Then I am at least one for three, whereas you are zero for three.
PLEASE refrain from complimenting me. I have such a low regard for your opinion based upon your first post here that hearing that you consider something “commendable” makes me wonder uncomfortably if I should be doing it at all.
I think we both understand that you know fuck-all about me, who I am, what I do, or where my loyalties lie.
Are you kidding? Your first post. Your manifest loathing for a profession you had set yourself on the path of following, and which you apparently still pursue, inasmuch as you are still studying it. (Why are you still in school, anyway? If I thought as little about a profession – any profession – as you do the law, I would leave school and wait tables before having the first thing to do with it. Have you no self-respect?)
Of course! An ass is an ass in any forum. I do not consider you an ass because we are on a message board, but because of your comments. I would not consider you less of an ass if we met in court.
::Slaps Jodi’s hand and jumps back into the ring::
Nothing. You amuse me, just like a monkey playing with its own shit.
Oh yes.
See here, lad, that’s simply uncalled for. I am quite open minded. For instance, I have yet to decide whether there is any connection between your idiocy and your repugnant personality. Does the latter necessarily follow the former, or is it merely happenstance that you possess both qualities to such an unusual degree? Further data is required, I’m afraid.
Oh, look! The monkey just smeared poop all over itself! Silly monkey.
Not an epithet usually applied to me, at least partly since I’m rarely misleading. But, since I did screw up once, I guess I’ve earned it for life, huh?
I was rather hoping so, yes. It seems Jodi has found better uses of her time and erudition than to defend the entire legal profession for the thousandth time to ignorant fuckheads such as yourself. I do see she has started to rip you to shreds over other matters, though.
I am in awe of your fair-mindedness. To admit the blatantly obvious, at least partly, is admirable.
Its true nature and intention is to provide a civilised and professional way for people to settle disputes, make agreements, achieve justice, punish criminals, and other sundry necessary actions. The practice of law has been around for thousands of years, and never has a society abandoned it in favor of another means to the same ends.
So it is fee oriented. As are many other professions. Hell, I could make the same arguments about plumbers, but no one rails against them. The claim of unjustified is simply and totally wrong. Lawyers get paid well, and there is no shortage of work. Obviously there are people who want to hire lawyers. Lots of people. These people don’t consider it an unjustified profession.
I’d like to see how you think we could exist as a society without lawyers. Should all cases be decided by “rock paper scissors”? Perhaps everyone should represent themselves in court. I guarantee that if a society were ever to try that, a legal profession would arise in very short order.
In short, even if all lawyers were scumfucks, which they’re not, the legal profession would still be a better alternative than anything you have suggested so far to replace it.
Let’s just say that you were accused of a crime you didn’t commit. How would you handle the situation without a lawyer, or any legal training of your own.
Hell, in this country (the US), the right to burn the flag or have an abortion (among many others) only exist because lawyers successfully argued cases before the Supreme Court. Without lawyers, it would be impossible for the common man to achieve justice. Ever.
Well, for my own part, I wouldn’t hire you, if only because I think you are completely incapable of logical and coherent thought. Your hatred for the legal profession would also be a concern. Already in this thread we have heard from at least three lawyers whose posts I have read all over the board, and whom I have a great deal of respect for. While I have singled Jodi out for her abilities at righteous vitriol, minty green and Bricker are both, in my experience, intelligent, knowledgeable, and well spoken. As are (I believe) all other lawyers I know of on the board.
Perhaps they’d want to hang you upside down and shake you so that what passes for your brains dribbles out your ears and a more useful organ falls into their place.
Oh dear, I appear to have made myself unpopular. Well, I am no doubt leeting myself in for further venomous assaults, but, brace yourselves, here I go…
Jodi: You’re right, I know nothing about you as you know nothing about me, didn’t stop you though did it?. I still pursue a law degree firstly because I was over half way through it before my conscience really kicked in. Secondly because it will open up more employment opportunities than most other qualifications. I have no intention of waiting tables, though it is a more honourable career path than that of a lawyer. “Am I an idiot?” was purely a rhetorical question designed to undermine Minty’s (arguably fantastic) claim to be open minded. Given your limited knowledge of my actual capacity for thought your assertive “Yes, next question” is a conclusion of little merit.
