It happened in the early 1970s, just before I moved from Chicago to Cincinnati.

They were tearing apart half a square block in the Loop, preparatory to building some new monument to bad taste. It was a hard hat area. There were signs all over warning people to stay clear of the area, that there would be falling bricks and falling timbers and falling anything-else that was heavier than air. Then, because not all Chicagoans can read all that well, they erected a 6-foot chain link fence around the thing, with DANGER and KEEP OUT signs posted every couple of feet.

Cut to a lady shopper. She's in a hurry to get from here to there. And what's between here and there is the construction area. She looks at it. Doubtless she reads the signs. Unquestionably she sees the hard hats. And finally she climbs over the fence, carrying her shopping bag with her, and starts walking across the area. And gets hit on the shoulder by a falling timber.

Cut to a court room a year later. The cast on her broken shoulder has long since been removed. No matter. She's suing the city anyway.

Didn't she see the signs, asks the defense attorney?

Yes.

Didn't she see that everyone was wearing hard hats?

Yes.

Didn't she figure she was endangering herself by climbing a chain link fence that was obvious meant to keep her out?

Yes.

Then, since she knew the risk she was taking, what was the basis of her lawsuit?

That the city was negligent.

How on God's green earth could we have been negligent, demanded the defense attorney.

You should have physically restrained me from climbing the fence, was the answer.

All through laughing? Well, this next line ought to make you cry.

She won her suit.

Now, I wish that she, and the lady whose lap -- after some decoration by a cup of MacDonald's coffee -- was determined to be worth $3 million, were isolated examples of the idiocy of protecting us against ourselves, but alas, they're not.

Take air bags. Please.

We know they've killed hundreds of infants. We know they're going to kill hundreds more. But the law still says every car's got to have them. After all, it's for our own good.

Or those incredibly annoying child-proof bottles. Maybe your child has no interest in swallowing 73 Viagra pills at once. Maybe your child is 43 years old and living 8 states away. Maybe you don't have a child. Makes no difference: he's going to be protected, even if he's imaginary.

Well, I don't have to go on with more current examples. You live in the year 2000; you know as many as I do.

I had rather hoped that the government would become a little less intrusive with the dawn of a new century, would stop going quite so ludicrously out of its way to protect us from ourselves. But that's me. I still hope politicians will be honest, and that the Cincinnati Bengals will have a winning record.

So, since it's not going to happen, let's see what we _can_ expect in the years to come:

War. Now, my understanding has always been that war defines a situation where two sides of an argument try to kill each other, for lack of a more convenient way of deciding which side is right. But after World War I, they banned mustard gas. Too inhumane. (I never knew there were humane ways for armies to kill each other.) After World War II, the nations all signed test ban and anti- nuclear treaties. Too devastating. Everyone knows that Saddam Hussein is an international criminal because he has weapons of biological warfare which are too heinous to contemplate. Please understand: I am _not_ a war buff -- but it does seem to me that if government keeps protecting soldiers against themselves, we're going to need new rules of warfare, and the outcome of the next war will be decided by a replay of Achilles and Hector duking it out before the gates of Troy.

Sports. We all know it's only a matter of time before boxing gets banned. Can't have people beating on each other in the ring, even if they're willing to do so and the financial rewards dwarf anything they're likely to make in any other field of endeavor. But there are more sports than boxing where one can easily foresee government intrusion. Like, for example, basketball, where the giants of the human race throw around elbows and fists while fighting for rebounds, and wear absolutely no protection. Eventually I expect the government to insist upon shoulder pads, goggles, and helmets. Too many football players wind up in wheelchairs, or at least with serious limps; if it continues, and there's no reason to expect it won't, sooner or later some right-thinking politician is going to insist that the NFL becomes the world's first touch football league. The one sport they'll leave alone is professional wrestling, since it's fake to begin with and no one ever gets seriously hurt (except for the occasional freethinker who falls fifty feet to his death on national television).

Literature. Several categories will have to go. Can't have porn; it leads to rape. Can't have murder mysteries; an occasional killer will confess that he learned his methodology from Dame Agatha or Sir Dick.

Cigarettes. Total ban, maybe even a constitutional amendment. No, not because of tobacco; they contribute to everyone's political campaigns. It'll be because of the very real chance of burning yourself with your lighter.

Cigar clubs. Initially, they'll be required to have non- smoking sections, even though every member is a committed cigar smoker and indeed gathers there expressly to smoke in peace and quiet, free from government intrusion. Ultimately cigar clubs will be banned -- which will lead to smokeasies, and stag parties where the girls come out, as they did 50 years ago on television, dressed as packs of Lucky Strikes and matches.

Well, of course it's easy to list all the ways in which we'll be protected from ourselves. But what's protection without a little punishment to enforce it?

For example:

Suicide. It's against the law now. But the way things are going, I foresee attempted suicide becoming a capital offense that almost always merits the death penalty. (Counter-productive? No. You get rid of him before he can talk others into trying to take their own lives. The entire principle at work here is that the good of the many outweigh the good of the one, unless of course the one is politically connected.)

Jaywalking. Probably a $500 fine, and you have to turn in your shoes for 60 days.

Oversleeping. 6 Sominex pills per night for a week. Or maybe you have to listen to a speech on economics by Steve Forbes.

Sexual dysfunction. You are required to go to the bowling alley every Thursday night for a month and lie about your conquests.

Trip on stairs. Trip on carpet. Cut self shaving. Strain back playing golf. Fall down while drunk. Trip over untied shoelace. Burn nose with cigarette lighter. Trip over dog. In every case, the manufacturer will be held liable. (Well, okay, you can't sue the dog's manufacturer, exactly -- but any court will encourage you to sue the breeder, the manufacturer of the leash and collar, the guy who sold you the leash and collar, and the manufacturer of the dog run. Oh, and probably the dog's vet and groomer, too.)

Fall off roof. Perhaps the most lucrative of all. You not only sue the owner of the building, the architect, the manufacturer of the shingles, the manufacturer of your shoes, and the manufacturer of the gutters you grab at on your way down -- but you might even sue the owner of the land for having the lack of consideration to leave it where it was certain to break your fall and cause you untold pain and suffering.

That's the future I see. Given what's come before, I really don't know how you can extrapolate a different one.

But there's one I prefer.

It has every lawyer and judge and lawmaker in the country standing before an enormous blackboard, each with a piece of chalk in his hand.

And at a given signal, they each write PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY on the blackboard 500 times.

Not bloody likely, is it?

Certainly not as likely as a three million dollar lap. *sigh*
-end-