(This isn’t the guy. I think it’s his son…)
Longtime reader and commenter Neil Dorr chided me today for writing so much about the post-election media, political, and legal ethics breaches going on, and not as much on the types of topics I tended to cover on the old Ethics Scoreboard, now an archive of an earlier time when I thought a few posts a week could cover the topic of societal ethics. I was more innocent then, and I also had to depend on a webmaster: I posted more essays in the first year of Ethics Alarms than the entire output of the Ethics Scoreboard. Neil said he missed posts like the one about “the Lobster Hat”. I have to say, I don’t think there have been many posts likethe one about the lobster hat, which was one of my occasional “a day in Jack’s strange life” posts. I had forgotten about it completely. I tracked the decade old post down, however, and for Neil, and anyone else who is interested in lobster hats, here it is..
Today I accompanied my wife to a doctor’s appointment that she was dreading, and while we were checking in with the receptionist, a large, rotund fellow with a long white beard walked in to do likewise. On his head was what appeared to be a large, red lobster…a hat of sorts, though not a very seasonable or practical one. It was spectacular, however, with two large claws that drooped down about eyebrow level, and an impressive tail in the back. If I were ordering this specimen at Jimmy’s Harborside in Boston, it would be about a four-pounder.
I was amused at this unexpected sight, and said to my wife, loud enough so Lobster-topped Santa could hear me, “See? You think you have medical problems. This poor guy has a lobster attached to his head!” To my surprise, the man turned sharply and looked at me with a furious glare, snorted, and walked out the door, clearly offended, exactly as if I had said, “Wow! That’s some harelip you have there!” or “Gee, where does a guy as fat as you buy suits?”
This makes no sense to me, and more than that, I think it’s unethical conduct. It is understandably rude to make personal comments to strangers, call attention to their oddities, or stare. But there is such a thing as implied consent. When someone wears, for example, a clown outfit, he or she is presumably doing so to attract attention, and those who indicate that they are taking notice should be relieved of the obligation to do so unobtrusively. Choosing to wear a red ball on the end of one’s nose, or Groucho glasses, or the old arrow-through-the head gag is the exact equivalent of wearing a sandwich board bearing the words, “Look at me! Notice me! Be amused!” Wearing these things and then appearing offended when others do as they have been asked is a bait-and-switch. It’s a dirty trick.
Now, this man had a lobster on his head in a doctor’s office. If it had been a psychiatrist’s office, I suppose, I might have thought twice about commenting on the lobster, but it wasn’t. Perhaps the plush red crustacean really was attached to his head, and he was having it removed. Or maybe the lobster hat is an emblem of his religion, and he takes it very seriously. Could it be that he didn’t know there was a lobster on his head, and someone had secretly replaced his real hat as a cruel joke? Any of these admittedly unlikely scenarios would have justified his negative reaction, but call me suspicious: I don’t believe it. This is a man who voluntarily appeared in public in provocative and mirth-inspiring head-gear and behaved as if I was a boor for mentioning it. His conduct was analogous to a woman who comes to work naked and asks indignantly, “What are you looking at?” I call foul. She knows damn well what I am looking at, and if she didn’t want me to look, she would have worn an overcoat.
Admittedly they won’t come into play very often, but just in case you are tempted to wear a lobster on your head in my presence, here are some simple ethical guidelines:
1. Don’t intentionally dress or act funny if you have no sense of humor. Wanting to both maintain dignity and privacy while wearing comic accessories is a conflict of interest.
2. If you do go out in public wearing a lobster (or reasonable facsimile, including cloth lobsters and crayfish), you have a duty to understand that it will be taken by many as an indication that you are seeking comment. Responding negatively to those who take it as such is the equivalent of denying an evident fact, and is therefore dishonest.
3. If, by some strange set of circumstances, the lobster on your head has a serious purpose, you have an ethical duty (the duty of candor) to so inform those who see you, either before or after they try to engage you in light-hearted banter. “I think you should know that I wear the lobster hat to honor my late brother, who was eaten by a rogue lobster 20 years ago today,” is always appropriate if true.
4. You have an obligation to learn your culture’s comic images so you will not publicly proclaim to others a degree of levity and openness that you do not in fact possess. Among those things that will attract light commentary or jest if displayed in public in the United States in 2007: stilts, hula skirts, medieval armor, orangutans, facial tattoos of the Three Stooges, codpieces, horse costumes, chicken suits, and “John Kerry in ’08” buttons.
Oh yes…and lobster hats.
Learn those four easy rules, and neither of us will embarrass ourselves.
Ethics Alarms 
Had you considered it was a lobster with a oversized, endomorphic, humorless, hairy wart on its ass?
Dammit, you beat me to it.
Lobster Lives Matter©™®
The frog on the head of the guy who walks into a bar joke!
Once belonged to the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) and, frankly, we OFTEN went into public places, if not in armor, at least in costume. We did this because we were actually TRYING to encourage comment and dialogue. Actually attracted many new members that way.
If someone still dresses like it’s the 90s do you encourage them or ridicule them as any good citizen would?
I gotta be honest with you, I’m so fashion unconscious I probably wouldn’t recognize the difference. I’m still wearing jeans and T-shirts. A lobster hat does kinda stand out, though. I would have joined Jack.
