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California Enacts Law Requiring IMDb To Remove Actor Ages On Request (hollywoodreporter.com)
California Gov. Jerry Brown on Saturday signed legislation that requires certain entertainment sites, such as IMDb, to remove -- or not post in the first place -- an actor's age or birthday upon request, reports Hollywood Reporter. From the report: The law, which becomes effective Jan. 1, 2017, applies to entertainment database sites that allow paid subscribers to post resumes, headshots or other information for prospective employers. Only a paying subscriber can make a removal or nonpublication request. Although the legislation may be most critical for actors, it applies to all entertainment job categories. "Even though it is against both federal and state law, age discrimination persists in the entertainment industry," Majority Leader Ian Calderon, D-Whittier, said in a statement. "AB 1687 provides the necessary tools to remove age information from online profiles on employment referral websites to help prevent this type of discrimination."Bloomberg columnist, Shira Ovide said, "Congratulations, IMDB. You have now become the subject of California law." Slate writer Will Oremus added, "Sometimes I start to think California is not such a bad place and then they go and do something like this."
Isn't that directory information? I suppose removing it from imdb.com makes it harder to learn an actor's age, but it's still out there people. You're in the public eye. Knowing exactly how old Natalie Portman is because imdb prominently displays it doesn't change anything.
So, we'll have it that Wikipedia can post age data about an actor or some other public figure, but IMDB can't?
Instead of displaying age:
Age: This actor is so ancient they do not wish it displayed.
So the counterpoint is freedom of speech and the truth is an absolute defense against charges of libel.
But.. What is IMDB doing to verify the ages its does post? Maybe I'm just a cynic, but I really don't think they are checking official birth records. And in the business of show business age is a big fucking deal (src: I married a casting director). Whether it should be a big deal is something else, it is a big deal and beliefs about an actor (and especially an actress's) age can mean the difference between regular work and the poor house.
If IMDB is going to post ages of people for whom age is a crucial factor in their career, they better be absolutely damn sure they are getting it right.
It seems unlikely to me that Hollywood has an age discrimination issue. It seems much more likely that Hollywood has a looks discrimination policy, and merely hiding the numeric age of an actor or actress isn't going to resolve this.
If an actor doesn't look the age for a part, they're not going to get the role. Trying to hide their "real" age won't help with that. Nothing short of completely changing Hollywood culture - and, really, American culture - to not be so youth-focused will change that. And that's not an easy task, and certainly not something this law will help with.
This is clearly a "this is something, so we're doing something about the problem!" law. It won't help in any way, but at least it's a bullet point on some lawmaker's resume!
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
No I have not read TFL. Why do you ask?
"Registrant Organization: IMDb.com, Inc.
Registrant Street: Legal Dept, PO Box 81226,
Registrant City: Seattle
Registrant State/Province: WA"
Dear California: How about "go fuck yourself". That a good answer?
Oh, you don't want IMDB operating in your state? Perhaps you could build some sort of Great Firewall. That's worked out so well for China (and North Korea).
That makes perfect sense, in California politico-legal logic. This is, after all, the same state that gave us the glorious legal logic "racial discrimination is mandatory by law because racial discrimination is illegal".
#ThatsSoCalifornia
"Sometimes I start to think California is not such a bad place..."
Well there's your mistake right there.
Better known as 318230.
Whats your age? Your Birthday? Martital Status? Names of any children you might have ....
You sort of live in the public's eye, but not really. I know you are a work in tech, but try to pretend to have some empathy for a moment.
* Purely a rhetorical device, no one wants to stalk you.
Separate IMDB into the promotional site and the informational site; spin the informational site off as a 501(c(3)) non-profit. Make the for profit promotional site a permanent trustee and committed donor to the informational site, while IMDB-Pro operates as a for profit site. Even if denied federal non-profit status, they'd still be separate and exempt from the California law, IMNALO (In My Not A Lawyer Opinion)... They might consult some lawyers to see if that's viable. Alternately do what other corporations do when presented a hostile environment by a state. Move and that the jobs out of state.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
This is just dumb - publicly available, non-PII information banned because you run a particular type of website.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Yeah I don't see hiding the ages preventing the studios from casting actresses as love interest for men their father's ages. And in an industry where they try to cast an actor of the right race, weight, height, etc (and occasionally get criticized for the same)... I'm not sure how standard anti-prejudice laws can work well.
