Common Sense or Common Currency?

The other morning I heard a news report on the radio of an 81-year-old man who is filing a lawsuit against Brut, the maker of men’s fragrance and shaving products.
The lawsuit alleges that the aftershave the man put on had ignited while on a camping trip. Consequently, the man suffered second and third-degree burns. The suit argues that the Brut aftershave the man was using did not have proper safety labels, warning that the product was flammable when exposed to heat and flame.
Since I have a bottle of Brut cologne in my medicine cabinet, I decided to check it out. I read the ingredients, among the first of which was alcohol. Furthermore, I could smell the alcohol contained in the cologne. It was pretty obvious. I looked at my aftershave, too, which was a brand other than Brut. This also contained an obvious amount of alcohol.
Frankly, I’ve known for years that men’s cologne and shaving products contain flammable ingredients, namely alcohol. Why, you ask? For the same reason we apply rubbing alcohol to the skin after we cut ourselves shaving. It stops the bleeding and helps to protect the skin against inflammation and irritation.
Now, I learned at an early age that alcohol was flammable. I used to watch my dad barbecue out on the back patio, pouring beer onto the meat. This caused the flames to get big. I asked my dad about it once. He said that the alcohol in beer is what makes fire grow bigger. I learned this fact, too, in elementary school science class. It is pretty rudimentary knowledge for those of us who passed the fifth grade.
Okay, maybe this 81-year-old man did not learn anything beyond the fourth grade or was asleep during science class; but I doubt it. Most of us don’t learn in school that alcohol is flammable. We either learn from experience, observation or just through common knowledge passed down to us from our folks and others.
The bottom line here is that knowing alcohol is flammable is common knowledge, and not exposing it to heat or an open flame is common sense.
Evidently, this guy had neither common knowledge nor common sense enough to stay away from his camp fire after applying his alcohol-based aftershave.
So, for lack of a better term, the burning question in my mind is, why should the Brut Company and the general public have to suffer for one man’s stupidity? Why should I have to pay a higher price for my Brut product because one man is suing the company for damages caused by his own ineptness?
I asked this same question of myself years ago after the infamous McDonald’s coffee fiasco, from which a woman sued the fast-food giant for selling hot coffee to her. The clumsy woman spilled the hot coffee on herself and suffered second-degree burns. Hello?! Hot coffee is supposed to be “hot.” That’s why it is called “hot coffee.” Why did McDonald’s have to pay for this woman’s clumsiness? Further, why did the rest of us, the consumers, have to pay for it with higher prices at the order window?
Remember the Ford truck incident, in which a man sued the domestic automaker for having faulty doors on its pickup trucks? Evidently, the man had been driving drunk. He failed to fasten his seat belt. When he lost control of his truck and it rolled, he was ejected out the driver’s side door and suffered grievous bodily injuries. Because of him, Ford and other automakers had to raise the cost of production, while the rest of us--again, the consumer--paid higher prices for the cars and trucks we wanted to buy.
After so many other ludicrous and asinine lawsuits, it isn’t any wonder that their only purpose is not to seek justice, but rather to net large cash rewards for the plaintiffs and their attorneys. Therein lies the rub: Lawyers.
Once a well-respected field, the legal profession has turned into a sideshow of sorts in recent decades. Two centuries ago, lawyers helped to forge a new nation by drafting our U.S. Constitution. One hundred and forty years ago, lawyers helped to set other men free by emphasizing equality in our nation’s laws.
However, somewhere along the line, lawyers were awarded the dubious moniker of “ambulance chaser.” I’m not sure where this expression came from, but I know why: When lawyers discovered the lucrative business of torts, they found a source of untapped and seemingly infinite wealth from which to draw; not unlike a mosquito that taps into a blood bank.
Take democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, for example. The guy just put the finishing touches on a 24,000-square-foot mansion on his South Carolina estate property. He didn’t cash in on a 401(k) for that. The funds for this lavish monument to himself came from his winnings as a trial lawyer.
Ever wonder why so many lawsuits are for astronomical amounts, into the tens and hundreds of millions? It is not so much the plaintiff as it is his lawyer, who convinces his client that his pain and suffering is really worth that amount. Make no mistake: It is not for the client’s gain as much as it is for the lawyer’s. Attorneys routinely collect 20 percent as a standard fee for their services. So, that’s 20 percent of $100K, which is about the price of a new car. Or, maybe 20 percent of $10 million, which is much more than the vast majority of people will ever see in their lifetimes.
Now, I did not intend to turn this into a lawyer roast. I recognize they do have their place in our society. And there are good, honest lawyers in practice. Yet, with so many frivolous, self-aggrandizing lawsuits out there, and so many companies paying out millions of dollars in settlements and/or damages to individuals and their lawyers, one cannot help but wonder where the priorities of the legal profession are. Is it really about justice, or the dollar bill? Evidence strongly suggests the latter.
What I really intended to write about was idiots and those of us who are forced to pay for them. But there really isn’t much more I can say on the subject, except that there are idiots born every minute. Lawyers know this, and flock to them like flies to a pile of dung. The sooner we can restore common sense and the idea of personal responsibility, the sooner lawyers will find that with fewer idiots, the pursuit of a fool’s errand is not worth their time or efforts. Then, perhaps they will return to the practice of real, substantive law instead of the sideshow known as torts.
Besides, I thought torts were something we ate for dessert. Wait a minute: to a lawyer, a tort is dessert.
Nonetheless, in today’s legal profession as in business, money talks and common sense walks.