diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 6257af43..bcc71ac7 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,6 +1,10 @@
 # ChangeLog for Gentoo System Intialization ("rc") scripts
 # Copyright 1999-2007 Gentoo Foundation; Distributed under the GPLv2
 
+  22 Aug 2007; Roy Marples <uberlord@gentoo.org>:
+
+    Only open /proc/cmdline if it exists, #189686 thanks to Christian Affolter
+
   21 Aug 2007; Roy Marples <uberlord@gentoo.org>:
 
     Fix pppd getting the interface metric.
diff --git a/src/rc.c b/src/rc.c
index f4613a8a..1cb899a6 100644
--- a/src/rc.c
+++ b/src/rc.c
@@ -378,7 +378,10 @@ static char *proc_getent (const char *ent)
 	char *p;
 	char *value = NULL;
 	int i;
-			
+
+	if (! rc_exists ("/proc/cmdline"))
+		return (NULL);
+
 	if (! (fp = fopen ("/proc/cmdline", "r"))) {
 		eerror ("failed to open `/proc/cmdline': %s", strerror (errno));
 		return (NULL);