"Click here for a list of actors who are so insecure that we cannot show you their age. Next to it you find a link to their Wikipedia entry."
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
If Hollywood actually gave a shit about age as much as this article claims they do, then plastic surgery wouldn't still be running rampant today.
Hollywood cares about how you look, not how old a piece of paper says you are. They've cast plenty of twenty-somethings as teenagers, and the sheer power of makeup has allowed actors and actresses of all ages to portray dozens of roles that are either much younger or much older than their actual age. I find this particular information filter totally pointless.
I can't figure out that if they had their first appearance in 1965 they're probably at least 60? It ain't about age but having the look the directors want...
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Like wikipedia?
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
Check their IP address, and if it's from California, display "age redacted because you live in California", otherwise display the age.
Because some of them don't want to reveal their birth certificate.
I'm so glad they are spending their time solving such important problems, but apparently they are unfamiliar with the 1st Amendment. Why pass a law that seems very likely to be overturned in court at the first challenge?
It seems unlikely to me that Hollywood has an age discrimination issue.
Oh they certainly do have an age discrimination issue, particularly for female actresses. They also have race discrimination issues, gender discrimination issues, and lots more besides. This isn't even a debate. The evidence is undeniable.
If an actor doesn't look the age for a part, they're not going to get the role.
That might have some credibility if they didn't also hire actresses who do not look the role at all. See Emma Stone in Aloha. See whitewashing. Same thing happens with them hiring actresses who are FAR too young for the role they are playing.
Hollywood aren't the consumers of the actors' work. They are the middlemen. We — the world-wide audience of viewers — discriminate. We want to be entertained by sexually-appealing people, which generally means younger ones. There is no escaping this — trying to legislate it away is just the kind of stupidity, for which California has been known (and mocked) for decades.
(Heinlein's Friday (1982) is a good example of such mocking...)
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
It's not even a issue if the discrimination is done for a bona fide occupational qualification.
It's also not just actors although they are visibly the most obvious example of looking an age. Directors, producers, other production staff, etc would also be covered. Not usually appearing on camera, it's harder to argue that they need to look an age in order to properly perform their job, yet they are the subject of ageism as well.
...California sure spends a lot of effort protecting/catering to multi-millionaires.
-Styopa
Not like ages can't be found elsewhere...
Bad law bring it to the Supreme Court and get it overturned. IMDB probably has mega money from all that advertising they run on their site. They have plenty of money for a lawsuit
This feels like a total 1st amendment violation in every possible way.
I know in the US we have exceptions for first amendment, but this is hardly child porn. I can see how it can be an issue for age discrimination, but it's more a burden on the employer to no utilize this information. Besides, doesn't birthday come back on most standard background checks anyway?
You need to discriminate on appearance when it comes to acting roles, having someone with wrinkles and remnants of grey hair playing a teenage character would just look stupid.
There are plenty of roles for older actors because plenty of movies and tv shows feature older characters. You don't hear young actors complaining they weren't chosen to play a grandfather character.
Movie producers are just choosing actors who are appropriate to the role as envisaged in the story.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
But, is there some angle where we could blame Republicans for it?
Do you have ESP?
Why not just allow their birthdays to be posted, but forbid addition and subtraction?
This law says, you may not publish true information because some one else might do something discriminatory with it.
But, we already have laws forbidding the discriminatory thing that might happen. So, this law abridging freedom of speech and of the press is necessary why, exactly?
Answer: It isn't necessary at all. This is exactly the "won't someone think of the children" thinking that suckers us into whittling our rights away into nothing, one sliver at a time.
"We reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals." --The American President (20.1.2009)
Well, as long as his priorities are in order.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
What's driving laws like this?
