But he never, you know, nobody ever, nobody ever said to Van Gogh, ‘Paint a Starry Night again, man!’ You know?
–Joni Mitchell, Miles of Aisles
Did you know that some cops commit crimes? What about the limits of Artificial Intelligence, constrained by garbage in, garbage out, providing algorithms that are either grounded in racism by proxy or manipulated to prove the belief that, since there can be no such thing as a disparity between races, the results are faked to align with fantasies?
Did you know that cops, of all colors and genders, are more afraid of young black guys than anyone else, and so respond too quickly to fear and kill them? Did you know that prosecutors understand their fear and don’t prosecute them?
Some of you want another story about a cop who stopped a woman and coerced her into oral sex on a dark stretch of road. Some want another story about how blacks are disproportionately targeted by the racist criminal justice system, proving systematic racism permeates our world and we must tear everything down and replace it with . . . something.
In the comments to a post, some newcomer will feel compelled to inform us of their critical belief of what more we need to know, what was left out of a post that cannot be left out. Why some tangent demands our attention. Not that it hasn’t been discussed, often at far greater depth than it deserved, but that he doesn’t know it and so it doesn’t exist in his universe.
I get emails, constant emails, on stories, cases, ideas that I have already written about. “I thought you would be interested in knowing” something. Sometimes I am. Most times, it’s something I’ve already written about. Sometimes, I’ve written about it a hundred times before, in its various permutations. There is nothing more to say about it.
But if it’s not on the front page, it doesn’t exist. It never happened.
A law student asked me the other day if I could write more about the practice of law in the trenches. I told him I had, for years, done exactly that. He was not to be put off. Do it again, man. This time for me.
My pal, Jake, wrote me about another effort at AI, this time from the NYPD, to which I snarkily replied, “How cool would it be to write the same thing over and over?” Jake, who invented the Sentence-o-Matic 1000, got it. And I got where he was coming from, as he’s a tech guy and realizes both the benefits and detriments the delusion of technology brings to law.
But what more could I add? There are a million stories of interest about the law, but if I can add nothing to them, what am I to do? Is there an insight missing that bears revealing? Is there something wrong, some lie, that’s being passed off as real without anyone willing to call it out? Is the story so outrageous that it demonstrates some important point that needs to be made?
One of the things I’ve never done here is repost old posts. Sure, I’ll link to them for background, or to include by reference the points I made so I don’t have to repeat them for the n00bs. Not that most of you use the links to figure out why I’ve done so. I can see, from my side of the computer screen, just so you know.
Many other bloggers do so, repeat old posts, even update them on occasion. Since my reason for doing this is for my own purposes and not yours, it would make little sense for me. If I’m here to write, then reposting makes no sense. But if that fails to sate your desire to see yet another post about a dirty cop or AI, or the thousand of other things I’ve written about since the day SJ opened shop in 2007, then go find somewhere else to play.
I really don’t need to listen to your complaints that I’m not serving your needs, writing the stories you want me to write about. I may never have painted a Starry Night, but I surely don’t want to listen to your demand that I paint another one.
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It’s hard enough for me to keep up with the new posts and comments, I just don’t have time to go back and read years of old stuff. Occasionally I will click one of the links and read the older stuff and, maybe, when I have more time I will make it back to the beginning and read all of them from start to finish. but by then I may be getting them from the internet archive.
It took me over a decade to write. I have no expectation that anyone would spend that much time reading.
I think you should write about the sex life of lawyers:
I have nothing to add that Jackson Browne hasn’t already said. A lawprof sent me a book to review that included a sex scene involving a Supreme Court justice. I have still gotten over it.
Felicia Herman.
“Great – just what I need. Another book to add to the To Read Queue.”
Dear Felicia. I haven’t heard from her in a while. I hope she’s happy and doing well.
Be careful. People might begin to think you’re outgrowing your shitlord phase.
Her former husband was a very dear friend, and Felicia was kind enough to bequeath me Joel’s Hawaiian shirts.
I was told there would be donuts.
You were supposed to bring them.
Chill. We promise not to ask you to cut off an ear and shoot yourself in a cornfield just to establish your “red” period. Since you don’t like repeating yourself, choose one.
We? You and the clones?
Psst, got any of those bootleg SJ posts that never made the set list? If so, and you also keep a “working post title ideas folder” it might be time to unshackled the algorithms on yourself….
P.S. Fuck Van Gogh, Guido van Rossum was Benevolent Dictator for Life until he gave it up last summer. You should head on over to Amsterdam and look him up before I get special permission to unleash all the comedic power of Python on my grand jury hypothesis.
PLAY FREE BIRD!!!!!!
People visit church every week, and the minister delivers the same prayer – just for them. Perhaps people come to your church not just for the topic and content, but also the experience of normalcy, comfort and regularity.
In a world gone weird and absurd, this is a little slice of what we were used to, complete with the cranky “get off my lawn” yells. This is a safe space.
I guess sometimes it sucks being a thought leader…and being mistaken for a ‘same ole’ song’ leader. I’ve always found it rather strange…a kind of blind narcissism…how people could be sooo nice and buttery when trying to get you to play their favorite song, by their favorite performer, and then get downright pissy when you say no…like someone once said, ‘people suck’.
