We Need A Law About This? 

Published Mar 18, 2025, 7:00 PM

The plight of a stubborn air traveller leads to questions about public shaming & other legal questions.  

Do we need a law about this? It's one more thing. I'm strong and getty, one more thing. So we got to figure this out as a society, either morally and culturally or actually legally, where we are on the whole. Somebody whipping out their cell phone and recording you and then what they can do with it and all that. Joe who almost went to law school is going to at some point say, there's no expectation of privaty privacy.

But you know, public place, You've saved me the trouble.

But that was that was that meant different, That meant something different when only if you were wanting to spend three thousand dollars on a on a moving video camera and carry it around, were you capable of videoing anybody? Now everybody can video everybody all the time. There was no reason to care about that particular rule.

Well, and that has more to do with the government, you know, surveilling you than anything. You cannot use someone's image and likeness for profit without their signing a release of some sort.

Did you know that? I think there are thirty states that are one party consent states for recording someone. Most states are not that not like California, where like, if we're gonna we we can't call somebody up on the phone like you could in the old days on radio, which was a lot of fun, call somebody up and put them on the air without them knowing it, or record them without them knowing it.

That's actually a different law. Those are two different questions. Yeah, airing somebody's a different question. How about just recording them? Just recording? Uh yeah, yeah, what about it?

I don't I don't think you should be able to record me without me knowing it. I don't care who you are.

Uh No. Although the counter argument is like if somebody's threatening you or defrauding you, or committing any other than there are dozens of examples, you're not allowed to get the proof of it that you need, Katie.

I So I have a question back to what you said, Joe, where you can't make a profit off of a video of somebody.

Else mm hmm. Theoretically, I mean, like, if you're in a documentary, they got to have everybody's got to sign a release right of some sort, although I don't know the fine print on that, so you know, don't start doing a documentary on my say.

So I'm just thinking about like those videos that go viral somebody puts on they're about to talk about.

So let's let's do this and then we can get into the specifics, because we're going to talk about this story which went viral a week or so ago. Maybe you've heard the outlines of it of a woman who wouldn't give up her seat on a plane to a child, and then some other woman took out her phone and recorded it, and the woman who wouldn't give up a seat became the bad person. Here's the here's a news report version of this.

Plane passenger is being publicly berated by a furious mom for refusing to swap seats with her toddler. Jennifer Castro was filmed calmly ignoring the angry mother's request after she boarded the Gol Airlines domestic flight in Brazil in December. When she boarded the plane, Jennifer found a toddler sitting in her window seat and asked him to move, which caused the tod to start crying. When she refused to move, the mother pulled out her phone and started filming Jennifer and said, I'm recording your face.

This is disgusting.

It's the twenty first century and people have no empathy for children.

So what happens from here is the mom posts the video of this awful human being who, in her words, who wouldn't give up her seat to the three year old one to sit at the window seat. Got to admit I probably would have given up my seat, but you don't have to posts it. It ends up with two point one million views as of this. The woman who wouldn't give up her seat gets, you know, out of the way that these people do and says she had to quit her job and was getting threats and couldn't walk down the street and emotional this and that, and is suing the airline for allowing this to happen. I don't know how the airline comes in. Yeah, okay, And then, but just in general, if I have the worst day of my life, and what would be a good example, Okay, yell at a waiter at a restaurant, not cool, shouldn't do it? But I do it, and somebody gets it on video and posts it, and I mean it material effects effects my life? Is that just a world we're going to live in forever?

Now?

Number one, throw your meal on them. If you're gonna go that far, just throw that meal right into their chest, okay, like Gordon Ramsay, like we were talking about the other day, Just push it right into their chest. They're wearing a white shirt to leave the mark. Uh wow, yeah, I don't, I don't. Are you talking ethics law?

