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First New Dismissal Motion Against RIAA Complaint
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "Several weeks ago it was discovered that a California federal judge, in rejecting an RIAA application for default judgment, had dismissed the RIAA's standard complaint for failure to state a claim, calling it "conclusory" "boilerplate" "speculation" in Interscope v. Rodriguez. In the wake of that decision a New York woman being sued in Brooklyn federal court, Rae J Schwartz, has told the Court that she is making a motion to dismiss the complaint in her case, Elektra v. Schwartz. This is the first post-Interscope challenge to the RIAA's boilerplate, of which we are aware. This is the same case in which the RIAA had sent a letter to the Judge falsely indicating that AOL had 'confirmed that defendant owned an internet access account through which copyrighted sound recordings were downloaded and distributed'. Ms. Schwartz suffers from Multiple Sclerosis, but the RIAA has pressed the case against her."
TGIF everyone! Am I being optimistic, or are the chinks in the armor showing more lately?
u-bend
Ms. Schwartz suffers from Multiple Sclerosis
So what? It doesn't pertain to the case at all. If I suffered from MS and I killed someone chances are I'm going to jail. The validity of the the RIAA claims against her aside, just because you have a disorder doesn't give you a free pass to do whatever you want.
Although it may be true that Interscope v. Rodriguez may be valid in the jurisdiction for which it was issued, there's no obligation upon any other jurisdiction to follow it. This battle against RIAA complaints is far from over, and is likely to result in a visit to the S. Ct. in ~10-15 years as these cases wind their way through the appellate process.
There is a distinct possibility that Elektra v. Schwartz will come up with a different result - and this could actually be a good thing. Remember, it takes conflicting holdings between circuits for the S. Ct. to hear most cases...
"Ms. Schwartz suffers from Multiple Sclerosis, but the RIAA has pressed the case against her."
Does anyone else get tired of all the "Joe Schmoe is 72 years old, has a goiter and an infected big toenail, but the RIAA still presses on!" sensationalism?
It seems as if every defendant in these cases has to be painted as a victim not only of the RIAA, but life itself. How about focusing on the fact that the RIAA has no proof, or legal grounds, and leave it at that!
The write up is good up until the last line. The respondent having MS says nothing about the case nor does having MS prevent her from using a computer or downloading music or provide immunity from civil prosecution.
The fact that she has MS is irrelevant.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Is there no common law or statutory cause of action in barratry (or otherwise, e.g. RICO Act) that could be brought against the RIAA in a class action? While not a defence, and certainly adventurous, barratry et. al. ought to be available as a counterclaim.
I imagine it would be more judicially efficient to resolve all these cases as a class action. It would also give access to justice to those who would otherwise be unable to properly defend (or counterclaim in) their action.
Finally, and less adventurous, do the relevant statutes address classes of defendants? This would seem to be, if the boilerplate accusation is correct, a quintessential case for judicial efficiency by way of a defendants' class.
What does her having MS have to do with the price of fish? The way it's phrased ("...but the RIAA has pressed the case...") seems to be suggesting that people with debilitating conditions should be above the law.
Chernobyl 'not a wildlife haven' - BBC News
The USA is a Socialist state and the state has a duty to protect the old, the young and infirm. The US has Social Security and many other socialist programs and the judiciary is the teeth of the system. The RIAA is casting such a big drag net, that they are bound to snare many cases that deserve sympathy, which then weakens their overall strategy. So it makes sense for lawyers to use these cases to hit back at the RIAA since they have a better chance of winning.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Was just about to post this exact thing. Ditto on everything the parent said.
"You will pay for your lack of vision..." - Emperor Palpatine to Ray Charles
Quite right. But it makes for excellent news copy, particularly if she's innocent and the RIAA have hit the wrong person with their scattergun approach to lawsuits.
Stress accelerate the development of this disease.
But of course insensitive clods like you don't care about quality of life.