Although it's easy to dismiss this law making incident as an act of utter stupidity, I don't think it is reasonable to assume that lawmakers are really that moronic. Are they pondering to actor guilds as electorate? Do actors throw a lot of money at elected officials? Are there really that many actors so their votes worth the indignity? What's going on?
A side note: there are quite a few supporting comments on sites like Deadline, so it seems that many actors are under impression that this law would work... (Is weed really that good in California?)
It (HSR) was never going to work, and even if they built it, would lose money, and require more and more Subsidies. The Train was never going to work, it was a payoff to the Unions for their support of Liberal Democrat election campaigns. It was never going to work, because it was already under funded and over budget even before the first train rolled out of the station.
Reality is a bitch to people wearing rose tinted glasses.
The reality is, HyperLoop is much more attractive .. at least in concept.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
you can't subscribe to imdb2.com. you can't have a membership of any kind. There's no one to pay. So that means it can legally post ages and birthdates. done.
In any case, discrimination in Hollywood is not a "problem"... it's by design. We, as a society, have for whatever reasons decided that Hollywood can feel free to consider race, gender, age, etc in a way that most businesses are not allowed. California is being a little bit schizophrenic here in that they still allow Hollywood to discriminate based on age but they want to mitigate the effects of this by forbidding the sharing of age information.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Californian once more proves it needs to slide off into the ocean and be gone....
I was under the impression that Birth, Death, and marriage information was publically available in California.
http://www.cdph.ca.gov/certlic...
It would seem that this law is in violation of the existing laws, but IANAL, nor am I a rich 'celebrity'. Hollywood folks seem generally above most laws, or at least shielded from them.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
You will croak, you little clown
When you mess with President Brown!
There problem solved.
It's done. They already completed it. What's the problem?
To a lesser extent, men.
This is a wise method of using data.
Now, where this will next become an issue is when 62 yo women actresses with long IMDB film and TV credits, start asking their early roles be removed, as that can also tell you how old they are.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Guess where the wiki people get the ages from. Hint: look at the bottom of the page at references and you see "IMDB".
Remove as well sex of the actor, race, oh, and also any movies the actor is ashamed of.
But I repeat myself
Hollywood is the place where they cast one of the 10 most beautiful people in the world for a role of a homely older person and then spend three hours in makeup every day getting her to look just right. And, they do this while there is a line of talented, average looking, age appropriate women around the block looking for work.
Personally, I don't think they do it because of age discrimination. I think they do it because there's only a handful of actresses that will guarantee ticket sales just by casting them. But, it certainly looks like age discrimination when you look at a case in isolation.
The movie industry isn't anywhere near as bad as the porn industry. They don't seem to hire anyone over or under the age of 18. I mean let's face it most actors in the porn industry remain 18 long after the cellulite starts showing from under their schoolgirl outfit.
Or so a friend told me. Can someone verify this for me? I don't know because I don't watch such stuff. *whistles and looks at the ceiling*.
This is as dumb as the 'right to be forgotten'. Tell that to a sex offender. Oh, wait, the EU wants to use 'right to be forgotten' to sanitize a powerful person's past history of sordid acts. As if this makes sense. Rendering the truth illegal is a very interesting step, no?
But this is California, the land of the irrational. Most any serious casting director can use IMDB etc to work through an actor's history and make reasonable assumptions. Look through Helen Mirren's filmography, and you can reasonably conclude she is older than 60. Duh. And she's still fabulous.
the complaint her isn't the obviously old actors, it's the difficult older-than-they-seem bunch. In an industry based on illusion, it is both remarkable and understandable that they rely on perception, and if an actor is perceived as older than the role, or perceived age is critical to a role, well, they 'need' to address that.
In every way, though, this is a stupid idea. No one who intends to benefit from this will. No one.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Society has an age discrimination issue. Most of us, even women, would rather look at a fresh-faced young girl than at a woman with lines on her face.
Whatever issues society has, it doesn't follow that a movie producer has to indulge them because of some unsupported delusion that people won't pay to see a quality actress in an age appropriate role. Or a black actor. Or an asian one. Frankly I think there is a lot of credibility to the argument that a movie with some integrity would be more likely to attract fans than a movie that plunks whatever starlet-of-the-month into the role regardless of what it does to the movie.
