Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!caip!clyde!cbatt!cbosgd!ihnp4!cuae2!ltuxa!ll1!cej
From: cej@ll1.UUCP (One of the Jones Boys)
Newsgroups: net.cycle,net.auto,net.legal
Subject: Re: Re: The government preventing us from hurting ourselves
Message-ID: <436@ll1.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 2-Aug-86 19:38:27 EDT
Article-I.D.: ll1.436
Posted: Sat Aug  2 19:38:27 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 4-Aug-86 00:57:56 EDT
References: <1022@im4u.UUCP> <1050@dataio.UUCP> <931@hoptoad.uucp>
Organization: No Place Special
Lines: 68
Xref: mnetor net.cycle:1100 net.auto:6198 net.legal:2955

>>If unhelmeted motorcyclists will take on all responsibility to
>>insure themselves then I will gladly allow them to take the
>>additional risk that coincides with riding without a helmet. 
> 
> (Laura points out that many would accept the responsibility if it
> were possible for them to do so.)
> Not too long ago I was kicked out of a tree by a Forest ranger. 
> It seems that he was afraid that I might sue if I fell out of the
> tree.
>
> [a pedestrian was] so drunk she had to hold onto a hedge to stand
> up. [she] let go of the hedge, and fell into the path of an oncoming
> automobile that was not going more than 10 m.p.h [the pedestrian]
> being less than 20 feet from where my mother had made a full stop.
> [The driver, Laura's mother, was successfully sued.]
> 
> Laura Creighton		

	It seems that the people in the U.S., manifested in our
legal system, are with increasing speed losing sight of any concept
of personal responsibility.  (I say the people in the U.S. since I
don't know if other countries find themselves in the same situation
in the U.S. does.).

	I was always taught (or did I just learn) that you may do
most anything, as long as you are fully and completely prepared to
accept the results of your actions.  That it is your social (and
personal) responsibility to be aware of all the results your actions
could cause, and win or lose, you take the outcome "like a man".
(I wish to imply no sexism by the above usage.  I thought for
several minutes, and could not think of a different phrase which
would say the same thing in short order.  If you know of one, please
let me know by e-mail, and will use it exclusively.)

	If you can't or don't want to take care of the situation
afterwards, don't play the game.  That is how I thought things went.
This, in my mind, means that you should be able to ride you bike
with no helmet, but either you cover the medical expenses, or you
get no extra-ordinary care for your head injuries.  In the case of
Laura's tree climbing, no suing the park and personnel (and it
seems Laura wouldn't).  Now if you are walking by the tree, and it
falls on you, that is a different story.  In the case of the drunk
pedestrian, I find it to be both an insult to, and a sad commentary
on, our society.  (Assuming the the pedestrian could not be seen,
and just fell in front of the car.)  If I drink, and I fall in front
of a car, it can only be my fault, and my responsibility.  And with
reguard to people suing bars because someone got drunk there, and
hit them, I almost could not believe it when the first case I heard
about found against the bar.  Does that mean that if someone gets
whiskey from a state store here in Ohio, where the state runs all
"package" store sales except for beer and wine, I can sue the state
for "letting" him get drunk?

	My question, and the reason I included net.legal in the
newsgroups, would be; Are the lawers responsible for the total
disreguard for the concept of personal responsibility?  Or is society
the driving force behind the lawers?  If I go to a lawer with a suit
he fees is B.S., but might win in todays courts, and I WANT
representation, why shouldn't he represent me?  Is today's society
only interested in personal freedom and personal responsibility when
it gets them what they want?


		The first one to see an illusion by which men have
		flourished for centuries surely stands in a lonely place.
			Gary Zukav - The Dancing Wu Li Masters

...ihnp4!ll1!cej			Llewellyn Jones