It took a while, but a lawsuit in New Hampshire has finally been settled. And the right side won.
Back in 2006, a golfer at a Granite State golf course got a bad lie. He whacked the hell out of the ball anyway. It shot straight into a yard marker, ricocheted right back at him, and took out his eye.
The duffer, naturally, sued the golf course. And several years later, the courts ruled that it was his own damned fault.
There was no one else involved in his mishap. No one else hit the ball. No one hid the yard marker on him and popped it up at the last moment. He could have moved the marker, aimed around it, or taken a penalty and moved his ball. Hell, he could have cheated and kicked his ball aside. Instead, he took the shot and took himself out.
Yeah, I feel bad for the guy. Blindness is one of my bigger fears. But that doesn’t mean the golf course is obligated for damages because of his bad shot. Hell, I bet the club has a waiver saying that the golfer is responsible for any self-inflicted injuries, and that golf can be hazardous. (And if they didn’t, they ought to now.)
Bad things happen. But it isn’t always someone else’s fault. We need to take a smidgen more personal responsibility in our lives.
A lesson that this golfer ought to know by now.