Is it even possible to fix the problem of age bias in Hollywood, and if so, would that actually help address the problem of age discrimination in society?
Given that they are the image makers it would be a darn good place to start. Is it possible to fix? Maybe. Won't be easy though. The key would be proving that age discrimination is actually harmful to the economic outcome for a film. Challenging case to make since they don't let a lot of people who aren't white and young (if women) into movies to test the theory.
To everyone slamming California and "Hollywood" for this, how would you feel if your profile on LinkedIn or any other employment site posted your age without you having any choice about it? And what if those profiles were created without any participation on your part? I see people on Slashdot complaining about ageism in the IT industry all the time, and they don't even have to deal with something like this. IMDB is basically an employment profile site for people in the entertainment industry, and it's the dominant site in this regard, much more so than LinkedIn for other professions.
I'm not sure this would be a big problem for famous actors, but knowing someone's date of birth is an important piece is building a portfolio for identity theft. I think it's quite reasonable for people not to want their birth date published.
Once again California tries to legislate law for the entire nation. Their arrogance is only surpassed by the Feds who try to legislate laws for the rest of the world.
Have you ever cast anyone or gone through the casting process?
I fire up google (technically Startpage) and I type in "How old is so and so." Almost 100% of the time, I'll have answer in about 10 seconds, and almost 100% of the time that answer won't be from imdb.
If you're "famous" then you've surrendered the expectation or even the possibility of being able to conceal basic personal details like your age from the public domain. This is part of the price of fame in our society, and no amount of bad legislation written by pretentious assholes is going to change that.
This laws seems a little contrived - presumably it was prompted by a complaint or two specifically citing IMDb, but what about something like Google, they're not an entertainment DB, but I can type "How old is " and they'll tell me.
How much time and tax payer money is spent on this kind of pointless exercise?
Dear California lawmakers,
We hate you.
Sincerely,
The rest of the nation
should just block traffic from California
actual actor age is irrelevant in hollywood, EXCEPT for under 18 vs 18+ for obvious (content) and not so obvious (child labor laws) reasons.
Age: Overflow Error
CH2O is an essential compound using by the human body to produce other, more complex compounds. Your body maintains a fairly steady 2 ppm CH2O by releasing any excess as you exhale. California bans plywood containing any more than 0.05 PPM - because CH20 is "known to the State of California to cause cancer". Your body needs 50 times that level. Apparently California didn't notice that even eating the plywood would REDUCE the overall concentration of CH2O (formaldehyde) in the body.
I am Governor Jerry Brown
My aura smiles and never frowns
Soon I will be president
Carter power will soon go 'way
I will be Führer one day
I will command all of you
Your kids will meditate in school
Your kids will meditate in school
Fine. Show a 3 yr range. Close enough, but not exact.
I've been lying about my age online for 15 yrs. Only where it is officially required do I share my real b'day.
Instead of displaying age:
Age: This actor is so ancient they do not wish it displayed.
Actually, it sounds like this is how they have it set up. You need pro membership in order to suppress your age. So it's a way for IMDB to make money from people who face age discrimination and want to make their age a little less obvious to fans and potential employers.
Real lawyers write in C++
...in the entertainment industry?
I thought the whole industry was founded on discrimination. Casting is basically legalized bigotry.
I really doubt that this "law" will stand any kind of court challenge. State sponsored censorship of publicly available information is illegal at the Constitutional level. This is not yelling "FIRE" in a crowded theater. California's excuse is laughable. Unless you are casting for a 60's style surfing movie or a remake of Logan's run, your movie is going to need old people in it and will employ old actors. Granted she is not an American actress, but Dame Maggie Smith is still quite employable at 80+. I wonder how many people complaining about not being employed in movies has to do with not having any talent rather then how old they are.
Since this thread is likely to attract the attention of our readers from California, I'll add note here that's a bit of a tangent.