Well, it needs to be dealt with either ethnically, morally or legally. All right, But if we're just gonna live in a world where your worst moment is up for grabs for anybody who has their phone out and they can just make you look like an ass clown to the whole world, affect your reputation, maybe your kids at school or your job. Everything is up for grabs all the time. Are we gonna put some sort of limits on this? Can we do we turn against this Somehow do we turn against people who whip out their phones and record this stuff? I doubt we can ever get there.

Yeah, well, you yourself have said as if I we need more shaming for avererant behavior in the modern world, not.

Less right, But uh yeah, let me try to think about well, yeah, this is this is the problem.

People with bad judgment get to do it too.

Whatever it is, right, So I I do believe that we need more shaming, not less. For like, you know, you're you're you should be ashamed of begging for money. I think you should be ashamed. You should really want to not have to beg for money.

Right, shame. But you should have your hair cut from your head and be paraded naked through town with a lady shaking a bell at you and shouting shame.

I agree completely, But shaming people for really just human nature, which is everybody loses their temper sometimes or whatever.

You have it in public like that?

Are you gonna are you gonna? Are you gonna hope to like never lose your temper in public ever in your life? Have you never lost the control? Yeah to be ashamed?

Yes, exactly quick videotaping Katie on it.

I don't know. I don't think I actually haven't. I don't think I have an instance of ever losing my temper in public that I would be like horrified to have on video. I don't think that's ever happened. So I'm using a I'm using a hypothetical that doesn't even apply to me.

So that this takes me back to my question, is if it racked up that many views. Whoever posted that video got some monetary blowback.

Right they are they are an influencer, or at least now they're an influencer.

So they they.

Weren't, They weren't an influencer before, but they become an influencer because they got, you know, millions of followers.

And if millions of people go to their page and start clicking on their other content, now it's a cash cow based off of this chick's situation on this plane.

So the question before me then is if something not for commercial purposes inadvertently makes money in Brazil and it happened in public, what are the laws on this emerging field. I don't have a fucking idea.

But we gotta, we gotta figure this out. I think we can't. We can't just operate this way. So this woman, so she gets on the plane. This is a sort of plane that's got assigned seats, and there's a little kid in your seat and you say, hey, that's my seat. Can I sit there? You have a window seat, you paid extra for a window seat, and.

The kid get a little slumber in huh.

The three year old starts crying because the three year old really wanted that seat. Mom should have paid for it. Mom asks would it be okay if my three year old sat in that seat? Like I said, I being a dad and have had, you know, kids on planes not the easiest thing in the world. I probably would have given up the seat, but you're not obligated to. I don't think it should be a you know, ruin your life for a while moment. If I say no, no, I'm gonna I'm gonna stay in this seat, and then they whip out their phone say you're really not going to give up your seat to this kid.

No, they're the dick, They're the a hole, as the Internet says. Now, was this a so we can sit together situation or was it just the kid prefers the window seat?

Yes?

No, no, no, no, there's a there's a seat number on the kid's ticket put their ass in it.

Yeah. Yeah, Well that's the mark said. Really gone viral. You'd be hounded all across the country.

Be kind of worked up to that.

The Internet decided that the woman that wouldn't give it up her seat is the bad person.

That's what the Internet decided. By far up the Internet. It's evil, Michael, you're saying something my mom or dad would have said, no, you got to get in that seat. This nice person, that's their seat. You can sit over here. Yeah. Yeah, gosh.

I wish my parents would have videoed their last flight.

They were taking first class from San Francisco back to Boise, and apparently the couple in front of them had a three year old that they were soft parenting. This kid was this kid was slapping her dad and one didn't want the cheerios but wanted the Nutter butters and all, and and she's screaming at the top.

Like two or three.

And the reason the age is totally relevant because the mom grabs the daughter and puts her in her lap and goes, how do you feel right now? Let's let's get talk about your feelings. And my dad's my dad is texting me she's fucking two.

Yeah, it was sharier feelings.

Yeah, I don't know, angsty, conflicted on we on on we exactly. I just Dad, There are times Mom, I just I don't know why I bother.

