Freedom of Tackiness
A woman in Colorado says she was
evicted from her apartment for keeping her Easter decorations up too long.
I think I’m leaning toward her side, even though from the brief
description it sounds as though her display was unutterably tacky,
simply because I want to live in the sort of country where people can
show the world just how much taste they lack. And because tacky is
fun, in a tacky sort of way.
But the bit that caught my eye was:
“An Easter decoration is a religious statement and should be protected — even if it is just bunnies,” said her attorney, John Pineau.
Bunnies are a religious display? Who knew?
Huh? The landlord took it down, so she stopped paying rent? Arguments about tacky displays and building rules aside, that doesn’t sound like an appropriate response on her part, and eviction seems like a predictable outcome. I suspect there’s more to this than we’re hearing.
FTA:
Call me crazy, but I don’t think bugs care one whit about the differences, tangible or otherwise, between regular processed sugar on a door and super special sugar of the Blessed Peep on a door; they’re going to eat it either way and cause problems for everyone.
On the other hand it’s entirely possible Pineau the landshark is the one responsible for attempting to frame this as a religious argument and convinced Burdick this was the best way of winning the suit. “Zealous representation” and all…
Eamon Knight:
The way I read it was “Hey! He stole my decorations! Well, if he wants my rent check, he’s going to have to return them.”
Fez:
Yeah, that sounds like a lawyering tactic to me: defining bunnies as religious iconography in an attempt to mount a first-amendment defense.
If that works, can I declare plastic pink flamingos to be related to the FSM?
Sound to me like the landlord had a good case until he decided to lay his hands on the private property of his tenant. Of course, the correct response to that is to get the authorities involved, not to stop paying the rent. It sounds to me like the resolution will be, “You give her her bunnies back. You pay the rent and the late fees. Both of you, whack yourselves in the head with a wooden spoon.”
Jeez. Most of the time, I can’t imagine living under the tyranny of a home owners’ association. Then somebody like that moves in and makes petty dictatorship sound like a good idea. Why do people have to make life so hard?