Originally posted by
[email protected] 5 2004, 11:23 AM
The folly of Americans does often seem to "test the limits" of credibility.
I've read of a company in Arizona that, for a mere $10, will send a brief message to dead people.
Here's how it "works": your message is memorized by a person known to be terminally ill. After s/he dies, s/he will attempt to locate the recipient in the "after-life" and deliver your message or as much of it as s/he can remember. If s/he cannot locate your recipient, s/he will pass your message along to any entity which may be willing and able to deliver your message.
So far, there does not seem to be a mechanism for your recipient to send a reply. :lol:
:redstar2000:
The Redstar2000 Papers (http://www.redstar2000papers.fightcapitalism.net)
A site about communist ideas
Hmm, how about the folly of Brazilians?
(29 January 2003, Brazil) At work, Manoel Messias Batista Coelho was responsible for cleaning out the storage tanks of gasoline tanker trucks. He had been employed in that capacity for two months when he ran afoul of fuel.
The 35-year-old began to fill a tanker with water, a standard safety procedure that forces flammable vapor out of the container. He returned an hour later to check whether the water level was high enough to proceed. But he had trouble deciding, because it was so DARK inside the tanker.
A resourceful employee, Manoel forgot the very reason why he was filling the tank with water when he lit a cigarette lighter to shed some light on the situation. His little test successfully determined that the water level was NOT yet high enough for safety. The vapor explosion launched him through the air, and he landed in the company parking lot 100 meters away.
Manoel suffered severe burns, blunt force trauma, and an injury to the head that exposed his brain. Our witless car washer had learned his terminal lesson in safety by the time the firemen arrived.
Or the Brits?
(3 March 2002, Sheffield, England) As Kim Fontana, 32, and Paul Cowley, 40, left the pub, they noticed that a streetlight was burned out, creating an attractive pool of darkness on the road. Unable to rein in their passion, they began to canoodle on the asphalt outside the pub.
Witnesses said the couple was lying right on the white line, kissing and cuddling. The passionate pair were warned of the danger of their chosen position not once, not twice, but three times -- by a car driver, a bus driver, and a pedestrian.
An off-duty paramedic honked three times and shouted, "You want to get up, or otherwise you’ll be run over." The man simply said "Cheers, mate," and the paramedic heard a female voice laughing. A bus driver swerved to avoid them, and drove past with wheels on the curb. A concerned pedestrian shouted to warn them that another bus was headed their way.
Despite these disruptions, Kim and Paul continued, oblivious to the approach of a small, single-decker Nipper bus. The bus driver mistook the undulating shape for a bag of rubbish in the poorly lit street, and was unable to stop in time. There was a dull thud...
Kim and Paul were struck and killed at midnight. Paramedics found Kim lying on her back with her jumper pulled up, and Paul between her legs with his trousers pulled down.
The only downside to this timely removal of lunacy from the gene pool is the fate of the bus driver. Despite the couple's own actions, and a police investigator's statement that "one can expect a pedestrian walking or running in the road, but to expect a driver to anticipate a pedestrian lying in the road is out of the ordinary" -- a judge felt that "his driving fell below the standard one would reasonably expect of a prudent, competent driver."
The bus driver was fined for careless driving and his license was revoked for six months. Fortunately, his employers consider him an excellent employee, and plan to give him other duties for six months. Relatives of the victims said they were glad the driver had kept his job.
"Does it really matter what these affectionate
people do, so long as they don't do it in the street
and frighten the horses?" -Mrs. Patrick Campbell
Or New Zealanders:
(9 April 2003, New Zealand) Phil needed to make repairs to the underside of his car. But when he jacked it up, there wasn't enough room for him to work. So he removed the car's battery, placed the jack on top of it, and set to work again, this time with plenty of elbow-room.
Unfortunately for Phil, car batteries are not designed to carry much weight. The battery collapsed and the jack toppled, trapping him beneath the car. Unable to breathe due to the weight on his chest, he quickly expired in a pool of battery acid.
This incident is illuminated by two additional facts: First, Phil's occupation was Accident Prevention Officer at a large food processing plant. And second, ten years previous, he had been working under a car when the jack collapsed, trapping him and breaking one of his legs. Some people just don't learn -- even from their own mistakes.
Or Indians:
(January 2003, India) Regarding accidental deaths during the construction of a subway in New Delhi, the New York Times wrote, "One of those killed was an unlucky thief who tried to steal braces holding up a concrete slab; it fell and killed him."
Or Croations:
(January 2002, Croatia) A Croatian was killed while trying to open a hand grenade with a chainsaw. He wanted to retrieve the explosive to make firecrackers for the New Year’s holiday
These are all from the "Official Darwin Awards" website.
You see, Redstar2000, I can take any nation and hold it culpable by focusing on isolated acts of stupidity by individual citizens. It's easy. The bottom line is that the USA is the world's most advanced nation industrally, economically, and techologically, and it's overall performance and contributions throughout history says a lot more about it as a country than what a few uneducated rednecks believe (I see no source for any of these claims, buy the way).
Honestly, Redstar2000, I expect idiots like Revolutionindia to submit meaningless B.S. like this, and I may expect imbeciles such as Teis or Cubist to eat it up too, but I would expect you be analytical enough to think in the abstract a little and steer clear of this type of rubbish.