A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a
base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited,
hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a
lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson,
glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a
bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but
the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar,
and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I
will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest
the least syllable of thy addition.
– Shakespeare, King Lear Act II, Scene II.
I may have been criticized for my objection to a lesbian couple’s contemplated lawsuit against a heretical baker who wouldn’t bake them a cake for their “wedding.”
Well, it seems that my criticism of overly litigious individuals itching to take others to court as loathsome cowards is not new. As you can see from the Shakespeare quoted above, these objections have a long pedigree.
By way of explanation for those who don’t speak Elizabethan, an “action taker” is one who is eager to sue. Note the derision with which Kent treats the litigious Oswald.
Seems to me that I’m not the only one who thinks that those who would use the law as a weapon instead of ironing out their little disputes more civilly are a bunch of cowards.
Were the people who took Brown v. Board to court loathsome cowards? How about Plessey vs Fergueson?
Or does that only apply to people you disagree with?
Rovias,
I didn’t say that everybody that pursues litigation is a loathsome coward. But some people can be dismissed as “action takers.”
Through what process? By you disagreeing with them?
Okay.
Let’s try to explain this a different way.
I think you would agree that a store owner has an obligation to keep his premises free of hazard, right? So, if a person goes into a mom-and-pop general store and slips and falls and breaks his arm, the store owner should be held liable for negligence, if the hazard on the premises was caused by negligence. I certainly agree with that proposition.
Now, let’s say a person slips and falls in that mom-and-pop store and gets only a small black and blue mark on her hind parts that goes away within a week. A person who would sue in that situation is a loathsome “action taker” because the store is going to have to face a big inconvenience over such a trifle. Life is not perfect. These things happen. It’s inevitable.
I’d say the people in the previous post very likely (I wasn’t there) experienced a pretty trivial slight. I’ve experienced similar slights in my life. Once a White Power guy yelled “Sieg Heil” to me in a parking lot. Once, a woman in a strange african inspired get-up came up to me while I was looking for a place to eat my lunch in the bronx zoo and started shouting at me. I recall her shouting that I am not a son of Judah, and instead am a son of Joseph and I keep the black man down. True story. I have no idea what motivated her to say that. I think she didn’t much like Jews. Oh well. These things happen. If that’s the worst thing that happens to me, I will have lived a pretty darn good life.
I’d say that if having to go back to the yellow pages and find a new baker is the worst thing that happened to that couple, they also would have lived a great life.
Being sued, on the other hand, is a pretty bad thing to have happen to you. Inflicting that on a decent person for a trivial injury or slight is an awful thing to do.
Even your example is flawed. The same fall that would be brushed off by a twenty year old athlete could break the hip of a 70 year old. The same hazard can cause both, and therefore should not be allowed, even if only twenty year olds have thus far had that fall.
Furthermore, none of the incidents you mention include a denial of services. So its apples to oranges.
You realize, of course, that if this type of thinking would lead to the entire world having to be padded and made completely and totally safe. It cannot. There are some hazards in the world, just as there is no escaping insult and offense short of retiring to a hermitage.
This is a fact of human life.
Deal with it, just as I deal with the fact that people do things that offend me.
And have a happy Thanksgiving for you and all those dear to you.