Many of you have moved to Texas or are considering doing so, because in Texas many more jobs are available, and you can get a house five times larger than what you can afford in the desirable parts of California*, etc.
* Based on:
Texas unemployment 4.2% vs California 6.3%
Average home price/sq foot of $661 in San Francisco area vs $121 in DFW
61K average income in California vs $53K in DFW
If you've moved here or are thinking about moving here, welcome to Texas!
What does this have to with dumb laws and ridiculous regulation in California? If you think Texas might be a better place for you to live, consider that there are *reasons* for that. The things we do in Texas *cause* Texas to have much lower cost of living, with lower unemployment and comparable wages. You left California and came here because the California way of doing things didn't work out. You're coming to Texas because the way we do things works better. Therefore, when you arrive please don't lecture us about "you should do it this way, the way did it in California." If you like the California way so much, including the results of the California way, please enjoy those results - by staying in California. Here in Texas we don't want to ban the use of dihydrogen monoxide in construction. If you want to live without dihydrogen monoxide, you can do that in California - there's not much H2O there. If you decide Texas would be better place to live, welcome. Now put down the bong, take off that dress, Fred, and hop in the truck. We have some work to do.
Watch me evade that stupid law by applying the difference between first and last movie appearances in the IMDB listing and adding a reasonable offset which is a guess at the age they started acting... once again, CA legislators prove that no law is too stupid to evade!
Eternity: will that be smoking, or non-smoking? I Corinthians 6:9-10
OK, it's getting to the point where if they obviously know the law they're voting for is unconstitutional, they should each be personally brought up on treason charges.
Yeah, I had the same problem with that bitch, but more on the topic of religion. She just can't take it when people hold an opposing opinion. What a fucking intolerant cunt.
Reminds me of my brother-in-law (big, dumb, jock, conservative, Fox-bot, douchebag, that's buying into all their anti-Hillary propaganda. Makes an ass out of himself every time he opens his fucking mouth and too dumb to realize it.)
You are forgetting writers, directors, PR people who do suffer age discrimination in positions without any personal appearance aspects. I know that the average age of viewers of the site is about 14 but the reflective comments to the effect that age discrimination does not exist or that it is justifiable are pretty weak. For probably cultural reason the British movie and TV industry has far less age discrimination than Hollywood so it is hardly endemic for the industry. In any case if the US population continues to age (which would happen rapidly if immigration were limited) the entertainment business will naturally adapt.
They do plenty of ummmmm "blackstaining" too. Except they refer to that with the nice term "color blind casting".
That is what it is, because a lot of times it doesn't matter.
I know they had a black version of "Annie".
No, they had black actors in a modern version of Annie. Sorta. With all the other changes, it is quite a different story.
Then, there was recently a black Johnny Storm.
I'd complain more about Jessica Alba in 2005 or what they did to Doom in both movies.
Will Smith's character in MIB.
If you're going to complain about MiB, race shouldn't be an issue.
Some black guy was cast as Ford Prefect.
Betelgeusians are actually reddish-purple. It was all makeup.
Pam Greer's character in Jackie Brown.
Grier, but not sure where you're going with that one. Is it racist to make a white drug runner black, or is it racist to make a drug runner played by a black woman because a white one is less believable?
Morgan Freeman as "Red" in Shawshank Redemption,
They considered many other actors, but Morgan Freeman nailed the character, so why not change it?
But if you want to be bothered by something, consider how the film is set in Maine, yet a real point of prisoner abuse would be the convict labor of the post Civil-War South. Give us a movie about that, I dare you.
Denzel Washington as Gray Grantham in Pelican Brief.
Arguably, they removed the romance becuse of that racial issue.
What would they have done if it wasn't interracial? The world may never know.
Sam Jackson as Nick Fury.
That was typecasting. The comic revision in the Ultimate universe decided to base their Nick Fury on known-badass Samuel L. JACKSON and the movies went with it.
Of course, the original backstory for Nick Fury is fraying anyway. Almost as bad as Erik Lensherr. He and Charles Xavier may both need some youth serum to last in the comic time of the Marvel universe.
