From: inc@tc.fluke.COM (Gary Benson)
Subject: Re: Power Miter Box Safety Warning
Organization: John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA
Date: Sun, 20 Dec 1992 17:00:01 GMT

In article <BzH8uB.9xG@fc.hp.com> scot@fc.hp.com (Scot Heath) writes:
>Bill McGeehan (IRMTAQA2@SIVM.BITNET) wrote:
>: From: Bill McGeehan
>:   This weekend, while using my Craftsman power miter box, I was
>: showered with a spray of metal. It seems that when I moved it to
>: the 45 degree angle I needed, the fence didn't move enough to clear
>: the blade. When I looked further, there was a chunk of wood that
>: had fallen through the table from the previous cut. This didn't
>
>: to get some opinions. Should a product be able to function this
>: way? It seems negligent in that the pointer showed I was locked in
>
>Ok, since you asked......
>
>QUIT WHINING!  No matter how hard any manufacturer tries to make his tools
>safe and/or fooproof, not all circumstances are forseeable.  That chunk of
>wood that blocked the motion wasn't there when they shipped it.  It's your
>responsibility to see that you keep the mechanism of all your tools (all
>the moving equipment you posess) clean and in proper working order.
>
>The nature of the environment in which this equipment is required to function
>is dirty, fraught with peril and therefore deserves extra attention.  Just
>because it worked the last zillion times you used it doesn't mean it will
>work this time, especially when the operating conditions have changed.
>
>I am not questioning your abilities but as you think back, was the saw a
>little hard to swing into position?  Did anything bind?  It would appear on
>the surface for one to be showered with metal would require a persistant
>effort on the part of the operator.  Haste almost always makes waste when
>working with wood.
>
>This is not meant to be a personal attack but in our sue happy society, I
>have had my fill of the general attitude of "protect me from myself".  When
>it comes down to it, your the one with his finger on the trigger and no one
>can protect you but you.
>
>-Scot 


Applause, applause! Very well said, Scot, and I completely agree with
everything you said. Just yesterday I was speaking with my boss about this
very topic. I told him that my biggest disappointment with the way the
country has turned out is not just that people are lawsuit happy but that
they take this stuff to court and get awarded millions. The result is high
or impossible to obtain insurance, and the nurturing of the proposition that
the manufacturer has some kind of long-term responsibility for how you used
his product. Don't you suppose that if instead of a shower of metal, Bill
had lost a finger or a hand he wouldn't be posting but would be talking with
an attorney.

Someday it will be impossible to buy any product in this country without
signing a legally-binding disclaimer. The "protect me from me" mentality is
too well entrenched to reverse, in my opinion.

I was once threatened with a lawsuit over a $25 piece of a car's plastic
grillwork I slid into on ice. The threat was by a *friend* of my wife's!
Turns out she goes to court on the average of 3 times a year, probably for
equally trivial things.

My own message to Bill: no, Sears has no liability unless one of their
official spokespersons is standing beside you saying, ok, yup, go ahead and
do that, yes, that's fine, do that, yup, and so on. Since that probably was
not the case, the person responsible for operating that piece of machinery
would be the responsible adult in the room at the time. In other words, you
yourself. Please be more careful. Read your owner's manual again. See if
there is a way you can prevent the same thing or worse from happening again.

An uncle of an old girlfriend of mine pulled his radial arm saw through his
thumb. He was 65 years old at the time, had run the saw hundreds of times. A
carpenter by trade, he just got lazy one day and forgot to look and lost his
thumb. But he did not sue anybody because he realized like everyone who knew
him that it was his own damn fault.

My father-in law stuck his index finger into a large lathe and lost 2/3 of
the finger. He had run the lathe as his job for over 10 years. One day he
just got lazy and forgot to look and lost his finger. But he did not sue
anybody because he realized like everyone who knew him that it was his own
damn fault.
-- 
Gary Benson   -_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-inc@sisu.fluke.com_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation. 
Stupidity is not a sin; the victim can't help being stupid. But stupidity
is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death, there is no
appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity.
                                                   -Lazarus Long