Everyone knows that visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the most rewarding, affordable things to do in New York City, right?
Well apparently not, because a member of the MET and two Czech tourists filed a lawsuit against the museum Tuesday for false advertising. According to Reuters, “They argue the museum employs misleading signs and other techniques to dupe its 6 million annual visitors into believing they must pay to gain access.”
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Perhaps it would be helpful for visitors if the word “recommended” was denotatively defined in ten different languages like the “Get Help” signs in the subway. Perhaps it would be beneficial to have colorful pictures to show what “suggestion” means.
In all fairness, it does say “recommended” in small print under “admission,” which appears in larger, bold print. Yes, visitors are funneled into lines to the admissions desk where cashiers await to collect “entrance fees,” and such entry procedures could be interpreted as deceptive.
But what is this divergence of intellect when it comes to the meaning of admission and recommended? Is the combination of the terms a touch too much? Should a world-acclaimed art museum, housed in a Victorian Gothic style marble monument dumb down its admissions policy to the effect of “Pay-What-You-Wish” or better yet “FREE”?
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The museum’s rent-free agreement with the city mandates that it opens its doors to the public multiple days a week, although it is permitted to ask for a voluntary donation. The lawsuit claims that the MET deliberately deceives its visitors into thinking there is a mandatory entrance fee.
They are asking for an injunction as well as unspecified damages for all museum visitors who have paid with a credit card.
But, hey! Plaintiffs! The MET don’t cost a thing!
Add that to the list of crazy things tourists do!
