Comments on: Court: ADA requires captioning stadium music

By: robert

robert — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 21:45:29 +0000

What about something to help the blind referees?

By: Equality Taken to the Extreme : Conservative Compendium

Equality Taken to the Extreme : Conservative Compendium — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 05:20:04 +0000

[…] reality resulted in numerous headaches and legal absurdities. Witness the latest example (hat-tip: Overlawyered): The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled today that the Washington […]

By: Kevin Thompson

Kevin Thompson — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 01:26:35 +0000

Hilarious. It may be a negative that deaf Redskins fans miss out on the lyrics to the Macarena, but it’s balanced out by the fact least they don’t have to listen to all the whining that goes on after they get beat every weekend.

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 16:17:09 +0000

What is it with this team? Between this and the neverending trademark dispute, these guys certainly generate a lot of oddball litigation.

By: Richard Nieporent

Richard Nieporent — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 23:45:09 +0000

If the Court really wanted to improve the experience of these fans, it should have enjoined the Redskins from loosing so many games. 🙂

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 22:20:54 +0000

random thoughts:
1) Simple solution, play music with no lyrics…
2) every stadium now has a giant electronic screen, so in reality its not much of a burden
3) this lawsuit highlights much (but not all) that is wrong with our legal system
4) I hope this is a joke

By: kimsch

kimsch — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 22:00:24 +0000

Wouldn’t subtitled lyrics on the Jumbotron necessitate that the deaf patron watch the Jumbotron to see the words, thereby keeping said patron’s eyes off the field? Can the deaf patron then sue the team/field/city because the patron missed a vital play because the patron was watching the subtitles?

By: Smart Dude

Smart Dude — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 21:45:54 +0000

April Fool!

(Please tell me this is an April Fool joke).

By: Jerryskids

Jerryskids — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 21:10:14 +0000

“Without access to lyrics played, for example, during cheerleader dance routines and the halftime show, plaintiffs would not fully and equally experience the planned and synchronized promotional entertainment that large stadiums like FedEx Field provide.”

What about the rights of the blind to fully experience the cheerleaders? Will they be allowed down onto the field to feel the cheerleaders?

And the obvious question – if I put out one of my eyes so that I am half-blind, am I then legally entitled to feel half of the cheerleaders?

And as far as questioning whether or not this is a joke – what does it say about the system that you can no longer tell the difference?

Laws by definition draw a line between what is allowable behavior and what is not allowable – laws need to be clear. A law that says you cannot chew gum while standing on one foot or you will be whacked in the head with a baseball bat is pretty clear. It may be stupid or unfair but it is not unclear. Stupid or unfair laws can be repealed. Unclear laws must be litigated.

Ideally, it is the job of legislators to draw up clear, fair, intelligent laws. It is the job of lawyers to clarify any shortcomings of the legislators in enacting unclear laws. But when the lawyers and the legislators are one and the same, it is in their best interests to enact laws that are as unclear as possible. As legislators, they can claim that the laws are not stupid or unfair and if the law is unclear how can you argue with that contention? And as lawyers of course, KACHING!

So any laws that use vague, subjective terms like ‘reasonable’ are not laws at all. They do not draw a line between acceptable and unacceptable behavior. You might as well scrap the whole legal code and just say “Thou shalt not do bad things”. You want to know what ‘bad things’ are? We will find out when you get served with the arrest warrant or the lawsuit and a jury decides what ‘bad things’ are.

By: Walter Olson

Walter Olson — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 20:42:06 +0000

I love that it’s so hard to distinguish actual litigation news stories from April Fool hoaxes. But numerous other clips concur with this one:

http://www.nad.org/news/2011/3/deaf-washington-redskins-fans-win-stadium-access-case

Earlier at Overlawyered:

http://overlawyered.com/2006/09/deaf-sue-to-force-closed-captioning-of-redskin-football/

The Washington Redskins are, of course, an affluent organization, but mandates of this kind will affect many providers that are much smaller.