Do you agree with the idea of taking off the warning labels off of everything and letting stupidity work itself out?

Question

Subglacial · Accepted Answer

No, lol.

* First problem is that warnings aren't always there to avoid liability for other people's mistakes, they're there to inform reasonable people of a danger they might not know about or be able to perceive. You might have great balance, but you might not know that that cliff is unstable due to weathering. You know that you can die from electrical shock, but you might not know that that wire is live. You know that some things are dangerous to eat, but why would you think this deliciously minty liquid someone told you to put in your mouth isn't supposed to be swallowed?

"Yeah, but we don't need to label the obvious dangers. Obviously." What's obvious to you might not be obvious to somebody else with a different experience. A lot of the dangers we face in the modern world are not things we've evolved to be afraid of, so yes, what you avoid and what you don't is definitely based on experience, not just instinct or intelligence. Whatever line you draw is going to be completely arbitrary.

We're also spread over the entire globe and have a wide diversity of cultures and environments, which means a wide diversity of dangers, and everything is always changing. Somebody visiting from somewhere else might not know how dangerous something is until you tell them... or until they read the warning.

* Second problem is that it isn't only your mistakes that can cause you harm. Whose fault is it when your infant dies because the babysitter you hired wasn't aware of a choking hazard? What if your kid gets a lung-full of chlorine in the school bathroom because the custodian in the adjacent stall mixed bleach and ammonia? What if a bus full of people dies because the driver wasn't careful going over an icy bridge?

* Third problem is that even if we only look at the accidents we're personally responsible for, it doesn't take a stupid person to make a stupid mistake. Smart people make stupid mistakes from time to time, and anybody who tells you that they don't is lying. With some of the threats that exist in our world, it might only take one mistake to instantly kill you. That's not something to fuck around with, no matter how competent you think you are.

Other factors also contribute. Consider that we've had sweet-smelling soaps and colorful detergent tablets for a while, but it's only recently that we've heard of this Tide pod challenge; what's more likely: that the children of this generation suddenly became stupid, or that the prevalence of social media and the constant connection to half a billion other kids amplified the pressure young people feel to stand out among their peers? (One might even call this "peer pressure". That sounds pretty catchy. I'm going to revolutionize the field of child psychology with this novel concept.)

* "Okay okay. All great points, Mr. Subglacial. But even still, over time, unintelligent people will die more often than intelligent people. The trend will be for these people to be weeded out over many years." You got a timeframe for that? Can we expect results in the next 10 years? 20? Fourth problem: the increased likelihood of dying to stupidity is so small [citation needed] that any noticeable population-wide change is going to take a long time. How long? I'm no expert, but let's see... 8 billion people, average generation of 20-30 years, I'd estimate... a really fucking long time.

Sorry, I don't have any specifics for you here, but the onus of providing specifics falls on the one making the proposal. How much more likely is a person of below-average intelligence to kill themselves because of carelessness? People weren't dropping like flies before we started putting warnings on things, so probably not very, right?

This is the reason why concerns that we are weakening our species on an evolutionary time scale by treating hereditary diseases are largely unfounded. Even assuming that stupidity is purely hereditary (it's not), and assuming that we can completely negate the danger (we can't), there is no positive selection bias for it. In theory, the odds of a person passing on their "stupid" genes should be 50/50, so depending on how many people actually carry this trait, it might be as likely to die off just by itself as it is to spread.

* The final problem is that we can already see that this obviously doesn't fucking work. You would think that only an idiot would purposely inhale noxious smoke and drink poison, right? But we've been smoking herbs for thousands of years and drinking booze for tens of thousands, yet these clearly unhealthy behaviors haven't gone away yet.

Then again... people have begun smoking a lot less in the last few decades. I wonder if this is because smokers just now finally started dying, or if a global public awareness campaign informing people of the danger of smoking and regulations that disincentivize it had more to do with it.

TL;DR: this is not a plan to improve the world, it's a plan to needlessly cause suffering so cynics can feel better about themselves.

I'm with the other guy on this: this is a dipshit take, and I feel ridiculous for giving it as much time as I have.

Part2603 · Accepted Answer

The problem with your idea is we have grown up in this warning label culture, where danger is procedural rather than intuitive.

We have people who are worried about plastic pollutants and then will spark up a doobie because "Everybody is doing it."

The warning labels may be comical at times but at least they give some effort of imparting a quantum if information. This is dangerous because of this specific reason.

I think procedure is an important part of safety culture.

