COMMERCIALSPEAK ONLY!

Shhh . . . don't talk to strangers
By Kelvin Wade August 19, 2010

In 2006, Matthew Snatchko was arrested at the Roseville Galleria Mall for engaging three women in a discussion of faith. The pastor violated a mall rule that activities that had a 'political, religious or other noncommercial purpose' were to be only practiced in designated areas and then, only after an application was submitted four days in advance.

Snatchko was released when the prosecutor found him innocent of any charges. The pastor sued and a Placer County superior court judge sided with the mall.

Snatchko appealed and last week a three-judge panel of the 3rd District Court of Appeal said the rule instituted by Westfield LLC, which owns the Roseville Galleria as well as our mall, was unconstitutional.

According to the decision, Westfield's rule prohibited 'peaceful, consensual, spontaneous conversations between strangers in common areas' on topics unrelated to the mall. Can you imagine this? Conversations between strangers that didn't involve the mall were prohibited.

Obviously Westfield LLC didn't set out to set up an Orwellian system that monitored customers' conversations. Their intent was to keep customers from being harassed. The city of Los Angeles is in a multi-year battle with the Hare Krishnas in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals over panhandling at Los Angeles International Airport. Target has a policy that bans solicitors from the fronts of its stores.

Let's face it, when you approach a store and see a solicitor out front holding a clipboard or sitting at a table, unless they're Girl Scouts hawking those delicious Thin Mint cookies, it makes you want to turn around and shop elsewhere.

But to go so far as to say strangers aren't allowed to speak to each other about topics unrelated to the mall strays into the Twilight Zone. Get out of our heads.

Lest you think I'm exaggerating, when the senior general manager of the Galleria was asked in his deposition if a customer could walk up to a stranger in the mall and ask if they're supporting a particular team in the Super Bowl, he responded: 'You can go in and again fill out a third party access if that's what a person chooses to do.'

Really? You'd have to fill out an application telling the mall that you're going to be shopping there in four days and would like to be able to ask strangers sports questions? Can anyone at Westfield LLC be shocked that the rule was struck down?

I had breakfast at IHOP recently with one of my oldest, dearest friends. A woman stopped by our table on the way out to share a book with me she was reading on healthy eating.

I was polite and didn't toss a harvest grand and nut pancake in her face or ask why, if she was concerned about healthy eating, she was in an IHOP, or even inquire how she developed enough gumption to waddle her plus-size body to my table to lecture me on dietary habits.

While it was an unwanted interruption, the only thing worse would've been if the restaurant had a policy where you had to fill out an application to speak to a stranger and risk arrest if you didn't. Peace.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

ADDITIONAL NOTES: I hate to be solicited for things. I don't want people coming to my door. I don't like tables in front of stores. I don't like people walking up to me and trying to sell me anything. This is America 2010, there is tons of legit advertising everywhere. There's the internet. If I want something, I'll get it. I don't need the face to face hardsell. I don't sign petitions. I once was duped into signing a petition by the Lyndon LaRouche people. I don't sign petitions.

Still, I don't want a store to try to regulate what people can say. That woman who came up to me in IHOP, I don't need the store prohibiting what she can say to me. I'm fully capable of telling her to shove it. (Of course, I didn't. I'm a gentleman.......to a point.)

In the Snatchko case, what makes this more bizarre is the women who the Pastor spoke to agreed to talk to him. It was a store employee and security guard who told him to leave.

And look, if someone is harassing guests and following them and won't stop talking to them in a store, any business can ask that person to leave. Then, it's based on his/her behavior and not the content of speech. Is that too hard?