Saturday, January 31, 2009

Scary World of Danger

Bizarro is brought to you today by Urban Health Hazards.

If your local paper prints its comics in color on weekdays as well as Sunday, you may have seen this cartoon in a different form. I was out of town and unable to send my own color files in time and so the syndicate used their usual coloring service to color a week's worth of Bizarros in mid-January. Many cartoonists opt to use this kind of service all the time, but I like my cartoons to look different, so I do them myself. Below is the cartoon as it appeared in such papers.

As you can see, these commercial services do a much simpler job on the comics than I like to do, hence the extra work I put in (without extra pay.) I think it's worth it.

I've long had a problem with America's tendency to want to make everything so safe that you can scarcely hurt yourself if you try. Product safety is a good thing, I don't want to buy a car that will explode into flames if I back into a lamppost at the mall. But in my humble and cranky opinion, putting railings and warning signs around everything from volcanoes to the Grand Canyon goes much too far toward defeating natural selection. I think if someone is dumb enough to climb down into an active volcano, or jump off a cliff into a raging river, they probably shouldn't live long enough to pass those genes on.

When I was in Hawaii recently, I crossed a bridge about 40 feet above a crashing river with huge boulders. There was a forbidding sign warning you that people have been injured or killed jumping off this bridge into the water. I didn't need this sign, neither would have you. Yet there were three young men in their 20s jumping off into the water. They seemed to be surviving, but then I didn't hang around all that long.

We're not the only country to indulge in this habit of protecting morons. I saw the same thing in Italy not long ago. This sign was warning tourists against the inherent dangers of using your umbrella improperly. Personally, I never use an umbrella in any way that is not recommended in the directions.

If you're going to post warning signs, I prefer this style.

10 comments:

guy who trapped monkey girl said...

Actually I am very surprised that the typical playground equipment in the city parks have not been banned by OSHA. Or even worse... kids would need to be harnessed to a lead to go up the ladder for the slide... not to mention that the kids would need to be certified to be able to use the harness.

Chriss Pagani said...

SAFETY SUGGESTION: All Bizarro cartoon come with directions to the nearest mental health clinic.

Anonymous said...

How about this warning sign?

kerrikoo said...

I live in this little one horse town that refuses to come up to this century.. We have nothing for the teenagers to do.. So of course we are one of the worst area's in Pennsylvania for drugs.. A group of kids have been fighting to get a skate park put in.. The township will not allow it.. someone might get hurt.. They are afraid of getting sued.. First they blamed it on money. No one wanted to foot the bill.. Until the kids went out and raised their own money.. then they blamed it on safety reasons.. I'd much rather my kid get a skinned knee than be addicted to Heroin all their life.. It's ridiculous..

isee3dtoo said...

I used to work as an expert witness (i.e. legal whore - you pay me I talk, the more you pay the more I talk). (The legal whore should be a bizarro someday.)

The warning sign that impressed me the most was on the back of a personal water craft. Something like "Caution: operator and rider should wear neoprene swimwear, severe anal or virginal injury can occur."

Now when you read that caution it must make one think a little bit. We found nearly 100 medical article about this problem so it the following does happen.

Operator of personal water craft hits really bad wake, rider or operator gets bucked off (i.e. back flips off) the personal water craft with legs spreads and anal or virginal area pointed directly at the rear end of the craft. The craft's rear buck's up since no passenger and the craft's jets are pointed directly at the the anal or virginal area. In other words the jet of water hits the target. What is really interesting is what happens next.

In many cases the bikini bottom or the man's swim trunks disappears completely; except for maybe a string that is hanging out of the orifice the swim wear disappeared into. On men only option one can occur however on women two options and sometimes the swim wear is found in both.

So that is a warning I would heed.

FIDO said...

on know i see 3dtoo..c3po and his bullshit is back,,


as most of you may know my grandpa or as they say in french pepere possesses a virghin ass..

isee3dtoo said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

The italian warning sign is the one used in building sites to warn everyone of the many ways you can injure yourself if you work there (as a matter of fact, the central one forbids every unauthorized person to stay outside the site).
The blue ones list the equipment workers should wear.

It's compulsory to use this sign everywhere there is something under construction or being repaired.

I suggested many times to change it into a single "Warning, Darwinism applies inside this site".

Greets from Italy!

Anonymous said...

I saw one of my all-time favorite warning signs while crossing the alps in Austria at a scenic turnout with a lot of loose rocks around -- it said "Caution -- Rolling Stones".

On that same trip in the mid-'80's, I was surprised on a visit to the leaning tower of Pisa to see no warning signs and no handrails -- it would have been easy to slip on the buttery smooth marble and slide over the edge from one of the floors. This was before it was stablized, too, so it could have presumably fallen over, too. It made me really admire Italy.

doug nicodemus said...

if you want to see warning signs look at the common 6 or 8 foot ladder. last time i looked there were at least 6. in fact they are running out of space for places to put them. people do dumb stuff on ladders. signs won't prevent that.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_czS9RUqlWdw/SAS9ie8h4wI/AAAAAAAAADU/UvkOzFBmzrk/s1600-h/Bucket+on+Ladder.jpg