Our Overly Litigious Society

I’m really sick and tired of the abuse of the legal system--getting wrongfully sued by people and ambulance chasing lawyers who think that since we have a well-known company, we can afford to just pay anything someone comes up with.  I would have not started to write this rant if not for the most absurd notice to come to me earlier this week.   A customer is suing me personally in small claims court for an artist who started a show 1-hour late.   While the customer is rightfully irritated that the artist came late, I don’t recall getting a single complaint when Prince showed up 3-hours late to his midnight show and played from 3am to 6am at City Winery. 

In the recent Madonna lawsuit, some fans claimed they had to get up early to go to work after the concert ended at 1am, because she came 2 hours late to the show.  Her lawyer’s defended saying she had both history showing up late and “no reasonable concertgoer could expect the headline act to take the stage at the ticketed time.”    The plaintiff’s lawyers told People Magazine that his clients would file a response to Madonna’s motion to dismiss their lawsuit.  (To be clear, I don’t read People Magazine on a regular basis, but found it while exploring the issue).

This is all maddening.  First, City Winery is not Live Nation a co-defendant, and what a waste of time and money.   I’d like to blame Trump for creating a society that sues everything all the time and that having a team of lawyers to both sue and defend suits is normal, but I can’t blame him for everything.  Hell, the best liberals, climate activists, and “fine people on both sides” have legal teams  But g-d dammit, this all has gotten out of control and wastes precious time, money and bandwidth.   The US has the highest number of lawyers per capital in the world.  While Germany, Sweden and Israel have higher rates of lawsuits per 1000 people, that just means they are more efficient than American lawyers. 

I understand that part of business today is to make sure your legally compliant across the board on everything from keeping your customers and employees safe, happy, etc.  One has to be very fastidious in their observations of the laws, from HR rules to public safety.   This is very important.  I get it.  When I put up a ceiling of old sweaters covering the old Knitting Factory, the FDNY made me fire retard to make it safe.  I get it, I appreciate it.   Most people think of me as a mench.  I do the right thing, will not even have a meeting these days with closed doors.  I address customer complaints, pay staff really well, and try and be honorable across the board.   Can we control a Chef in a kitchen who throws a temper tantrum because a cook screwed something up like we see on TV.  Nope, but we try.  Write ups go into the file, warnings are given and terminations after paperwork is in triplicate are provided.  But we still get sued for decimation, agism, you name it.   How to get $50,000 from us after working a week in the kitchen.   That is the ambition of many people sadly. 

We now have several lawsuits because our website has some photos that don’t offer an oral description for the blind.  We have had to pay a company for years to audit our site and all our pages to make sure the technology is there for a blind person browse the site.  I think this is important.  But if one of developer misses a picture, one in 1000 on the site, we get sued for breaking ADA laws.   Some ambulance chasing scumbags literally look for this, convince a client to get behind the suit and sue.  We have had several.    Cost of doing business.  Right.  But how much is too much?  My goodness. 

No wonder why the court system is so challenging for the more important battles.  Perhaps when a landlord screws you over, but has built an army of lawyers with local courts relationships created to support them when the time comes.  Does this sound familiar Judge Aileen Cannon in an irrational and flawed dismissal.   It’s legal insurance having judges in your court, so to speak.  Anyway, this was not supposed to be political but a post coffee morning rant on these idiotic lawsuits that are like mosquitos on a camping trip and there is no bug spray that works.    OK, back to work.