turn the sweatshirt inside-out because it doesn’t violate the school dress code and was ultimately issued a two-day suspension for “insubordination.” The saying on the hoodie is from a comedian who impersonates rednecks, while the outline of the Remington Model 870 is a symbol of his love for hunting, Burtscher told WTOL.

“It’s like a basic symbol of a redneck. Always having a shotgun or whatever. It’s not telling you to go out and commit a heinous act or anything like that,” he said.

“I feel like I should be able to express myself in things that I like and hunting is one of the things that I like,” Burtscher said. “I would say (the shotgun) is one of the most common, well-known hunting guns out there.”

The school dress code states students cannot wear clothing that promotes violence, but Superintendent Carl Schultz said principals have the final word on what is appropriate. Schultz confirmed it’s not against the school dress code to wear clothing with images of weapons, unless it causes a disruption.

Schultz would not discuss the circumstances of Burtscher’s situation. The teen contends his sweatshirt wasn’t threatening or disruptive.

Burtscher is only the most recent Michigan student to face punishment over an image of a firearm.

Earlier this year, a Lake Superior State University student was jailed for nearly three months over a constitutionally protected social media post featuring an AR-15.

Lucas Gerhard’s ordeal started with a post to a private Snapchat group ahead of his return to LSSU for his junior year. The post included an image of Gerhard’s newly purchased AR-15 with a bayonet attached to the barrel.

“Taking this bad boy up, this outta make the snowflakes melt, aye?” he wrote in the post. “And I mean snowflakes as in snow.”

Guns are permitted on the LSSU campus and are required to be registered and stored in the public safety department. Gerhard complied with those requirements on his first day back to school when he checked the rifle and 240 rounds of ammunition on Aug. 23, WDIV reports.

The day prior, one of Gerhard’s friends showed the Snapchat post to another student with whom Gerhard had previously had “political arguments” with and the woman “took offense,” Gerhard’s father, retired Col. Mark Gerhard, said at the press conference.

Campus police interviewed Gerhard about his weapon and the student was emphatic that he did not intend to harm anyone or himself, but complaining students insisted Gerhard has “extreme political views” and told police they feared for their safety.

“I never thought our society was so fragile that someone’s life could be ruined for telling a joke among friends,” state Rep. John Reilly said at the news conference. “It’s a travesty that the county prosecutor charged him with any crime, for something that is clearly and undeniably protected speech under the First Amendment.”

Gerhard was ultimately charged with making a terrorist threat, a 20-year felony, with a trial set for March 18. The 20-year-old has already serve 83 days in jail after his arrest for the August 2019 post, WWMT reports.

Reilly and Rep. Beau LaFave are now pushing legislation to limit the scope of Michigan’s criminal code to hone in on actual terrorist threats by considering the context of conversations.