There was a protest against the ejection:
Well, I can’t speak for all 300 million of us, but personally, I’d prefer to be judged on my merits as an individual, and not have assumptions about my character made based on the geography of where I live.
For what “obvious reasons”?
And it’s not even clear that they were protestors in any real sense of the word. Certainly the guy who was arrested was not. His son, whose shirt explicitly opposed war against Iraq, might by some stretch of the imagination be considered a protestor (if simply wearing a t-shirt qualifies). But the father’s shirt simply called for peace, and made no mention of Iraq or any other country. It said “Give Peace a Chance” on the back, and “Peace on Earth” on the front. If that’s a “protest,” i’ll make sure to call out the cops when this year’s Christmas cards are being sold at my local mall.
The short answer is “no, it is not covered.”
A public accomodation cannot refuse service to a member of a protected class, typically race, gender, nationality, etc. Some states extend that to sexual orientation; some, as you noted, extend it in certain situations to HIV-positive status.
But here’s the key: those laws only forbid refusing a customer because of his protected class membership. Outside of that, a customer can be refused for any reason, even a stupid and illogical one.
I can’t eject a black guy from my bar because he’s black. I am, however, perfectly within my rights to eject him if I don’t like the shirt he’s wearing (assuming that isn’t a mere pretext for ejecting him based on race). Hoity-toity restaurants do this all the time – try going to 21 without a jacket.
Political viewpoint is not a protected class; nor should it be. Not only is it nebulous (as you point out), but treating it as such would put the government (through the courts) in the uncomfortable position of deciding what is or isn’t political advocacy. Imagine a guy in the XYZ mall with a T-Shirt reading “XYZ mall fucking sucks” – crusading consumer advocate or just a petulant asshole?
BTW, that post a few inches up the screen was my 1,000th!
Yay!
Miller, as the person who accidentally started this squib of a firestorm, I am an American. To be precise, I’m someone who moved to America as a toddler, grew up here, and put up with four months of bureaucratic hassle to become a U.S. citizen. I chose this country, and I haven’t regretted that choice for a moment.
That said, I get tired of feeling like I have to defend myself if I mention something about this country I don’t like. America to me is like a much-loved husband. I chose him. I love him. I will defend him freely and proudly. There is no way I would ever leave him. That said, there are some little things about him which drive me nuts. If it were an actual husband, it might be leaving the toilet seat up (not having one, that was the best I could come up with). It being a country, it’s pompous, self-righteous sounding security guards.* It doesn’t mean I don’t love my country any less.
I wasn’t aware that there’s been a rash of people saying, “That’s what’s wrong with America” and my post was not intended as a blanket indictment! All it was intended to do was vent my frustration over a ridiculous situation. Isn’t that what the Pit is supposed to be for?
Sheeeesh! In future, I’ll stick to mile-long posts. They’re less likely to get misconstrued!
CJ
*Disclaimer, since I’ve already been nit-picked once: the guy who came closest to being my husband was a security guard, but he was not pompous or self-righteous. The last statement was not intended to imply that all security guards are pompous or self-righteous.
Congratulations mhendo, the perfect opportunity for me to use my newly acquired quoting skills. 
I only expect you to use a modicum of critical thinking and realize the difference between a single event, that has been blown way out of proportion, and the views of an entire county. Ignoring the hundreds of anti-war rallies that have occurred in this country and instead focusing on one dipshit security guard to make a determination that it is “Amercia at its worst” is specious logic at best, and a blatant attempt to fit a situation to your preconceived notions at worst. And you know all about that, don’t you, Boo Boo
The current trend is not to kick people out of malls for wearing peace t-shirts, the current trend in the media, and on this board, is for people to decry every stupid thing that happens as a huge indictment of America. Look at the posts in this thread, and even in the G.D. thread, and you see so many posters going melodramatic over a trivial and isolated event. And I am sensitive to people’s opinion of the United States, especially when it is founded on crap like this.**
But it shouldn’t ring any bells because it is a piss poor example of mob mentality and institutionalized persecution. In fact, after the security guard was an idiot and had him arrested, AMERICANS did a protest, the mall asked to drop charges, and life went on.
I know you get a raging hard on when you think somebody might possibly be intimating that perhaps you can pull this holier than thou “can’t take a little criticism” crap, but reread my post. It had nothing to do with not criticizing America and everything to do with not criticizing America over one trivial, isolated incident while ignoring the peace protests that are going on every day in this country…
Blah, Blah, Blah. Well, I’m glad your misreading and miscontruing make you so fucking amused. I’ve now explained what should have been clearly evident in my first post, for your benefit. But if you need me to hire a crane to get it to you up there on your high horse
just let me know.