That huge black guy who played "The Kingpin".
That was size and the movie not giving a damn about the Kingpin's origins or character. Wasn't Michael Clarke Duncan that did it though.
Netflix show is better.
And those are just the ones I can think of based on characters I know from books and comics. I'm sure they blackstain many screenplays too.
Do tell us how, none of your examples really come across in the way you think.
You may as well complain about the new versions of 12 Angry Men or Ghostbusters.
Yeah, poor Meryl Streep sure does have terrible problems getting roles, huh?
And none of what you wrote has anything to do with an actors age as a number on imdb. So the reason they want to hide their real age has nothing to do with how they look.
as having your age posted could lead to age discrimination. I just don't see how the law can really be enforced effectively so what is the point.
I'm really glad you enjoy where you live. Seriously.
> I could just stay in Canada and enjoy my universal healthcare vs paying hundreds a month in Texas
The average Canadian taxpayer pays about $20,000 / year for health care costs. Personally, I'd rather pay "hundreds a month in Texas" via my employer than thousands via the govt in Canada, but if you like what you have, great!
I would only think you were silly if you traveled to the US for the treatment you needed rather than sitting on the waiting list for six months in Canada, and while here complained that we should be doing it the Canadian way. That would be silly because if you actually liked the Canadian way, you'd stay in Canada for treatment. You'd come to to the US (and pay cash) only if there was a clear benefit from the way we do it here. We get a LOT of Californians doing that - fleeing the results on California policies and coming here, where they are quote vocal about trying to enact the exact same policies that sent their job outsourced from California.
Sadly a quick scan across the IMDB discussions on films starring actors whose age deviates from their characters shows that audience reactions can be based very much on age, irrespective of whether the player was right for the role.
Audience reaction is correlated to film success, and Hollywood is very sensitive to film success.
How about Access Hollywood, Extra, Entertainment Tonight, Entertainment Weekly, etc wishing their birthday?
Congratulation on lesser known actors become even more lesser known. Before people cared enough about putting birthday, and now why bother . I would think ageism is less of a "problem" for actor when the story written has a role with certain age in mind already. A director isn't going to cast a young teenager for grandma role. What's prevent them skipping over people who do not list their age? If enough directors do that then everyone would be afraid to request to take off their age, which defeats this law entirely.
Man if I want to give California politician a big FU I would just check user IP is from California and determine to hide age or not. California is becoming like France where they expect their internet law to apply to the entire world.
To justify a restriction on any constitutional right, the law must meet three requirements:
1) Is the state's interest compelling? They must show that the public benefit outweighs the restriction on individual freedom - and this test is taken pretty seriously in First Amendment cases. For example, "hate speech" is not restricted in the United States because, even though the value of the speech is low, the right itself is just that important. In this case, there is not even compelling evidence that there is a public benefit at all. Anti-discrimination laws are generally less applicable in the entertainment industry, because things that would normally be considered discrimination, such as age, race, and gender, are bona fide occupational qualifications in this field. So it could easily be argued that the "compelling" interest is, in fact, not any interest at all, as it was specifically excluded from existing anti-discrimination law.
2) Is the law effective? They must show that the law is (or is likely to be) effective in achieving its stated goal. It's hard to see how prohibiting the publication of information that is already in the public domain could pass this test, especially if the information is readily available on other sites. The only way to make the law effective would be to apply it to every site on the Internet, which would bring us to...
3) is the law narrowly tailored? They must show that there is no other practical way of achieving the same goal, that does not impinge on the right, or if there is, that the restriction is limited as much as possible, and impacts as few people as possible. The existence of existing anti-discrimination laws pretty clearly shows that there is another way, in fact one that is already in place in other industries. And it has been, perhaps not perfectly effective, but effective enough.
So, no, this law is plainly unconstitutional on all three tests and will be tossed out in a second.
The example of a renter in an apartment building is totally irrelevant. While the tenant is renting the apartment, it becomes, to a limited degree, actually theirs. No one's biographical page is theirs in any property sense. It is no different from running an ad in a newspaper. You can put anything you want in the ad... but the newspaper publisher still has the final say. It is their newspaper. The actor can, of course, put up their own website and put anything they want on it.