Minty Green: Hmmm… Your simian/coprohile interest is most alarming, have you considered counsel? Given your agreesive and insulting refusal to entertain my efforts to elevate Gazoo’s gripes about the legal profession to a wider, albeit more general, level I remain unconvinced of your claim to any degree of open mindedness. I believe such a claim to be no more than a wild boast, however I remain open to pursuasion and hope (i’m a patient man) that you may redeem yourself yet.
Waterj2: You conceed yourself that your first post was misleading, I myself was misled. My label was a simple joke, no more, and not an attempt at any permenant label. No, really, forget it, the mistake was all yours. Your bloodlust, also, is alarming, not least because it focuses upon my blood. Anyway, you could, indeed, level similar criticisms at other professions and you use plumbing as an example. Well, no one gripes about plumbers because they provide a decent service at a fair price and lawyers are not subject to the same market forces as plumbers. How many millionaire plumbers have you come accross? If I had the inclination I would argue that their utility value is of far greater importance and more beneficial to society.
You mention breifly that the nature of law is to provide a civilised and professional means for setteling disputes. Wrong. That is a secondary consequence. It’s primary function has always been to “protect the opulent minority” and their possessions from the great unwashed masses who would not understand such a notion (wonder why), at least, that is, according to James Madison (who I’m sure you have a great respect for). Furthermore law has been around for a long time and yet it is only relatively recently that ordinary people have been able to access it. Even today many people cannot access justice because the price is too high. I believe (though am not certain) that the “legal aid” service in the US is even more tight fisted and discriminatory than our own. Either way we both have unfair systems. Tacitus Gaius Cornelius once wrote “when the laws are most multiplied the state is at its most corrupt”. Spot on. If your legal system and profession is so great how come you have the worst murder rate, highest prison population (now a fast growing profit based industry) and greatest levels of reoffending in the Western world? (not a Yank jibe, its pretty bad here too). Furthermore you still have the death penalty, along with Russia, China, the entire Middle East and oh almost everywhere but the rest of the developed world . Very civilised. You mention the fight for abortion and flag burning (still contentious issues on your side I understand), well if minority thinkers deserve a fair hearing why not me? What’s wrong with an original and challenging mind of my own?
Finally, (sorry for going on and on and on) I do not hate the profession, I simply see it for what it is. If you’re too chickenshit, lazy and conformist to look beyond your own limited horizons in an attempt to see further than your own pre-planned daily existence don’t take it out on me. Well, actually, you can if you like, but at least try to keep a genuinely open mind (are you listening there at the back Minty boy?)
Phew! Oh, almost forgot. If I am incoherent and lacking any capacity for logical thought how is it that I was accepted for a law degree (on which I am so far successful) in the first place? I still have the option of becoming a lawyer, but I won’t. My interest is more geared towards legal history and jurisprudence rather than ripping people off and self enrichment (no, don’t reach for your guns, I’m not a communist).
Well if I havn’t bored you all to death, killed this debate or sent you reeling in you bigoted shame - Bring it on! However do, please, try to be a little more creative with your insults. I know aggression is the American way, but, please, I am a civilised and advanced being, there is only so much predictability and unoriginality I can take.
Your conscience has “kicked in” about the “nature” of the legal profession, but that same conscience allows you to be a hypocrite in pursuit of said (less than honourable) profession? Yeah I’m REAL puzzled about the reaction of the lawyers in this thread to your posts…
:rolleyes:
As far as posters in this thread “knowing” anything about you…If your other posts are anything like those in this particular thread, making a judgement about you and your aptitude for the law, does not require a herculian stretch of the imagination.
All I’m gonna say is this: everyone bitches about lawyers, until they need one. And “all lawyers are scum, but MY lawyer is an OK guy” disease is rampant these days.
