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nerdgirl

Should being annoying in public be a finable offense?

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One small town in central Michigan thinks so:

Being Annoying Now Illegal In Brighton
“Since when did being annoying become a crime? Since Brighton City Council approved a public conduct code Monday night, which includes fining someone up to $500 for being annoying.

“One section of the bill reads, ‘It shall be unlawful for a person to engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose.’

“The bill also states it's unlawful for anyone to insult, accost, molest or otherwise annoy any person in public.

“The ordinance was modeled after one in Royal Oak, where the Brighton police chief previously worked.”
Annoying ordinance passed in Brighton

(Btw: for those who look for partisan explanations: the area is strongly Republican and has been for the last 30+ years. It’s not San Francisco, Boulder, the People’s Republic of Cambridge, or even Ann Arbor by a long shot.)

I’m trying to imagine the metrics to determine what counts as “annoying”? Who gets to determine "annoying"?

Wow … just wow … & not in a good way.

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

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Being annoying is so subjective...how could this be anything more than a jobs program for defense counsel? sheesh. That's moronic.

ACLU should step in for first ammendment reasons.

:S

Vinny the Anvil
Post Traumatic Didn't Make The Lakers Syndrome is REAL
JACKASS POWER!!!!!!

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I don't get it. Police have been arresting and fining annoying people for Disorderly Conduct for centuries. Is this a new law for those that are mildly annoying ?? Like those that fart in crowded elevators ?
"No cookies for you"- GFD
"I don't think I like the sound of that" ~ MB65
Don't be a "Racer Hater"

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I don't get it. Police have been arresting and fining annoying people for Disorderly Conduct for centuries. Is this a new law for those that are mildly annoying ?? Like those that fart in crowded elevators ?



I don't get it either. Am curious to the background/back story on this ... but not *that* curious to track it down. :P

Without more information, my best speculation is that it's 'small town' politics at it's worse. One of the council members of another small town in the same county came after a fellow township council member with a pitchfork (it's a largely rural county) a number of years back -- would that qualify as 'annoying"?

It is a new law.

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

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‘It shall be unlawful for a person to engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose.’



This thread annoys me, consider yourself under citizen's arrest! >:(



Is this gonna hurt? [:/]
Nobody has time to listen; because they're desperately chasing the need of being heard.

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‘It shall be unlawful for a person to engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose.’



This thread annoys me, consider yourself under citizen's arrest! >:(



Is this gonna hurt? [:/]


I do have that magic lasso handy. :P

/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

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One small town in central Michigan thinks so:

Being Annoying Now Illegal In Brighton

“Since when did being annoying become a crime? Since Brighton City Council approved a public conduct code Monday night, which includes fining someone up to $500 for being annoying.

“One section of the bill reads, ‘It shall be unlawful for a person to engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose.’

“The bill also states it's unlawful for anyone to insult, accost, molest or otherwise annoy any person in public.

“The ordinance was modeled after one in Royal Oak, where the Brighton police chief previously worked.”
Annoying ordinance passed in Brighton

(Btw: for those who look for partisan explanations: the area is strongly Republican and has been for the last 30+ years. It’s not San Francisco, Boulder, the People’s Republic of Cambridge, or even Ann Arbor by a long shot.)

I’m trying to imagine the metrics to determine what counts as “annoying”? Who gets to determine "annoying"?

Wow … just wow … & not in a good way.

/Marg



i would think this would be supported tottaly by the left. I think it is the next step in the evolution of politcal correctness.

Your point is exactly on the mark however. Who decides????
"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

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i would think this would be supported tottaly by the left. I think it is the next step in the evolution of politcal correctness.

Your point is exactly on the mark however. Who decides????



I'd say the left is more usually on the side of free speech, actually. Censorship seems to be more of a favored tool of the right and the religious...
Do you want to have an ideagasm?

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i would think this would be supported tottaly by the left. I think it is the next step in the evolution of politcal correctness.

Your point is exactly on the mark however. Who decides????



I'd say the left is more usually on the side of free speech, actually. Censorship seems to be more of a favored tool of the right and the religious...



It is neither left nor right. The Left tries to ban or eliminate speech it deems offensive to any group that is not white straight male Christian. The right will try to ban speech unpatriotic, annoying or seditious.

Both want to ban - they just want to ban different things.


My wife is hotter than your wife.

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>i would think this would be supported tottaly by the left. I think it is the next step in the evolution of politcal correctness.

Your point is exactly on the mark however. Who decides????

>>I'd say the left is more usually on the side of free speech, actually. Censorship seems to be more of a favored tool of the right and the religious...

>>>It is neither left nor right. The Left tries to ban or eliminate speech it deems offensive to any group that is not white straight male Christian. The right will try to ban speech unpatriotic, annoying or seditious.

Both want to ban - they just want to ban different things.



Ah....yes, Brighton!:$

When I think of Brighton, I see images of 30ft foot blazing bonfire's, skinny dipping under the fireworks, lakeside Heavy Metal concerts, nude sledding and naked tubing....first kisses and cigarette wishes, the alpha and omega.....

But them people are blocked off from society....all it is, is the prep jockeys against the greaser rednecks...they get along fine at their ends of the territory, but begin to clash in the city square and at high school sporting events...

