Overlawyered » political correctness

Slumdog Millionaire

Ted Frank — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 01:32:36 +0000

The Bollywood masala homage, Slumdog Millionaire, received ten Oscar nominations today, including one for best picture. It’s an excellent movie, if one forgives the entertainment world’s plot device of having a game show take place live, when in fact virtually all of them are taped.

And where there’s success, there’s those who try to hijack it for their own publicity stunt. Such is the case of Tapeshwar Vishwakarma, who is suing two Indians associated with the movie, A R Rahman and actor Anil Kapoor, claiming that the use of the word “slumdog” is defamatory to Mumbai slumdwellers, and will get a court hearing on February 5. (Kapoor uses the word in the movie.) I know not Indian defamation and free speech law–this strikes me as the sort of issue Salman Rushdie had with people who did not grok the concept of “fiction”–but until this case is dismissed, let us hope Vishwakarma does not get a hold of Huckleberry Finn. (AFP, “Slumdog stars sued for defaming slum-dwellers”, Jan. 22).

Tags: India, libel slander and defamation, movies film and videos, political correctness

Slumdog Millionaire is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Microblog 2008-11-02

Walter Olson — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 03:59:59 +0000

Leading California conservative blogger explains why he’s voting no on 8 [Patterico] #
A text message arrives on your cellphone while you’re at a polling place. Illegal “electioneering”? [Doherty, Reason "Hit and Run"] #
Humorless academic denounces bawdy un-PC hit comedy Little Britain [Feral Child] #
Agree or disagree, it’s hard to find a more eloquent McCain endorsement than David Frum’s [NRO] #
Audio of Ted’s talk at U. Chicago [Federalist Society chapter]

Tags: campaign regulation, John McCain, political correctness, same-sex marriage, Ted Frank

Microblog 2008-11-02 is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

July 9 roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 20:14:20 +0000

Significant if true: Ninth Circuit may have finally decided that judges should stop micromanaging Forest Service timber sales [Lands Council v. McNair, Adler @ Volokh]

GMU lawprof/former Specter aide whose law review output grabbed big chunks of others’ work without attribution doesn’t belong on the federal bench, though he may have a future at Harvard Law [Liptak, NYT; WSJ law blog]

Update on gift card class actions (earlier) filed by Madison County, Ill.’s mother-daughter team of Armettia Peach and Ashley Peach [MC Record; more background here and here]

If you regard demand letters from attorneys as menacing and aggressive, maybe you’re one of those “lawyer-haters” with cockamamie notions of loser-pays [Greenfield, and again]

Just wait till Public Citizen goes after those “charities” that spend more on telemarketing than they raise by it — oh, wait a minute [LA Times via Postrel]

U.K.: nursery schools urged to report as “racist” incidents in which pre-schoolers say “yuk” about spicy foreign foods [BBC, Telegraph, Taranto; the author speaks, via Michael Winter, USA Today]

Blawg Review #167 creatively assigns each of 50+ blog posts to its own “state”, though it took some doing to associate us with “Maryland” [Jonathan Frieden, E-Commerce Law]

I will NOT go around saying Miami-Dade judges are being paid off… I will NOT go around saying Miami-Dade judges are being paid off… [Daily Business Review, earlier]

“‘I’m thinking of getting disability.’ … This individual figured that [it] was tantamount to a career choice”. [physician blogger Edwin Leap]

Tags: environment, Florida, Harvard, law schools, Madison County, nastygrams, Ninth Circuit, political correctness, Public Citizen, United Kingdom

July 9 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

May 2 roundup

Walter Olson — Fri, 02 May 2008 00:03:02 +0000

Contriving to give Sheldon Silver the moral high ground: NY judges steamed at lack of raises are retaliating against Albany lawmakers’ law firms [NY Post and editorial. More: Turkewitz.]
When strong laws prove weak: Britain’s many layers of land use control seem futile against determined builders of gypsy encampments [Telegraph]
“U.S. patent chief: applications up, quality down” [EETimes]
Plenty of willing takers for those 4,703 new cars that survived the listing-ship near-disaster, but Mazda destroyed them instead [WSJ]
“Prof. Dohrn [for] Attorney General and Rev. Wright [for] Secretary of State”? So hard to tell when left-leaning lawprof Brian Leiter is kidding and when he’s not [Leiter Reports]
Yet another hard-disk-capacity class action settlement, $900K to Strange & Carpenter [Creative HDD MP3 Player; earlier. More: Sullum, Reason "Hit and Run".]
Filipino ship whistleblowers’ case: judge slashes Texas attorney’s fee, “calling the lawyer’s attempt to bill his clients nearly $300,000 ‘unethically excessive.’” [Boston Globe, earlier]
RFK Jr. Watch: America’s Most Irresponsible Public Figure® endorses Oklahoma poultry litigation [Legal NewsLine]
Just what the budget-strapped state needs: NY lawmakers earmark funds for three (3) new law schools [NY Post editorial; PoL first, second posts, Greenfield]
In Indiana, IUPUI administrators back off: it wasn’t racial harassment after all for student-employee to read a historical book on fight against Klan [FIRE; earlier]
Fiesta Cornyation in San Antonio just isn’t the same without the flying tortillas [two years ago on Overlawyered]

Tags: attorneys general, attorneys' fees, Barack Obama, gypsies, harmless lawsuits, Indiana, IUPUI, law schools, Massachusetts, Mazda, New York, Oklahoma, patent quality, political correctness, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., roundups, Sheldon Silver

May 2 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

July 17 roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 00:06:29 +0000

Judge Bartnoff declines to reconsider decision against Roy Pearson in dry cleaner pants case [AP/WUSA]
Turnabout fair play? Louisville hospital sues trial lawyers, saying they injured its reputation and tried to extort settlement [Courier-Journal]
Employer sued for “post-traumatic stress disorder” after pranksters post co-worker’s profile on gay section of HotOrNot.com [McCullagh, CNet]
Former Belleville, Ill. cop sues over prosecutor’s letter suggesting his testimony not to be relied on [M.C. Record]
British race relations agency demands removal from shelves of Tintin comic book [Telegraph]; 22-year-old in Scotland sentenced for “racially aggravated breach of the peace” after website commentaries that went “beyond the realms of bad taste” [also Telegraph]
Farewell to that little patch of floating liberty, the South Carolina river shack [Zincavage]
Hey docs: if a plaintiff’s law firm calls your office to talk about a former patient, don’t call back [Medical Economics via KevinMD]
Yale Club replies to Judge Bork’s lawsuit [Turkewitz]
Arizona businesses aghast at hiring-sanctions law that suspends their license to operate should supervisor be found to have hired an illegal [Arizona Republic]
Grants from Bob Barker foundation (Jul. 5, 2001) help fuel animal rights boom in law schools [NLJ]
University of Utah settles lawsuit brought by devout Mormon student actress who refused to recite dramatic lines that were blasphemous or obscene [three years ago on Overlawyered]

Tags: animal rights, Arizona, hospitals, political correctness, Roy Pearson, South Carolina, Utah

July 17 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system