Care to elaborate, Rick?
Between Bricker and Truth Seeker I guess I can see how bars can make certain restrictions. One was the ‘no colors’ rule that many have. The other was ‘no unescorted women’.
I think Ohio has been wrestling with a boob law (sounds like fun) for a while now. Problems started a few years ago when a couple of ladies were arrested for going topless in a gay pride parade. Eventually charges were dropped and certain laws were deemed unconstitutional. Some interesting things have come out of that change. One of the first was a new propensity for attractive women to bare their chests at Broad and High (the middle of downtown Columbus). Usually, they are doling out passes and advertising for strip clubs, although there was a PETA like one this last summer. The second, and most appreciated from my vantage, was that dancers in bars that sold booze could now go topless. Prior to this, only dry bars could show breasts, and they were also total nude bars. Now many of the ‘go go’ or strip club bars that have a liquor license can have their dancers perform topless.
The cite I quoted from the King County website said owners of places of public accommodation could place “reasonable” restrictions on public behavior within those spaces. Quite frankly I don’t really care what the legal formulations and technical tests a court would do are. This is NOT a courtroom, I am discoursing with laymen, I am a layman myself. I have no responsibility to use the proper legal terminology. Discussions of the legal terminology, classic formulations, court tests, and other other legal jargon is nothing but a nitpick. Pretty much all of the friction between us has been because you have conflated my use of “public space” with “public property”. In the context of my comments I think it is fairly clear that the closest legal term to the concept I was describing is “place of public accommodation”. The state does have laws surrounding the establishment of places of public accommodation and if you want to own such a place, you have to follow those rules.
As the case of the breastfeeding mother who successfully sued a private pool who ejected her and revoked her membership for breastfeeding demonstrated, the courts(agents of the state) can step in and declare restrictions on behavior in places of public accommodation null and void, as well as punish the owner. This case happened in the '70’s IIRC, before public breastfeeding was a protected right. The establishment tried to impose a restriction on behavior which was not expressly protected or outlawed(as they can usually do) but the courts found in favor of the breastfeeding mother and overturned the establishment’s restriction.
Re-read the first post where I used this “public place” formulation back on the first page. I’ll re-post it for you.
Any mention there of transfer of ownership of the property to the state? Any mention of public property? The laws of the state of Utah referred to in this quote are the laws governing behavior, and the restrictions private entities can place on it, in places of public accommodation. I didn’t use the legal terms and I apologize if that has caused you some confusion. The statement is still correct in intent and it is a reasonable reading to interpret “public place” as a layman’s representation of the legal concept of “place of public accommodation”.
Enjoy,
Steven
[QUOTE]
Well let’s go through it shall we
Your response was
(bolding mine)
This is the exact same argument that southern white owners of lunch counters, and restaurants (and other businesses) used in the late 1950’s and early 60’s to keep their business segregated. Needless to say they got spanked by the courts BIG TIME.
So in saying that you hope that asking an African American to leave your business is legal you are trying to argue what was declared illegal over 40 years ago. Check your watch, it seems to be about 40 years slow.
If you still have doubts do a Google on Denny’s and discrimination. IIRC correctly they paid millions to settle a discrimination suit over not serving African Americans a couple of years back.
****** Do not confuse Bricker/Rick with me Rick/Rick It is really easy to tell us apart, he is the smart one. 
Hey, that was Monday. And I ate at a Burger King on Monday. So they’re apologizing to me!
I can’t really think of anything that was wrong. Well, the fries were cold. That kind of sucked. Hot french fries are my favorite part of the fast food menu, so that did kind of bring me down.
But they apologized to me. They actually took the time to acknowledge their mistake - wait, they didn’t really do that. But they apologized to me personally (and to everyone else that ate at BK on Monday), and that’s pretty special.
It’s really the sincerity of the apology that takes a relatively minor mistake at one restaurant and turns it around into a public relations triumph for all of Burger King. Good job.
