Friday 24 July 2009

manufactured crisis

The German people are not as a whole insurance-junkies, as H was trying to convince me--or rather that he was not a fanatic himself. The Germans are not a particularly legitious people, either, though I think that their almost complete lack of sleazy lawyer advertisements and claim-jumping television offers, make them seem to take the matter more seriously. There is a plethora of insurance to be had to safeguard every aspect of one's health, property and legacy, all narrowly and precisely defined. Sometimes I feel that this multiplicity of underwriters must have very hyper-active imaginations, turning every benign instance into a chain-reaction of events that lead to freak-accidents, the overturning of empires. I am sure that agents thought up the butterfly-effect or the creationists' argument about the jalopy spontaneously formed when a tornado sweeps over a junk-yard. Still, there's much sense to having the extra protection that hopefully one will never need. H took the matter seriously as we were talking about options and the extra coverage, and he got a bit annoyed with me for missing the point, which I often do. Insurance beyond the ilk of the proletariat does not give one license to be a jerk: I can't put our trash in the neighbour's dustbin and feel immune from any repercussions because we're insured. I can't incite a turf war at the flea market, because we're insured--although the policy specifies it can cover loses or damages sustained in a side-business operation. The policy also explicitly covers damages done to hotel rooms or other rental property. I was really hung up with the idea that H and I could trash a hotel room like rock-stars and get away with it.