Americans have a history of fearing what foreign dictators might do to them.
During World War II they feared that the Japanese Empire might turn them into a nation of Japanese-speaking slaves.
During the Cold War, TV ads often reminded Americans that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev once said: “We will bury you.”
Today, Americans–especially those on the Right–fear Iranian Ayatollahs will force them to wear turbans and quote the Koran.
Strangely, few Americans seem to fear the ayatollahs much closer to home: Landlords.
The power of landlords calls to mind the scene in 1987′s The Untouchables, where Sean Connery’s veteran cop tells Eliot Ness: “Everybody knows where the liquor is. It’s just a question of: Who wants to cross Capone?”
Many tenants have lived with rotting floors, bedbugs, nonworking toilets, mice/rats, chipping lead-based paint and other outrages for not simply months but years.
Even in San Francisco–the city misnamed as a “renter’s paradise”–landlords are treated like gods by the very agencies that are supposed to protect tenants against their abuses.
Many landlords are eager to kick out long-time residents in favor of new, wealthier high-tech workers moving to San Francisco. An influx of these workers and a resulting housing shortage has proven a godsend for landlords.
In July, 2014, a 98-year-old San Francisco woman faced eviction from her apartment of 50 years, because the building’s owners wanted to sell the place to take advantage of the city’s booming real estate market.
“I’ve been very happy here,” Mary Phillips told KRON 4, an independent San Francisco TV station. “I’ve always paid my rent. I’ve never been late.”
The landlord, Urban Green Investments, sought to evict her and several other tenants through the Ellis Act. This is a 1986 California law that allows landlords evict tenants to get out of the rental business.
Urban Green Investments has bought several buildings in San Francisco, evicted their residents through the Ellis Act, and resold the buildings for profit. Many of those being evicted are low income families and seniors.
Phillips vowed to fight her eviction: “They’re going to have to take me out of here feet first,” she told KRON. “Just because of your age, don’t let people push you around.”
Phillips said she has nowhere else to live, and she and her attorneys fought the eviction. They did so not only through the courts but ongoing street protests.
Those efforts paid off in November, 2014. As part of the resolution of her case, Phillips released the following public statement:
“Mary Elizabeth Phillips has reached an agreement with Urban Green Investments that will allow her to live in her apartment for as long as she likes, through the end of her life.
“Mrs. Phillips appreciates the support she has received from the community over the past year, and she requests that interested people please respect her privacy so that she may peacefully enjoy her home. Thank you.”
That case, at least, had a happy ending. But tenants at an apartment complex in Winter Garden, Florida, may not prove so fortunate.
The Windermere Cay has forced new tenants to sign a “social media addendum” that threatens a fine of $10,000 if they give the complex a bad online review. It also forces tenants to sign away their rights to any photos, reviews or other material about the apartments that are posted online.
The Windermere Cay
The addendum went viral on March 10 after at least one tenant shared it with the online magazine, Ars Technica. It reads in part:
“In the event that this Social Media Addendum is breached by any or all of the Applicants for any reason, the Applicants shall be jointly and severally liable to pay Owner liquidated damges representing a reasonable and good faith estimate of the actual damages for such breach.
“Owner and Applicants agree that, in the event of a breach, Owner’s damages would be difficult to ascertain.
“Accordingly, Owner and each Applicant agrees that the amount of compensation due to Owner for any breach of this Social Media Addendum will be $10,000 for the first such breach, and an additional $5,000 for each subsequent breach….
“In the event of breach, the Applicants will pay the liquidated damages owed to Owner within ten (10) business days of the breach.”
In addition, there is this: “Applicant will refrain from directly or indirectly publishing or airing negative commentary regarding the Unit, Owner, property or the apartments.
“This means that Applicant shall not post negative commentary or reviews on Yelp!, Apartment Ratings, Facebook, or any other website or Internet-based publication or blog.”
The reaction to this attempted muzzling of freedom of speech has been one the landlord probably didn’t expect. Yelp! has been flooded with negative reviews of the complex.
One five-star review–obviously written tongue-in-cheek–was signed “Adolf H[itler]” and praised the complex for having “my kind of management.”
There will be more about online reaction to thie latest attempt at landlord censorship in Part Two of this series.