Let's look at some other examples of restrictions on speech that apply to typical corporations...
* There are no tobacco ads on television (although the other day I was sure surprised to see one for the almost-as-horrible liquid nicotine). The compelling interest is public health and saving people's lives; the product itself is the problem. Although I would argue that banning the product and who cares about the advertising would be a better (and more constitutionally sound) way of approaching it, I doubt the tobacco companies would choose that over the current situation.
* Certain content (language, nudity, violence) is not shown on broadcast television. In this case although the compelling interest is weak, in this case there is a property rights situation: the government (through the FCC) "owns" the broadcast spectrum. The same content is readily available on non-broadcast television. The Internet has always been considered to be more like cable, except probably even more so. If, however, the government decided to impose stricter requirements (such as, for example, the "equal time" laws for political candidates that were kicked around a few decades ago) the constitutional hurdles would also go up.
* Packaged food is required to display nutritional labels (with questions arising over things like GMO ingredients). The public interest (allowing people to make informed choices about their food) is significant, there's no other practical way to convey this information, and while all packaged food is impacted, the overall impact is fairly minor because the labels are fair
I heard one of the original 90210 actresses supporting this by talking about how she had to lie about her age because she was 27 and trying to get a job playing a teenager. That's not someone being a victim of age discrimination, that's sensible casting. Which the show didn't have by the way - it was famous for having the kids played by actors way too old for the roles.
I live in California and the thing that annoys me most about Prop 65 is not that the warnings are everywhere (they probably should be), but that they are COMPLETELY useless. Try buying just about anything at home depot. A little thing pops up that says "important prop 65 information". You click it, it TELLS YOU ABOUT THE DAMN LAW. It doesn't tell you WHAT is in the product that is known to cause cancer or ANY OTHER INFORMATION. Just, "hey, this law exists, there, I warned you.". That's so far beyond fucking stupid.
And there i was thinking that british kids graduate high school at 17 or 18 and americans at 29 or 35 because us schools are so bad they keep getting put back.
She gets roles because she sells tickets. She got that rep when she was young and good looking. She isn't an example of acceptance of older actresses, she's an example of the acceptance of proven ticket sales. The fact that she happens to be a good actress is irrelevant.
"Even though it is against both federal and state law, age discrimination persists in the entertainment industry."
... age discrimination persists everywhere. If you don't believe it, check the computer-related fields.
Ummm
How else are you supposed to know that the headshot in the IMDB article is 20 years old? Is the state of California forcing IMDB into legal liability for false advertising?
The fact that there is a law against age discrimination is hardly a valid reason for not allowing their age to be stated on the website.There are laws in some states against gender discrimination, does that mean a website may not state an actor's age? Or if the website states the actor's race are they violating the 14th Amendment?
So long as Wikipedia exists, removing ages from IMDB will accomplish little. Removing ages and dates of birth from Wikipedia isn't going to happen because it would attack the fundamental nature of a reference work. Upcoming actors who are not yet sufficiently notable to merit a Wikipedia page may benefit.
Every lawyer I've ever talked to (about relevant situations of course) has said, "Avoid going to court as much as possible." It's expensive - case in point, I just paid fees of $6000 for evidence presentation slides that aren't even gong to be used (we settled), on an $85000 result. Had we actually gone to trial that would have doubled. Most important, it's completely unpredictable. The judge and/or jury may be having a bad day, may disagree with your hair, mostly likely will completely misunderstand the case, or just have preconceived notions. Perhaps the biggest problem is that getting out of jury duty is so easy that the remaining pool of potential jurors is described by one lawyer I know as "the only people too lazy or stupid to get out of jury duty." (OTOH I've been on a jury once, it was hard but rewarding. Everyone should do it.) So basically going to actual trial is worse than a crap shoot. The plaintiff may get nothing, or 10 times what they deserve, and the facts don't actually make much difference.
