Laws

WTF Fun Fact 12687 – The Problem With Pointing Out Baldness

A UK judge just ruled that using the word bald as an insult in the office is now considered inappropriate because it’s a word more likely to apply to men than women. (While outlets keep reporting that calling a man bald in general now constitutes sexual harassment, that’s not what the ruling said.)

But the employment tribunal also compared calling a man bald to commenting on the size of a women’s breasts (which, well…I guess we’ll all just have different opinions on that one).

According to CNBC’s coverage of the ruling:

“Three members of the tribunal who decided on the ruling, and alluded to their own experience of hair loss, said that baldness was more prevalent in men than women. Therefore, they argued that the use of the word ‘bald’ as an insult related to a ‘protected characteristic of sex.'”

And we get it, but it’s worth pointing out that we’re all now extremely aware that women can experience baldness as well (alopecia, the Will Smith slap…anyone remember that?).

The case was brought by Tony Finn, who was an electrician for the British Bung Manufacturing Company. He was fired last year and a threat from his shift supervisor is part of the complaint. The supervisor called Finn a “bald c—”! And, no, the main problem was not the second word.

The insult was deemed a “violation against the claimant’s dignity, it created an intimidating … environment for him, it was done for that purpose, and it related to the claimant’s sex.” Again, we’re talking about the world “bald” here, not the C-word.

According to CNBC:

“The tribunal members also suggested that it was not the use of profanities that was the issue, with Finn also having being found to use such language in the workplace: ‘Although, as we find, industrial language was commonplace on this West Yorkshire factory floor, in our judgment Mr King crossed the line by making remarks personal to the claimant about his appearance.'”

Finn will now receive compensation from the company, but the amount has yet to be set.
– WTF fun facts

Source: “Calling a man bald counts as sexual harassment, UK judge rules” — CNBC

WTF Fun Fact 12639 – Prosecuting Space Crime

Pretty soon, it may be illegal for Canadian astronauts to go on crime sprees in space.

Now, we’re pretty sure that’s not why Canadians become astronauts in the first place, but apparently, you can never be too careful.

So, what’s this all about? Well, Canada just proposed an amendment to the country’s Criminal Code in their no-doubt riveting 443-page Budget Implementation Act in the House of Commons. It basically states that any crime committed in space by Canadians will be considered to have been committed on Canadian territory and punished accordingly. In other words, if you commit moon murder as a Canadian, you better not come back.

Interestingly, Canada has been preparing for space crime for a while now. Their Criminal Code already lays out prohibitions on crimes Canadian astronauts may commit during space flight to the International Space Station. accounts for astronauts who may commit crimes during space flights to the International Space Station.

Canada is part of the Lunar Gateway Project, a NASA-backed orbiting space platform. Part of that plan includes a trip to the moon, and apparently, the government wants to make sure Canadians maintain their reputation for being polite even among extraterrestrials.

The proposed code change reads:

“A Canadian crew member who, during a space flight, commits an act or omission outside Canada that if committed in Canada would constitute an indictable offense is deemed to have committed that act or omission in Canada.”

There are two interesting questions at play here – 1) who controls space justice, and 2) what gives a country the right to say space in their territory for prosecutorial purposes?

If you think space crime is absurd, there have already been accusations that have raised questions (however, no crime actually occurred). In 2019, astronaut Anne McClain was accused by her estranged spouse, Summer Worden, of improperly accessing bank records from the International Space Station. But McClain was later cleared after her spouse admitted to lying.

Still, it made people wonder how we might prosecute crimes in space, where no one technically owns territory (yet) and no one has jurisdiction.

Now, we already have some guidelines for international space law, believe it or not. According to CBC News:

“‘There are five international treaties governing activities in space but the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, ratified by Canada and more than 100 other countries, is the most relevant when it comes to dealing with alleged crimes in space, wrote Danielle Ireland-Piper, an associate professor of constitutional and international law at Australia’s Bond University. ‘As for the question of who prosecutes space crimes, the short answer is that a spacefaring criminal would generally be subject to the law of the country of which they are a citizen, or the country aboard whose registered spacecraft the crime was committed.'”

But things might be different if the astronaut-on-astronaut crime occurs between two different nations. In that case, there might be some disagreement about which country is able to prosecute the space offender. – WTF fun facts

Source: “Crimes on the moon could soon be added to Canada’s Criminal Code” — CBC News

WTF Fun Fact 12570 – The Telephone’s Real Inventor

In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was one of a handful of men who were working on a machine that transmitted vocal communications telegrphically. But we only remember him because he got to the patent office first (and he was already a well-known inventor).

