Labels are our friends

People are always ragging on boxes and such that have huge blatant labels that strike anyone who has even an ounce of common sense as completely obvious and even a bit stupid. Coffee cups labeled “Warning: Contents may be hot” and plastic bags with “Warning: Bag is not a toy” stenciled on it are just a few examples of this sort of thing. Most people look at these carefully worded warnings and go, “Well Duh!” and move on with their lives while pondering why some person/company took the time and money to put the words there in the first place.

Now everyone has heard the much repeated (Usually highly inaccurately) story of the little old lady who made millions because she “didn't know her coffee was hot.” (This story has reached the pinnacle of urban legend and has been somewhat distorted with the telling and retelling so I would advise people actually look up the exact facts of the story before passing judgment.) People hear these stories about how people who seem to lack any form of common sense have done stupid things which then prompted new labeling. They wonder if there are people out there who really are that dense.

I have never even once pondered the base stupidity of the human animal because I have seen so many shining examples of it in my 50 or so years (But enough about my family.) that stick with me to this day. During my brief stint working at a Harry and David Kiosk during the Xmas Holidays, I was served a very healthy helping of just how unobservant and stupid people can be.

I was in charge of receiving shipments, doing inventory and organizing the stock room so that the other employees could readily access the necessary stock when needed. One of these duties included unloading the delivery trucks, breaking down the pallets of product and transferring it to the stock room. One early and very cold morning, I was breaking down a pallet and on the very bottom of the massive pallet filled with pears, apples and other heavy objects was three or four layers of boxes labeled thus:

Wats it say, huh huh?!

(Side note: The little white specks are snow. Told you it was cold out there.)

Now please note two obvious labels. One states that the contents are glass and fragile. The other indicates the product cases should be stacked a specific way. Big bold black print that is kind of hard to miss right? Well, guess what? Not only were these fragile containers packed at the very bottom of a heavy pallet of goods, but every single one of them (50+ boxes) were stacked with the “This side up” label on the bottom. Yeah, you heard me all 50 boxes were stacked exactly opposite of how they were supposed to be.

So why do we need big ugly labels stating directions that most of us find stupid or at least silly? It is certainly not to stop people from doing stupid stuff because my above example proves that doesn't work. Stupid, unobservant people will keep doing the same stupid shift every time no matter how many times they are reminded not to. To quote a great philosopher, “You can't fix stupid.” No the labels aren't to help and protect the stupid. Instead they are there to protect the rest of us when stupid people do stupid stuff and wind up getting hurt or causing mass destruction.

In today's Lawsuit happy environment where people sue at the drop of a hat, companies are spending billions of dollars just to keep the stupid from coming back to bite them in the butt. So the next time someone suffocates their goldfish because they thought a plastic bag was a toy, the company that made the bag can say, “Whups, you can't sue us because we said on the bag that it wasn't a toy.” To people with any sort of sense, these steps seem silly, but as my Daddy always said, “Common sense Isn't.” (for those who have trouble following Redneck, add another “common” to the end of that sentence for it to make sense.)

So the next time you see a label on your favorite food or beverage that makes you shake your head in shame, take heart in the fact that somewhere out there someone read that same label about not drinking gasoline and took a swig anyways. Who knows, it might make you feel better about yourself.

End of Rant