Body part valuation and other things Disney

Browsing the headlines today (while I should have been doing something much more productive with my time) I came across a brief article about Disney being sued for scalding coffee being dropped onto a man’s lap (http://channels.netscape.com/ns/crime/story.jsp?floc=FF-APO-1110&idq=/ff/story/0001%2F20030911%2F000731356.htm&sc=1110&photoid=20030905CADD115). Now, I find most things associated with Disney to be rather disgusting in the first place. Thinly veiled gratuitous self-promotion in the form of horrid movies taking their tiles from Disney’s own professional sports teams tops my list of things despicable about that little empire. But I also have a problem with people suing for their own inability to take responsibility for their actions (e.g. the woman who sued McDonald’s for spilling coffee on her own lap, obese people suing fast food for making their couch potato lives worse, smokers suing tobacco companies, then stepping into the courtyard to light up during the recesses, etc.). However, that is not the case in this particular incident. This man had a pot of coffee accidentally dropped on him while dining and it scaled and eventually discolored his genitalia. This raises the question, then, of how much the normal coloration of your genitalia, or other body parts for that matter, is worth. He is getting 668 grand for it, minus the 1/3 the lawyer, who, incidentally, has probably not had his genitalia discolored by scalding hot coffee, takes as his fees. I wonder how this amount was actually calculated by the jury. I imagine that the logic of the deliberations must have included his domestic situation: He’s 33, already married, one child. What I wonder is if he were single and childless, would he have received more, based on the idea that discoloration of the genitalia would prevent, or at least severely discourage, potential mates. And by that logic, could I get a cool million for my own? The only way to adequately value such things would be through the setting up of a futures or exchange market. There are, in effect, such markets for most internal organs, but these need to be expanded to include others to be truly effective in litigation of this sort.

In other things Disney, is my favorite thing about Tokyo Disneyland – it’s cursed, at least according to numerous people I’ve spoken with in Tokyo. It seems that young couples who venture to the Magic Kingdom on Tokyo Bay find themselves without relationships shortly after such an outing. This is attributed to the fact that after taking out the necessary loans to pay for entrance to the park, you get to stand in slow moving queues and delve into the depths of your partner’s soul. What I enjoy most about this idea is that some of the people who have experienced this phenomenon have actually been with their partner for a great deal of time, but didn’t know the other well enough to realize they had so little of interest to offer. It would seem to me a quiet dinner somewhere with limited distractions would do the trick, and be much cheaper. But then they wouldn’t have the benefit of being able to fill awkward silences with comments about how hot it is.