In the interest of fighting ignorance, there is at least one state, New York, where legislation amending their civil rights act granted mothers an absolute right to breastfeed in public:
I’m sorry, but you misunderstand, Rick, or more likely I wasn’t clear. All I was saying was that I do not think it should be illegal to ask, with limits (i.e threats). I do not advocate that they can actually enforce any such request. SImply, I do not think the simple act of a verbal request should de facto be restricted if the request can be reasonably denied.
This is the most difficuolt pitting I’ve ever seen. So much to mock, but so little to be angry about. You have a rude cow who latches an infant to her naked udder.
You have an uptight asshole who cannot stand the sight of a tit.
You have a pimply teen just trying to do his job with screaming all around him.
You have a bk pr flunky just trying to make everyone happy.
Well, the cow should have fed her kid in a non-public area.
The idiot who complained, unless he was getting squirted with fluids, is even worse than the cow. It’s burger king, after all.
The pimply teen did his best. I’d give him a raise.
bk corporate just apologized to everyone.
I think the minimum wage teen is the only one we should be sorry for. The poor guy was only trying to make peace between two rude assholes.
Texas has similar laws. Other states may as well, but I am most familiar with Texas laws. The statement Shayna quoted was part of a defense against another nitpick. There are three basic levels of legality in the US justice system. Things which are explicitly outlawed, things which are explicitly protected, and everything else. The complaint Truth Seeker lodged when he said
was a legal nitpick because autz had said
Now I believe autz was quoting someone else’s assertion that breastfeeding was a “right” even places where it was not specifically protected. The problem came in because “right” is a specific legal term reserved for activities which have been explicitly protected, and thus the red flags on the radar of the legalistically-minded. For the layman though it is perfectly fine to take the statement at face value when speaking of breastfeeding. There have been enough cases as precedent and there is an overwhelming majority of states which grant breastfeeding the status of a protected right that the “general rule of thumb” is perfectly reasonable.
Truth Seeker made a change to the statement when he objected to it by abstracting it away from the specific issue of breastfeeding. He is quite correct that items neither explicitly protected(rights) nor items specifically prohibited(illegal activities) should not be considered “rights”. Something being neither a “right” nor a “illegal activity” means they have never been addressed by the legislatures or courts and we do not know which side the courts/legislature would come down on if the question of a citizen engaging in that behavior was addressed. The statement autz quoted is still on solid ground though because it limited itself to the issue of breastfeeding and even in states where the question of public breastfeeding has not been addressed by the courts or the legislature, there are very good chances that it would be considered a right if the case arose.
Gangster Octopus: Businesses do not have the same rights to free speech that individuals do. If a designated spokesman for the business, such as a manager, makes a request it is assumed to have the authority of the business behind it. Even if the business has no ability to enforce the directive, they have explicitly, by establishing the business, agreed not to make these requests. To do so is a violation of their agreement with the state by which they operate a business.
zuma: Fuck you very much.
Enjoy,
Steven
So is your whole house decorated in black and white?
Ava
Zuma, What, exactly, is your problem with this… You and a few others state that it is wrong (Although state laws say otherwise). What I want to know (And keep asking for) is WHY YOU THINK IT IS WRONG?
I’m trying to understand the POV of those who think it shouldn’t be, but no one give a reason.
I am stunned.
What steps, beyond passing laws mandating the right of mothers to breastfeed in public, can society take to convince zuma and his ilk that their stance is misplaced?
Let me lay out the general structure of U.S. civil rights law and then I’ll respond to your points.
Civil rights law creates what are commonly called “protected classes” of people, e.g. Blacks and Hispanics. To some extent, these aren’t really protected classes so much as “illegal classifications.” For example, the law doesn’t outlaw discrimination against blacks, it outlaws discrimination based on race.
People within these “protected classes” cannot be treated any differently than anyone else simply because of their membership in a protected class. For example, a restaurant cannot ask blacks to pay for their meals in advance.
