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Blind people sue Target because they can't access Target's website.
Chris:
I think I'm going to sue Rolex for nor being accessible to the middle class.
ChadTower:
In that case I'm going to sue Laura Prepon for not being accessible to me.
tommy:
--- Quote from: Chris on October 03, 2007, 03:23:15 pm ---I think I'm going to sue Rolex for nor being accessible to the middle class.
--- End quote ---
I can get you a nice "rolax" real cheap.
shmokes:
--- Quote from: Chris on October 03, 2007, 02:17:51 pm ---
--- Quote from: KenToad on October 03, 2007, 02:15:28 pm ---I think this is just about shopping, at least according to the linked article from the first post.
--- End quote ---
For now.
--- End quote ---
Um . . . no, forever (or until Congress decides to change the law). When people talk about these law suits like this as being "frivolous", they commonly have severe misconceptions about how the court system works. If someone sued you for not making your personal website blind-person-friendly, the case would never go to trial. First, the blind person's lawyer would tell them that they had no case. But let's say the blind person insisted on suing you, and either represented himself or found an attorney who was willing to represent him in spite of advising him that he had no case (actually telling a blind client that there was any possibility of winning here would be grounds for malpractice, which would end the lawyer's career). Even here, the case will never go to trial. You'll simply file for a motion to dismiss for a failure to state a claim. This means that you concede all of the plaintiff's allegations. You don't deny any of them. But even assuming all of the plaintiff's allegations are true, they do not establish a cause of action.
The Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in employment, State and local government, public accommodations, commercial facilities, transportation, and telecommunications. It also applies to the United States Congress. The ADA REQUIRES businesses to accommodate blind people. It specifically mentions retail stores; it specifically mentions blind people.
The law imposes a duty on me to not do anything that would create an unreasonable risk for you. If I negligently build a homemade flamethrower out of a Super Soaker squirt gun, and while I'm showing it off, accidentally light some bushes on fire and the fire spreads to your home, burning it down, I am liable. You have a cause of action, because the law REQUIRES that I exercise reasonable care, and the breach of my duty to you gives you a cause of action.
Now, if the law IMPOSES a duty on all businesses to accommodate provide effective communication for blind people (and, yes, it has been specifically extended to online businesses, in case anybody thought that might be an open loophole), and a business breaches that duty, how is it a frivolous lawsuit for a blind person to sue any more than the hypothetical I gave you above?
If you don't like it, blame the law, not the judiciary. It's not like this stems from some "activist court" (as people like to call them), reading a protection for blind people into the constitution where one doesn't exist. It's just a federal law. Congress passed it. It's not unconstitutional. Therefore Target is required to abide by it. If they break the law, injured parties have a case.
edit: thread's moving fast. added quote for clarity
ChadTower:
The question here, of course, is whether or not there is precedent for such commercial facilities extending to a website. They are not refusing to accommodate blind people - the store are all fully accommodating. The website may or may not be depending on whether or not accommodation is even defined for commercial websites. So it doesn't make it easy for some blind assisting software packages - does that constitute nonaccommodation in the eyes of the law and is the website legally required to be so?
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