ID: the nose did not occur naturally, how would we wear glasses otherwise? (apologies to Voltaire)
Meanwhile, this is a person who never even heard of, let alone participated in, file sharing, let alone used file sharing to infringe plaintiffs' copyrights.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
It's a variant on Missing White Woman Syndrome. The important point is that, in trying to explain to the general public that music downloaders are not evil criminals then using this case to point out that the RIAA also chase MS victims may help sway opinion. It's not logical but it's how it works.
init 11 - for when you need that edge.
Perhaps they intend to show that while the account was registered under her name, it was physically impossible for her to operate the computer at the time of the alleged incident? Just a guess, but your right that MS has nothing to do with that case overall if she did have the ability.
But the RIAA accused her of downloading "You Can Learn to Breakdance" volumes 1-5.
Ms. Schwartz suffers from Multiple Sclerosis, but the RIAA has pressed the case against her."
This appeal to pity has no place on slashdot!
Those who know, do not speak. Those who speak, do not know. ~Lao Tzu
No only Steven Seagal is Above the Law.
So what? It doesn't pertain to the case at all. If I suffered from MS and I killed someone chances are I'm going to jail. The validity of the the RIAA claims against her aside, just because you have a disorder doesn't give you a free pass to do whatever you want. As to the Letter of the law, you are right. And the fact that one of the defendants was dead, or a grandmother, or a single mother of three is also meaningless as far as the law is concerned.
However, considering the tactics and FUD the RIAA is using in the cases they've filed, and that the general public doesn't respond to what is legal, it responds to what the media feeds them, I have no problem with it being pointed out.
Or, to put it another way, it makes no difference what Race a person is, when they are arrested for a crime, yet you will almost always have it pointed out. You can find similar examples involving religion, sex (Female Murder suspects are really big news in my area), or a host of other things that are not directly pertinent to the case itself. Commenting about these things increases the attention the case gets, and, although not directly relevant, it is a true comment.
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
It's a legal case, not a civil case, and they're picking on someone who is less able to defend themselves, and who will be very badly affected by the case, regradless of the outcome.
IT's not a "do the crime, do the time" kind of thing, because there is no crime.
If the RIAA can claim that pirates are helping terrorists in their press releases, why can't their victims play the pity card? Turnabout is fair play.
does this wash come with a happy ending?
Could be worse, could be the RIAA sued someone dead. Or someone who doesn't have a computer or a Internet connection, or is deaf. Or generally someone they figured was too weak from a debilitating illness to fight back.
No, they wouldn't... Would they?
Money for nothing, pix for free
Just don't call her "gimp," 'cuz she gots the ms and that'd be rude. Huh.
Those of you who are suggesting that the focus of the article is the defendant's Multiple Sclerosis haven't read the article very carefully. The mention to MS is in the very last sentence.
The last two sentences of the article have nothing to do with the main point of the story, which is defendant's attack on the insufficiency of the RIAA's boilerplate complaint, which is the first such attack of which I am aware since the Interscope decision was handed down. Those last two sentences are merely background to give you a point of reference to which of the RIAA's 30,000 cases this happens to be. The next to last sentence describes a lie the RIAA told last year in this case to the Judge -- that, too, has nothing to do with the sufficiency of the RIAA's complaint, but none of you have singled that out or suggested that the article emphasizes that.
So it's baloney to say the author is relying on the defendant's MS for anything. I.e., it's intellectually dishonest to suggest that this article emphasizes the defendant's MS.
******************
Now a digression.
Had I chosen to emphasize her disease, as I might have, I don't see that there would have been anything wrong with that. And to those of you who think it's okay to bring nonsensical litigation like this against children, stroke victims, hurricane victims, MS sufferers, disabled people on welfare, and others.... to you I can only say that your value system is not unlike that of my opponents, who likewise see nothing wrong with what they are doing.