This does not mean, however, that you cannot ask everyone to pay in advance. Nor does it mean that you can’t ask some people to pay in advance but not others, so long as you do not do so based on an “illegal classification.” For example, you could ask anyone who does not have a major credit card to pay in advance. You could also ask left-handed people or Republicans to pay in advance, if you wanted to.
Now very few business would do this precisely because it is unreasonable and would interfere with their ability to make money. Nonetheless, so long as they apply these rules equally with respect to people in protected classes, it’s perfectly legal. For example, refusing to serve all left-handed Republicans is legal. Refusing to serve only Black, left-handed Republicans is not.
By the same token, nothing prevents you from controlling the conduct of those who enter your business so long as you do not do so based on their membership in a protected class. For example, you could refuse to serve anyone wearing a Pro-Bush t-shirt. You could not refuse to serve only Blacks wearing Pro-Bush t-shirts.
You can also, of course, control conduct even if it relates to membership in a protected class so long as you do so without reference to membership in a protected class. For example, while you cannot discriminate based on religion, Burger King can certainly prevent a practioner of Santeria from sacrificing a chicken in a Burger King restaurant, so long as they prohibit, say, Catholics from holding a mass there. In states that treat sexual orientation as a protected class, you can ask two gays snogging each other to leave so long as you also prohibit straight couples from engaging in the same conduct.
The point here is that there is no “general reasonableness” standard in U.S. civil rights law. A business is free to require or prohibit any conduct it likes on its premises, so long as it does not discriminate against protected classes in doing so.
Bottom line: If your local diner owner goes 'round the bend and refuses to serve you (or anyone) unless you stand on your head and sing “Born to be Wild,” you’ve got no case.
**
Well, you really ought to, if you want to actually understand how things work. All the county ordinance you cited does is increase the number of protected classes in that county. It makes no mention of a general “reasonableness standard.” I actually bothered to look at the ordinance itself and here is how it describes discrimination,
http://www.metrokc.gov/mkcc/Code/15-Title%2012.pdf
**
No, it’s not a nitpick. In this case, its essential to actually understanding what you are talking about. I always find it amusing when people wear their lack of specialized knowledge as a badge of honor. “I’m a layman! I’ve got no use for all that fancy talk, just give me good old-fashioned common sense!” This might pass when you’re tossing a few back with the boys at the local pub, but it doesn’t cut much ice when you’re having a serious discussion.
**
No. The main problem, as I understand it, is that you keep insisting there is some sort of generalized “reasonableness” standard in U.S. discrimination law.
** Under U.S. law, a taking doesn’t necesarily involve a transfer of ownership, it can also occur when government action interferes with the use of private property.
The problem here isn’t “legal nitpicking,” it’s that you don’t understand the reach and scope of civil rights law in the U.S… I’m sure many other people share your confusion. Hopefully, I’ve made it a bit clearer. I invite Bricker to step in and clarify anything he feels needs clarifying.
Unless I take offense at being asked to sing “Born to be Wild” while standing on my head. If I file an action against the owner for making this a stipulation of service and a court decides that no one should ever be asked such a thing, using whatever reasoning they care to use, then the owner’s restriction on what behavior he can require in his resturant is null and void. All of this is exactly in line with what I said about the state holding all the cards. I didn’t bring up “reasonable” until the cite from King County. I guess we’ve done it again because “reasonable” is one of those legal keywords like “right” which has a specific meaning. Now you seem to think I am asserting something about the way the legal process would proceed. I’m not. All I’m saying is the courts, or the legislature, can trump an owner’s restriction on activities. They can do this before the fact(as they did in the Utah case) or after the fact(as they did with the case of the mother who was ejected from a public pool for breastfeeding).
