What do you think?
Today, I have no time to write an introspective piece.
But in order to write something relevant to law school, let's try a little thought experiment. The following is an issue that came up in my property textbook. What do you think about it?
Buzzers. Should we have them or not?
Buzzers are cage like devices in retail stores that prevent the customer from entering the store until an employee buzzes them in. NY is where you mostly find them. They are supposed to add a measure of safety to the owner of, say, a jewelry store or of other high-end products.
Unfortunately, blacks are usually the ones who do not get buzzed in, primarily black teenagers wearing sneakers and hooded sweatshirts.
But often times, the buzzer is abused. A black woman wrote about her horrible experience of exclusion at an upscale retail store. She stood in the cage waiting to be buzzed in. The pimply faced white teenage boy behind the counter told her, "We're closed now." It was 1pm and other white customers were in the store.
If the black woman sued the "saleschild" for unfair exclusion, perhaps she would win in court. But what if she were a black male? A young black male dressed in sneakers and a hooded sweatshirt?
Should we even allow store owners to exclude people from their stores before the people have a chance to prove whether they are good customers or not? Certainly a rowdy, drunk, raving lunatic customer may be escorted out after he acts up. But prejudgment?
Incidentally, I saw an episode of Law and Order once where 3 black teenagers went to a jewelry store at night with the intent to rob it. The owner would not buzz the kids in and so they started to shoot at the owner. The owner shot back, but it was later discovered by the detectives that the owner had locked the store's outside door and so was essentially shooting the teens like shooting fish in a barrel.
The neighboring store owners, upon hearing that the 3 teens were killed, felt relieved and hailed the murderer as a hero.
But in order to write something relevant to law school, let's try a little thought experiment. The following is an issue that came up in my property textbook. What do you think about it?
Buzzers. Should we have them or not?
Buzzers are cage like devices in retail stores that prevent the customer from entering the store until an employee buzzes them in. NY is where you mostly find them. They are supposed to add a measure of safety to the owner of, say, a jewelry store or of other high-end products.
Unfortunately, blacks are usually the ones who do not get buzzed in, primarily black teenagers wearing sneakers and hooded sweatshirts.
But often times, the buzzer is abused. A black woman wrote about her horrible experience of exclusion at an upscale retail store. She stood in the cage waiting to be buzzed in. The pimply faced white teenage boy behind the counter told her, "We're closed now." It was 1pm and other white customers were in the store.
If the black woman sued the "saleschild" for unfair exclusion, perhaps she would win in court. But what if she were a black male? A young black male dressed in sneakers and a hooded sweatshirt?
Should we even allow store owners to exclude people from their stores before the people have a chance to prove whether they are good customers or not? Certainly a rowdy, drunk, raving lunatic customer may be escorted out after he acts up. But prejudgment?
Incidentally, I saw an episode of Law and Order once where 3 black teenagers went to a jewelry store at night with the intent to rob it. The owner would not buzz the kids in and so they started to shoot at the owner. The owner shot back, but it was later discovered by the detectives that the owner had locked the store's outside door and so was essentially shooting the teens like shooting fish in a barrel.
The neighboring store owners, upon hearing that the 3 teens were killed, felt relieved and hailed the murderer as a hero.
posted by Alice in Wonderland at 11:11 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home