I can understand that some activities or services are inherently risky and you shouldn’t be allowed to sue when you’re made aware of the risks - for example, suing a climbing gear company because it breaks when you don’t know how to use it and you become paralyzed.

But no sane world should allow someone to be exempt from accountability after they OPENLY acknowledge that they might be negligent, and that negligence may cause your death, just because you sign a piece of paper

[+] ElHexo@hexbear.net 17 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (3 children)

[deleted]

[–] RyanGosling@hexbear.net 12 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I’m assuming every party is honest in this context. If you just began climbing, and you decide to buy gear and attempt a difficult climb without the proper knowledge and experience

While there are riskier activities, I can't think of any that are immune to being made more dangerous by companies doing the wrong thing

There are also just stupid people. If you do everything right, and the guy you’re supervising decided to pull out his phone for a selfie or something and a breeze blows him off the mountain, I don’t think the employee/company should be responsible

[–] worlds_okayest_mech_pilot@hexbear.net 10 points 4 months ago

How else do you test this claim (that you didn't know how to use it) otherwise though?

Perhaps in a perfect world, all organizations intending to have a risk clause (for safety, not profit of course) would need to provide licensing and testing first?

Like say there's the Hexbear Skydivers Club. The HSC would have to have standards for certification under the Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism safety guidelines, and hand these certs out to people who have done enough practice.

If someone without these certs goes splat on their own, it would likely be investigated as a tragic accident. But if someone with those certs goes splat, then there's a full investigation, and worlds_okayest_mech_pilot, the dunce that approved the comrade to skydive, is liable for punishment.

Just my random sleepy input lol

[–] Egon@hexbear.net 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Most places require that you take a course on how to do lead-climbing before allowing you to use the gear. Or they require that you can prove you've already taken such a course.
It's like with diving in that way.

That doesn't mean there's anything stopping you from buying gear and just going out, but I feel like the "proof" would then be that it is broadly expected that you've taken a course and you didn't, which "proves" your lack of knowledge. With this "proof" it would probably be assumed that the accident was user error, rather than faulty equipment.

[–] FloridaBoi@hexbear.net 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I don’t know how solid a contract would have to be to protect against negligence especially if it is in some excess of standard practice. For a lot of stuff there are liability waivers but even those aren’t bulletproof

[–] TreadOnMe@hexbear.net 3 points 4 months ago

NAL, Contracts can't offer full protection from liability, that is a layman myth. What it can do is insulate the party from some level of liability. This is usually calculated as a percentage (the amount of which is determined in different regions different ways through years of previous judgements). Basically, it can reduce your percentage of liability, which in different states can offer different things. In some states, it can mitigate claimed damages, in others it can 'nearly' void liability, but it depends on how 'cause' is defined (in some states it has to be 100% in others 50-50 is enough to seek damages).