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Wackiest Warning Label of 2004 Announced Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch
January 5, 2005 Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch (M-LAW) has announced the winner of its eighth-annual Wacky Warning Label contest: a flushable toilet brush that warns users, "Do not use for personal hygiene." M-LAW created the contest to reveal how lawsuits have created a need for common sense warnings on products.
Common Good chair Philip K. Howard has praised the contest for raising awareness of the legal fear that "is undermining our way of life, causing reasonable people to act unreasonably."
Other winners include:
A label on a popular scooter for children that warns, "The product moves when used."
A label on an electric hand blender promoted for use in "blending, whipping, chopping and dicing," that warns: "Never remove food or other items from the blades while the product is operating."
A label on a nine-by-three-inch bag of air used as packing material. It carries this warning: "Do not use this product as a toy, pillow, or flotation device."
"Warning labels are a sign of our lawsuit-plagued times," said Robert B. Dorigo Jones, M-Law president. "From the moment we raise our head in the morning off pillows that bear those famous 'Do Not Remove' warnings, to when we drop back in bed at night, we are overwhelmed with warnings. Plaintiff's lawyers who file the lawsuits that prompt these warnings argue they are making us safer, but the warnings have become so long that few of us read them anymore--even the ones we should read."
"Fear of litigation has become pervasive in America," Philip K. Howard said, "and, while this contest is naturally funny, the underlying problem is a very serious one."
M-Law is a non-partisan, non-profit organization working to increase public awareness of how the litigation explosion is hurting America. Read more on their website.
See a list of past winners.
Read Common Good's press release praising last year's Wacky Warning Label contest.
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