5 ms·

"A spokesperson for MSG reiterated in a statement that safety is their highest priority and that facial recognition is just one of the methods they use. MSG Ent

"A spokesperson for MSG reiterated in a statement that safety is their highest priority and that facial recognition is just one of the methods they use. MSG Entertainment also said it is confident their policy is in compliance with all applicable laws, including the New York State Liquor Authority." Why do spokespersons frequently speak in non-sequiturs? They simply underline the absence of any good argument. I hope it isn't because many people don't realize this, though I fear it might be so. I also hope the second sentence will turn out to be as logically incoherent as the first.

voidmain0001 4y ago
This explains why MSG called out the NYSLA - https://www.forbes.com/sites/justinbirnbaum/2022/12/07/madison-square-garden-could-face-disciplinary-action-on-liquor-license-after-billionaire-dolans-ban-on-lawyers/?sh=73c019001ad0 https://www.forbes.com/sites/justinbirnbaum/2022/12/07/madis...
- mannykannot 4y ago
  Thanks for the link. Notice that there is no claim here that it is a safety issue. If MSG fears certain employees may reveal things it does not want known, it should constrain those employees from contact with the public within its venues.
  - pixl97 4y ago
    Yea, I would go on to state that MSG is 'fucking dumb'. Now, I don't know how things work in NY, but at least where I'm from the lawyers do not go to your place of business and ask questions. They go to the courts and put in a filing for demands. If anyone shows up to question employees it's going to be private investigators that are seemingly unaffiliated and you won't know to block them in the first place (NY law might be different here). To me this screams "MSG is doing illegal/contract breaking shit"
    - cryptonector 4y ago
      Of course lawyers ask questions outside of courtrooms and court filings, though you're right that they would send private investigators rather than lawyers to... investigate.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
jerf 4y ago
Because it works. Human brains are fairly bad at detecting non sequiturs. Even with practice it is still hard, because the brain does not want to activate the expensive rational thought system unless there is a good reason. If you can get it to activate that expensive system, it is often then easy to see through, but that is a tall bar.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > Human brains are fairly bad at detecting non sequiturs. I think it's more that we automatically try to fix them. If you asked somebody to recall and reproduce those sentences after reading them, they would unconsciously add information to what they recalled until it turned into a reasonable defense.
  - joveian 4y ago
    I suspect another part is just that people only have so much time to read and consider such stories and all they really need to do is make it seem like the situation is more complicated than it seems (which sometimes is actually the case). I tried a quick search for any studies on what people actually think about these company statements but couldn't find anything; another possibility is that people do easily recognize them as BS but that so few people ever see any particular news article that it doesn't really make any difference. I think printing BS company (and politician, etc.) statements as is, often at the end of an article, is a major issue affecting the reputation of journalism. I don't know the full history but it is related to defamation issues that need to be taken into consideration in some way. I think the situation is something like: printing the company's response makes it much harder for the reporter/publication to be sued for defamation and so the easiest thing to do is to just attach the response as-is without further consideration. They could (and IMO should, and occasionally do) ask questions like "how does this statement relate to the question we asked you" but companies mostly will just ignore such questions (they can print that and I think usually do if they actually ask the question). There can potentially be unexpected complications that arise if they press the company that make the story more difficult to write and/or defend legally. I don't know how much of it is legal considerations if there is a lawsuit vs a kind of unwritten agreement not to push to hard to avoid lawsuits. It partly relates to these quick stories that publications don't want to put much effort into, but even long expensive articles don't seem to have a good record IMO. They do seem to just hope that people will recognize it as BS but even when that is the case printing BS affects their reputation as well. The Forbes article that voidmain0001 mentioned linked to this routers article: https://www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/madison-square-garden-doubles-down-plaintiffs-lawyer-ban-even-after-it-backfires-2022-11-15/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/madison-square-g... It seems the lawsuit that prompted the ban is minority shareholders suing the wealthy family who were the majority owners of two business they recently combined.
robocat 4y ago
> second sentence will turn out to be as logically incoherent as the first The key part of the second sentence: they are confident. Tricky to argue just how confident they are.

voidmain0001 4y ago

This explains why MSG called out the NYSLA - https://www.forbes.com/sites/justinbirnbaum/2022/12/07/madison-square-garden-could-face-disciplinary-action-on-liquor-license-after-billionaire-dolans-ban-on-lawyers/?sh=73c019001ad0 https://www.forbes.com/sites/justinbirnbaum/2022/12/07/madis...

mannykannot 4y ago
Thanks for the link. Notice that there is no claim here that it is a safety issue. If MSG fears certain employees may reveal things it does not want known, it should constrain those employees from contact with the public within its venues.
- pixl97 4y ago
  Yea, I would go on to state that MSG is 'fucking dumb'. Now, I don't know how things work in NY, but at least where I'm from the lawyers do not go to your place of business and ask questions. They go to the courts and put in a filing for demands. If anyone shows up to question employees it's going to be private investigators that are seemingly unaffiliated and you won't know to block them in the first place (NY law might be different here). To me this screams "MSG is doing illegal/contract breaking shit"
  - cryptonector 4y ago
    Of course lawyers ask questions outside of courtrooms and court filings, though you're right that they would send private investigators rather than lawyers to... investigate.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

jerf 4y ago

Because it works. Human brains are fairly bad at detecting non sequiturs. Even with practice it is still hard, because the brain does not want to activate the expensive rational thought system unless there is a good reason. If you can get it to activate that expensive system, it is often then easy to see through, but that is a tall bar.

pessimizer 4y ago
> Human brains are fairly bad at detecting non sequiturs. I think it's more that we automatically try to fix them. If you asked somebody to recall and reproduce those sentences after reading them, they would unconsciously add information to what they recalled until it turned into a reasonable defense.
- joveian 4y ago
  I suspect another part is just that people only have so much time to read and consider such stories and all they really need to do is make it seem like the situation is more complicated than it seems (which sometimes is actually the case). I tried a quick search for any studies on what people actually think about these company statements but couldn't find anything; another possibility is that people do easily recognize them as BS but that so few people ever see any particular news article that it doesn't really make any difference. I think printing BS company (and politician, etc.) statements as is, often at the end of an article, is a major issue affecting the reputation of journalism. I don't know the full history but it is related to defamation issues that need to be taken into consideration in some way. I think the situation is something like: printing the company's response makes it much harder for the reporter/publication to be sued for defamation and so the easiest thing to do is to just attach the response as-is without further consideration. They could (and IMO should, and occasionally do) ask questions like "how does this statement relate to the question we asked you" but companies mostly will just ignore such questions (they can print that and I think usually do if they actually ask the question). There can potentially be unexpected complications that arise if they press the company that make the story more difficult to write and/or defend legally. I don't know how much of it is legal considerations if there is a lawsuit vs a kind of unwritten agreement not to push to hard to avoid lawsuits. It partly relates to these quick stories that publications don't want to put much effort into, but even long expensive articles don't seem to have a good record IMO. They do seem to just hope that people will recognize it as BS but even when that is the case printing BS affects their reputation as well. The Forbes article that voidmain0001 mentioned linked to this routers article: https://www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/madison-square-garden-doubles-down-plaintiffs-lawyer-ban-even-after-it-backfires-2022-11-15/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/madison-square-g... It seems the lawsuit that prompted the ban is minority shareholders suing the wealthy family who were the majority owners of two business they recently combined.

robocat 4y ago

> second sentence will turn out to be as logically incoherent as the first The key part of the second sentence: they are confident. Tricky to argue just how confident they are.