When are they going to punish these offenders the same as drunks? One teen just killed a cyclist texting on a cell phone. Either way, it’s distracted driving. We’ve just demonized one over the other.
this is exactly my response. he kills a man due to wreckless driving, and then gets a slap on the wrist. it’s no different than being drunk! that kid needs to go to prison, the maximum time in jail for this is one year…what crap.
i’m not for creating more laws, but more and more people are f’ing up out there on the roads–alot of what i see is from cell phone use. now people are typing messages when driving…it is getting more and more dangerous. something has got to give.
When are they going to punish these offenders the same as drunks? One teen just killed a cyclist texting on a cell phone. Either way, it’s distracted driving. We’ve just demonized one over the other.
How have we “demonized one over the other?” Explain that over-rationalization, please. I am anxious to read the scientific, peer-reviewed comparisons of ETOH over electrons anyday now. I can’t wait for another support group in the making - Mothers Against Cell Drivers (MACED).
Yes! That’s the answer!
Wouldn’t mandatory laws calling for ‘No mobile use during driving’ be much more appropriate? First offense: insurance rate increase times X? Second offense: .
What about adults? We can’t just zero in on the ‘teen’ crowd, can we? That would be so unfair.
Good luck with that proposition.
- kd
I’ll never understand why they allow hand held phones in a car. Are calls to your wife to see if she needs milk, or that you will be home in 5 minutes really that important to do while you’re trying to turn in an intersection with one hand on the wheel?
Is it that hard to use hands-free?
I guess you can’t legislate common sense but if I sit at an intersection, I can probably count 50% of the drivers with one hand, head at an angle to prop up the phone, and not paying any attention to the road.
Heaven forbid if we go 5 minutes out of our day without the ability to make a phone call.
KD–it’s not an over rationalization. the kid was text messaging, he hit a cyclist and killed the man, will probably get a slap on the wrist. if the same thing happened, and the kid was drunk, same outcome (death of cyclist) the penalty would be much steeper obviously.
why?
kid was driving wrecklessly and took a life. took somebody’s son, father, husband, relative and friend. it’s bullshit. the penalty should be much steeper. perhaps then, people would think twice before driving around wrecklessly text messaging their friends about stupid bullshit.
if there was a consequence, maybe people would be more responsible.
i have a major pet peeve about people talking on cells while driving - it seems about 90% of the time, these days, when a driver cuts me off, misses a light, nearly hits me, etc, she’s talking on a cell.
on the other hand, should CD players be banned? radios? what about truckers with CBs? smoking?
-mike
p.s - i own neither a car nor a cell phone.
most people fucking up out there are on phones or texting. and cars today have devices in the steering wheel to turn up volume, change channel all of that stuff. between people stuffing their face with fast food and screwing around on the phones, it’s a wonder more of us haven’t been hit.
I think it is a huge mistake when a government tries to fix questionable behavior by creating laws against it. Granted, it is usually bad judgement to use a cell while driving. There are lots of things that we do in life that is not always the best of ideas. The last thing I want is a more invasive police force examining my bad habbits and putting me in jail for the ones that others deem as poor choices. With very few exceptions I don’t want police arrecting people for what COULD or MIGHT happen.
This in no way lets people off the hook for vehicular manslaughter or whatever other violation is commited. I was dissapointed that the text messaging teen got such a light sentence.
Why do so many adults want a government to babysit and try to fix all of lifes inconveniences or shortcomings? This isn’t a day care we are living in people.
government is a folly, i 100% agree. as soon as it’s involved, everything goes wrong. the best solution is for people to make better choices. but, seeing as how our society is going, that’s just wishful thinking.
we just have to be even more careful out there.
Why do so many adults want a government to babysit and try to fix all of lifes inconveniences or shortcomings?
Because there are so many stupid people and there is nothing we can do to stop them unless there are rules.
If you don’t know that we’ve demonized drunk driving, you haven’t been caught yet.*
Meanwhile, people who text message absolute horseshit to each other - and kill pedestrians/cyclists/other drivers - sleep great at night.
I see the success at curbing drunk driving via “criminialization” as a perfect mold for breaking people of this bad habit. When enough people have died because of cell phones (which are not needed), you’ll see it happen.
- not that I’ve been caught, but friends who have paid a huge price for driving carefully while “tipsy”. Meanwhile some dorky text messaging kid can kill someone and pay a teensy weensy price comparitively… It’s incredible.
I think it is a huge mistake when a government tries to fix questionable behavior by creating laws against it. Granted, it is usually bad judgement to use a cell while driving. There are lots of things that we do in life that is not always the best of ideas. The last thing I want is a more invasive police force examining my bad habbits and putting me in jail for the ones that others deem as poor choices. With very few exceptions I don’t want police arrecting people for what COULD or MIGHT happen.
This in no way lets people off the hook for vehicular manslaughter or whatever other violation is commited. I was dissapointed that the text messaging teen got such a light sentence.
Why do so many adults want a government to babysit and try to fix all of lifes inconveniences or shortcomings? This isn’t a day care we are living in people.
So drunk driving is okay with you?
