[Leica] Re: Supersize me

[lrzeitlin at optonline.net (Lawrence Zeitlin)]

On Mar 7, 2007, at 10:36 AM, Didier wrote:

> The day will come where these companies will be taken to court and  
> claimed for damages for selling ill making goods - like the tobacco  
> industry.

U. S. courts generally hold that a manufacturer has an absolute  
obligation not to sell consumer products which are known to be  
harmful. If the product cannot be made harmful, makers are required  
to provide warnings of the hazard and directions for safe use. This  
practice has been carried to absurd lengths. The last electrical  
device I bought, a DVD recorder, came with two pages of tightly  
printed safety warnings in the instruction manual before the table of  
contents. These even included a warning not to attempt to make DVD  
recordings in the bathtub. The last power tool I bought had 31  
separate warnings about safe use on tags and labels attached to the  
product. Even your new Leica M8 has multiple warnings in the  
instruction manual about the potential of electric shock and correct  
methods of disposal of the camera when it no longer functions.  
Germany is even worse than the U.S. in this regard. I suspect that  
the next bottle of Coke I buy will have "Open other end." stenciled  
on the glass bottom.

That being said, the usual manufacturer's defense in product  
liability cases is to plead ignorance. Every president of a cigarette  
making company claimed that they had no knowledge of the harmful  
effects of smoking is testimony before the U.S. Congress. This 30  
years after publication of the Surgeon General's report on smoking  
and lung cancer. The secondary defense is to admit that the product  
is harmful but that consumers know all about it and are making an  
informed choice to use the product. This is the approach the fast  
food purveyors are using. MacDonalds, Burger King, and Wendy's do  
supply information on the fat and calorie content of their products,  
usually on a hard to read sign in the back of the store or printed in  
small type on the reverse side of a placemat. Food handlers never  
call the customer's attention to the signs.

That is the thrust of the several dozen cases now pending against the  
fast food outlets. "All the advertising stressed how tasty the burger  
was and how much fun it was to eat at MacDonalds, Burger King, or  
Wendy's. No one ever mentioned that the food was bad for me."  
Restaurant trade magazines publish monthly articles on the threat to  
the industry. New York City has already banned trans fats. The UK  
bans genetically modified foodstuffs. Smoking in public places has  
been outlawed in most urban centers except in the tobacco producing  
areas of the South. The big fear is that when you go to MacDonalds  
and order a Big Mac, the counter person will be required to say "Of  
course you know that this Big Mac has 1000 calories and more  
saturated fat and salt than you should consume in a day. Please sign  
this release and then I'll give it to you."

But don't worry about corn oil. At the rate fuel prices are rising,  
all the corn in the midwest will be converted into ethanol and the  
residue used as hog and cattle feed. All you will have to worry about  
then is the cholesterol.

Bon appetite,

Larry Z