As I have previously mentioned, I use the "friends" and "foes" feature in Slashdot for the purpose of managing my reading load. Although I haven't in the past, going forward I am going to mark as a "foe" -- and therefore be spared reading the comments of -- any user ID who says that it is irrelevant that the defendant is disabled, or impoverished, or a child, or one of the other categories of disadvantaged and/or defenseless victims. Anyone who feels that way is not my kind of people.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I propose a sliding scale of crimes you can get away with given a certain disease. For example: Restless leg syndrome - Jaywalking Crohn's Disease - Speeding Lupus - Disorderly conduct MS - Copyright infringement AIDS - Grand theft auto Terminal cancer - Attemped murder I'm sure you all can work it out from here.
It looks licke that this woman could sue the pants off of the RIAA for this. IANAL & YAAL, so please tell us that my guess is right?
-mcgrew
Many people with MS are effectively and legally blind as a result of their disease. The defense may argue that the defendant doesn't personally use the account as a result of her blindness.
Also, the OP probably mentioned her disease because there has been a pattern of the RIAA going after disadvantaged groups. Where the hell have you been, living under a rock or something?
As a legally blind computer user, I find your proposed defense somewhere between amusing and offensive.
Also, while MS can cause legal blindness, in many people it doesn't. I know an MS patient whose vision briefly became impaired then returned to "normal". Equating MS to vision impairment is an error.
On to the more valid part of your post:
I agree that it was mentioned because it fits a pattern in the RIAA's lawsuits. But, I also think it feels out of place the way it's wedged into the article summary. Bottom line: If, on the one hand, the RIAA believes in their case, they shouldn't be expected to cede their perceived rights to anybody with a health problem. If they know (as many suspect they do) that their legal actions are bogus, and if they are trying to intimidate people and extort money wherever they can, then their choice of target in this case makes their behavior marginally worse -- but only marginally compared to the underlying premise that they're knowingly bullying innocent people.
I propose a sliding scale of crimes you can get away with given a certain disease
You've forgotten the most popular one for this group: real or imagined Asperger's or ADHD etc: license to troll and flame on Slashdot, AND right to take Highly Theatrical Umbrage when someone questions whether or not perhaps you're just annoying, instead.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
No only the President is above the law. And the Office of the President is above the law. And the Office of the Vice-President is above the law. And the members of the Executive Branch carrying out orders from any of the above people are above the law.
That said, I really hope the judge dismisses the RIAA complaint. This could be a great precedent.
Yes.
And this is why pretty hot female teachers having sex with 15 year old male students are not punished while handsome male teachers having sex with 15 year old female students go to prison for a decade.
Because the law is blind and impartial.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
your value system is not unlike that of my opponents
Your opponents who know full well who their primary enemies are; slashdot readers, ars technica readers, "et al" (as you lawyers say).
I of course have no proof, but strongly believe that the RIAA has a small army building up mod points by bashing SCO in the SCO stories, bashing MS in the MS stories, praising Apple in the Macintosh stories, etc.
Not just karma whores, but professional karma whores, who are whoring just so they can fuck up slashdot's mod system on an RIAA story.
In short, I call shenanigans (and I applaud you, NYCL!)
-mcgrew (mcgrew.info, not the mcgrew from McGrew Security)
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
"Because the law is blind and impartial."
A 15 year old female student can get pregnant. A 15 year old male student cannot.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Won't somebody think it was Children!
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
For a very long time, the evidence has overwhelmingly pointed to her being "not liable" (that's the legal term for being "innocent" in a civil case). If the RIAA has any sense, they know that she didn't do it. So why were they pursuing her for so long? It isn't as thought they need the money.
Excellent points!! Mod parent UP
Signature applied for, Patent Pending
It matters a great deal to the RIAA how capable its victims are of defending themselves. I think a quick study of the victims they choose to pursue would show a significant bias. The victims they pursue are poorer, sicker, and more clueless than the average citizen, or the average file trader. Bullies only pick on those who they think won't or can't fight back.
That the RIAA chooses such victims shows they aren't interested in a fair fight, and that they don't care what the real merits of their grievances are. They don't seem to have much faith in their own case, or surely they'd take a different approach than the extortion and terrorism they've attempted.