As for who decides.....right now it is the upper middle class rich conservative parents of the prep jockeys....
Your secrets are the true reflection of who you really are...

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One small town in central Michigan thinks so:



What do I have to do to get standing there to press charges for some one being a schmuck in public on the internet?

Would routing my packets through a machine there do the trick?

If so, maybe they could do like those little islands do in offering internet services. Instead of routing your services through some podunk island to get around gamling laws, you could route through the US midwest to get added legal protections and have any one on this web forum fined $500 for being anoying in public.

The mind boggles.

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I think this law exists to address the migrant mime population that arrives in Brighton each year.

:|



Or Gilbert Gottfried.
"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

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Follow-up on the origin of the ordinance: the new police chief had one in the previous jurisdiction he served (Royal Oak); the rationale behind it: pre-emptive desire to have ability by police chief, i.e., there do not appear to have been any specific incidents prompting the ordinance; and some initial responses: like here, that it’s unconstitutional.

"Some question Brighton's ordinance against annoying others"
"The City Council Dec. 18 passed ordinance amendments that give police more power to arrest or ticket citizens on grounds of repeated harassment, intimidation or interference in the activities of other community members or city officials.

"Michael J. Steinberg, the American Civil Liberties Union's legal director for Michigan, questions the city action. ‘The ordinance gives police the unbridled discretion to arrest a person for engaging in a constitutionally protected activity,’ Steinberg said.

"The Brighton ordinance makes it a civil infraction for a person to ‘engage in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit acts that alarm or seriously annoy another person and that serve no legitimate purpose.’ It further makes it illegal to ‘insult, accost, molest or otherwise annoy, either by word of mouth, sign or motion any person in any public place ... any person in a public place.’

“’I can go to a City Council meeting, and just my presence can be annoying,’ responded resident Pat Cole, a frequent critic of city actions.

“‘The concern isn't someone who speaks up and says something the council doesn't like,’ said Police Chief Tom Wightman. ‘It implies someone who is disrupting the ability to carry out a meeting. It provides several tools we didn't have in the city in the past.’

“City Manager Dana Foster said the ordinance was patterned after one in Royal Oak, where Wightman was deputy police chief before coming to Brighton. Foster stressed the ordinance ‘has no relationship or linkage to any individuals in the community,’ including those who have been critical at past council meetings.

“The police chief said the ordinance ‘is designed to protect the citizens from harassment that doesn't rise to the level of stalking, which is covered by a state law. It's important to note it's not about a single incident but involves repeated acts.’ Wightman said the harassment section is a ‘civil infraction,’ involving a fine only. However, two other sections - interfering with a police officer and disturbance at lawful meetings - are misdemeanors, which involve a maximum $500 fine and 90 days in jail.

"Former Brighton City Council Member and local attorney Richard Gienapp said the ordinance ‘may be unconstitutionally vague, and threaten free speech. It seem like an unfriendly thing to do, a solution in search of a problem,’ he said.

“But Foster defended the ordinance as a common one, citing at least 17 other communities - as small as Fowlerville and as large as Grand Rapids and Lansing - that make it illegal to insult, harass, alarm or annoy another person.

“Wightman said Brighton's ordinance ‘actually sets a higher standard for enforcement than many of the other communities’ because it ‘requires repeated acts (and) was crafted to establish a balance between the need to protect citizens and the concern for protected speech.

“‘Many old city ordinances prohibit being an annoying person, but whenever that provision has been challenged, it has been struck down as unconstitutional,’ argued Steinberg.

“Royal Oak City Attorney Dave Gillam said no one had been charged under its harassment ordinance in the last two years. ‘We have other sections that deal with most such offenses,’ such as striking or shoving another person, which comes under assault and battery, Gillam said. He said the ordinance has never been challenged on constitutional grounds or for vagueness.”


If there was no predicating incident(s) and there was no lack of current ways/means (laws) to deal with incidents, I’m not understanding the motivation to pass this regulation.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

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I think this law exists to address the migrant mime population that arrives in Brighton each year.



Ever watched the movie "Shakes the Clown", he (and Robin Williams) took care of those mimes!

BTW, Brighton Michigan is a pretty cool small town, free speech not withstanding

"Just 'cause I'm simple, don't mean I'm stewpid!"

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BTW, Brighton Michigan is a pretty cool small town, free speech not withstanding



It is an exceptional place to live...many things to do and places to go that are outside the eye of the law....lots of freedom from being bothered.

I'm not suprised at this law however, it is indicative of something they would do. I know many people that can give personal testimony as to the prickishness of cops in that town. They will get you for anything and everything they can...including tickets for slowly rolling through stops signs that aren't there but "are supposed to be there." They even sent an 18 year old to jail for the whole summer (90 days-the max)for drinking underage. (first offense)

But as I said...its a nice place to live and many people just don't care. IMO, the mentallity is just eff the police and try to avoid them...they seem to be indifferent of this law....perhaps they understand that people in their own town tend to cross the line every so often, especially with the overwhelming sense of freedom there combined with urban sprawl.

EDIT

I just wanted to add that many of the people in brighton can be even bigger pricks than the cops there...it is not surprising that they can be annoying for annoyance sake only...I think its like the obscenity law....you know it when you see it.
Your secrets are the true reflection of who you really are...

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