The Angry Exile: Is litigation too easy?

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Friday, 21 January 2011

Is litigation too easy? - UPDATED.

If you can sue for something which beyond dispute is entirely as a result of your own poor choices then I'd say yes, it's getting that way.

"She admits she was walking through the mall - she actually works there - looking down, trying to text, and just falls right into the fountain."

A fall as a result of not looking where she was going into a fountain which she presumably knew about since she works there. Is there any way you can argue that it wasn't her own fault?

Not really, so how come she's threatening to sue?

Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49, was texting on her mobile phone when she tumbled head first into a shallow fountain in a mall in Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, this month.
...
A video of her fall, which was captured on the centre's CCTV cameras, was posted on YouTube and has since attracted more than 1½ million views. Laughter could be heard on the footage while it was being played.
Marrero, who works at a store in the centre, told US television network ABC's Good Morning America she had initially laughed at her fall but added that no one had taken her feelings into consideration when they posted the video on the internet.

Awwww, diddums. Yes, it's that permanently giggle-worthy litigation for hurt feelings again. Thank you Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49. I haven't seen one of these for a while and I always find them amusing.

"It shows in the video. Nobody went to my aid. Not one single person ... it could have been anybody's mother. It could have been a senior citizen falling and would they have gotten the same treatment as I did?" she asked.

Aside from the fact that nobody should be responsible for you except you, Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49, from the video there seemed to be nobody nearby you who looked like centre security anyway.* And you were up again in a couple of seconds and climbing out again in another four or five. Who the fuck were you expecting, Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49? Superman?

But of course what this is really about is Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49 did something stupid and embarrassing and which made people laugh, and that it's now on the internet making even more people laugh. And she's feeling the humiliation.

"I didn't get an apology, what I got was, 'At least nobody knows it was you.' But I knew it was me."

And now millions know it was you, Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49, and not because millions have watched the various YouTube clips of it either. You see that is as self-inflicted as your hilarious text message fountain dive. For example, take me sitting here more than 12,000 km from Wyomissing, Pennsylvania. If I'd have seen the video, which isn't guaranteed, I'd have laughed and carried on with my day completely oblivious as to the name or age of the person in the clip. But, Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49, because you've decided that people finding it funny is an excuse for you to threaten legal action the video will be seen more widely and your name, age and face are known as well, as is anything about you that's in the public domain. So instead of being an anonymous woman who fell into a fountain through her own fault we now know you as Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49, a born again Christian with a criminal record for theft and currently awaiting trial for five charges including receiving and theft by deception, and who fell into a fountain through her own fault and was dumb enough to draw yet more attention to the fact by getting a lawyer involved.

In a way that's as funny as Cathy Cruz Marrero, 49 falling into the fountain in the first place.

UPDATE - Via Down With That Sort Of Thing, further evidence that litigation is too easy. An Australian community warden called Geoff Stephens suing his council employer because people keep saying things like "G'day, sport" to him and making kangaroo jokes. Look, folks, this must stop. It is wholly inappropriate to call Mr Stephens "sport". The correct term is "yer big sooky la-la" and must be used from now on.

* On the subject of centre security a security guard has been fired for releasing the CCTV footage, which if his/her contract said they weren't allowed to do is probably fair enough.