Lot of corporations think they don't need to behave responsibly, don't have to worry about secondary effects of their business, and that they can be as insane as they like because they're just little guys themselves in a big rubber room of laws which will restrain them from really hurting others and themselves too. One business dumping toxic waste in a lake may not be a big deal-- the environment out of sheer size if nothing else can sometimes absorb the abuse. Same goes for lobbying to pass "toxic laws". The world is a big place. But when everyone does it.... Sometimes it's too late when they discover they're bulls in a china shop instead, and the world isn't such a big place after all.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
If this is also true, then it could also be used to help drive up any damages due!
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
As a person with a disability, I agree with you. Here a few more points about a disability being pertinent to a court case:
Lawyers fees, court costs, travel and other expenses to fight back can affect the persons ability to get treatment and/or medication for the condition.
Have to go to court can take time away from getting needed treatment (think dialysis).
Also, the RIAA seems to be targeting people that they believe can't or won't fight back; I find it appalling that they seem to be going after people with disabilities, senior citizens, children and students (for the most part).
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
"A 15 year old female student can get pregnant. A 15 year old male student cannot." You are not really that stupid, are you?
Take, for instance, an incident in the rural little town of Hinckley, UT. Several years ago, a town employee was caught with her hand in the proverbial cookie jar, having spent town funds on (among other things) diet pills and kitchen decorations. She defrauded a small community and broke the public trust. Pretty bad, if you ask me.
The asshat of a judge over the case, Judge Donald Eyre of Millard County, gave her a slap on the wrist. Yet, reading the local weekly police blotter (I used to live near this shit stain of a town), this judge routinely punished the Hispanic and white trash population far harsher for far lesser offenses. I wish I could find the case transcripts for this dude's court somewhere online, as I bet it would be very entertaining (this case in particular, but just in general). This county/town is relatively obscure, and the only page I could find with any reference to the case at all is an ex-employee's brief account here.
So, while it not be right for personal standing or circumstance to affect court judgements, it does happen, so I see no reason why those caught in a corrupt industry's dragnet cannot exploit this and play the sympathy card.
Method of processing duck feet
Don't leave your mind so open that your brain falls out. Don't close it so much that you cut off the blood.
And because a lot of guys think it would have been great to have gotten to have sex with their female teachers and do not even see it as potentially damaging.
But the law doesn't make those distinctions and yet it is unevenly enforced (which was my ironic point). We aspire to be a nation of laws, not men when in reality our laws are frequently selectively enforced. That is a problem with making everything illegal is that then you can suppress people you do not like by enforcing the law against them while ignoring it against people you do like.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
> By saying it is worse to bring a suit like this against an MS sufferer, we feel you are implicitly stating that it is not so bad to bring it against someone who is not an MS sufferer, and that is something we find objectionable.
Well, it is. Now hear me out.
As has been reported many times, stress is a factor in MS. By bringing this lawsuit, they can worsen her condition. In other words, it's like the RIAA is helping kill her. Add to that the fact that the disease is very expensive and that means that MS sufferers have limited means to defend themselves. So now they'll have a hard time affording medicine AND a hard time affording legal representation. Thus, the circumstances make it worse. After all, you KNOW they're not going to make any money off this case, even if they win.
Honestly, I do think it more objectionable to pick on the weak and the sick who have a hard time fighting back. Not because they have or should have more legal rights than anyone else, but because it is so dastardly of the RIAA to do this to begin with. There's absolutely nothing stopping the RIAA from dropping cases. They can be as discriminatory in bringing them as they want to be, so far as I know, without giving up any legal rights.
In other words, the heartless bastards just don't care. And they wonder why people cheer when MediaDefender got owned. At least that was a company that should've been able to defend itself against one lousy torrent with all their dirty secrets in it. I mean, that was their job, and they couldn't do it to save their own skin.
See the difference? It's the difference between only picking on those who cannot fight back and standing up to a bully. People boo one and cheer the other, even though all people are equal under law.
Is that sarcasm you're usin.... ooooh Shiny!
