> "How do I get out?" she nervously asked. I followed her back up to the hatch, where some Agents did their best to calm her down, but firmly reminded her that no one would be allowed to leave until the end. She seemed a little upset, but I saw her later and it seemed that she'd happily embraced the Stockholm syndrome.
I don't mind the trespassing so much, but activities without safe words aren't cool.
What's the "safe word" for an long (think international) flight? What's the safe word for a deep-enough-to-require-decompression scuba dive? What's the safe word for a roller coaster? A parachute jump? There are lots of things which, once embarked upon don't have any "easy" ways out apart from seeing them through to the end.
From TFA "To remind you, this is an event with some legal and physical risks. If you are uncomfortable with these risks you should not attend. Really. Once the event begins you cannot leave for two hours."
They made it clear enough - in my opinion. If you're the sort of person who needs a safe word for all your activities, you shouldn't attend that sort of event (or do any of many things which are hard or impossible to "back out of" once started).
Fair point; there are some activities that it is simple not feasible to terminate at a moment's notice. But this wasn't one of them: standing between the woman and the end of a claustrophobia-induced panic attack wasn't the laws of nature but two goons scared of the legal consequences of their actions. Helluva difference.
And remember, even if the woman knew in advance she was at least somewhat claustrophobic, the exact nature of the physical and legal risks were unknown: maybe the woman would have been fine if they had been climbing up ladders onto an abandoned rooftop instead of down ladders into an abandoned subway.
While you (and anigbrowl below) are both right - in that my counter examples all involve some sort of physical inevitability of the "lock in" - I'm not sure that's necessarily a hard requirement to enforce this kind of lock in. From the "real world" there's things like journalist lock ins at political events which're much the same - a voluntarily agreed upon limitation that's not enforced by the fact that you just stepped out of a plane or descended 120 feet under the sea, but which are no less "enforced".
I'm of the opinion that an event organiser is perfectly entitled to put these sorts of restrictions on participants ability to exit an event (within some reasonable bounds), and so long as it's clearly enough explained before participants agree and attend, a "claustrophobia-induced panic attack" should be no more or less of a concern for event staff than it'd be on an international flight. The sufferer should be extended all sympathy and assistance - but the decision to "break the agreement" should be of the same sort of level as diverting a Sydney to San Francisco flight to Hawaii, sure you'd do it in the face of a clear and imminent medical emergency - but there's a certain (and perhaps large) level of discomfort which passengers are rightfully expected to "put up with" as part of the agreement. People who're "afraid of flying" and prone to panic attacks understand that, and make appropriate decisions (for them) all the time. From the article's "and it seemed that she'd happily embraced the Stockholm syndrome." it sounds to me like she accepted "the rules/agreement" in the end, while perhaps regretting the choice was in this case incorrect for her - the very negative use of the phrase "Stockholm syndrome" implies to me that she thinks the event organisers and the "two goons" did the right thing.
I'm sure other people think differently - and while I respect that different opinion - I'm not sure I agree that every event ever organised needs to cater to every possible latent bad reaction. _I_ want to be able to attend events that challenge my personal limits of comfort/security/sanity/whatever. I'm happy enough for those things to have clearly and strongly worded warnings - but I'm unhappy with someone saying "that's not a restriction imposed by a law of nature, so you can't impose it as a requirement of an event you run".
Trapping a person inside a building by force, when otherwise they would be physically capable of leaving, on the other hand, could easily be construed as criminal kidnapping. In this case, kidnapping in order to obstruct justice may even be arguable.
Sure. I'm not arguing against "it could easily be construed" and "it may even be arguable" (though I think you're seriously stretching there). If this was a regular nightclub with no prior agreement/requirement about exit policy, you'd be completely unarguably right.
My questions are: Are there circumstances in which it would be considered appropriate? And what sort of notification do you have to give in advance before it could be widely considered appropriate?
Where I come from, the government considers it appropriate to "lock up" journalists for 6hrs on a voluntary basis in return for privileged early access to information about the federal budget: http://ministers.treasury.gov.au/DisplayDocs.aspx?doc=pressr... I'm not sure how the exemption for "except in case of emergency" is applied, but I reasonably sure it's closer to the "OK, divert the flight from San Francisco to Honolulu" grade "emergencies" rather than claustrophobia or panic attacks.
If I, as a competent adult of sound mind, wish to _choose_ to put myself in a situation where someone will "trap me inside a building by force, when otherwise I would be physically capable of leaving" - what steps does an event organiser have to go to to not be accused of wrongdoing when they do exactly that?
