The McDonald’s coffee lawsuit. People always bring this up as an example of a frivolous lawsuit, and what an idiot this woman was, suing for millions because her coffee was hot!!1??
Well actually, the coffee was 190 degrees, she suffered third degree burns to her groin and genitals, was hospitalized for 8 days, the damage was severe enough that it required skin grafts, and she then had 2 years of additional medical treatments. All she originally wanted from McDonald’s was $20,000 to cover her medical costs, they offered $800. The jury ended up awarding her $160,000 plus $2.7 million in punitive damages, which ended up being reduced to less than $600,000.
So no, it wasn’t a frivolous case, and the plaintiff was in fact very reasonable in what she was asking for. The murder of Kitty Genovese and the “bystander effect.” Did you know that almost 40 people watched a woman get stabbed and raped from their apartment complex and no one did anything or called 9-1-1 because they all thought someone else would do it!!?
The Negro League team owners wanted a merger. This was in their interest. You’re claiming, though, that the Negro League players preferred a merger. What’s your evidence for this? I do know that Satchel Paige was upset that Jackie Robinson was chosen over him to be the one who broke the color line.
Many of the Negro League teams were in the same cities as MLB teams. The only way they could have survived a merger would have been to move (where?) or to maintain segregation. That is, you’d have had black-only teams playing against white-only teams. I doubt the black public would have been satisfied with this, and I’m sure the black press (e.g. the Chicago Defender) wouldn’t have supported it. I suppose some black players might have been in favor of it, since it would have meant more jobs, but I’ve never seen a quote from any of them saying so.
You’ve also claimed that Robinson “wasnt even the top choices of the major leagues.” In fact, most major league owners were against integration. Branch Rickey was going out on a limb when he decided to integrate his team. His selection of Robinson was based on a number of things, including the fact that Robinson had a history of standing up for his rights in a constructive way.
Yes there were many reasons. He was college educated. He was more articulate than 99% of the white players. He was smart enough to understand what the consequences of any bad reactions by him might be. Which leads people to sell him short as a player. He was a fantastic player. My father was a diehard Brooklyn fan. Robinson won over the fans by what he did on the field. He deserved being in the Hall of Fame.
I agree. I also would opine that the distinction is often tenuous. Particularly that between serfs and slaves - the word “serf” itself having to do with the servile condition ; and the helots of Sparta having been preciously close to (but not quite) being serfs instead of slaves. Freedom’s a spectrum and all that.
But that is really a scholar’s distinction, if we’re being honest, neh ? The average Joe, faced with the condition of the 'gyptian peasant circa 2500 BC, would absolutely dub it to be de facto slavery IMO.
Eh, you’ve got a point, but my counter-point would be : you only get conscripted once, for a few years (which, admittedly, often means “for the rest of your life” ;)). But you do, or rather did, get corvée’d your entire misbegotten life.
And while in principle tax and corvée are one and the same, in actual practice I think I’d rather shell out a thousand bucks now and again than shlep 5 tons of limestone up a man-made mountain, whipped all along, uphill both ways in the snow etc…
Even for all the proto-beer in all of Egypt.
The average Joe would be horrified to be faced with the conditions of the 'gyptian aristocrat circa 2500 BC.
But no, I do not think “slavery” is a good description - not because their condition was not horrible by today’s standards, but because “slavery” existed in their society - it was applied mostly to prisioners of war, but could also be imposed as a result of incurring an unpayable debt.
In short, slaves existed at a level below that of peasants - whose obligation was to pay taxes, but who was not a prisoner or in debt-bondage (yet).
Investigation Discovery’s A Crime to Remember series just did a show on this the other night. Their reasoning for Karl Ross not calling the police right away after the third attack was that he was gay and only called them after one of Kitty’s friends found her in the hallway and called to him to call the police. The police at that time made life very hard for homosexuals and Ross was afraid.
They also said it was really no secret that Kitty and her female roommate were having an affair but their neighbors and friends didn’t care. That was one reason the roommate didn’t initially cooperate with the police and moved away shortly after the murder.
I don’t know about the Egyptians, but yes, sort of (allowing for no “turning up” [or “turn down the AC” if you’re one of those weird people]). From yesterday (#4).
Coffee lady was also found 20% liable, so it wasn’t like they were saying it was all McDonald’s fault. The company was just found to be responsible for the majority of damages.
The explanation I read about this, way back in 1982, was an excerpt from some Journal of Ancient French Language that the local newspaper was quoting. The researcher had (re)discovered the term* *kheke *which was already antiquated at the time but refers to the crumby coating on the inside of a bread pan or the bottom of an oven after you remove the bread that was baked therein. The point was that the foreign-born queen wasn’t so stupid as to say, “If they don’t have bread, let them eat cake.” but was pragmatically telling the palace cooks “They are begging for bread so give them the dregs, discards, and crumbs from the royal ovens.” which repaints the incident as a less airheaded (though not necessarily more compassionate) response to the situation. Regardless, her response only served to piss off the masses that much more.
Like the researcher’s explanation, the more favorable view of Marie Antoinette returned to being buried under the more entertaining mythology.
–G
*My apologies, I did not study French, I cannot remember the proper spelling.
It’s not quite in the same league vis a vis historical importance as “The New Deal didn’t end the Depression” or “Hitler was an atheist”, but one that irritates me is “Each clan in the Scottish Highlands had its own unique tartan, worn only by members of that particular clan, and it was possible to identify a man just by looking at his plaid.”
No. Highland weavers wove tartan in whatever patterns they liked. The raw wool was colored with local dyes, of course, and those dyes did vary from region to region in Scotland (tartan was worn by Lowlanders, too). So it was possible to distinguish tartans from different regions, which suggested likely clan affiliations (a man in a Atholl tartan was more likely to be a Murray than a Macleod…) but did not definitely state them (…but he could also be a Robertson or a Stewart).
Was that a typo? What sort of idiot slides into the only base you’re allowed to overrun?