Do boys get pregnant where you come from?
Well, if they keep it up long enough they can kill her in a perfectly legal way. Then all they need to do is back off her estate (which will already have been eaten by legal fees).
I consider what they're engaged in as a legalized form of torturing someone to death for profit.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
FWIW, it also affects neural tremor. This would make most forms of compensation for blindness difficult. It could make using a mouse quite difficult.
Still, I can imagine that listening to music is something that she might still enjoy. And given that she can't earn a living...
So "stealing" music *might* seem attractive to her.
This is not evidence that she committed copyright infringement, or was involved in a conspiracy to infringe copyrights. Such evidence as has been made public says that she didn't and wasn't. I'll grant that it isn't conclusive.
OTOH, given the RIAA's know record for accuracy (i.e., approximately random chance) I don't think that she's at fault. And I believe that the RIAA knew that she wasn't at fault. I further believe that the RIAA is engaged in malicious persecution of a disabled person. Possibly the tactics that they are using are not provably illegal. Possibly, but I wouldn't go so far as to say probably.
FWIW, this does not decrease my respect for the RIAA...it was already near the bottom. What this means to me is that there's no particular benefit in respecting copyright laws WRT the music labels, since you're just as likely to be a victim if you don't as if you do. In a way it's a pity that they don't publish anything I'd want to hear, as it might give me a smidgeon of pleasure to "violate their rights". Unfortunately, not enough to pay for listening to the result.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
The problem is, people, including yourself have used things like this to garner pity and attack the RIAA. I am not saying what they are doing is right, but I think it is a bit absurd that we always refer to her as "the one with MS" or we have "the single mom working two jobs". Please you are no different then any lawyer, sleezy as sin. The difference is people on slashdot don't care 'cause you are "on their side".
"But the law doesn't make those distinctions and yet it is unevenly enforced (which was my ironic point)."
;)
I agree with you, but I think your example is bad. The big problem with teen sex is pregnancy. If the teacher gets pregnant, oh well, she's an adult and she should know better. (At least that's how the law sees it.) If a 15 year old female studen gets pregnant, she's not of age to make that choice or meet that responsibility, and it messes up her life. From the pregnancy perspective, the two aren't the same. There are other ways to look at this, too, and the result still is different consequences.
If the consequences are different, punishment under the law is different. That's why this is a bad example.
As I said, I agree with you, but your example just doesn't work. Personally, I would have brought up Paris Hilton's whopping 4 days in jail. Celebrities are treated differently from common-folk, and not for anatomical reasons.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
and that has exactly WHAT bearing on the facts of the case?
"Just Smile and Nod." --Huck
> You are not really that stupid, are you?
Okay, you're right, teenage boys can get pregnant, too. Thanks for the un-stupid lesson.
Do you think that becoming a father at 15 doesn't mess up your life? Or do fathers have no responsibilities where you live?
Yeah, I've noticed that. Apparently though, it's because female teachers suffer from a momentary lapse of judgement while male teachers are pedophiles. Seriously, males are the newest minority. Maybe not as poorly treated as the other minorities, but definitely second-class in trustworthiness etc.
It doesn't matter that it is a true comment. It's not "not directly relevant," it is completely irrelevant. It doesn't fit into the standard background facts that people generally mention (e.g. many people have preconceived notions about people of particular races or genders, and so it piques people's interest when a white mother of 4 is accused of dismembering a vagrant, yet it doesn't when an MS sufferer commits copyright infringement). It is the kind of comment that might be used to sway the public into thinking, "Oh no! What meanies the RIAA are!" and disregard the issues entirely, and as such, I feel sick supporting people who would use such a tactic. It is the kind of tactic that, when I see it used, I have to ask myself, "Is their case really that weak that they would resort to this?".
Besides, the battle we want to win is not with this particular case, but rather something on a much larger front. If we win public opinion here only because of the MS issue, then we gain no actual ground. In fact, if people start to think, "I support the RIAA except with the exceptions of sick people and grandmothers," it will be much harder to sway them later. It is much like the DMCA which, due to the additions of exemptions, went from "really bad" to "mildly bad but not bad enough to spend effort on to repeal" for many people.
