The Police Deserve a Big Thankyou

This is just a short post to say thankyou to the Police, wherever you live, be it New Zealand or the USA, or Canada or Australia, or Sweden or Qatar, the Police do an amazing job and they never get the thanks they deserve.

In fact its quite the Opposite,tune into the daily news of your country, and there is always someone complaining that the Police didn't get there fast enough, the Police have violated their rights, or they are in a bad spot and its all the fault of the Police. In some cases this may be true, but I'm guessing in the case of the people who contact the media, it isn't.

You only have to look at some of the Myspace and Bebo pages of young people and its full of dumbass comments, like "F the Pigs", "Lets show them and Riot" "Kill the Pigs" "The F*N Pigs are Stupid" Of course these comments are next to a picture of these morons, with thier pants halfway down, giving some sort of hand signal that looks like they got it from the Boy Scouts.

So this is a post to say Thank you to the Police. Thanks for cleaning up the streets of boofheads, thanks for taking away, Wife Beaters, Child Molesters, Murders and Rapists, thanks for visiting the schools and teaching children how to be safe, thanks for taking drunk drivers off the road, thanks for dealing with grieving families, thanks for helping people out in a disaster.

Thanks for doing this without asking for a Thank you.

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Harvard's Women-Only Gym Hours

Last week, my undergraduate alma mater made the Fox News hitlist for announcing that it had decided to make a campus gym, the Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center (QRAC) closed to men for a few hours a week. As the Harvard Crimson's former editorial chair Andrew Fine wrote, this story wouldn't have been news (or all that controversial) were it not for the source of and justification for the request: a group of female Muslim students requested women-only hours because they must otherwise be fully clothed when working out alongside men.

Much ado about something? The QRAC is not the centrally located gym on campus -- in fact, it is a 20-30 minute walk from the main classroom area and the bulk of the university's undergraduate population (a far closer gym, the Malkin Athletic Center, has its own problems). The hours selected for the gender limitation are "off" hours, during which very few students would likely trek from their classrooms to the QRAC. Still, the confluence of religious and gender concerns has made the story on subject to much commentary in the press and blogsophere, including some good discussion of the legal issues involved:

My colleague Howard Friedman's Religion Clause

Volokh Conspiracy, "Women Only Exercise"

Title IX Blog

Harvard Crimson, "No Boys Allowed: Women-only hours at the QRAC constitute a pareto inefficient policy"

Harvard Crimson, "The All New Girls' Club QRAC Turns Single Sex"

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Chicago Marathon Study

During the recent Sports and Recreation Law Association conference, I presented a paper on the legal and risk management issues involving last year's LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon. The race, run under unusually warm weather in Chicago, resulted in the cancellation of the race after one entrant died and hundreds were taken to hospitals. [To read my prior blog on the race click here; to see videos on YouTube, click here and here]

I became intrigued for personal as well as professional reasons. I have run a number of long distance races (often at the back of the pack) and have long considered whether the preparation done by the organizers are adequate to ensure an efficient and reasonably safe race.


As far as liability is concerned, most litigation is precluded by tort and contract law limitations. Assumption of risk is a venerable tort concept that creates a defense to negligence cases because the participant, by voluntarily entering the event, assumes all reasonable risks of injury which in a marathon include many factors, such as physical difficulty, running surface and the weather. Assumptions of risk can also be created under contract, through a waiver agreement or an agreement to participate. It is a rule of thumb that any athletic event organizer who markets a competition open to the public includes such agreements, which tend to broadly disclaim liability to the organizers, sponsors and municipalities (or facility owners) for negligence. Most states do not recognize a waiver of all liability (meaning for intentional or reckless acts), but uphold assumption of risk clauses against negligence claims.



But what happens when difficulties in the race are partially caused by the event coordination itself? Before answering this question, I wanted to find out more about the recollections of the runners involved in the race. I put together a questionnaire and e-mailed it to running clubs across the United States and to specific runners that I identified through news articles and YouTube videos. The questions included:

Did the weather forecasters predict such a hot and humid day or did the weather exceed their predictions in both temperature and humidity?

When did you find (if you found) water and Gatorade lacking? At what mile? Did the race have (or supposedly have) water stops every mile?

Did you see runners in distress? At what point?

In some of the videos I saw, there seemed to be efforts by others (firefighters, e.g.) to spray water on the runners or have makeshift areas. Did you see anything like that?

Did you see ambulances? How were the paramedics able to take the injured runners out of harms way?

How would you rate how well the organizers handled the situation? If you can, please explain the basis for the rating.