Truth Seeker, stop it. You’ve gotten so far off track from what I ever said that you’re just making the situation less comprehensible. When you butt into a discussion between lay people and start picking their statements apart trying to make them fit into the legal system you’re not clarifying anything. All you’re doing is driving people to believe the legal system is so alien as to be incomprehensible and the practitioners thereof so petty as to be not worth having a “serious discussion” with. Being constantly told that you must be an expert on the topic to have anything to contribute is very annoying. If every layman is to be expected to care about the legal tests which would be used in a court of law, or “classical formulations”, or to research the underlying statute referenced in a county’s legal summary page before taking it at their word, then this state of affairs is nothing more than an arguement for reform of the legal system.
Enjoy,
Steven
Sorry for the bold caps to follow, but…
FOR THE LOVE OF PETE, WILL SOMEONE WHO THINKS A WOMAN SHOULD NOT BREASTFEED IN PUBLIC, PLEASE ELABORATE AS TO WHY YOU FEEL IT SHOULD BE THAT WAY, OTHER THAN IT’S DISGUSTING. I WANT TO KNOW WHY YOU THINK IT’S DISGUSTING!!!..
Thank you.
CAUSE SOMEONE IS GETTING TO SUCK ON A TIT AND IT AIN’T ME!
Enjoy,
Steven
Truth Seeker, I’ve been trying to follow and have to say that I understand less after your explanation than before it.
Now, I’m going on a 2 week vacation, so don’t address any questions to me personally. I’ll just avoid Burger King on my journey.
Mtgman, I think you’ve hit the nail on the head.
I am by no means a prude, but it seems that overall our culture has thrown manners by the wayside. There are many things that are by no means illegal, but are definitely what one might call ‘indelicate behaviors’ that manners would dictate be kept to the privacy of ones home, or at least done with a bit more discretion.
Frankly, I personally think it’s rude. Now I would never go so far as to suggest that there be any sort of ban on breastfeeding in public, but I hardly think it needs to be protected by law. I also do not disagree that it is both a natural and necessary function, but like other natural and necessary functions it is one that can cause embarassment or offense to others. I no more want to see a woman’s exposed breast in public than I want to see someone picking their nose or scratching themselves. Each of these actions, if done with discretion can be accomplished in public if absolutely necessary, but it’s my opinion that one should have the tact and manners to keep them private.
Honestly, I find the idea that some people feel the need to secure their right to subject others to what should by all rights be a personal and private activity just as confusing as you find those of us who object. If and/or when I have children I would be embarassed to death to nurse in public, and if it were absolutely necessary I would certainly find a way to be as discreet as possible.
Next time I’m in a fast food place, and the person in a nearby table is picking their nose, I’m going to ask management to tell them they have to take their food, and eat it in the toilet, or cover their faces so I don’t have to see their snot covered visage. Just as reasonable in my mind, as asking a baby to have it’s meal in the germ infested air of a public restroom. (No matter how well cleaned the surfaces are, flushing the toilet causes a fine mist that stays in the air for hours with it’s microbrial goodness, not a good place to eat certainly.) And also, does the mom take her food into the toilet to eat it, setting it on the toilet tank or floor? Or does she leave it out at her table, to get thrown away or who knows what else done to it?
Use your heads, and also show some compassion! She’s not doing it to make you uncomfortable on purpose, she’s just trying to peacefully live her life. It’s not an issue, until you make it so. Sometimes you literally just have to look the other way, until other reasonable solutions have been found. Don’t think that other’s haven’t done the same for your sorry ass, either. (That comment directed at the “people” shouting that it’s wrong of a mother to feed her child in public.)
If they are going to ask a breastfeeding mother to “go somewhere private” to feed her child, they’d better set up a “lounge” area for such a purpose, clean germ free air, that’s private, with a table for mom’s meal. They’d better start re-designing all their restaurants. This isn’t a bad idea, it’s reasonable, and all the immature yokels out there wouldn’t have a thing to cry over, or gawk at, and mom and baby could both eat in peace. (And put changeing tables in all the men’s rooms while they are at it, dad’s change diapers too ya know.)