Okay, I’ll chime in real quick…(sorry about the fight I started, just wanted to vent about a bad experience…Perhaps the thread title should have been “Why SOME lawyers piss me off.”)
Max Torque - yeah, like a mechanic.
minty green and Bricker - I agree with the comparisons to other professions and “free advice.” In the OP I went too far with the last paragraph. My bad. My point, as poorly written as it was, was to say that when someone posts a vague legal question, giving a minimal of details, suggesting that the OPer consult a lawyer is over the top (my gripe being that lawyers have a tendency to refer even minor, simple problems, IMO, to other lawyers).
It is certainly your right to respond or not. I never meant to imply otherwise. And, although no excuse, I was in a bad mood regarding a dumbass move by an idiot and I have to account for the fees paid.
DKD - You have the right to your opinion. And as an advocate of the 1st amendment (yeah, a Yankee), I will support that right here in the US to my death. But…
Why make rips on entire profession? As several have said, yes, there are dumbasses and jerks in all fields. Why attack a legal system that, while with it’s own flaws, is better than any other in history?
For all the dumbasses I deal with, there are, in fact, several more who serve their client, and therefore the rest of us, very well.
I regret opening this thread at this point. I guess it’s my own fault, coming to the pit (and a lesson well learned). I just wanted to vent my frustration, but instead I angered posters I respect, and brought a shithead to the forefront.
Au contraire. I know that you are a person who lacks the courage of his convictions; that is given to wild over-generalizations; and is so self-involved that he imagines that if he perceives a profession as not for him personally, it therefore must be without redeeming value. I further know you are a person who does not restrain himself from posting indefensible drivel, knowing full well he is insulting others in doing so, because he does not have the sense to realize that his is not the only defensible viewpoint. All this is manifest from your first post. You, OTOH, know nothing about me beyond that I consider you an ass – because I told you so.
So you lack the courage of your convictions. I see. Well, don’t expect congratulations. If I personally truly felt I was more on the road to personal and professional hell, I wouldn’t refrain from turning around just because I was more than half-way there.
Ah. So it does, after all, have some redeeming value – at least in eyes other than your own.
You do realize what a craven, spineless synchophant this reveals you do be, do you not? I mean, I can respect someone who flat-out hates lawyers and the law, disagree with them though I may, but I have zero respect for a person who who holds it in such contempt and yet still pursues it. This is, again, more evidence that the profession as a whole is better off without you.
But how this works is: I judge your capacity for thought based on how you display it. If you display the lack of thought and the knee-jerk bullshit rhetoric displayed in your first post, I will conclude you are an idiot. A notion you have yet to disabuse me of. And, believe me, MINTY is very open-minded. I credit your failure to realize this to the fact that – again, based on your first post – you wouldn’t know an open mind if it was ringed by signs stating CAUTION! OPEN MIND AHEAD! and you marched past and fell in it.
And “concede” is spelled “ede” and a sentence generally takes a period or a question mark, not both.
Sez you. And, just to review, you are not the Lord High Arbiter of what the law does or does not do, or is or is not designed to do. I can only imagine WATER is shaking in his shoes to find you consider his opinion wrong – a dismay that would only be exceeded if he discovered you considered his opinion right.
This is utter bullshit. Where are you, anyway? If you are in any common law jurisdiction you ought to know enough about legal history to know that this is a gross and indefensible overgeneralization. Shit, even I know that and I don’t even practice in a common-law jurisdiction.
More bullshit. Every person has access to the courts. Every person in the United States who has a cause of action, legitimate or not, and can swing the (almost always nominal) filing fee can file their case with the appropriate court of law. No person is barred from the courts due to the inability to pay – an idea that is by its very nature unconstitutional.
Even more bullshit. If you “are not certain” of a point, and therefore cannot defend it, then you should not post it as it only reinforces the general opinion that you are an ass or a moron, or both.
Arguably because we are the only country in the Western world to retain the largely unfettered right to keep and bear arms, which of course has fuck-all to do with the justice system. Next.