While I'm happy enough that I'd agree to be "bound" by an event invitation instruction saying "To remind you, this is an event with some legal and physical risks. If you are uncomfortable with these risks you should not attend. Really. Once the event begins you cannot leave for two hours." - I can understand that some people might think that's not "enough".
If there are any people reading who disagree that statement is sufficient to justify the actions on the part of the event staff in the article - what would you consider "sufficient notification/agreement"? (Or do you think restricting my ability to choose to be able to go to that sort of event is "right"?)
Ok, last one for me. I think we just fundamentally disagree and that's that in the end.
I'm using the phrase 'safe word' very specifically here. When there is a consensual abridgment of rights or safety, there needs to be a way to distinguish between escape attempts which are part of the play, and a serious withdrawal of consent or change of circumstances. We don't actually know that the woman in the story really wanted out of the hole in the ground. Maybe she was just disappointed with the concert when she found out the full details and wanted to go see a movie instead. Maybe she was having a full blown panic attack from being underground and felt like she was going to die if she didn't get out. Maybe she just had to pee. Maybe she was just testing and wanted to be turned back, wanted to feel trapped because it added to the allure of the event. Mostly we don't know because the author of the article wasn't reporting on her, she was just a background character in the story of the concert to add ambiance. "Oooo, we were totally trapped down there, one woman tried to leave and they wouldn't let her."
In my opinion, striving for absolute pre-consent is wrong, dangerous, and stupid. What if the woman needed to leave because her baby-sitter had just called to say she was leaving and her children were now unattended? What if she was having a life-threatening medical problem (asthma, diabetes, heart condition...)? What if her brother had just been in a car accident, and was at the hospital dying? I assume there are conditions under which you would agree she should leave, even if she agreed not to beforehand. There are situations under which they will turn a plane around, and there are situations under which they will have a diver make a rapid ascent and deal with the consequences later.
In my opinion, a severe panic attack is fully horrible enough to warrant leaving. If it happened in a prison, I'd call it cruel and unusual. We can't know what someone is subjectively experiencing, and it's also very hard to know what someone is physically experiencing with respect to medical conditions, so it should always be within the rights of an individual to declare that the situation has changed and withdraw previously given consent.
> "it may even be arguable" (though I think you're seriously stretching there)
He's not stretching - it's one of the very textbook definitions of kidnapping, forcibly preventing someone from leaving a situation. Put it this way, if I, as a paramedic, am on scene of someone who has a medical need, but is of sound mind, if they say "no, I want to get out of this ambulance" - even if we are going lights and sirens to the hospital - for me to refuse leads me to charges of assault, kidnapping, and malpractice.
FWIW, my "it may even be arguable" objection was to the specific "on order to obstruct justice" part of this claim: "In this case, kidnapping in order to obstruct justice may even be arguable."
In _my_ opinion, anybody who argues they've been "kidnapped" if being told they can't leave an event which advertised itself saying "once the event starts you won't be able to leave for two hours" is most likely being unspeakably self centered and disrespectful of everybody else's time and rights. Sure, there are exceptions - and if event staff _really_ tried to enforce the agreed-upon no-exit policy in the face of medical emergency or obvious external need, perhaps "kidnapping" would be the right (or one of the useable) legal remedies, but going down that path for claustrophobia or panic attacks will result in me judging you in a _very_ unfavourable light - in much the same way as I'd be extremely unhappy to have my flight diverted for a panic attack.
In your professional/ambulance case, there's at least one big difference - people don't specifically get asked to agree up front that once they get in the ambulance the deal is they agree not to get out until the end of the ride. And I've got a question - where does practical reality come into conflict with your risk of getting charged? If I demanded to get out of your ambulance immediately, whould you stop and let me out in the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge or the Lincoln Tunnel?
You are talking about matters of etiquette & consent. Consent can be granted, but it can also be revoked. The woman in question apparently ceased her attempts to leave when presented with two bouncers who intimidated her in some way. This in itself may be, in American legal parlance, 'assault', the threat of force, used instrumentally in order to accomplish kidnapping. But it begs another question: What exactly would have occurred if the woman had not taken 'no' for an answer? The men were there to tell her not to leave. The men were chosen for their physical characteristics that conveyed an implicit message of 'we are able to restrain you if we have to'.
Your examples involve physical impossibility or significant physical danger, and are not a good comparison for an event where the non-departure rule is merely strategic.
"I don't mind the trespassing so much, but activities without safe words aren't cool."
Consent goes both ways; if you're told beforehand that you're not going to be allowed to leave, then it's selfish to put everyone else at an increased legal risk that they didn't sign up for.
I don't mind the trespassing so much, but activities without safe words aren't cool.