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Can Miami Really Ban Giant Puppets?Plus, why police say they're a menace.

By Brendan I. KoernerPosted Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2003, at 2:48 PM ET

Giant puppets: power to offendOver 100,000 protesters are expected at next week's Free Trade Area of the Americas summit in Miami. In anticipation, the city is considering an ordinance that would, according to Reuters, ban "glass bottles, slingshots, signs on wooden sticks and giant puppets." Can Miami really ban giant puppets?

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Probably not, and it's looking more and more like the city's going to temper its antipuppet plans. The police worry that the sticks used to hold the puppets aloft might be used as cudgels, or that the papier-mâché characters could conceal weaponry. The Miami City Commission initially considered an outright ban on the puppets, which have been a staple of antiglobalization protests for the past several years. But attorneys noted that such a sweeping prohibition wouldn't pass constitutional muster, since the ban could be construed as infringing on First Amendment rights. So, the second version of the city's antiriot ordinance, which comes up for a vote tomorrow, specifically permits giant puppets, provided that they are supported by lumber that "does not exceed 10 feet in length and 1-by-2 inches in width."

The city argues that legal precedent supports the legality of such size restrictions. In May, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld similar regulations in Vlasak v. Superior Court. In that case, a woman named Pamelyn Vlasak—née Ferdin, and famous for voicing Lucy in several Peanuts TV specials—was arrested at a 1999 animal-rights protest. She had been brandishing a "bull hook," a tool used by elephant trainers. A 1978 Los Angeles ordinance specifically bans any object that exceeds "three-quarters inch in its thickest dimension" at all city protests. The bull hook was 1.5 inches thick and thus deemed a potential safety hazard. Explained a Los Angeles deputy city attorney after the Ninth Circuit ruling: "If it can hurt an elephant, it has the potential to hurt a human being during a protest."

But puppeteers and the American Civil Liberties Union have complained that the restrictions amount to a de facto ban, since many of the puppets are too large to be supported by such short, skinny sticks. A purposeful ban—even a de facto one—could be ruled unconstitutional, so an amendment has been written that would scrap the limitations and allow giant puppets "so long as the lumber or wood is not detached from the puppets." The buzz is that the amendment will be tacked on to the ordinance tomorrow, along with a sentence that specifically permits the use of stilts shorter than 15 feet. The stilt bit comes about as the result of complaints from Miami's Caribbean community; the community's annual parades are famous for their brightly outfitted stilt walkers.

Bonus Explainer: Puppets have a long history of ticking off those in power and facing subsequent prohibition. In 1793, for example, the duchy of Saxony banned puppet shows as subversive, since the plots often poked fun at aristocratic corruption and vice. And the government of Napoleon III outlawed improvisation among French puppeteers in 1852, for similarly repressive reasons.

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Explainer thanks Randall Marshall and Lida Rodriguez-Taseff of the American Civil Liberties Union.

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Brendan I. Koerner is a contributing editor at Wired and a columnist for Gizmodo. His first book, Now the Hell Will Start, is out now.

Photograph of giant puppet in demonstration in Canberra, Australia, courtesty Agence France Presse.

COMMENTS

Remarks from the Fray:

The real "threat" is the embarrassment of seeing a huge GW Bush head, along with the other bozos whom the puppets seek to ridicule. It has already been reported that the President, upon hearing that he would be ridiculed in "effigy", declared that there was "no way in hell I'm traveling to Effigy."

But on the bright side, the ban on giant puppets may be the legal tool that Terry Schiavo's husband can use to keep Jeb's sweaty opportunistic, manipulating mitts off of her. Certainly, if Terry doesn't count as a giant puppet, I don't know what does.

The ban should also, if broadly interpreted, keep most of the media, punditry and ditto-corps away, being more like giant puppets than real people. And of course, no Brit Hume, the Puppet Who Became A Real Boy.

One might note that normal sized puppets are still permitted. This proviso was included so that complex policy positions can be explained to the President should he ever find himself in that city someday. See? These people do think out all the angles.

--doodahman

(To reply, click here)

I will start having respect for the ACLU when they cease their Python-esque pursuit of such farcial matters such as how large a stick can a puppeteer wield in a demonstration and actually start supporting the by Constitution guaranteed right to keep and bear arms that is infringed upon more and more every year.

Support ALL of the Bill of Rights, you fashionable malcontents, or support none of it..... Your "principles" should demand nothing less.

--kahcarrier

(To reply, click here)

(11/11)

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