So yes, bring up MS with the most ham-handed sentence construction ever, if you wish, but remember that even if it helps the individual in the public's eye, it hurts the cause.
But the law says "Adult with person under 18 == Jail Time." Period.
The law doesn't carve out special exceptions for females or males; fertile or infertile.
The law doesn't say "Male teacher who have a vasectomy can plow every girl on the cheerleader squad without punishment".
By your logic, the punishment for a male teacher who was infertile should be much less than for a male teacher who was fertile. And likewise those strap-on using lesbian teachers would get a complete "by" since they couldn't possibly impregnate.
And in many cases female teachers are not punished at all. It is only when they go back to the well repeatedly that they get busted.
The underlying principle on BOTH sides is that a 15 year old isn't emotionally or mentally mature enough to make that decision and so it is basically rape. And that mixing a 15 year old with 30 year old is a recipe for a messed up 15 year old (male or female).
Paris is an interesting case I agree. I'm not clear yet whether she ended up with more or less punishment.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
"Do you think that becoming a father at 15 doesn't mess up your life?"
;)
Nope. Never said anything of the sort.
I dare you to go up to your mother and say you think pregnancy is just as much of a life-fuck for the father as it is for the mother.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Which would be a valid complaint if it was parkinson's?
just as well given the crap films he's released over the past few years
"But the law says "Adult with person under 18 == Jail Time." Period."
Ah, okay, fair point. I have a point I want to reply to here, but I concede on this one.
"By your logic, the punishment for a male teacher who was infertile should be much less than for a male teacher who was fertile."
By your logic, a man who doesn't wear a shirt at the beach should be arrested for indecent exposure. What? No...? Okay. Extreme arguments are silly, I think we both agree on that. Men and women are biologically and anatomically different. Okay, you got me on the statuatory punishment, but for the remainder, this point still stands. Chauvinism isn't the only reason in the world why two different punishments would be handed out to two different sexes for the same offense. Nor does that inequity automatically mean 'unfair' or that justice isn't blind. We live complex lives in a complex world and even if 'justice' did run purely on logic and fact, we'd still have a hard time perceiving it as fair.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, I'm guessing the RIAA wants all the "bad" publicity it can get on cases like this.
It's been said before that there's a reason the individual record labels file suit through the RIAA: The RIAA as a group is INTENDED to appear scary and evil. They sue little old ladies, twelve-year-old girls, the terminally ill and handicapped - ANYONE who "screws with them." They even (IIRC) make press releases about how kids who they accuse should drop out of college and get a low-wage job to make their settlement payments.
What does Joe Public hear? The RIAA is a bunch of hardasses who'll jump all over me if I even THINK about downloading Limewire. But not those groovin' guys at Virgin Records or wherever; they're still cool.
In other words... by helping to villify the RIAA, Slashdot may actually be HELPING their PR push.
We know it's the right person because AOL didn't say it was!
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
By your logic, a man who doesn't wear a shirt at the beach should be arrested for indecent exposure.
No, it should go the other way. A man won't get arrested for indecent exposure for being topless on the beach, so women should be afforded that as well. Equal protection under the law and all that.
The judge was a fucktard, should have just given the case a 6 month recess , and your cousin's three kids should be suing the shit out of the dirbag for wrongful death. OJ was found not guilty and they are taken every penny he can lay his hands on; and if Los Vegas gets it's way, he'll have free room and board for the rest of his life.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Child abuse is child abuse.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
In some state the law doesn't distinguish between a man being topless in public and a female being topless in public (Females can because Males can), which leads to an interesting situation, in New York it's equally legal for males and females to be topless in public, yet if a television news crew films a topless female legally on the street in NY, the FCC can fine them if they broadcast it.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Take "on the beach" out of that and you've hit the nail on the head.