Historians and government officials have since reexamined the research and found that Bell wasn’t actually the first to create the world-changing technology. That honor goes to an Italian-American immigrant and mechanical genius from Florence, Antonio Meucci.

In fact, in 2002, U.S. Congress recognized an impoverished Florentine immigrant as the inventor of the telephone rather than Alexander Graham Bell. The Guardian reported, “Historians and Italian-Americans won their battle to persuade Washington to recognize a little-known mechanical genius, Antonio Meucci, as a father of modern communications, 113 years after his death.”

“It is the sense of the House of Representatives that the life and achievements of Antonio Meucci should be recognized, and his work in the invention of the telephone should be acknowledged,” the resolution stated. (You can read the resolution (107th Congress, H Res 269) on Congress.gov.)

While you might think there was a mad dash to the patent office, it’s actually the case that 16 years went by between Meucci’s demonstration of his “teletrofono” in New York in 1860 and Graham’s 1876 patent.

However, it was Bell’s telephone design that ended up being used to create the first telephones, so he does deserve some pretty massive credit. It’s just that Meucci deserves some and well and never really gets it.

The title of the most annoyed competitor of Bell’s likely goes to Elisha Gray, a professor at Oberlin College. He actually sent his lawyer to the patent office on the same day. Bell’s lawyer got to the desk first on February 14, 1876. His filing was the fifth entry of the day, while Gray’s lawyer was 39th. The U.S. Patent Office awarded Bell with the first patent for a telephone (US Patent Number 174,465).

Some historians actually claim that Bell knew what was happening and may have bribed someone at the patent office to doctor documents showing his patent came in first, but we’ll probably never know. – WTF Fun Fact

Source: “Who is credited with inventing the telephone?” — Library of Congress

WTF Fun Fact 12569 – Idaho’s Cannibalism Prevention Law

An Idaho statue reads:

TITLE 18
CRIMES AND PUNISHMENTS
CHAPTER 50
MAYHEM

18-5003.  CANNIBALISM DEFINED — PUNISHMENT. (1) Any person who wilfully ingests the flesh or blood of a human being is guilty of cannibalism.
(2) It shall be an affirmative defense to a violation of the provisions of this section that the action was taken under extreme life-threatening conditions as the only apparent means of survival.
(3) Cannibalism is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison not exceeding fourteen (14) years.

So, our first question is: only 14 years? That seems lenient.

But perhaps even more interesting is that because Idaho is the only state with a law so explicitly addressing cannibalism, it’s also the only state in which the act is legal in some cases. Go re-read #2.

Basically, if you ingest human flesh or blood under extreme life-threatening conditions and it is your apparent means of survival, you’re all good. We imagine this could create some interesting legal loopholes.

Source: “Did you know that these ‘odd laws’ existed in Idaho?” – Associated Press

WTF Fun Fact 12568 – Georgia’s Fried Chicken Law

Gainesville, Georgia has gone to great lengths to establish itself as the “poultry capital of the world.” They’ll even “arrest” a 91-year-old woman for eating fried chicken with a fork instead of her fingers.

Ok, so the arrest was staged by a friend. Still, an ordinance in Gainsville says everyone must eat fried chicken, “a culinary delicacy sacred to this municipality, this county, this state, the Southland and this republic,” with their hands.

A little overstated, the ordinance is, of course, tongue-in-cheek. It was devised as a publicity stunt in 1961 in the hopes of getting enough attention that people would come to think of Gainsville as the fried chicken capital of the world. We’re not sure what the competition looks like for that title.

It turns out you really can be arrested for violating the ordinance, though no city in their right mind would spend taxpayer money taking it to court.

It did, however, make for a good birthday joke back in 2009. Ginny Dietrick was visiting from her home in Louisiana for her 91st birthday. While eating lunch at Longstreet Cafe, Gainesville Police Chief Frank Hooper strolled in and told Dietrick she was under arrest for eating her fried chicken with a fork.

We’re not sure surprising a 91-year-old that way is the best course of action, but her friend, Gainsville resident A.C. Marshall thought it was a great way to celebrate. Of course, it was all a practical joke, and Marshall set up her official pardon on the spot by inviting Gainesville Mayor Myrtle Figueras to the Longstreet Cafe.

“You are required to come back to Gainesville often and are required to eat lots of Gainesville chicken,” Figueras told her.

Luckily, Dietrick got more out of it all than just a scare. According to the Gainsville Times, Abit Massey, president-emeritus of the Georgia Poultry Federation, ordained Dietrick an Honorary Georgia Poultry Princess. We’re not sure what other rights and honors come with the title.