Stricter laws (specifically drug laws, which are in dire need of reform and are in the process of being reformed in many jurisdictions) and more consistent enforcement – not, IMO, a negative thing. And the “highest prison rate” can only be attributed to the U.S. if you cling to the now-artificial distinction of a “western world,” conveniently leaving out non-western countries with higher rates. Next question.
The recidivism rate in the U.S. is roughly on-par with that of the U.K. and most other “western countries” and is higher than that in other countries, often considered less civilized, because the laws for offending and reoffending are so draconian. Not surprisingly, China and Saudi Arabia have very low recidivism rates. Hurray for them, huh?
Our legal system is “great” because it allows every individual, without exception, to have access to the courts for grievances. Black, white, rich, poor, smart, stupid . . . all are allowed to file and appear in a court of law. If you think it sucks so badly, perhaps you’d like to propose a better solution? Because I’ve heard lots of bellyaching about how the existing system sucks, but not much on how it could be made better.
Yes, many of us think so. You disagree, apparently, but then again your not the be-all and end-all of justice that you apparently believe yourself to be.
Because they have legitimate and defensible points to make. You do not. They are not farting across a message board and deluding themselves that its music. You are.
Nothing! See if you can acquire one; you’ll be much better off.
You wouldn’t know “what it is” if it coalesced into a shark and bit you on the ass. You know, your ass – that thing you couldn’t find with both hands and a map.
Hey, if you’re too self-involved, intellectually-challenged, and disillusioned to follow the path you’ve chosen, and too chickenshit, lazy, and coformist to give it up, don’t take it out on us.
Beats me.
Again, thank you.
Hah! You’ll be a stellar addition to that field! :rolleyes: What do you imagine “jurisprudence” is anyway, if not a history of the law? And why would you want to immerse yourself in a the history of a field you abhor? Not above taking a shit bath, are you?
As if we’d give a shit if you were a communist.
“I love me, I think I’m grand; when I’m with me, I hold my hand.” Never dateless on a Saturday night when you’re in love with yourself, huh? I’d roll my eyes again but you’re bag-of-wind personality and banally pretentious posting style means my eyes are getting tired.
There is a lot to be said for increasing the proportion of mature students in law school and decreasing the proportion of youngsters who are admitted only on grades.
Being bright is not enough to make a good lawyer. Both a sense of direction and a sense of proportion are necessary. These often are not well developed in young people by virtue of their lack of life experience, resulting in students who become disillusioned as they begin to realize that what they signed up for is not what they expected.
The unfortunate thing is that the lack of depth which opens one’s self to disillusionment often also opens one’s self to bitterness and to groundless, sweeping denigrations. Just as a youngster will probably have an incomplete understanding of the profession prior to or early on in law school, a newly disillusioned youngster will still have an incomplete understanding, only now it may be a negative perception which has replaced the previous positive perception.
It comes down to someone knocking on the outside of a building, imagining what is going on inside, and then drawing hasty conclusions.
To back up my claim about you not having a grasp of logic, allow me to illustrate the concept of a straw man. A straw man is a logically fallacious argument whereby you set up a weak argument with some similarities to what I am claiming, then disprove it, claiming that you are attacking my argument. For example, if I claim that the justice system is justified and necessary, you disprove the contention, never made by me, that it is flawless by pointing out flaws. If I ever had a case in court and my lawyer tried to pull this sort of shit, I would lose all confidence in him/her.
Now, answer my question as to what a better method for settling disputes fairly would be.
Also, prior to the emergence of laws and a legal system, those in power had more power, and the legal system started as a way of limiting that power. If the legal system always helped those in power, how do you explain every western monarchy becoming gradualy more democratic over the last few hundred years?
Getting back to the original post, i’d like to share a personal experience.
My hubby did his first Chapter 7 filing a month or so ago, and one of the creditors tried to get his client (the debtor) to sign a reaffirmation agreement.
The interesting thing is, the creditor was very sneaky about it - I forget the exact words they used, but they tried to give the impression that the reaffirmation agreement was a routine document of little significance. And they really pushed for the debtor to sign it without understanding it.