They made it legal for women to go topless in Ottawa a while back. Of course most women don't WANT to go topless, so you didn't see some sudden surge of breasts on the street, but there was one group who took advantage of the change: Prostitutes...
What did the city do? They made it illegal for prostitutes to go topless (while working). It's sad that they take one small step in the direction of actual fairness (i.e. equality, not artificial hiring quotas and such) and they can't even implement that evenly across the board (male prostitutes are still good to go as far as I know). It's also kind of ridiculous to make it illegal to advertise your illegal services in a particular way.
I agree with you that men and women are different anatomically and biologically.
As far as a man being arrested for being topless... well yes they were well into the 1920's
(http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~roseying/ids110/3FRAME.HTM).
From that site:
"Modesty was an issue well into the 1920's. Under the 'Bathing Suit Regulations' published in May 17, 1917, men's suits had to be worn with a skirt or have at least a skirt effect. The skirt had to be worn outside of the trunks. The other alternative was to wear a flannel knee pants with a vest and a fly front. During this time, the knitting mills were rapidly churning out many styles of suits, including the "speed suit," an one piece suit with deeply slashed armholes and closed leg trunks."
So... why do women have to swelter in a western "burka" when men get a pass? Because the law is being unequally enforced on both sexes. Indeed, current cases about topless females tend towards saying a topless female is as legal as a male is tho they still unfairly hold that if she is somehow behaving sexually she can be arrested while a topless male behaving sexually could not.
Consider... the "A" cup flat as a pancake female is arrested for being topless while the "B" cup overweight male next to her (lots of guys basically have breasts once they get fat enough) is not arrested. Is she being given equal protection under the law? No. And when judges are presented with cases that stark, they tend to rule she has as much right as a male to go without a shirt on a hot day.
If we choose to write the laws to respect those differences then cool. If we say "a female who exposes her breasts can be arrested" then that would be the law. When we say "A person wears a shirt or not" then we need to treat all 'person's the same.
Anyway... drifted far afield of my original point which is that the law is very arbitrary these days and it becomes hard for me to respect it. I was outraged by the Hilton thing and in the end not sure if she got more or less than other non-celeb's would have.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
"A man won't get arrested for indecent exposure for being topless on the beach, so women should be afforded that as well. Equal protection under the law and all that."
That wouldn't be equal protection.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Exactly. I personally suffer from Restless Other People's Property Syndrome, but they keep accusing me of stealing. How about a little humanity?
It isn't as thought they need the money.
They had problem paying the settlement in one other case...
The moon is not fully subjugated. I demand a second assault wave preceded by a massive nuclear bombardment.
That was around long before Tom Waits ever said it.
I can understand being a grandmother or a single mother of three being irrelevant to a case, but death? Last I checked, you can't sue a dead person, and if my reading of the constitution is right, the family of the decedent is immune to litigation that arose because of said decedent's alleged acts. IANAL.
...And the fact that one of the defendants was dead, or a grandmother, or a single mother of three is also meaningless as far as the law is concerned. I can understand being a grandmother or a single mother of three being irrelevant to a case, but death? Last I checked, you can't sue a dead person, and if my reading of the constitution is right, the family of the decedent is immune to litigation that arose because of said decedent's alleged acts. IANAL. That's ok, the RIAA lawyers ANL (are not lawyers) either.But if you think the RIAA doesn't pursue dead people, you don't know these ghouls.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
So what? It doesn't pertain to the case at all.
Yes, let's not let actual facts get in the way of the RIAA's theoretical case and blatant lies to the judge.
Save that for the punitive damages counter-claim.
I'm well aware of those posts, but it baffles me as to why those cases weren't dropped when an official death certificate was delivered. By the way, I believe it's those two that will show up if you google for 'suing dead people'.
"This is the same case in which the RIAA had sent a letter to the Judge falsely indicating that AOL had 'confirmed that defendant owned an internet access account through which copyrighted sound recordings were downloaded and distributed'."
Hmm...I wonder if anyone's got the guts to go after the RIAA for perjury...