That's an entirely fine position to take, but people who believe that the court system isn't fair aren't likely to want to use it in the first place to obtain what they genuinely believe is a fair verdict. They would be literally gambling that the court *might* side with them based only on their feelings about the matter, rather than what is objectively lawful, and such an approach, even if their claim otherwise may have had merit, is just another example of a frivolous lawsuit that loser pays is supposed to prevent.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
if actors want to insert themselves not only as Public Figures but also Influencers of Public Policy on a large scale, then they need no more protection than any other politician.
Censorship to protect a paranoid elite that insists on telling everyone else what to do? nope.
>> The average Canadian taxpayer pays about $20,000 / year for health care costs.
> Your numbers are off by almost a factor of 4, actually. The per capita costs for healthcare in 2015 was $5292
$6000 on the government spending PERSON (plus $500 out of pocket). You probably have either kids or parents who are paying very little tax, if any. Guess who is paying the $6,000 each that they cost? It ends up roughly $20,000 per payer, per person employed full time. That is, each person currently paying pays an average of $20,000.
> that in USD, I would have an annual take home pay of $132 extra living in Texas
Employers provide health coverage in the US. It's not part of take-home pay in either place. In both places, the bulk of the cost is not seen by the consumer (which screws things up), with some incidentals like non-prescription medicine paid for from take-home.
The systems are actually quite similar, just basically in Canada the government runs the one and only insurance company. The only major difference is that in the US you have more choices you make, there are different plans to choose from. Here's something that would be really different:
My wife and I were referred for MRI scans. Since the cost wasn't paid out-of-pocket, we didn't care too much what it cost, but I did ask, for reasons that are slightly off-topic here. The place the doctors referred us to charged $2,000 apiece. I took 5 seconds to do a Google search for "MRI Dallas" and cAalled the first place listed. They said $1,200, but only $1,000 during off hours, and $650 if I filed the insurance form rather than having them handle it (which means they get paid immediately from my HSA). From $2,000 with the "normal" method that 99% of people do to $1,200 just by making one quick phone call! Another $200 saved if I came in after work, when they less busy. That's fully half the cost saved. What if there were a system that encouraged people to cut the costs in half by making a phone call and scheduling the appointment for 5:30, when they get off work.
Jeeez, folks. Doesn't this fall under the general auspices of a 'Public Citizen' who's lifestyle, job, and overall publicity revolves around their PERSONAL INFORMATION IN THE NEWS ? I guess the next step in the 'democratic' state of California is to make it illegal to report on ANY issue / data / personal information of ANY citizen - public official, high profile personage, or 'IN THE NEWS' individual. I would laugh my a** off if it weren't for real - but, sadly, I just mix another drink and bemoan the state of our legal system. ps - I STILL hope I live long enough to see 'the year they killed all the lawyers'.
redneck geek
The law doesn't mention IMDB at all. The idea where sites where people are posting their reusumes looking for work should not be required to provide birthdates or ages is perfectly valid, just remove the 'entertainment' part and apply it to any industry. In the tech industry, as in entertaintment, age discrimination is real. Older tech works find it extremely hard to get work in some places, so I would think that slashdot of any place would see through the IMDB crap and understand why this makes sense. Oh well.
I wish I had a lawn.
Just saw a new commercial where they obviously replaced the previously "most interesting man in the world" with a younger version (Dos Equis XXX beer commercial).
I'm sure some actors would argue (successfully or not) that the numerical age discrimination could limit roles because it might alter how people perceive them. Where they *might* have passed for a 26 year old in a movie, but if the director saw that they were actually 38 may have dismissed them outright.
> SOME employers. Many do not. Or many only partially pay.
There's a little law here in the US that says employers MUST provide health coverage for full-time employees. If you're not aware of the Affordable Care Act, no need to try to discuss the finer details with you.
What kinda pissed me off about ACA is that I preferred health INSURANCE, not a comprehensive health *plan*. You know, insurance, a system that covers unexpected high costs that I can't readily cover out-of-pocket. ACA basically made health *insurance* illegal, now everyone has to pay for "the system" to handle a $25 flu shot, doubling it's cost.