On Civil Disobedience, Drones, Street Art, and Being Bold

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I enjoy seeing people using art and technology to make change. Reconciling that desire with my oath to uphold the law isn't easy and I struggle with it constantly. I think the first step is knowing what the law is and what your rights are. Only then can you push back effectively. Whether or not he consulted with an attorney, KATSU certainly knows what he faces every time he goes outside with a spray can. That knowledge is the difference between art that matters and art that’s just taking up space. That’s the difference between being bold and being reckless. KATSU decided that saying something, knowing that he could go to jail for it, is more important than saying nothing and being safe.

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Marvel's Daredevil Gets Young Attorneys Right

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My problem with TV lawyers extends beyond my thin skin. I find those portrayals to be wildly incorrect, bearing little resemblance to what I see in the mirror every day or out in the real world with my colleagues. Lawyers are just people, after all, not robots or monsters. Too often on TV they’re slimy dirtballs or driven idealists. They’re used as the butt of jokes or as obstacles the hero has to overcome. On the rare occasion humanity is allowed to poke through, it’s often to decry the awfulness of the profession or the corruption in the judicial system. What Daredevil gets right is that for many of us, it’s not like that.

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Avoid Legalese In Your Contracts, Live A Happier Life

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Avoid Legalese In Your Contracts, Live A Happier Life

Lawyers think that because they went through expensive and grueling training (and law school is expensive and grueling, make no mistake), they need to create a barrier between themselves and you, the client, to justify all that they went through. So they invent obscure, arcane, and impenetrable language to create that barrier. Worse yet, they've been doing it for so long that everyone thinks that contracts and other documents used in business have to be written that way in order to be legally binding. 

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Attorney For Chris Kyle’s Killer Is Concerned That American Sniper Will Harm His Client. He Has A Point.

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Attorney For Chris Kyle’s Killer Is Concerned That American Sniper Will Harm His Client. He Has A Point.

J. Warren St. John, the defense attorney for Eddie Ray Routh, the former marine who killed American Sniper Chris Kyle at a shooting range in 2013, recently gave an interview to The Hollywood Reporter complaining that the popularity of the film American Sniper will prevent his client from getting a fair trial. According to St. John, the film lionizes Kyle and as a result, it will be harder to find a jury that isn’t influenced in some way by the film’s portrayal.

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When The Movies Get It Right: Spielberg's Lincoln Understands The Law Better Than Most Movies

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Before I started law school, I labored under the same misapprehension that many people do: that the law is a fixed thing with clearly delineated lines between what’s permissible and impermissible. I just assumed that law school would teach me where that line was and what sat on either side of it. My rude awakening occurred very early on in torts class when my professor’s canned response to any hypothetical from the class was “it depends.”

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