True story: Today I was on my college campus in California, on the quad, hoping to admire the partial eclipse today. Some enterprising young woman next to me was selling glasses for three bucks. I saw some people buy some and decided what the hell. Unfortunately the only thing she had left was some kind of monocle. I bought it anyway and enjoyed the partial eclipse. After around 10 minutes of looking on and off, I sat down to read the text on the monocle. It said it was exclusively for phone use and under no circumstances was it to be used for viewing with your eye. Saying it could cause serious damage. Thankfully no pain so far, but I hope I didn't do any kind of serious damage. I've had anxiety about it ever since. The seller said to not worry about it and it would be fine. She had no idea either. Lovely!

[–] JudahBenHur@lemm.ee 35 points 7 months ago

sees phone lens cover: "this is an old timey eclipse monocle".. I'm just teasing the idea of an eclipse monocle just made me giggle. I hope you're eyes are ok- it sounds like you're good?

[–] neptune@dmv.social 17 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I think it's more the manufacturer knows it can't cover both eyes and so tells you not to use it that way. If your eyes don't hurt, I'm sure the damage was very minimal. But what do I know.

[–] TheControlled@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

Thanks, makes me feel better.

[–] trolololol@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Well the floaties I bought for the pool had warnings in many languages but only the one in murican got my attention: it's not a toy and it's not a floatation device. What the hell do Americans use it for if the legalese forbids everything?

Same story with people treating kinder eggs like a lethal device.