Disclaimer

“This is a public service announcement. This is only a test. Emergency evacuation protest. May impair your ability to operate machinery. Can’t quite tell just what it means to me. Keep out of reach of children. Don’t you talk to strangers.”—Green Day, October 3, 2000, Reprise Records.

When did we turn into whiney, litigious jerks who have to be warned about the potential evils in the abuse of absolutely everything? And, no, I’m not harkening back to the “good old days” kinda emails that hit our inbox every once in a while suggesting most of us old farts managed to survive riding in the back of pickup trucks and lying on the back deck of Dad’s Mercury on the way to the cottage or how we lived long enough to yammer on about walking to school in galoshes in sub-zero weather while eating sugar cubes slathered in butter and doing mundane chores after school. No, I’m just wondering when the H E double/ triple/quadruple warning icons on my Milk of Magnesia bottle did we throw our common sense/our inner voice out the triple glazed, safety-barredwith- childproof -openers – on – them window and start calling litigation lawyers every time we submitted ourselves to an overdose of stupidity. Seriously, is it really necessary to have a warning printed on the side of the takeout cups and milk bags and toothpaste tubes? “Contents may be hot and if spilled could cause burns or other injuries.” Really. When we hang out our car window to order a coffee, we should always assume it’s going to be hot (unless we ordered an iced drink and I’m just betting someone has sued because of brain-freeze). Then the whole thing falls apart when we try to balance an uber-hot drink in a takeout cup between our legs as we negotiate a sharp right out of the drive-through and we’re surprised when our private parts are cauterized by a hot double-double java bath. Please pull up to the second window, please.

I’d like to meet the person who “invented” warning symbols and cautionary labelling. You know what I mean, those little icons on the hairspray cans, the bleach bottles, the dish detergent, the back of the treadmill, the baking soda box. The skulls and crossbones, skeletal hands, lightning bolts felling a stick figure, falling rocks, mountain goats, charging moose, radioactive symbols, magnetic rays, laser beams, hot liquids, cold liquids, stick figures falling/slipping/diving/running, animals jumping, fires burning. I wish I’d been the gal who had thought to build a business warning people about the hazards of a cup of hot drink, peanuts, animal products, plant products, oil products, dairy products, wheat, the byproducts of those products and of the purgative effect of eating too many bran bars, instead of being the Mom who shouted “you’re gonna poke your eye out” and “put those scissors down” and “don’t put your head there.”

I’m not saying it’s a bad thing to know what’s in a food product, for instance, but producers now list ingredients on food products. What I’m saying is we have lost touch with our common sense and our gut instincts. How about those disclaimers marching across the bottom of the television screen during a commercial for a hot product? Why do we have to be told, “Don’t try this at home” or “Professional driver, do not attempt” or “Exceeding recommended daily dosage could cause oily leakage” or “Do not use while operating a motorized vehicle” or “Do not fold, spindle or mutilate” and “Do not puncture or incinerate, ” “Apply only to affected areas,” “Freshest if consumed before date on carton” and my personal favourite “Not to be taken internally.” Products like curling irons have the warning “For external use only” emblazoned on the packaging. Seriously. Pizza boxes telling us the contents may be hot—I hope so. “Not for intimate use” and “Not for human consumption” (on game playing pieces).

I know, from personal experience, the world is inundated with idiots who use VapoRub inappropriately, by folks who figure twice as much is twice as good and by those who stand before the ride has come to a complete stop. We are a society excessively inclined to litigate even if we’ve been thoroughly warned of the outcome of our impending stupidity. We have all lost touch with our sense of common sense.

“Wearing of this garment does not enable you to fly.”

theresa@wellingtontimes.ca