–a. In initial preparations?
–b. Water supplies?
–c. First aid?
–d. Organizational skills to cope with an unexpected event?

When did you hear that the race was canceled? What was your reaction?

Did the people who announced the cancellation tell runners what they should do and not do?

Some interviewees said that runners were taking a large number of cups of water, which contributed to the shortages for the runners toward the rear. Do you think that was true?

If you have run other marathons, what do you think could have been done differently?

Do you know if anyone (e.g. a law firm) contacted you regarding the proposed class action?

Many of the runners I contacted criticized organizers for lack of adequate amount of liquids (although they increased the water supply based on the weather forecast and took other measures like more emergency vehicles and misting stations) and for a perceived breakdown in organization after the race was cancelled. A number of respondents were confused as to what to do and some claimed that promised transportation did not arrive. However, only one of the 40 plus runners I surveyed welcomed the idea of a lawsuit. Most said that the organizers distributed warnings about the heat. A number of respondents suggested that the race should have started earlier and some were incensed by the comments of the race director that seemed to blame runners for taking too much water. And most of the respondents agreed that the race should have been cancelled. The runners who were most affected by the logistical problems were those who tended to be slower or novice runners.

Although there is a paucity of cases involving lawsuits against marathon organizers, I did find one case that concluded that an assumption of risk clause did not preclude a lawsuit against marathon organizers where lack of water and electrolytes occurred during the race. The California appellate court in Saffro v. Elite Racing, 98 Cal. App. 4th 173 119 Cal. Rptr. 2d 497 (2002) ruled that the trial court's summary judgment ruling was reversed.

I would be happy to send my presentation to anyone interested. E-mail me at Sportslaw@aol.com.

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The Estranged

I have messed up parents. I don't mean to imply that my parents are alcoholics or any of that type of stuff. They are simply messed up people. Left to themselves, they turned on one another and now are in the process of getting a divorce after 37 years of marriage.

My mother is a nurse and is eerily similar to famous nurses like Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest or Annie Wilkes in Misery. I can't watch either of those movies without thinking of my mother. She is a crazy person, and she will destroy your life if you trifle with her.

My father is a bigoted asshole suffering from MS. He has a penchant for cutting remarks and crushing your spirit. He is a dark cloud of negativity who takes his sole delight in the misfortunes of others and their flaws in character. MS has only worsened him, and he is insufferable. The irony of my dad is that people find him to be incredibly funny. My dad is not a comedian, but as Aristotle pointed out, comedy is where people are portrayed as worse than what they actually are. Since this is what my dad does, you will laugh at what he says. Then, you will overhear what he says about you or others will tell you. Then, you will hate the fucker.

I can tell you that I don't give a fuck what other people think about me. But I do care what my father thinks about me. He thinks I am a loser and a piece of shit and a worthless son of a bitch. These are the things he says about me when I am not around. So, I find it difficult to be around him knowing he says these things about me behind my back.

Both my parents have a tendency to reclusiveness. This only increases their insularity. They are people who do not like other people.

I often wonder if I do not suffer from the same pathologies. But I do like people. I can be critical, but I try to be balanced in that criticism. People are not all good or all bad. And I enjoy people. I am fascinated by them and their stories. I love to spend time in cafes or what have you and talk with people about their ideas, their dreams, their work, and their lives.

I get from my dad a gift I call the razor tongue. It is a gift or curse depending upon how it is used. When someone deserves it, I can crush their soul. When someone does not deserve it, I feel very badly. I have made many women and a couple of men cry just by the things I have said.

I haven't spoken to my mother in three years. I spoke to my father this past week, and I can tell he does not think much of my militant atheism. Fuck him. He spends his days pissing and shitting his pants, so I don't give a fuck. I don't care to ever see him again.

It is sad to be this way with the people that raised you. But those two people have caused me more misery than any other people in my life, and I have given them a lot. I want to be happy. And if I am ever in need, I would prefer suicide to asking them for anything.

I only reconciled with my father because of Greta. I still can't believe I was as involved with someone as foolish as her. This is the same woman who likes the fact that she lives two states away from her mother as a "buffer zone." Christ, I can't believe I listened to that stupid bitch.

People may call me heartless on this, but they have no appreciation for how spirit killing my dad can be. For the three years I was estranged from him, I have been very happy. Since reconciling with him, I feel myself sliding back into the old misery and hatefulness. I don't want this. The blame lies with him.

My family may not be happy with me on this, but I can't go back to that dark period I lived under. Life is too short to have it filled with toxic people. If people make you better, keep them around. If they make you worse, get rid of them. My parents made me worse.

