Largely from lawsuits, I guess, so many commercials contain all kinds of disclaimers about the obvious. You know, Don't jump off a cliff with cardboard wings; carried out by professionals on a closed course.
And the drugs they try to sell you now spend most of their time telling you about side effects. I love the constant notice that birth control pills will not prevent HIV. (Do HIV med ads tell people that they will not prevent conception?)
People must be damned stupid. And/or lawyers make everyone paranoid.
A new medical commercial for an anti-psoriasis medicine contains an animation of little robots under the skin making extra cells on an assembly line. The disclaimer reminds us that this is a dramatization and does not accurately represent the disease process.
Duh!
I'm waiting for the Mr. Clean commercial to disavow that he will come to your house to clean for you.
3 comments:
No, really it's juries in the USA: they get to set the amount of damages in liability cases, and lawyers can take such cases on contingency (no fees at all from the client, but 33% of any damages, compensatory damages and punitive damages). Also, juries don't have to say that they feel there really was any misdeed by the sued company or person. Lawyers accordingly wind up their cases by emphasizing how miserable their client's life is now that they're crippled from having jump'd off a cliff assuming that their batman halloween costume would enable them to fly. Or a jury decides that the malformation of a baby was caused by an obstetrician's mistake so that the parents will receive a lot of money from the MD's insurance company to help take care of the baby. Judges instruct juries not to do this, but juries are still free to do this de facto, just as they are free (in all anglophone countries) to find someone not guilty or guilty contrary to their assessment of the facts of the case but in accord with their sympathies or vengeance. (Some years ago a famous case: a drunk illegal immigrant fell off subway platform in NYC. Awarded umpteen million by a jury. Lawyer got probably 33%). Cost pass'd along to citizens of NYC in taxes.) A major factor in medical expenses in the USA. None of this is permitted in Canada, Britain, or indeed anywhere else in the world. A unique and colourful part of American culture which therefore ought to be revered by all true Americans. Any politician who proposes to remedy this is destroy'd by trial lawyer association priesthood that funds his or her opponent. Such politicians would be like a reformer in a scarcity agriculture economy complaining that burning a lot of food by the priests to their gods is a waste when that food could feed starving, malnourish'd children.
I think the USA could become an officially bilingual contry this way: a Hispanic employee of a city or state or the federal government gets hurt despite warning signs in English -- which he or she might have taken more seriously if they were in Spanish, even though he or she does speak and read English. Jury awards a huge amount of money, and all insurance companies instruct government agencies as well as private companies, universities etc, to post all instructions and warnings in Spanish or they won't get coverage. All the jumping up and down of English-only activists would be powerless to stop the de facto officialization of Spanish -- unless they could get an amendment to the federal constitution pass'd protecting all companies and government agencies from litigation for having English-only signs.
So it's our own damn fault. Oh, well. The shadow of jury sovereignty.
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