Opinion ID: 1693536
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Nature of Recreational Activities

Text: In developing the common law in this area, we must recognize the everyday reality of participation in recreational activities. A person who engages in a recreational activity is temporarily adopting a set of rules that define that particular pastime or sport. In many instances, the person is also suspending the rules that normally govern everyday life. For example, it would be a breach of etiquette, and possibly the law, to battle with other shoppers for a particularly juicy orange in the grocery store, while it is quite within the rules of basketball to battle for a rebound. Some might find certain sports, such as boxing or football, too rough for their own tastes. However, our society recognizes that there are benefits to recreational activity, and we permit individuals to agree to rules and conduct that would otherwise be prohibited. There are myriad ways to describe the legal effect of voluntarily participating in a recreational activity. The act of stepping onto the field of play may be described as consent to the inherent risks of the activity, or a participant's knowledge of the rules of a game may be described as notice sufficient to discharge the other participants' duty of care. [8] Similarly, participants' mutual agreement to play a game may be described as an implied contract between all the participants, or a voluntary participant could be described as assuming the risks inherent in the sport. No matter what terms are used, the basic premise is the same: When people engage in a recreational activity, they have voluntarily subjected themselves to certain risks inherent in that activity. When one of those risks results in injury, the participant has no ground for complaint. Justice Cardozo made this point quite eloquently in a case involving a young man injured on a ride at an amusement park: One who takes part in such a sport accepts the dangers that inhere in it so far as they are obvious and necessary, just as a fencer accepts the risk of a thrust by his antagonist or a spectator at a ball game the chance of contact with the ball. The antics of the clown are not the paces of the cloistered cleric. The rough and boisterous joke, the horseplay of the crowd, evokes its own guffaws, but they are not the pleasures of tranquillity. The plaintiff was not seeking a retreat for meditation. Visitors were tumbling about the belt to the merriment of onlookers when he made his choice to join them. He took the chance of a like fate, with whatever damage to his body might ensue from such a fall. The timorous may stay at home.