Sure you might reason that people "should have common sense" and not wear baggy clothes around industrial machinery. It's a lot safer when you explicitly tell employees that the dress code is tight fitting clothes and in fact that requirement is OSHA and you will be fired for violating it. It's the different of people telling themselves, "I really shouldn't" vs "I CAN NOT do this it's against the rules"

Aerissa_Jade · Accepted Answer

I would say for obvious stuff, like the fan of a running car engine... like DUH what kind of idiot sticks their hand in there?

Some things that aren't obvious, they should keep them. I can tell you a story though about a piece of farm equipment that had really sharp blades on it and the company that made it, the employees (it was a smaller company) could adjust things while it was in motion without an issues but they still had stickers saying don't stick your hands in and a guy did, despite the warning, sued them and won.

He lost his arm in the process, and the company paid out maybe 15% of what he won and then went out of business. Re-opened under a slightly different name and no longer owed all that money.

Goes to show, warning labels don't stop lawsuits nor prevent stupidity.

Cynicaldreamer · Accepted Answer

Absolutely! Let Darwinism weed out the weak and stupid. If people don't have common sense on basic aspects of life, especially once you become an adult (and I don't mean 18-21 year olds... I'd say around mid to late 20s then  ideally  you should be mature enough to make decisions and realize the repercussions of your actions) then yes, let the stupid ones die off.

purplepoppy · Answer

Part of me agrees but another part thinks it would allow employers to force staff to do dangerous stuff.
My favourite one was a metal fishing lure that came with a do not eat warning. I often wonder why certain products come with obvious warnings, I assume someone must have done something dumb and sued.

HSalenko · Answer

This, in and of itself is a stupid idea. How are you supposed to know what it does? Shall we take away the descriptions of chemical properties in textbooks too? They're there for a reason and only idiots refuse to read warning labels in the first place.

D_Bone_Steak · Answer

YES!!! Stupid kids see a warning sign it's a chocking hazard and they'll still put it in their mouth, and if they have parents dumb enough to let them put it in their mouth... maybe we can't kill the root of the problem, but at least we are stopping the problem from spreading.

Soteris · Answer

The re-introduction of lawn darts would do wonders with thinning out the GOP. But seriously, probably a bad thing since most of it actually just harms a person rather than kills them and it would just cost more money to heal them not to mention bystanders being harmed and finally it might actually make them DUMBER if it impairs their cognitive abilities.

Chazmatazz269 · Answer

Absolutely EVERYTHING. No more warnings. No more protections. No more safeguards. No more kid gloves. If you’re not willing to throw the weak overboard, you better be prepared to go down with them. That’s exactly what is happening. The whole ship is going down because privileged assholes want to bubble wrap the world rather than teach their kids how to survive and be productive in it.

Anonymous · Answer

Yes. In the words of the late great George Carlin, "Let's remove all the warning labels, f*** em! The kid who swallow one too many marbles doesn't grow up to have kids of his own that's what I say".

Agape93 · Answer

Yeap. If you're stupid enough to eat laundry detergent or pull a trigger at your own face or decide you want to try drinking antifreeze, I won't mourn your loss.

DubiousIntentions · Answer

Even with warning labels people still do dumb things. And they still sue, saying "Sorry, no reada de Ingles."

SaoirseS · Answer

I understand the sentiment behind the idea, and agree there are some things we shouldn’t have to tell people not to do, but no leave them on.

Cassie88 · Answer

Yes. We should allow the terminally thick to off themselves in the most spectacular way possible! :D

alice55 · Answer

No, keep it the warning labels are pretty funny. Like on my microwave warning it was written don't put your hamster in it to dry it XD

abc3643 · Answer

No, because not doing so is a form of criminally negligent homocide.

LiamJHayden · Answer

Right? I half expect them to start adding a "Not to be used as a floatation device" warning to barbells.

PatriceONeal · Answer

No i need to know how much cotton is in the shirt. Doesn't mean you're stupid for not predicting ingredients. What a dipshit take.

worldscolide · Answer

Definitely I am all for Darwin Awards. Lets add a bit of chlorine to the gene pool.

loveslongnails · Answer

Not one of the best ideas I've ever heard, especially when it comes to medicines.

Anonymous · Answer

Absolutely not. You'll be caught in hazard yourself. Stupidity has a way of sorting itself out by disregarding the warning labels.

Dav1dTh0ma389 · Answer

No, I don't. Because then you can sue if something goes wrong Who wants to be sued

TrueConfection · Answer

Does anyone actually read them anyway?

Guy13 · Answer

Works for me...

Do you agree with the idea of taking off the warning labels off of everything and letting stupidity work itself out?

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