Although my husband didn’t bother to ask the creditor about it, I don’t think it would have been so unreasonable – given the creditor’s attempts to obscure the document – to ask the creditor what it meant.
I wonder how many debtors who file on their own sign such agreements, even though the agreement may not be in their best interests, because of the tactics described above.
Gazoo I hope that your employer isn’t sneaky. Ideally the reaffirmation agreement should say at the top: “BY SIGNING THIS AGREEMENT YOU WAIVE CERTAIN LEGAL RIGHTS” But somehow I doubt that yours (or anyone’s) does. And if your employer is sneaky like the creditor I described above, then it is your employer is more to be condemned than the ignorant lawyer who asked what the reaffirmation agreement stands for.
Will wonders never cease? DKD wanders into the thread, hurls around a bunch of ignorant insults about the legal profession, then claims to be disappointed that we’re not either bowing down before his superior insult technology or at least engaging his content-free rhetorical drivel in some sort of debate.
Tell ya what, pinhead. If you want to debate the value of the legal profession, why don’t you wander on over to Great Debates and start a thread? I’ll be happy to contribute, and I promise to make fun only of your frayed logic instead of your coelecanth-like wit. Be warned, however, that in GD, the participants will rip your claims to shreads over a hypocricy as big as joining the same profession you claim to despise with every fiber of your being. (One, two, three . . . yep, that accounts for all three fibers.)
In the meantime, I’ll just point out that unleashing Jodi on DKD is like dispatching a mosquito with a shotgun: highly effective, entertaining as hell, and there ain’t much left of the target. Autumn Wind Chick: I know next to nothing about bankruptcy law, but I would be fairly surprised if there wasn’t required to be some sort of prominent warning about the consequences of a reaffirmation on the document. In fact, didn’t the CEO of a big retail company (Sears? JC Penney?) have to resign a couple years ago when they got caught sneaking reaffirmations past the noses of unnsophisticated debtors? Help me out, folks–I remember the story in Newsweek a few years ago.
Well. I had no idea that I could inspire such vidictive fury. I am clearly in the minority, out gunned and face an uphill struggle, yet I am committed. Incidently I cannot help but wonder why it is you continue to entertain me, given that you percieve me to be so stupid and ignorant. Is it a bullying kick? Why is it that you havn’t simply dismissed me like the deluded fool you clearly feel that I am? Surely if my opinions are worthless then they do not warrent significant comment. Why waste your time?
Anyway, just like to clear a few points up.
I fail to understand how it is I am a hypocrite simply because I choose to continue with a legal education but have no desire to pursue law professionally. A legal education is good for developing an analytical mind and can lead to many other careers. I may well desire to understand the workings of the internal combustion engine whilst harbouring no desire to become a mechanic or an engineer. Do you get it? Furthermore in what way am I spineless? That one was lost on me totally. I have enjoyed my education and continue to do so. I may have taken a rather dim view of the law in recent times, yet my interest prevails. Sycophantic? Your understanding of the term is clearly corrupt. In what way do I fawn before the law and its related profession? Sycophants are generally thought of as over zealous “yes men”. As a critic of law I’m not sure I qualify. Also legal history and jurisprudece are seperate subjects, if related, not that I feel any great need to stress the point. It is largely irrelevant as are most of your attacks against my use of language and the occaisional spelling mistake. Moreover if you read back through the posts you should discover that I have attempted to keep them light hearted, yet in your venomous assaults you take my (arguably poor) attempts at sarcasm and the like quite literally and use them as a springboard from which to launch your next volley. Pathetic.
Finally you press me for a suitable alternative to the current system. I have never claimed to have one. All I have claimed is that the current system is unfair, inadequate, too wide in its capacity and application and primarilly serves to further significant class difference and property rights. Don’t even bother to comment, it’s well documented if you care to do the research and besides I have neither the desire or interest to keep up this tiresome ping pong. At least for the momment; do not think that I am bowing out or doing anything remotely like conceeding. At the moment I am very busy preparing for my examinations but will as Water2j suggested start a thread at the Great Debates forum in the very near future. If you really are ignorant to the true nature and history of law’s development you may find it interesting.
