...people might be SLIGHTLY more careful...
Canadian PSAs

Remember folks, there are no accidents.

NOTE: these are very detailed and graphic.

For some reason, it's hard to take those seriously. I keep expecting them to get up and be like "I'm fine, because I stayed at a Holiday Inn last night!" or "It's okay, Red Bull gives me wings!"

I guess I've been de-sensitized.

That's not that gory.

Staplerfahrer Klaus, on the other hand...

Every time I see one of these for the first time (on TV, so I don't know it's a PSA right away) I end up bursting out laughing before I realize it's supposed to be serious. Does that make me a bad person?

This is what happens when you keep screwin' around.

No it makes you a healthy person. Even though it seems like you aren't taking things seriously, that is a coping mechanism. When someone witnesses something like this your first reaction will often be to deny that it is real, at least on a reactionary, subconscious level. It becomes comedic. That's why so few people respond instantly unless they have been conditioned to do so.

That's also why so many violent events can happen, like stabbings or shootings. Combining your OODA loop with denial, it enables you to take a while to figure out what is going on, laugh at it, and then realize what is going on and panic.

It protects you from nightmares. You don't want those kind of nightmares.

Peace of mind FTW, thanks Spook.

Welcome to my major. This is exactly my line of work...i also am desensitized, but only due to the countless real videos/pictures of incidents where these really happened. These are cheesy, but seriously, be careful...the real thing isn't pretty. I hope I never have to see it in real life.

We've got billboards like these scattered around Phoenix.

Uh huh, no problem.

It's fascinating to me, the differences between a conditioned psyche and a normal, natural, healthy one. After traumatic events, normal people often recall "it all happening so fast". They can't always remember what went on.

However, people like myself, often remember vivid detail, and time seems to slow down. This is because that "horror filter" has been altered, broken down, or destroyed through operant conditioning. It's not that my brain is moving faster. It's that my mind is not blocking out the gruesome sensory input. This is part of why you remember more and time went slower as a kid. You were taking in more things. You didn't take as much of the world around you for granted as you do now. Not only do I process it differently, but it is usually stored readily available. This comes from lots of training that tells me that I might need to draw on this experience at any time.

There are other reasons that some people remember more or react faster, but it generally has to do with conditioning, or them being an anti-social type in the first place.

I dunno, all the live med drills with ridiculously realistic mock patients, the bear pits and sparring, bad situations, video games and movies have really ****ed me up. For the better I feel, I am more able to assess and react in tense situations like injuries and accidents. However, lots of things trouble me afterwards. My newest idea that I want to try is involving eye gouges.

Even hard hitting mother****ers that I know, you know, pliers and blowtorch types, often say that they don't know if they could stick their thumb in an eye socket and swish things up. I've found that taking someone who has stabbed someone before, and having them stab a bag of sidewalk salt that I am holding, while I act realistically, gives them similar feelings they had when stabbing someone. I want to try the same thing but with grapefruits or oranges taped over my eyes and see if it breaks down that resistance to people being able to commit that act.

Actually, IMHO, pictures are worse than the real thing, for the most part, as far as the "gross" or "horrifying" factor is concerned.

The human mind is pretty interesting.

Just a little bit.