Parents who think the miracle chair is too dangerous to use don’t know that the Baby Bumbo seat recall is about a safety belt you’d never use anyway. But the safety belt isn’t the issue – height is the issue.

Mobility is conquered by the Bumbo Seat, and our readers know that we have a special place for products that incapacitate little ones. The cleverly designed chair keeps kids stuck into it so that parents can feed them, clip their nails, wash their hands and do just about anything needed without fear of the baby scurrying away. It’s damn near impossible for a younger baby to escape from one, although an older baby (more than 9 months) will eventually make it his or her goal to find a way out. After all, that’s the game a baby realizes should be engaged with practically everything that straps, traps or otherwise incapacitates. A look at the pictures tells you everything you know – and parents are amazed at how the “thigh traps” serving as leg rests do the trick of keeping most kids stuck inside the seat.

Nonetheless, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a recall on units in 2012, warning parents to stop using the product until they order and install a repair kit – a restraint belt. But the belt will only go so far in preventing an infant from rocking overboard. For this reason, the recall really just needs five words in bold:

DON’T PUT ON A TABLE!

We live in world afraid of its own shadow. The Baby Bumbo seat recall is overkill and anyone with an ounce of responsibility recognizes it’s inanity. Surprise! Surprise! An infant can get out of a seat?

Jennifer Sicurella’s comments on Amazon.com sum up the stupidity of the recall: My issue with the chair is the stupid seat belt. And I mean stupid. It’s positioned in a way that it’s almost impossible to use. While there is a way to adjust the strap on either side, you can’t adjust the height of the middle T clip. It’s set too low to use without poking and prodding your child for minutes at a time and even then you’re risking catching the chubby legs in the clip. And just how safe is it really making this seat? The odds of your child climbing out of it – slim. The odds of it tipping over with your child inside, much greater. And the seat belt is only ensuring that the are still connected to the seat while lying on their face. Helpful.

The now archival Bumbo Baby Seat recall video has recently gone viral (again), telling new parents to stop using the wonderful little chair that incapacitates wandering babies. But with more than 5 million baby Bumbo Seats sold there have been less than fifty accidents, all resulting from parents who have not been attentive to their toddlers perched in the seat on top of a table.

After rebranding their miracle baby seat, the South African company now calls the seat a “Bumbo Floor Seat”, which will hopefully tell parents to stop perching their kids on top of tables and chairs without regard to kids falling out. It also tells you what the real Bumbo Baby Seat recall was all about – not putting your kid in a place where he or she could get hurt by the ever present reality that is gravity.

It’s a damn shame that misunderstandings are preventing this miracle product from new parents intent on protecting their children. But with a little more details on recalls like this one, perhaps parents will start to understand their are universal liabilities with raising children that often have little to do with the products they use.