You don’t have to stop criticizing the country, but you should stop making unsupported generalizations.
One idiotic security guard does not a country make.
You said, and I quote: “You know, much as I love America, this is an example of this country at its worst. It’s OK to sell an opinion, just not express it.” You didn’t say this is security guards at their worst, or drooling idiots at their worst, you said America, as if the country is properly reflected in this event. Being in the Pit doesn’t absolve you from making improper generalizations.
I apologize if I misconstrued your meaning. I went by the plain meaning of the words you posted, but if that was not your intent, please accept my apology. Care for some pie?
Does this mall have a music store?
Do they sell U2’s latest album, All That You Can’t Leave Behind there?
Does it have Peace on Earth as track eight?
Does this mean that the mall can sell you speech that you are not allowed to make?
here’s the rest of the story…seems things are a little out of context here…not like they were just walking around minding their own business.
here’s the part the media didn’t want you to know…not like they were walking around minding their own business.
The charge that they were stopping other shoppers has already been mentioned above, Boo.
I note the charge says that the "Security Officer received complaints about defendant wearing a T-shirt ‘Give Peace A Chance’ and defendant’s partner wearing other T-shirt stating ‘Give Inspectors A Chance’. So somebody complained about their shirts? Will the dipstick(s) in question please step forward?
Oh can I PLeaasssee make this my sig ,i laughed so hard i cried 
I don’t understand why they focused on the t-shirts. If they really were stopping people (which I doubt,because the person who allegedly complained has not come forward) why didn’t the guard ask them to quit harassing people? Why did the guard immediately demand they remove their shirts? They could still go around,without shirts and ask people to protest the potential war. The whole excuse the gaurd gave is shaky to me.:dubious:
I would be honored.
Oh, and BTW, love the username.
This is what the legal battle is going to center around. It may seem pretty open and shut that the mall is private property and can thus set their own rules, but the counter-argument would go that a mall is a place opened to the public as a forum.
In our communications law class, the dean said if he were to argue this case, he would propose that the modern-day shopping mall is the equivalent of “Main Street” of days past. Since instead of walking a public street to shop people walk the concourse of a mall these days, and a protester would want to take his/her message to where the people are, then such an action should be protected speech.
Zabali_Clawbane, I suspect that you may be right there. The Downs have both said that they weren’t doing anything besides shopping, and since there are typically CCTV cameras all over the common areas of a shopping mall, one would expect that the management would jump all over the chance to produce any security video (or even eyewitnesses) that could support the contrary claims made by the store detective & the security guard.
Since those claims weren’t reiterated after the thing became an international cause célèbre, my cynical nature suggests to me that they couldn’t be substantiated, and perhaps they were simply pulled out of the asses of the security folks to justify giving the pair the boot. Who could have guessed that they’d be all over the news for it?
All-in-all, it’s been an entertaining train-wreck. Woohoo!
Sheesh, bail out of the boards for one day, and you get stuff like this when you come back.
I was not saying that the Downs were “protesters” in any sense of the word at all. I was talking about the big wad of people who showed up at Crossgates with T-shirts and signs to protest the fact that the Downs got thrown out. That was, in fact, stupid and pointless.
Unless they were there to protest the arrest, in which case it was fundamentally retarded. The Guilderland police weren’t presented with much in the way of a choice.
Why can’t you people wrap your minds around the fact that the initial incident was nothing more than that a private security guard acted like a moron?
Hamlet, you just don’t get it, do ya?
You’re whining about how people say stuff about the USA in this thread (and everywhere else on the Straight Dope board) - and you’re really letting it upset you… and quite frankly, it’s silly… it’s like asking people to stop wearing wrist watches because wrist watches offend you…
There’s an old saying we’ve got down here - never confuse “popularity” with “respect”. You can manipulate popularity, but you can NEVER force someone to respect you. The same goes for the United States, or any other country you might care to name. Whether you like it or not, the rest of the world, indeed, the rest of your countrymen, are gonna choose how much respect they have for the United States - regardless of your pleas. That’s why your requests for criticism ‘abstentia’ are funny - they only invite ridicule for yourself and achieve absolutely zero in terms of altering the degree of respect that others have for the United States.
Look, I know you’re trying to be loyal and all, but mate, there are so many other more effective ways to do it than to whine about how people are expressing their opinions.
Bottom line? I, and my fellow Dopers, are gonna form our own opinions of the USA regardless of how much you’d like to manipulate the outcome.
Other than that, geez, you sure do like to get personal don’tchya?