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DVD-Hannibal Rising

Gaspard Ulliel is Hannibal Lecter in Hannibal Rising which explores the origins of the character Anthony Hopkins made famous in The Silence of the Lambs.

Hannibal Lecter was a boy in Lithuania, and he was traumatized by atrocities during World War II that led to the death of his family including his beloved sister Misha who was killed, cooked, and eaten. The horror of this killed something in Hannibal Lecter, and he became a monster.

The rest of the movie is a revenge epic, and it is great. It is a first rate film. The scenery is gorgeous. The characters are fascinating. Ulliel does a splendid job with the role.

The movie also touches on a bigger theme for me. It is one birthed by the Marquis de Sade and reared in Nietzsche. It has to do with the nature of humanity and our response to it. Hannibal Lecter is a fascinating character because he asks for no mercy and does not give it. But he does operate by a code of conduct. Lecter's victims are clearly deserving of their fate because they are monsters as well. Some are more monstrous than others. Because of this, we are both repelled and fascinated by the character.

Hannibal seems to accept that people are fucked in some way, and the world operates between victims and victimizers. This was the viewpoint of the Marquis de Sade. Hannibal does not have compassion so much as an aesthetic appreciation for things. He cherishes the beautiful and the elegant. He destroys the ugly.

The character of Hannibal Lecter fascinates us because he represents many ideas and a strange way of looking at the world. He embodies both the savage and the sublime. He is a monster, but he is monster who has our sympathy. You root for Hannibal even as you are repulsed by him.

This one is a must see.

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UNC-Duke and Cheering Speech

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Last night's UNC-Duke game provides a good opportunity for two quick thoughts on cheering speech. The game was another chapter in what is supposedly the nastiest and deepest rivalry in all of college sports, played at the arena whose fans get the most attention for their clever/rude (depending on your point of view) cheering speech.



First, Duke fans wore Carolina-blue ribbons in memory of Eve Marie Carson, the UNC Student President who was killed last week. I assume there was a moment of silence, but I did not see the beginning of the game. A wonderful gesture--and an illustration of precisely why cheering speech is so important and why I define it as such a broad category of expression. Sporting events are a unique secular gathering place at which we can express, as a collective, a great many messages and ideas (here, ideas of sadness and mourning and sympathy). Of course, many of these messages, including the memorial here, have absolutely nothing to do with sports or the game. That's the point--what touches "the game" is enormously broad.



Second, early in the week, Coach K met with Duke students to talk about their cheering and urging them to keep it classy and supportive of Duke and to be particularly sensitive in light of the events of last week. (H/T: Deadspin). Good for him and for Duke. Because, ultimately, the key to controlling fan behavior is for those in charge (coaches, university administrators) to convince the bulk of students to keep it clean and to have the student-section mores self-police, for social pressure to bring everyone into line. That, in fact, is how we develop and maintain a functioning civil society--not through government coercion, but through social pressures.



But here is a question: Suppose one asshole decided to depart those mores by displaying a sign saying "Our President Lives, How 'Bout Yours?" Without question this is insensitive and obnoxious and rude and disrespectful. But it is not defamatory; it is not a targeted threat; it is not obscene (or even indecent); and it is not fighting words--it falls in no unprotected category of speech. So is there any theory of free expression (other than a sort of Borkean, the-First-Amendment-only-protects-political-campaigns-and-policy-discussions position that never has gotten anywhere) on which that sign should be formally punishable (put aside for the moment that Duke is a private university)?

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WE WIN!!!

NEW ZEALAND HAS WON THE FIRST TEST!!!

Well done to the Blackcaps, a test that for nearly four whole days, look liked being a draw, has seen New Zealand win the test on the final day. The Blackcaps set the English 300 runs to win, and they got off to a flyer, from the first few overs.

Then Kyle Mills, surprised everybody, in an almost freakish display of bowling, took four quick wickets to have England 34/4, from then on it was a matter of time. Chris Martin came in and took three of the most vital wickets in the match.

This Test had everything, it took so many twists and turns, a match which saw an extremely slow runrate by England, a much more positive approach by New Zealand, and two batting collapses, it saw amazing bowling by SideBottom, Mills and Martin, out of this world fielding by England and some brillant keeping by McCullum and it also seemed that Taylor's century almost got lost in all of this, a big crowd on all five days, shows that Test Cricket is alive and well in New Zealand, a special thanks must also be given to the Barmy Army for adding colour to the game.

So congrats to New Zealand for winning the first test, two matches to go and fingers and toes crossed that we can go on and win the series!

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