To wondre WHY we live in a world where it everyone else's fault?

[Kimi]

Yesterday in the paper there was a bloke (compulsive gambler) suing a bookmaker for taking his bets and him going bankrupt,
Today there is a woman trying to sue a chap because she was sticking junk mail through his door and cut her hand on the letter box, the other week it was some very obese American trying to sue McDonalds for making him fat , and smokers and drinkers have been known to sue tobacco and alcohol company's.

It always seems to be someone else's fault, no one wants to accept responsibility for them self nowdays, or else see a way to make a quick buck.

Then their is the poor bloke who is looking at a murder charge because he struggled with a knife wielding career criminal who was trying to rob him and her bloke ended up stabbed with his own knife, the world has gone mad.

If I put my life savings on a horse and it lost that is MY fault for being stupid, not the bookies for taking the bet.

If I went shoving unsolicited crap through peoples door and cut myself doing so, that is an accident

If I spent my life shoveling big macs down for every meal I would expect to get fat

If I spent all day smokng then got lung cancer again all my own doing

If I spent all day knocking back alcohol and died as a result, (as my father did) all my own fault

And hell yes I would not care if I killed someone who was attacking me with a fecking knife, they should not have been trying to rob/kill me.

It is a sad world we are living in, and the worst part of it is it is becoming all too normal to blame every one else for our own short comings

As much as we should be hating these people who sue for mickey mouse charges shouldn't the ones who let them get away with it and pay them the money be the ones we should hate the most?!

I am going to sue you all for not including me on the chocolate invitation list

Every other bloody advert on day time T.V (yes sometimes I watch it) is asking "have you had an accident that was not your fault" no win no fee.

The other half is telling you how do c consolidate all you debts

Kimi those adverts piss me right off. It seems all the adverts are either insurance,injury claims or consolidate your debt ones. What ever happened to fun adverts that didn't make you wanna smash your head through the tv screen?

We were at a stately home with an adventure playground last summer. Ds1 and his friends were messing about on one of the platforms of an aerial slide while all the mums chatted. Ds1 fell off and broke his arm.

The following morning I had a phone call from the estate manager asking what had happened, how ds1 was and the poor guy was repeating 'we take health and safety very seriousl' over and over again.

I ended up telling him that it was an accident, it was more my fault than anyone else's because I wasn't watching him closely enough and I had no intention of suing them. He seemed so worried about what I was going to do.

Compensation culture in this country has gone mad and it needs dealing with sooner rather than later.

I couldn't get over that knife wielding maniac who got stabbed with his own knife and then the other guy got blamed. I'm damn sure if someone tried to rob and stab me, I'd be doing anything I could to survive.

Maybe he should have risk assessed his work and realised that if he tried to stab someone there was a risk he could get stabbed himself.

Or maybe not try and rob or stab anyone in the first place and just bloody well work for a living and actually value human life.

Then there were that couple who were sued because someone trying to break in to their home fell through a glass sky light and got badly hurt. EXCUSE ME but he was not fecking Santa and had no need to be on their roof trying to break in to their home.

There was someone, I think it was local news, who was on holiday, pissed, dived into the shallow end of a pool in the evening and brok his back or something then tried to sue the hotel. What a wanker!

I know it's a cliche, but hasn't there been a huge American influence on this?

I wonder if an attitude shift in the government would help matters? Surely it can't be this bad in other countries?

I had a cold call on the phone asking me if I had had an accident that I could claim compensation for.It took me by surprise, when I had had time to think I wished that I had really let rip and given them a piece of my mind! It is no wonder that children can no longer play conkers in the school playground, or make ice slides etc.

I think there is a massive American influence to be honest.

Someone with come common sense needs to say enough is enough

Hmmmm...I agree with some of your points not all...if I tripped on an uneven pavement and severely injured myself I would sue the ass off the council considering I paid my council tax I expect pavements to be of a reasonable standard!

I have sued...well my mother sued on my behalf in the past...I was 14 when I fell through a glass door in my home... my sister who was on the other side had to have a 1 inch piece of glass removed from her eye which was just millimetres from blinding her...I have a 3 inch scar on my left wrist where my hand was cut to the bone and a scar in my back where I had to recieve 10 external and 60 internal stiches (sp)...we sued the builders of the house because the glass they fitted was not suitable for an internal door for years we presumed it was plastic!...so I say if something happens and it affects your life sue!...if you don't companies get away with shoddy work and incompetence...suing for smokers happened because they lied about the affects and actively encouraged smoking even in school age children...some companies need to feel it in their pockets before they take responsibility...the Maccy D & gambling thing...well...thats just taking tha piss...but the fact that people threatened to sue encouraged McDonalds to change their menus for the better didn't it

My sister slipped in mums kitchen a fell through the back door glass, had to have two operations to remove glass and fix tendons.

