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#40596 09/02/01 07:15 PM
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http://wordsmith.org/board/showflat.pl?Cat=&Board=words&Number=38981&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5

I have a question following the post by Of Troy in the Professional thread in Q&A. I know it is not word related but it intrigues me.

Are lawyers really all that disliked in the U.S.? On television we hear jokes about them all the time, people denigrate them constantly and seem to really hate them.

In French Québec to be a lawyer is quite respectable. It is one of those professions people appreciate because of the level of education needed to become one.

Mind you, most Québecers do not 'have' a lawyer at all. We are not a litigious people. Even divorces are now generally handled by government social services to reach equitable distribution assets.

So, is this just a U.S. thing (and is it really true) or are lawyers really despised everywhere?


#40597 09/02/01 09:07 PM
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In the main the lawyers have gotten a bad rap. We would not need so many if there were not such a horde of greedy people trying to get by litigation things they are not entitled to, and unscrupulous people always devising new schemes that require new laws to protect us, and a society ever getting more complex to require still more new laws. The enemy is us.


#40598 09/02/01 11:06 PM
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Down here, you sometimes read about the civil rights movement--not just how the whole thing's been settled, but how everyone was fighting on the same side. Or about how no one knew about all the graft at a given time in a given city. The universal disdain for lawyers may be something like that. I mean, *somebody's hiring all 800,000(?) of them.


#40599 09/03/01 08:30 AM
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>So, is this just a U.S. thing (and is it really true) or are lawyers really despised everywhere?

I don't think it is the same here in the UK.

I have told lawyer jokes and have had to convert them to "American lawyer" jokes as in:
Q: What would you call 50 American lawyers at the bottom of the sea (translated from Ocean)?
A: A start

The joke usually falls flat and is met with blank looks, in the same way that "Polish" jokes were a few years ago. We just don't think that there is anything unusual or funny about Polish people. You hardly ever hear an Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman jokes anymore, although I do move in fairly "alternative" comedy circles, so most humour is observational.

Most people here use a solicitor to help them buy a house and to write a will, that is probably the only contact they have during their life.

In Edinburgh, in my experience, the main hostility is directed at surveyers who only look at a house once but end up with three or four people paying them fees for the surveys, at £250 a time and up to ten attempts to buy a property it can be an expensive business. The lawyers on the other hand tend to only charge a small fee for abortive attempts and work harder for their money. Similarly, when I was in London my experience of estate agents was very poor, I resented paying their 2.5% share of the transaction when I did all the work, whereas the solicitor really did earn her money.

The main issue is usually litigation, especially if you are on the wrong side of a claim. We have only relatively recently had no-win-no-fee litigation but the numbers are still small as are the amounts given in compensation. Fortunately, one of the big firms "Claims Direct" has just gone into receivership, probably as a result of its over-zealous advertising campaign and reputation as an ambulance chaser - I didn't hear too much sympathy expressed in any quarter. The NHS in England has a huge backlog of claims
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_1308000/1308747.stm
and is in danger of spending more on litigation than improvements to patient care, so maybe the lawyers will emerge as the baddies of the piece in the future. Who knows?

#40600 09/03/01 12:24 PM
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The following comment, like BelM's original post above, ties back to the thread re "professionals". There, wwh notes, "What's a professional? I have seen in print claims that practitioners of commercial sex were the earliest."

In a conversation over what is truly the oldest profession, the doctor claimed precedence. "As early as the second book of the Bible," he noted, "God created Eve from Adam's rib -- clearly the earliest surgical procedure." The builder responded, "Yes, but in the first book of the Bible, God created the earth out of chaos -- so my profession, construction, preceded yours." The lawyer paused for dramatic effect, and then rejoined, "So who do you think created the chaos?"

BelM, that may suggest the source of the US distaste for lawyers: we just naturally are associated with chao and trouble. Which reminds me of another story ... [but I digress]
~~~~~~~~~~
PS, if this is not a yart: a biblical "game" per the above joke: find examples of _______ was the first _________ because he/she __________.
Any takers?


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perhaps we and our lawyers deserve each other.
http://www.reason.com/9907/co.wo.reasonable.html


#40602 09/07/01 02:12 PM
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First, apology to tsuwm if this is a repeat of his link which I cannot get - full moon ?
Anyway, here are a few cases - sent to me by a friend who deals with the legal profession - to give non-USns a taste of the lengths the law sometimes stretches!

1. January 2000: Kathleen Robertson of Austin Texas was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running amok inside a furniture store.The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving tyke was Ms. Robertson's son.

2. June 1998: A 19 year old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor ran his hand over with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice someone had entered the car and was preparing to drive away as he (Truman) was in the midst of trying to steal the car's hubcaps.

3. October 1998: A Terrence Dickson of Bristol, PA, was exiting a house he finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up, the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and
garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, so Mr.Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. This upset Mr. Dickson, so he sued the homeowner's insurance company claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of half a million dollars and change.

4. October 1999: Jerry Williams of Little Rock, AK was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced-in yard, as was Mr. Williams. The award was less than sought after because the jury felt the dog may have been provoked by Mr. Williams who, at the time, was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

5. May 2000: A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, PA, $113,500 after she slipped on a spilled soft drink and broke her coccyx. The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson threw it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

6. December 1997: Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This
occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the lady's room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.



#40603 09/07/01 02:20 PM
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How many of these survived appeal?

And, regarding #4: The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced-in yard, as was Mr. Williams. I am a little confused. Was Mr. Williams on a chain in his owner's yard or in the dog's owner's yard?


#40604 09/07/01 02:23 PM
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Having trouble with complex thought this morning?


#40605 09/07/01 02:42 PM
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It's ambiguous, wow, and relevant to the case. If Mr. Williams was chained up in *his owner's yard, how close was it to the dog's owner's yard and how long was the chain on the dog? If it was long enough for the dog to get into Mr. Williams's owner's yard perhaps the dog *was negligent and deserved to be sued by Mr. Williams (although I should think that Mr. Williams's owner might be more likely to have the right to sue here for damage to *his property). On the other hand, if Mr. Williams was chained up in the *dog's owner's yard, perhaps Mr. Williams's owner should be suing for deprivation of property rights. Unless, of course, Mr. Williams was being chained up in the dog's owner's yard because he (Mr. Williams) had been caught by the dog's owner ravishing his (the dog's owner's) rabbits or some such crime against property.

I don't think *I'm having any problem with complex thought, here, wow. I think you're oversimplifying the situation.


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