The Wii, Xbox 360 Menaces: Unsafe for Consumers
BREAKING NEWS: Gaming consoles are unsafe, and even mere proximity to them may cause stupidity and/or death.
By now I think that everyone and their dog knows about the poor woman who died of ‘water intoxication’ after participating in a silly radio station contest that asked consenting contestants to drink as much water as they could without peeing. The best non-wee-er, would win themselves a Wii. One contestant, an eager mom of three Wii hungry children, literally drank herself to death. Rumours of lawsuits against the station, exclamations of “I didn’t know you could die from water!”, and general disbelief followed.I received an email about this one (thanks Kamyar!) and had every intention of posting it, before it simultaneously appeared in every single gaming feed in my feed reader, leading me to throw my hands up and say “what’s the point?”.
The story though, continues to spiral out of control. The radio station responsible for the stunt now appears to be facing both civil and criminal suits, despite the fact that the competition was voluntary and the participants consenting. I’m assuming that they’ll all go the negligence route and cite that the dangers weren’t made clear to the volunteers.
I do have to wonder though, how anyone in their right mind would think it would be a good idea to put that much of anything into their body. I have both biology and chemistry degrees, but I don’t think it’s academic knowledge that too much of anything, even water, is bad. Electrolyte imbalances? Strain on the gastrointestinal system? Any of this ringing a bell? I must say that I’m astoundingly impressed (impressed isn’t an appropriate word) that the woman actually managed to hold her urine. The body has a natural instinct for survival. There is the ‘gee I have to pee’ feeling, and the ‘omg I need to pee or I’ll die’ situation. I would think that the body, regardless of the effort put in to deter it, would eventually just let loose a torrent of pee to relieve its discomfort. It’s like when you’re drowning, but your lungs have noticed you haven’t inhaled, so they involuntarily suck in a few gallons of water. The body has natural overrides for when its owners appear to be behaving stupidly. Somehow though, this woman managed to suppress those, or the situation was already so out of hand that the water expulsion and retention systems of the intestines had just given up.
In response to the tragedy, the radio station, KDND 107.9 FM in California, appeared to take the events very seriously, firing 10 staffers, and cancelling the Morning Rave show on which the competition was held. They really had no choice in the matter from my perspective, after recordings of the event heard listeners calling in to warn of the dangers, and the joking dismissal of the DJs who took the call.
Between this incident, the ’sports injuries’ resulting from acrobatic Wii use, and the infamously sinister flying Wii-motes, it sounds like Nintendo’s crowd friendly console may have a dark streak, and it’s not the only one. Now, as The Game Rag reports, the Xbox 360 begun to show its malicious underbelly. 360 controllers have started taking on a mind of their own; flying out of their owners hands and causing property damage, personal injury, and other dangerous by-products of their use. Class action suits have been filed, and the law firm handling the claims against Microsoft, the manufacturer of the XBox 360. “They should have anticipated that people would handle their controllers like spastic seizure victims.”
Who knew coffee could be hot?
1 opinion for The Wii, Xbox 360 Menaces: Unsafe for Consumers
Kamyar
Jan 22, 2007 at 4:24 am
Thank you for posting this!! I really want people to be able to read about this stuff because I think it is important that people understand that no material object in this planet is as important as life itself! While that mother wanted to make her children happy by winning them a Wii, she did the stupidest thing on the planet by causing herself bodily harm. It’s just not worth it. And now those children are left without a mother. (The radio station has plenty of blame too, but, in the end it is the person that participates. Nobody held a gun to their heads.)
This reminds me of the people who were fighting and beating each other for an XBox 360 or a PS3. The level of greed in humans knows no boundaries. Doing really stupid things should be reserved for life-or-death situations, not for a Nintendo Wii.
Again, thank you for posting this!
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