The point i wanted to make was, from where i sit ( and i know, i don’t see how much ‘fan mail’ you trash) you have friends rather than fans. You KNOW you could have way bigger numbers…. there are millions out there right now waiting for you to think FOR them, Jordan…?
It appears you’ve done pretty well in cultivating a small but loyal audience that are mostly patrons of the art of thinking. I see you as a blawging version of Richard Thompson…as in, you don’t go expecting to hear your favorite song, you go wanting to hear what he’s up to now. Not a bad place to be, amirite?
Maybe i’m just blinded by my own experience but I’ll take 10 people around a camp fire that say ‘give us what you got’ over 100 that say that dreaded phrase…over and over and over and….
(funny-not funny…but these 2 songs also nicely encapsulate my half-assed musical career)
I would like to say that I never consider what anyone else thinks about what I write, and just do whatever I want to do, but it’s not entirely true. Some of it musing, some informational, some persuasive, often for the sake of others (particularly reporters or judges, who may not comment here but read SJ) to provide an alternative to mindless crap of the echo chamber.
So there’s method behind the madness on occasion, but never so much as to distort what I do here for the sake of popularity. I was far more mainstream in the early years, when this was pure crim defense and never mentioned anything that could be construed as politics or culture war. But as I see they can no longer be separated, and the damage done by the culture war to law (and thinking, in general), I find myself spending more time writing things that more and more people do not want to read. If I screamed “everything is racist and sexist” in each post, I would likely be far more popular among a certain crowd. They problem is it’s not true, so I’ll have to live without their approval. Sucks to be me.
A few times a year, I’ll spend an hour or two on a quiet Sunday going back and reading your posts from years ago. Thank you for all that you have taken the trouble to say, and for all you’ve taught me in the process. It’s not a “tummy rub,” I sincerely appreciate your work.
I hope you found it worth your time.
I don’t know from WordPress.
Does it (theoretically) allow article “tags”? (“Title IX”, “But for Video”, lawsplainer, yadda yadda) That’s the only answer that comes to (my) mind when you say “I’ve written about X before, go look it up”. And it’s too late for more than a decade worth of articles.
Heck, as far as I know, there isn’t even a headline index or navigate-to-date feature. Best we have is “leave a datestamp in the url and hope you’re lucky.”
And yeah. Pass these questions on to whoever helps you with your site. The only answer I need is when a new feature pops up on your site. Or doesn’t.
Would it be too ironic, given this post, for me to say I’ve fully explained many this before? Did you think this post was meant to ask you, who no doubts knows tons more about this than I ever could, to “fix” my problem with whatever the first thing that popped into your magnificently brilliant mind?
The Germans have a word for world-weariness, a sadness that reality will never fit the ideal mental image of what the world *should* be. I hope you’re not experiencing weltschmerz. I read Simple Justice every day, because there’s something interesting posted every day. Most times it’s something I care about, rarely it’s not.
I hope you’ll continue to find things you consider interesting enough to write about, I certainly enjoy reading about them.
Have a good Saturday.
Every night I’m weary. Most mornings, the need to write burns. Writers gotta write. I can’t promise that what interests me will always interest you, but there’s almost always something that makes me need to write about it. Have a good Saturday yourself.
As one your long time daily lurkers/readers, thank you for taking the time and expense. I don’t comment out of the adage of not making people stupider. Your posts make me the opposite of stupider just about every day, and they’re appreciated.
I love Joni Mitchell, and I’ve never even met her. Points for doing what she’s doing. You too.
I see you’re in one of your moods again. Dr. SJ failed to kiss you this morning?
Let me guess: You do what you do (write what you write) because you are OCD, and have too much time on your hands. You are finished with courtrooms and such nuisances. Dr. SJ, sensing your frusteration, put this little idea in your head to write a blog and you ran with it.
Now you cannot stop. Old lawyers never die. They just lose their appeal. It’s a terrible curse.
To our benefit, I should add. Every day we’re getting better in every way, in spite of the chaos and nonsense surrounding us. Guys named Jeffrey will write books about the Mueller non-report. Judge Kopf will continue handing down non-empathic sentences in his stoic, Teutonic manner.
Hillary may yet throw her hat in the ring, against all advice to the contrary. Pocahontas may renounce her Indian heritage and admit her mistake. Stranger things have happened.
Did you ever consider writing about the weather? Everybody talks about it, but nobody does anything about! We follow the weather assiduously here at BB Headquarters. We just had a mild “cyclone bomb.” Bet you never heard of that?
So Clarence broke his three-year silence? So now he gets a paycheck! Still, we bet on him voting against that black prisoner in ol’ MISS. He is not very empathetic, that one. An Oreo cookie, if you ask me? When will the Deep South stop fighting the Civil War and subscribe to the Constituition in its original intent?!?
Have a gooday, mate.
Dr. SJ never fails to kiss me in the morning. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t tire of me by 7 am.
About a month ago I googled some jackass I encountered in real life. It turns out you had written about something stupid he had done in 2006.
Surprising what you might find in the bowels of SJ sometimes.