Thanks, Ross!

I got a response (skim down the post) from the Vice President of SFWA (a
friend, actually), that said, "As a point of information: We had been
working for the past year, with our legal counsel, on a policy and
procedure. The rest of the document was not ready to go out but our
counsel had vetted this and it was."

Notice the use of the word "counsel" twice in two sentences.  I find
that this is a common response to my critique of somebody's erroneous
statement about or action concerning the law.  "I showed it to my
lawyer, and he thinks it's fine."

I never know quite how to respond to such a statement.  (What I said
was, "Thanks!")  My first thought is always that somehow I missed
something crucial that a "working" lawyer would have seen, and have just
made a fool of myself.  But I feel a simultaneous impulse to say, "Get a
better lawyer."  I never say it, of course.

Yet an astonishing number of erroneous (or else dishonest) things seem
to be done on advice of counsel.  I once saw a line of seven-year-olds
clicking "I Agree" to an exculpatory agreement that popped up on a video
screen in a laser tag parlor.  After I got my voice back, I asked the
guy behind the counter about it, who assured me that they were doing
this at their lawyer's suggestion. Mind-blowing.

Ken


-----Original Message-----
From: Academy of Legal Studies in Business (ALSB) Talk
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Petty, Ross
Sent: Sunday, November 06, 2011 2:25 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Discrimination & Sexual Harassment Discussion on Fiction
Blog

Ken: Nice summary of harassment for lay people.  I assume if some World
Fantasy employees are being sexually harassed, albeit by customers, the
organization may still have an obligation to take steps such as
anti-harassment policies and ejecting offending customers to prevent
such harassment.  
Ross D. Petty
Faculty Scholar
Professor of Marketing Law
Babson College.

________________________________

From: Academy of Legal Studies in Business (ALSB) Talk on behalf of
Kenneth Schneyer
Sent: Sun 11/6/2011 11:43 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Discrimination & Sexual Harassment Discussion on Fiction Blog



There were some recent unpleasant incidents at World Fantasy Con, the
annual convention of fantasy fiction fans, in San Diego, involving a
"creeper" who stalked and/or annoyed several female attendees.

This provoked some understandable and laudable outrage and strong policy
statements against such behavior, but, as often happens, these
statements included oversimplified and overgeneralized assertions about
discrimination and sexual harassment.

I've just posted a discussion of these matters on my fiction blog.  The
legal points will be old hat to y'all, but I thought the context might
interest you, and my presumptuous lecturing might be mildly amusing.
http://ken-schneyer.livejournal.com/43619.html

 

Cheers,

 

Ken Schneyer