Consult your Physician
Fri, 15 Mar 2024
Opinion
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I keep occasionally running into disclaimers that profess
something along these lines:

> Before partaking in this exercise, please consult a physician
> ... It requires both mental and physical strength ... Ensure
> you are in good health ... Know your limits ... You are at
> risk of personal injury ... COMPANY NAME is not liable for any
> damages ... etcetera

Pretty intense right? The above is paraphrased from a 142 word
disclaimer at the start of an exercise video on YouTube. What
exercise was the video instructing on? Was it skydiving? Free
solo rock climbing? Perhaps it wasn't exercise in a traditional
sense, but activities such as skin-hooking. Or maybe this was
some insane strongman routine, including deadlifts, atlas
stones, and other high-risk motions.

The truth is much more mundane. This video described a 10 minute
stretching routine designed to be performed while laying down in
bed. Excuse me? This required such a scary build up?

Another example:
> Before making any dietary changes consult your doctor ...
> Unintended side effects ... Potential miscarriage ...
> Permanent health damage ... Is not liable for any damages ...
> Continue at your own risk ... and so forth

What warning was this for you might ask? Steroids? Super
restrictive diets such as veganism or ketogentic diets? Foods
aimed at diabetics? Pregnant people?

No, this was a article overviewing some herbal teas, notably
nettle tea.

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I see these disclaimers relatively often, especially on
incredibly mediocre things. Whereas extreme exercise and diets
are promoted without medical backing. I feel as though these
disclaimers have lost track of reality, and in this post; I will
complain about them.

Now, let me start with a disclaimer of my own: I understand why
these walls of warning text are included in videos and articles.
They simply wish to void any liabilities for damage because
human stupidity knows no bounds, and because the United States
legal system knows fewer bounds still.

But come on... Ten minutes of stretching? Herbal tea? Meanwhile
there are no health labels on sodas or super processed foods
which are proven to have health aversive effects. A sedentary
lifestyle is *almost* guaranteed to be more damaging than one
which includes light exercise or stretching.

Now, if this was just independent bloggers and small companies
being overly cautious, that would be one thing, but
unfortunately this all goes much deeper. I do a lot of rock
climbing, mostly indoors. At all but one of the gyms I have been
to throughout Europe, I needed to sign a waiver stating that the
gym would not be responsible for injuries. Fair enough. In Italy
however, I needed a certificate signed by a doctor that I was
fit enough to exercise.

When I was asked to present this certificate I was baffled at
first. I was later assured by many people that this is common
for nearly all gyms in Italy, both climbing gyms and otherwise.
How backwards is this? ``You are not fir enough to exercise''?
Meanwhile you can try your best at merging with your sofa
without any form of medical assessment as to the risk you are
exposing yourself to.

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I feel as though this is a worrying symptom of a much wider
problem which can roughly be characterized as: ``people can no
longer take care of themselves''. Simple, rather mediocre
decisions, such as what tea to drink, must be made for you. You
should never be within two meters of a body of water without a
trained professional nearby. Careful with those stretches, you
might just rip off your limbs altogether.

At the same time, everyone is self-medicating with actually
harmful medication such as melatonin and painkillers, knowing
nothing about how to actually use these drugs. When people grow
sedentary and fat, that is within their freedom to do, but if
you wish to live alternatively, you better ask the government
official nicely first.

I am reminded of Aldous Huxley's wonderful work ``A brave new
world''. Where the totalitarian government aims to keep its
citizens in a perpetually immature state. No one makes their own
choices, and everyone drugs themselves up before any discomfort
can reach them.

I hope that we can change our social-, and legal- structures in
such a way that we can assume that those around us are
responsible human beings capable of looking after themselves. So
that we can share simple things such as recipes and exercises
without needing to be afraid that someone manages to drown
themselves in the soup we instructed them to make, or get
horribly injured by following our closed-eye meditation
instructions while driving. Unfortunately, this does not seem to
be the direction we are heading in... so in that light:

========================== DISCLAIMER ==========================
I am not a lawyer, I am not a doctor, I am not a politician.
This is not legal/medical/social advice.  In the worst case
scenario, my writings may even induce some semblance of
independent thought which has been shown to lead to:
- Social extrication
- Political radicalization
- Migraines
- Death
- An aversion to pine cones
- A substantial drop in birth-rates
- Self-harm
- General life improvement and/or psychosis 
I am not to be held accountable for these -- or any other --
effects my writings inspire.
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