Rashomon and Divorce Mediation

One of my favorite movies is Rashomon. It is an Akira Kurosawa in which a crime witnessed by four individuals is described in four mutually contradictory ways. The film is based on two short stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. The word Rashomon is now commonly used to describe the effect of the subjectivity of perception on recollection, by which observers of an event are able to produce substantially different but equally plausible accounts of it. I just heard it used today on NPR and I made my daughters watch the movie so they would understand the word. It is seen often in popular culture and has been used on All in the Family, Grey’s Anatomy, Happy Days, The Simpsons, How I Met Your Mother and many other TV shows. I once tried a case where a women was hit by a car as she was walking in a cross walk. There were three witnesses and each saw a different color traffic light. I am surprised I have not blogged about the Rashomon Effect before because it happens all the time in marriage and divorce. There is not much a mediator can do about the Rashomon Effect but recognize the effect and to have the parties agree to disagree. Neither party will ever convince the other party. They must Accept and move on.
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