Grama Or Not?

In the post about the boxer it said that he was told that if a gentile puts him on the scale it is only grama and permitted. I received an email asking for my thoughts on this.

I am not a posek and didn't see this discussed explicity but my gut feeling is that it is not true. Grama is an indirect melacha such as putting bottles of water near a fire so that when the fire reaches them, they will extinguish it. Having someone put me on an electric scale seems pretty direct. My body is doing the melacha. May I let someone grab my hand and turn on a light? IF it would only be grama the rule is that in a case of a great loss grama is permitted. [Of course many would argue that not participating in a boxing tournament is a great gain but in the young boxers mind it was certainly a great loss]. But I don't think it is.

In this article we defined grama [from the Chelkas Yaakov] as a melacha that doesn't happen immediately after the person's action. Here, the electronic reaction is immediate, so again, it wouldn't be grama.

Of course, I may be wrong. My main focus in my learning is generally not halacha l'myse so if it is not discussed in the sources, I leave it to those who are the Masters. I just posted to promote further thought and hope that someone will write an article defining the exact parameters of grama on Shabbos [he has to read mine first:)].

In general, just about every halachic statement and certainly halachic discussion that one reads about in the secular press will be inaccurate. Halacha is complex and the media [on matters of Torah] is simplistic. Beware.