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Comment by paulcole | Hacker News Reader

$300,000 for the average person, isn’t a lesson. It’s an albatross around their neck that will be their for perhaps their whole life and cause huge problems for at the very least decades. May as well make it $300,000,000. I don’t think of that as “justice” so much as “justice porn” so those of us who weren’t fined $300,000 can look and say, “What a great job the system did.”

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Right but alternative is making people pay for stupidity of some randoms. I don't have problems with socialized healthcare, it's mostly not person's fault they happened to have worse health than others, but this is just compounded effect of multiple stupid decisions in a row

> it's mostly not person's fault they happened to have worse health than others

How can one come to this conclusion given the trends in people’s weights?

How can you not, knowing how corporations literally spend billions of dollars a year to make sure people consume whatever unhealthy thing they are making this year? Like, yeah, it's my personal fault for drinking that can of coke, but let's not pretend that billions that Coca-Cola corporation spends on ads and marketing had absolutely nothing to do with it either.

Most people (except Christian Bale) don't make a conscious decision to become overweight. As far as I know, there isn't even a consensus why people are getting bigger every decade.

> it's mostly not person's fault they happened to have worse health than others

Cigarettes come to mind. You’re fine with penalizing this guy $300,000 for doing something stupid and penalizing society hundreds of millions of dollars for the maliciousness of RJR Nabisco, Philip Morris, etc.

I think the question it's meant to make people consider is, "Is this action I'm about to take really the last resort to save my life?"

If it's truly "die vs. do this and live the rest of my life in debt," yeah. It's worth it to take on the debt.

But it'll force another level of creativity out of you before you decide the only way to save your life is to light a whole dead tree on fire and hope for the best.

>I think the question it's meant to make people consider is, "Is this action I'm about to take really the last resort to save my life?"

it's been my experience that if I push it all the way to the last resort to save my life I am

1. not in a good state to make that decision

2. not in a good state to do the necessary steps to make the last resort work correctly.

Then stop putting yourself in those sorts of situations.

I was actually making a comment that was meant not to be applied just to me but to make people consider huh, yeah if I was actually at the point of last resort that's got to be pretty extreme and I too would not be operating at peak efficiency therefore it would be best to start the process of saving my life before it was the last resort or I die, but evidently I have once again been too vague in my preferred communication style.

No you were not, you made a great point. Some people just want to do mob justice and punish people so harshly, that they can't even understand that if they were in that situation, they'd likely feel the same as you.

But the point is that you're finding out about this potential consequence now, from the safety of your own home.

It'll be hanging over you when you're out, as things get worse and worse. You'll start thinking of alternatives much earlier, because the potential of living the rest of your life in debt if you only find a destructive way to stay alive won't let you wait as long to be thinking about solutions.

Nobody's reading this article from a place where they're already at "light a forest fire or die" danger level. This only works as a deterrent and a cautionary tale because people are finding out about it before they're in dire trouble.

Only if you know about the $300,000 fine, right?

This is literally the whole point.

Yes, exactly. Very few people will be aware of the fine so it’s use as a deterrent will be very limited.

You likely won't be thinking creativity if you have mental limitations due to medical state. Heat injuries, dehydration, etc can cause mental impairment. My guess is that's why they are focusing so much on him creating his own emergency and focusing on inconsequential things like lack of first aid kits or flashlights - so they rule out a temporary insanity plea.

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