Discussion
Shake Shack has changed the terms of service for its app, adding a "binding arbitration" clause that bans you from suing the company or joining a class action suit against it:
https://shakeshack.com/terms-conditions#/
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/10/27/shit-shack/#binding-arbitration
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@pluralistic Hmm ... "laws that protect *some* people but not the disfavored group". You and Mr. Wilhoit are on the same wavelength.
“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit:
There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind,
alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.
There is nothing more or else to it,
and there never has been."
~Frank Wilhoit, composer
https://crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/liberals-against-progressives/#comment-729288
#Conservatives #GOP #Republicans #Trump #Fascism #Authoritarianism #Meme #Memes #Quote #Quotes
As Luke Goldstein writes for *Jacobin*, the ToS update is part of a wave of companies, including fast-food companies, that are taking away their customers' right to seek redress in the courts, forcing them to pursue justice with a private "arbitrator" who works for the company that harmed them:
https://jacobin.com/2025/10/shake-shack-arbitration-law-terms-service/
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Now, obviously you don't have to agree to terms of service just to walk into a Shake Shack and order a burger (yet), but Shake Shack, like other fast food companies, is on a full-court press to corral you into using its app to order your food, even if you're picking up that food from the counter and eating it in the restaurant.
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This is an easy trick to pull off - all Shake Shack needs to do is starve its cash-registers of personnel, creating untenably long lines for people attempting to order from a human.
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Forcing diners to use an app has other advantages as well. Remember, an app is just a website skinned in the right kind of IP to make it a felony to add an ad-blocker to it, which means that whenever you use an app instead of a website, you are vulnerable to deep and ongoing commercial surveillance and can be bombarded with ads without you having any recourse:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/24/everything-not-mandatory/#is-prohibited
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Forcing diners to use an app has other advantages as well. Remember, an app is just a website skinned in the right kind of IP to make it a felony to add an ad-blocker to it, which means that whenever you use an app instead of a website, you are vulnerable to deep and ongoing commercial surveillance and can be bombarded with ads without you having any recourse:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/24/everything-not-mandatory/#is-prohibited
x
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Forcing diners to use an app has other advantages as well. Remember, an app is just a website skinned in the right kind of IP to make it a felony to add an ad-blocker to it, which means that whenever you use an app instead of a website, you are vulnerable to deep and ongoing commercial surveillance and can be bombarded with ads without you having any recourse:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/24/everything-not-mandatory/#is-prohibited
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That surveillance can be weaponized against you, through "surveillance pricing," which is when companies raise prices based on their estimation of your desperation, which they can infer from surveillance data. Surveillance pricing lets a company reach into your wallet and devalue your money - if you are charged $10 for a burger that costs the next person $5, that means your dollar is only worth $0.50:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/06/24/price-discrimination/
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