That is very cool.
It was fun, too. We held tournaments and got to beat on one another with swords made from rattan.
https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/800/0*5dC7BRPi0laF49-3.
That’s me protesting Bank of America during Occupy Wall Street. I made up a cool sign that read, “Stop hoggin’ the trough.”
Make a comment. I dare you.
404 Error?
Try this one, HT. https://occupylascruces.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/315625_2018413501173_1268941255_31712387_364531839_n.jpg?w=700&h=
Works!
Does the same reasoning apply when someone comes to work in highly sexually provocative attire- such that certain body parts are conspicuously pronounced?
That example is in the piece, no?
Sort of but you used an unlikely extreme. I once had to send a subordinate home to change fearing her attire was borderline suggestive. I wrestled with that decision feeling the need to balance her ” rights” for lack of a better word – and the likelihood that her attire would be a distraction to me and others. The crux of the issue is where does a male’s responsibility to avoid any appearance of objectifying sexually a woman when that female purposely dresses in a manner known to attract both wanted and unwanted attention.
Ok, then the answer is yes. A woman who dresses to attract attention cannot condemn men for paying attention. It still doesn’t justify lewdness or rudeness. And gentlemen don’t stare. Or drool.
While fighting mightily to avoid anatomical specificity, the well bred would heed the timeless advice of Jerry Seinfeld:
“Looking at cleavage is like looking at the sun. You don’t stare at it. It’s too risky. Ya get a sense of it and then you look away.”
Is it ok to ask “Are those real?”
I’d call that rude.
And you really shouldn’t have to ask….
No, I’m not stupid enough to do that even in a bar.
Agreed. I feared no lewdness just a significant distraction such that people would stop by and lingrer interrupting the workflow. Such behavior is non-productive but can lead to unwanted attention no matter how “gentlemanly” the behavior. It’ s just costly.
“The crux of the issue is where does a male’s responsibility to avoid any appearance of objectifying sexually a woman when that female purposely dresses in a manner known to attract both wanted and unwanted attention.”
Just because a female dresses in a manner likely to attract attention, the odds are that the person she is trying to attract is someone other than you, so unless you have good reason to believe it is you she is specifically trying to attract then use your self control that everyone has (but many choose not to use) and just totally ignore her manner of dress.
I am married with no interest in others. This person was dressing for another but I saw a regular flow of others stopping by to chat.
Also, as a manager I have a duty to protect my organization from any behavior that creates a hostile workplace which is often defined by the object of desire.
I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say you personally, I should have written people in general and you’re right, in a workplace a manager can’t rely on everyone using their self control so having stricter appearance rules is often necessary.
It depends, right? What was the attire? Some people go ballistic over bare arms, others over too much cleavage. And some men could get turned on by a bare ankle.
snark/ Some Muslims think the eyes alone are too much… /snark
for a “classic” Japanese, a view of the nape of a neck is enough of an invitation.
Link no work. Ok, go here more fun anyway.
View at Medium.com
One time I was an ear of corn. https://twitter.com/FarkleUp/status/673450335592026114
I almost related that photo to some of the costumes at the woman’s march. I decided that might be in bad taste.
Do you ear what I ear?
Corny.
Make Ethics Alarms Talk About Lobster Hats Again
METAL HA?
MEAT L HA…
Erg fat fingers.
MEAT ALHA
Wait a minute… take out the… EAT HALLAL?!?!? Illuminati confirmed!
Chris: Jump forward three years and see “The Amazing, Depressing . . .” April 28, 2020 comments.
There’s something a little bit creepy about a guy that wears a lobster hat in a doctor’s office. First, it might freak out the kiddies if they’re any in there. In a bar where they serve seafood it might be appropriate if the guy is Irish and has a very red face. I myself forego wearing goofy hats with horns, a pig’s snout, or antennas but I suppose it’s a matter of taste.
Thanks to you, Neil. I needed a laugh, and got one!
Jack, just for fun, what else can you dredge up from the Scoreboard (not to be confused with Drudge… we have enough of that)?
Intelligent humor is precious in at time that seems to have neither
I’ve worn silly accessories, never going as far as costumes, It was often to cheer myself up during bad times, and I REALLY wanted to talk about cheerful topics with anyone. My guess is that he was planning to say the same thing you said and you stole his punchline. That pissed him off, and so the glare. He wanted a fresh audience because he had no come back and wasn’t as funny as he thought he was…
He should have been wearing a pink Crustacean, ala Jimmy Buffett.
Hmmmm. Did anyone else see the “lobster,” or are you losing it? Or, maybe you’ve entered into a higher level of consciousness, and only you can see all the lobsters on our heads?
Your link to the decade-old post does not actually link to the decade-old post.
Thanks for the heads-up: it does now.
HEY: Sorry everyone, for the bad link to to the original essay. It is fixed.
Jack,
I didn’t see this until this morning and it made my day. Thank you!
-Neil
Thank you. I had literally forgotten about it completely.
Also don’t be surprised at getting photographed or asked for photographs. The man in the uniform of the Flying Tigers (maybe on his way to an airshow) shouldn’t be surprised if a military buff wants to take a shot of the impressive jacket, and the woman dressed up as Belle (costume party) shouldn’t be annoyed if someone’s little girl wants a picture with her.