But what where is the line between your responsibility to put up signs and warnings and futile exercises in protecting stupid people from themselves? A sufficiency clever fool will find their way into the hole you'd dug past the most foolproof barrier you could possibly erect.

Societal exceptions of where that line is vary greatly even from state to state even in the US, say nothing of the differences between expectations in say, wealthy city in the US and Brazil.

Sued to hell in a country with 1/10 the money of the western world doesn't mean a lot.

because it is your responsibility not to walk blindly into a hole.

Why the US is so blame happy, rather than personal responsibility, that is the question.

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Just different cultures

They are many reasons why people fall into a hole if it is not clearly marked. Some people have bad sight and may not be able to see a hole but are able to see flashy signs. Should people who have bad sight not be able to navigate freely?

Furthermore, this is about driving and not walking, and during the night. It shouldn't come as a surprise that people are not able to see a black hole on black cement at 'high' speeds (50kph/30mph). Add a little bit of rain or fog, and it's just a recipe for disaster. Maybe if people are aware that workers do stuff like that, they are a little bit more careful but it's probably too late when you finally see it.

The problem here is that there is a culture that does not care very much about their action towards others and think it's not their responsibility and nothing is going to happen to them. While I liked my stay in Brazil a lot (although it was only for a few days), the difference is quite obvious.

There definitely needs to be some kind of balance. For example, when I was in Asia, one city had random holes in the sidewalk at least every 100ft. They looked similar to the below and went into the sewer.

https://i.imgur.com/pw4iYk8.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/1Am87Yq.jpg

If you accidentally stepped in one of the holes, you could be seriously injured, or potentially have a life threatening injury if you're elderly.

At night time the street lights are very dim, and I only walked on the road, because I didn't have a flashlight and the sidewalk was too unsafe.

Well, it's actually both. We get a decent buffer of safety only if all parties take precautions.

Humans are very good at optimizing their behavior for close to constant risk. If one party does stuff to increase safety to compensate for other parties not being alert as they should be then the other parties will decrease their alertness to keep risk constant. You give them blind spot detection that works most of the time and they merge onto a motorcycle because they've learned to stop looking. You put orange barrels up at 99% of the road hazards and they'll drive right into the one that doesn't have them because they expect there to be orange barrels. You remove the little holder tab from gas pumps and people just shove the gas cap in (it fits perfectly). You put emergency stops, fail-safes and limit switches on power tools and they become part of normally operating the tool (why disengage the blade on a riding lawnmower when you can just take your butt off the seat and it will do it for you, no reason to not overload the trash compactor when it's got a relief valve).

Once you get beyond the bare minimum of warnings that alert people to some hazard returns diminish quickly, better to spend your resources on minimizing the damage of people being dumb than preventing them from being dumb in the first place.

That’s interesting - you are actually blaming the one who walked into the hole.

This is a pretty dangerous way of looking at the world - it’s victim blaming and means nobody has to take responsibility.

Negligence is definitely a problem. Some time ago the Brazilian Samarco iron ore mine collapsed due to negligence. That had dire consequences. Did they blame the victims for not being careful enough? Of course not.

https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/bhp-billiton-samar...