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LANDLORDS: AMERICA’S AYATOLLAHS: PART TWO (END)
In Business, History, Politics, Social commentary on March 12, 2015 at 1:11 amBecome a tenant at the Windermere Cay complex in Winter Garden, Florida, and you can check your First Amendment rights at the door.
Its management wants to force new tenants to sign a “social media addendum” as part of their lease. And if they dare to post a negative online review of the building, they’ll face a fine of $10,000.
But reaction to this attempted muzzling of freedom of speech has been one the landlord probably didn’t expect.
Yelp! has been flooded with negative reviews of the complex.
Among these:
If you are that worried about negative reviews, that just makes me ask one question: What are you hiding?
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This complex made national news by threatening a $10k fine to residents if they share a bad review or photo. This legal bullying demonstrates either an oppressive management or a complete ignorance of social media or personal freedom.
In both cases you should exercise caution if considering them and read your contracts carefully.
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I’ve got a great business idea. When our customers complain, instead of us fixing the problem we will threaten them with blackmail by asking them for ten grand.
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Sieg Heil Windermere!! Gestapo much???
What century do you people exist in?? I wouldn’t live here if you paid me to. You couldn’t give these units away considering your BS threats to FINE RESIDENTS TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS!!!
WTF is wrong with you people!! Anyone who gets a paycheck from this corporate monstrosity should be fired (or quit if they have half a brain…). Whoever came up with this super clever idea of A 10K FINE should be kneecapped.
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Well apparently anyone who lives here will get fined $10,000 for any bad reviews, and any photos posted on reviews are copyrighted to the company by terms of the lease???
This complex is about as dishonest as it gets guys. If an apartment needs a policy like this then what else do you need to know about the quality of the management here.
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The owners of the Apartment Complex are literally anti-free speech Nazis. Don’t move here unless you have $10k in your bank account and don’t believe in the First Amendment.
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This apartment complex deserves 0 stars, shame on the management company for deceiving people into signing their addendum.
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Be cautious of anywhere that fears the residents’ honest feedback so much that they forbid them from speaking out on social media. The energy spent on creating this stupid 10K clause could have been spent on actually creating an enjoyable living experience.
Click here: Windermere Cay – Apartments – Yelp
The sudden onslaught of bad publicity obviously caught the complex by surprise.
When contacted by Ars Technica, the online magazine that had exposed this outrage, a manager disclaimed the contract:
“This addendum was put in place by a previous general partner for the community following a series of false reviews. The current general partner and property management do not support the continued use of this addendum and have voided it for all residents.”
This despite the fact that the addendum had been given to a tenant to sign just a few days before.
Not only have these strong-arm tactics yielded a tidal wave of bad publicity, such an addendum would be legally unenforceable.
For starters, it’s a blatant violation of the First Amendment, guaranteeing freedom of speech and the press.
States have taken struck down efforts by businesses to censor the written opinions of their customers.
In his 2003 decision in New York vs. Network Associates, a judge ruled that telling customers they couldn’t publish reviews of software “without prior consent” violated New York’s unfair competition law.
Americans all-too-often take their Constitutionally-protected freedoms for granted–until they travel abroad to nations ruled by dictators. Or until they encounter would-be dictators at home.
Harrison E. Salisbury, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, faced the difficulties of censorship during his years as Moscow bureau chief for The New York Times (1949-1954).
Harrison E. Salisbury, with the Kremlin in back
Salisbury found he couldn’t rely on the Soviet government for reliable information on almost everything. Crime statistics weren’t published–because, officially, there was no crime in the “Workers’ Paradise.”
Unable to obtain reliable economic statistics, he plotted the rise and fall of the economy by shortages and surpluses in local stores.
Above all, Salisbury faced the danger of reporting accurately on the increasing paranoia and purges of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
“The truth, I was ultimately to learn,” wrote Salisbury in his bestselling 1983 memoir, A Journey for Our Times, “is the most dangerous thing. There are no ends to which men of power will not go to put out its eyes.”
Censorship victimizes both those who are censored and those who could profit from the truths they have to share.
Americans may be unable to bring freedom of expression to nations ruled by dictators. But they can–and should–fight to ensure that freedom of expression remains a hallmark of their own society.
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