When she got married she had to wear long gloves to cover the scars.

Glass was not safety glass and had high lead content. She was visited in hospital by one of these no win no fee lot, FFS in hospital.
These people are vile, nothing but amberlance cheasers the lot of um.

How did they even know about her accident???

I have no clue, we were visiting and a chap in a suit wonders up with a leaflet and says oh have you had an accident? You could claim compensation etc .........

Don't know where the hell he crawled out from but he was told to sod off back there

Of course people are responsible for their own behaviour, but that shouldn't let manufacturer's and service providers off the hook for behaving with social responsibility.

We as adults know what we are choosing. But the point about smoking, is that most people start smoking when they are children, unable to understand the long-term implications of their choices. Unscrupulous shop-keepers sell them single cigarettes so that they can afford to smoke. Sorry, but in that situation we shouldn't be blaming children for buying the fags, we should be blaming the shopkeepers for selling them in this irresponsible manner. They're responsible for their behaviour and it's a piss-poor lookout if we expect children to be more responsible than adults.

With the William Hill case, the reason the guy is suing is because he had opted for self-exclusion and they still allowed him to open a new account. They failed to fulfill their social responsibilities. Surely we're not saying that individuals must take personal responsibility, but big business doesn't have any?

We should make companies etc socially responsible, but there's a huge difference between suing for personal gain and complaining to Health & Safety or whatever and getting a company fined and their procedures improved, so an incident doesn't happen again.

Just because you sue the council for the uneven pavement doesn't mean they'll go out and fix them all. They'll just pay a bigger premium on the public liability insurance .

My dd suffered (and she did suffer, it was almost fatal> an overdose in hopsital. We could have sued, we didn't, preferring to use the experience to get protocols changed and to ensure that it didn't happen again.

Totally with you there LittleBella

Personal gain?...hmmm that depends also...if you were personally affected and your life changed or you were hurt I think you are entitled to both those things Saggar...I believe suing motivates companies and services to improve.

Yes but people still need to take some responsibilty for themselves and their actions. The examples below of tripping over a pavement whilst drunk or exaggerating injury after a car accident. It fuels the compensation culture and makes a mockery of real claims.

What about the bloke sueing the bookies........... that takes the biscuit that does........
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7243656.stm

What about the seriously overweight bloke who calls the fireman to come and move him in his bed, and seems to think it's their job?

My dh had to do that once duchesse. The bloke had a hospital appointment and lived on the upper floors of a tower block. They were there all day. Seriously.

Saggar I agree with you.
LitteBella - do unscrupulous shopkeepers still sell single fags to kids? Yeah it used to be true, but I would have thought most of them would be too worried about the consequences these days.
Most teens I know who start smoking do know the risks. In fact if there's one thing we can be sure of, with 21st century media there is no excuse for 'not knowing' any more - the information is out there, readily accessible in many different forms.
My daughter smoked for about a year - thankfully she's stopped now. I hated it (neither DH nor I are smokers). But tbh it was her choice, she knew the risks. I certainly wouldnt think I could pass the buck to anyone else and try to make them responsible for my dd's choice.

A teenager may know the risks, but they are still children and simply don't understand the long term implications. They don't understand that cancer, death, aids, infertility etc. are hideous, anguishing disasters, they don't have the emotional and mental capacity to truly understand these things in the way adults do.

A teenager may know the risks in theory and is responsible for doing it anyway, but the person who sold her those fags, who is an adult, is more culpable. Sorry, adults should not be selling children cigarettes, it's disgraceful.

The legal consequences have always been there, but like any other drug-dealer, the pusher knows he's not going to be shopped. How else do teenagers afford to smoke? I know lots of them have high pocket money rates, but a packet of fags is still a big inroad into most teenager's income. Without singles, most of those who now smoke, wouldn't be enabled to.

Of course, if the law started to be properly enforced, the cigarette manufacturers would simply produce smaller, prettily branded packets. They currently don't need to because enough shopkeepers are still willing to break the law on this.

I agree with some of what you say, Bella, but I don't think it's as simple as teenagers not having the capacity to understand and adults do. In fact I doubt if anyone can truly get their head around the anguish of cancer/infertility/bereavement unless they've experienced if pretty close to home.
The point I was making is that these days the information IS out there, far more than in years gone by. It's like when s schoolgirl gets pregnant and there's always the old chestnut about there not being enough sex education in schools. Rubbish! The information is there in the front line. Most teenagers I know are aware that smoking is harmful (it says it kills on the packet FGS). They may not understand exactly how it's going to feel dying of lung cancer 30 years down the line, but they can't say they're not aware of the danger. I think it's doing a disservice to out teens and to ourselves to try to make 'someone else' responsible for our choices.