What people seem to forget is that their trusted non-CAT meter didn't happen to be largely safe by accident, but because there were safety standards before CAT ratings. Your age old, non CAT rated meter doesn't immediately explode while using it, because (if it isn't a heap of shit) it was build according to another safety standard (maybe IEC 348) which was valid at the time of build.
While people argue CAT ratings are nanny state, for pussies, conspiracies, they happily point to their age old meters that were also build according to some safety standard. Uhhh. Trying to "prove" that safety standards aren't needed, by pointing to instruments that were build according to older safety standards, kind of doesn't make much sense.
It is not that the dangers of using a meter are random imaginations of the people who later came up with CAT ratings. The danger was always there, and the knowledge how to protect users from the danger as best as possible was codified in standards. And before there were written standards the knowledge was part of the engineering body of knowledge and was handed down from old engineers to new engineers as part of their education.
Standards evolve, because people learn more about the subject. In case of the safety standards it was already mentioned that research into arcing increased the knowledge about potential dangers. Instead of ignoring that knowledge engineers went ahead and incorporated the new knowledge into standards.
Your old meter, build to an older standard might or might not protect you from the newly understood danger, danger that was always there. The fact is, the old meter wasn't build to do so. If it protects you, then it does so by accident. A new meter, build to the newer standard, is supposed to protect you intentionally instead.
The newer standard requires a CAT rating and printing of that rating on the instrument. So what? CAT ratings are simple groups, made so that also the not so brightest bulbs in the chandelier have a chance to identify if a meter is fit for a purpose or not. It allows to teach even drunken electricians simple rules "Work on this panel? Your meeter needs to have that CAT rating printed on. *grunt* Got that? *grunt* *grunt*".
Argumenting that one did survive putting paper clips into a wall socket, and therefore safety standards aren't needed is extremely dumb. In fact, I would say the electric shock apparently had a negative impact on the brain capacity, at least this would explain the "argument". These days indeed few people die because of electrocution. This is because of safety standards, not because there isn't any danger.