Yeah, that's that's a tough one because I mean, kids when they're little, and if you got a special needs kid, they can act all kinds of different ways and you're just trying to get to your destination. So I don't I don't know. But I did see one one time with some teenagers who were back talking their dad, and I could not believe the shit that dad took from these two teenagers. I would have drugged them off the plane. I don't care what our plans are, Ye, we ain't going we're waiting for the next plane back home, or if this is our homework staying home. I can't believe he put up with that, and he threatened several times, Oh yeah, I want to take away your car, Go ahead, dad, I don't care. And then kids would laugh, just laughing at him. I just it was, it was, it was. I was embarrassed for this dude.

He was trying to end the trip as quickly as possible. I get it.

I would have gone to that great length and expense to drag their ascides off that plane. No, I don't care how to do.

What ends?

Huh to what end? If you're not getting what you want, that would be my end. And what they wanted was to go wherever they were going.

Oh yeah, I'm just thinking if they were going home, what are you going to prolong the trip?

Put him in jail, put him in an orphanage.

I had to hit the emergency slide and pushed him off, put him in the overhead compartment one of those boot camps.

But exactly exactly. But anyway to my original point, you guys are making the argument for me. You think the woman who didn't give up her seat didn't do anything wrong. She edited her life turned upside down. We have to come up with a mechanism keep this rappening, don't we in the modern world where everybody's carrying around a video recorder.

Again, my understanding of Brazilian law is cursory at best. But if you do it and distribute it for the purpose of damaging a person's reputation and or financial well being, then you got a tort right there.

Wow, so that's that's a good one, and you would almost always be posting it to damage the person's reputation.

Yeah correct, Oh yeah, that's practically assumed. I mean, what else are you going to do? I'm hoping this gets posted and in the next five minutes she becomes aware of the reaction and lets my kid look out the way. No, no, it's purely to hurt them.

See there, are accounts out there that's this one guy. I'm not even going to say his name because I hate his existence. But he's dedicated to figuring out who people are in viral videos and doxing the hell out of them, putting them on display their workplace, tagging their profiles and everything. And I think that type of shit should be illegal because you are reminding somebody's life.

My kid's going to law school right now. I'm going to tell her. Look, I will finance your law office. What we're going to do is when people seek to damage people's reputation unjustifiedly because you know, you got to win the jury. Generally, that's what we'll prosecute.

Yeah, uh oh, bird flu.

Basically, that guy's using a cell phone as a weapon. Yeah, it's you.

Know, well, yeah, as a weapon, because she whipped that out with the idea that okay, you're going to be intimidated now that I'm videotaping you and give up the seat. So yeah, it's absolutely a weapon.

And did you say she had she had a platform before she filmed this or she don't think so.

I think she became an influencer after she got the two million, and she's attractive, so.

Great that always the hot ones sounds like a beachh to me, Jack, Have you ever lost your temper in public and said do you know who I am? I'm Internet famous? Or I guess she said, I'm Instagram famous. One.

Remember that. If I ever had the words do you know who I am? Come out of my mouth, I would be embarrassed. To my core, I'd hang myself. What was I gonna say about that? Do you know who I am? Instagram famous? I had a point. Have you ever sent call law having a platform? Por having a platform prior?

Oh?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, so the whole influencer thing. So I'm like a shoe company and I'm going to pay her to wear my shoes, thinking I'll sell more shoes now.

Yes, unfortunately, because she's one millions of dollars of business done on that in that way. Yeah.

Remember the most famous woman on a plane that lost her mind a year or so ago is the one pointing at the guy in the back of the plane. You don't exist, he's not real or whatever the hell happens. Yes, and she, uh, she She's got tons of followers. Fun, what do you follow?

I follow her on Twitter and the other day, she posted a screenshot of it. Oh yeah, she got banned from American Airlines for that whole situation, and she got an email from American Airlines saying that you have twenty five thousand points that you haven't used, and she she captioned it, who's gonna tell them?

That's pretty funny, that's amusing.

Yeah, I can't believe you follow her, Katie, I do, you're not real?

Well, I guess that's it.

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