Blinded Me with Science

Last Updated on: 14th March 2014, 10:29 am

Ok, this is just stupid. A 15-year-old boy apparently learned how to make a home-made bomb out of caustic soda and other common products from a children’s television science show, although that is under dispute, because the show’s producers can’t find record of that exact experiment. His plan of impressing all of his friends went horribly wrong when he took his exploding creation to school, through it down, it didn’t explode…and he went to pick it up…at which point, it exploded in his face!. He has permanent damage to one eye, and spent several days in the hospital. Now police are trying to tell retail stores not to sell certain products to young people because they’re dangerous, and writing to the show’s producers telling them that their show caused this tragedy.

No! This kid’s wanting to build a bomb caused this tragedy. If he hadn’t seen it on a show, he would have gone to find info on it somewhere. It would have been just a matter of time.

Even if he did see it on the show, every science show I’ve ever seen tells you to not try this at home if it’s even remotely dangerous. They tell you to protect your eyes, and get a big person to help you if you really want to try this at home.

And, finally, the kid was 15. At 15, I knew that I shouldn’t make things that go boom because I might go boom if things went wrong. If I had decided to do something crazy like that, I knew it would be my fault, not some show’s fault, if I got hurt. And that’s the part that pisses me off. We can’t make the world completely safe, because then there’s no risk and there’s no way for anyone to learn anything. And why, once again, is personal responsibility going out the window? Sure, it sucks that this kid got hurt. But that’s where it should stop. No letters to TV stations, no attempts to tell stores what to sell. Just a realization that he’ll probably never try anything that stupid again.

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