This was Dietrick’s first poultry-related run-in with the law. She did recall getting some sort of parking ticket in the 1940s.

According to the Gainsville Times:

“Dietrick’s arrest citation ordered her not to get up from the table until she mastered the proper techniques for consuming this succulent delicacy, ‘down to and including the licking of the fingers upon the ingestion of the last available morsel.'”

Presumably, she had a good attitude about it. We’d like to see someone try to order us by law to eat a certain way. – WTF Fun Fact

Source: “Visitor arrested for eating chicken with fork” — Gainsville Times

WTF Fun Fact 12560 – The First Fingerprint Conviction

In 1910, Clarence Hiller confronted an intruder in his home, tackling him as both men fell down the stairs. Hiller was then shot, and the suspect ran away.

Paroled 6 weeks prior, Thomas Jennings was convicted of the crime. He was stopped by police when they saw he was wearing a bloody coat. But that wasn’t what got him convicted.

While investigating the scene of the break-in, police noticed that the intruder had grabbed a freshly-painted railing while boosting himself into the Hiller family’s window. They cut off the piece of the railing as evidence and presented it in court, comparing it to Jennings’ fingerprint.

Criminal justice scholars have proved that the way we use fingerprint evidence is not always in the best interests of justice, nor are fingerprints always accurately interpreted. In fact, our fingerprints even change over the course of our lifetimes, so an old fingerprint may rule out an actual criminal caught decades later.

But in 1910, this type of evidence was a first for a criminal case and the jury needed to be convinced that each person’s fingerprints are unique. Unfortunately for Jennings, that proof came from his defense attorney.

W.G Anderson rightly questioned the use of such poorly-understood evidence to convict a person, but it was his own fingerprint that would convince the jury of his client’s guilt.

Anderson challenged the forensic experts to lift his fingerprint from a piece of paper. They did. But his big plan was to solicit fingerprints from the general public to show just how shoddy the science of fingerprinting was. Alas, we do all have unique fingerprints and while there are often problems in our interpretations, this little experiment did nothing but convince the jury that fingerprint evidence was solid.

Of all the fingerprints collected, none looked like Anderson’s. The jury voted unanimously to convict Jennings, who was sentenced to hang.

In their coverage, The Decatur Herald noted that “the murderer of Hiller wrote his signature when he rested his hand upon the freshly painted railing at the Hiller home.” –  WTF fun fact

Source: “The First Criminal Trial That Used Fingerprints as Evidence” — Smithsonian Magazine

WTF Fun Fact 12450 – Singapore’s Gum Laws

Have you ever sat on a park bench or at a table in a public library only to have to Google “how to get gum off clothing” later on? For some reason, it’s one of those things that people still feel free to stick wherever they’d like. And now that we’ve spent the last few years learning so much about germs, it seems extra disgusting.

Well, Singapore is having none of it. None at all. To keep the country free of the gummy scourge, they’ve banned it altogether. You can’t import it or sell it. So any gum you get in Singapore is either illegal smuggled in or medicinal in nature.

The gum ban was introduced in 1992 by Singapore’s first prime minister Lee Kuan Yew. It became one of the only things foreigners knew about the country at the time, which was reportedly pretty annoying for the leader. But his goal was to create a today, pristine country that would turn into an international business hub and bastion of good behavior.

“We were called a nanny state,” Lee told the BBC’s Peter Day in 2000. “But the result is that we are today better behaved and we live in a more agreeable place than 30 years ago.”

Now, if you’re over 40, you may remember the story of American teenager Michael Fay. He was sentenced to 6 lashes with a cane (a pretty severe form of corporal punishment) in Singapore. It caused a strain in international relations between Singapore and the U.S. But, in fact, Fay was being punished for a ten-day vandalization spree during which he spraypainted cars and damaged and stole road signs. It had nothing to do with gum. In fact, caning has never been a punishment for gum chewing in Singapore.

Singapore has some other tidiness and good behavior laws as well, such as bans on graffiti, jaywalking, spitting, and everyone’s personal favorite “expelling mucus from the nose” (in other words, blowing snot rockets). Frankly, we’d be into banning that in public as well.

Another fun fact? You are legally required to flush a public toilet after use in Singapore.

Ok, so back to the gum. After so many years of having the law in place, Singapore has relaxed a bit. But that’s probably because no one really wants to risk it anymore. Since it’s illegal to sell it, the only gum you’ll see is at pharmacies. Licensed doctors and registered pharmacists can sell medicinal gum (such as nicotine gum) with no issues. But if you get caught spitting it out on the street, you can expect some trouble. – WTF fun facts

Source: “Why Singapore banned chewing gum” — BBC News