What a load of horseshit. No one on these boards has any obligation to answer any question. I do computer tech support and occasionally answer computer questions here. Why don’t I answer more of them? Because A)I do it enough in real life. If it’s not an interesting or quick situation or if it’s not a friend I don’t bother. B)some situations are too damned complex to go into on a message board C)Because I don’t have enough detailed background on the poster’s system. It doesn’t help to say “Reset your BIOS settings” if I don’t know what kind of BIOS you have. I could easily make things worse.
I suspect all these reasons, not your “robbing [your] brethren” stuff are why few of these questions are answered. If you’ll notice, general questions (“Why do lawyers defend rapists?”) get lots of attention while specific questions (“My mother found a lottery ticket on the floor while on a bus that was crossing state lines. When it turned out to be a winner, six people claimed that they had purchased the ticket. I beat one of them up 'cause he called my mom a whore, but skinned my knuckles. Then he kicked my cat. Can my cat sue him for pain and suffering? And who gets the money from the ticket?”) get far less.
Sometimes professinals will choose to share their expertise. I got a lot of help (thanks especially to wring!) on my “Help with doing interviews” question, but no one was under any obligation to help me out. And the quickest way I can imagine to get people to stop sharing their professional expertise is to demand/expect them to do so.
Well, I agree with you there (although I’m a firm believer in property rights). That’s why I’m a libertarian. However, I see the problem being a governmental one, not a legal one. And I certainly do not hold lawyers morally culpable for it, especially as I cannot envision any way for civilised society to exist without lawyers.
In order to regard an entire profession as useless, I would consider it essential to be able to envision how civilisation could continue in its absence. If that’s impossible, that pretty much defines a “useful” profession.
Actually, the terms you have capitalized are, in fact, required. I’m, of course, at home right now, but if you’d like, I can send you a copy of our “reaff” agreement. I think you’ll find that the one’s pushing the reaffs are the unsecured creditors. The only time I bother to send one is if a debtor asks me to. Fenris - I thought I had already apologized for that, but in case not…a personal “Gazoo is a dumbass, and apologizes for the last paragraph in his OP.”
Yes, the problem is essentially governmental. However to leave it at that has buck passing connotations. The government is a legal body from which the law itself and the legal profession draw its validity. I have never suggested that law is useless, it clearly has a use which can be traced back to the basic customs of primative society, however today it has grown out of all proportion. It has become a monster and over the past three decades has encroached on more rights than it has protected.
Yes, property rights are fine, everyone should feel free from the fear of having their property taken away. (Ever wonder why people take stuff which doesn’t belong to them?)
But “three strikes and you’re out”? (to name but one example).
Yes, we all have to make a living. But making your cash on the back of such policies?
How many “three strikes” prisoners are lawyers, or doctors or even plumbers? None; (granted you may get the odd exception, you always will) the people who by and large end up in prison are socially disadvantaged from birth. The law is a coercive means of keeping them in their place. “Forget social responsibility, equal education opportunities or any of that horseshit, you gotta lock those guys up. They interfere with my property rights”.
How often does the wrong guy go down? Or the bad guy get off? (Its common enough) Well, so long as we get paid, huh, after all what can the lawyers do about it? (Except rub their hands together at the thought of an appeal).
What about corporate crime? What about lawyers fees at the higher end of the profession? What about patent rights (think AIDS in Africa)? What about the death penalty? What about people like George Bush?!!
How come people need an expensive and elitist education just in order to understand right from wrong? There is no doubt that you do, right and wrong has been elevated to a level way beyond the grasp of most people. It’s tantamount to keeping it out of reach.
This is a huge area and I’m not sure that I’m still glad I got involved. (That’s the last time I throw in a rant off the top of my head for fun). However, as mentioned I am committed so keep an eye out for a new thread in a couple of weeks time.(PS I’ve tried to watch my typing, I don’t want to upset the pedantic with spelling mistakes,do I?)