No. Drunk driving is not ok with me. There are many crimes (including drunk driving, driving without a license, driving while blind, driving without insurance, jaywalking, driving while listening to Green Day, etc.) that I would like to see more strongly enforced. There is a law being broken by the very act of those kind of things. What if I am emotionally distressed and I get in a car to drive? Might I not be distracted? What if a bee flys in my open window and stings me and causes me to lose control and have an accident? Should there be a ban on driving while pissed? Open windows?
In the words of Reagan
“The government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”
and one of my favorites:
"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’
Incidently, (and yes this is another thread) but I am strongly in favor of all drugs being legal - along with gambling, prostitution, etc. I think those crimes are made more dangerous by being illegal, not from the inherent risk of the activity itself. An inspirational book on the proper role of government is “Ain’t Nobody’s Business if I Do” by the late Peter McWilliams
People will continue to be stupid, regardless of the rules.
**People will continue to be stupid, regardless of the rules. **
One stupid person in jail is better than none.
And then you will have to deal with ‘overcrowding.’
-kd
No. Drunk driving is not ok with me. There are many crimes (including drunk driving, driving without a license, driving while blind, driving without insurance, jaywalking, driving while listening to Green Day, etc.) that I would like to see more strongly enforced. There is a law being broken by the very act of those kind of things. What if I am emotionally distressed and I get in a car to drive? Might I not be distracted? What if a bee flys in my open window and stings me and causes me to lose control and have an accident? Should there be a ban on driving while pissed? Open windows?
There have been studies that show that talking on the phone (not just hand held) has the same effect on driving performance as drunk driving. I gather that you agree with the laws against drunk driving (even though they are meant to control what you might do, not what you do); so do you still stand against government regulation of cell phone use while driving?
so, since you are concerned with over crowding, you would rather have someone get off scott free even though they have killed your wife or sister or brother or best friend or parent or whomever.
that is ridiculous.
build more jails, half of the fuckers running around out there are career criminals, and a danger to society.
Making cell phone illegal while driving is not the answer.
Chicago made it illegal to use a cell phone while driving, so now everyone has one of the blue tooth/ear sets. This law has not had any measureable reduction in the number of accidents.
I use my cell phone while driving all the time. I don’t think it distracts me any more than talking to someone sitting on the passenger seat, or listening to the radio. I think text messaging would be a major distraction, but again no more dangerous than drinking hot coffee while driving.
I think people who don’t use their blinkers are by far more dangerous.
I read somewhere that people flipped out when radios were introduced in cars back in the '40’s (or whenever) for the same concern about distractions. It can always be something. I have an enormous problem driving by our outdoor pool that is near a major road in the sumertime. I have no problem with talking on the cell phone while driving. I do it more than I would like to. Text messaging is another issue altogether and I have huge problems with it because it forces your eyes off the road. Duh.
Making cell phone illegal while driving is not the answer.
Chicago made it illegal to use a cell phone while driving, so now everyone has one of the blue tooth/ear sets. This law has not had any measureable reduction in the number of accidents.
I use my cell phone while driving all the time. I don’t think it distracts me any more than talking to someone sitting on the passenger seat, or listening to the radio. I think text messaging would be a major distraction, but again no more dangerous than drinking hot coffee while driving.
You’d be wrong. As I said, it’s not the hand-held aspect that is the problem. There is a fundamentally different thought process that occurs when talking on the phone (to a remote person) than what occurs when talking to someone in the car or listening to the radio.
(edit)
Here’s one study (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=16268934&query_hl=1):
Cellular telephones and driving performance: the effects of attentional demands on motor vehicle crash risk.
Hunton J, Rose JM.
Bentley College, Department of Accountancy, Waltham, MA 02452-4705, USA. JHunton@bentley.edu
This study examines the effects of conversation mode and split-attention communication training on driving performance. The study is based on an experiment where drivers with and without communication training (pilots vs. nonpilots) completed a simulated driving course while involved in one of three conversation modes: no conversation, conversation with passenger, or conversation on a hands-free cellular telephone. Results indicate that cellular telephone conversations consume more attention and interfere more with driving than passenger conversations. Cell phone conversations lack the nonverbal cues available during close-contact conversations and conversation participants expend significant cognitive resources to compensate for the lack of such cues. The results also demonstrate that communication training may reduce the hazardous effects of cell phone conversations on driving performance.
PMID: 16268934
and another which may be relevant (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=15003592&query_hl=1):
Driving performance during concurrent cell-phone use: are drivers aware of their performance decrements?
Lesch MF, Hancock PA.
Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety, 71 Frankland Road, Hopkinton, MA 01748, USA.
Prior research has documented the manner in which a variety of driving performance measures are impacted by concurrent cell-phone use as well as the influence of age and gender of the driver. This current study examined the extent to which different driver groups are aware of their associated performance decrements. Subjects’ confidence in dealing with distractors while driving and their ratings of task performance and demand were compared with their actual driving performance in the presence of a cell-phone task. While high confidence ratings appeared to be predictive of better driving performance for male drivers (as confidence increased, the size of the distraction effects decreased), this relationship did not hold for females; in fact, for older females, as confidence increased, performance decreased. Additionally, when drivers were matched in terms of confidence level, brake responses of older females were slowed to a much greater extent (0.38 s) than were brake responses of any other group (0.10s for younger males and females and 0.07 s for older males). Finally, females also rated the driving task as less demanding than males, even though their performance was more greatly affected by distraction. These results suggest that many drivers may not be aware of their decreased performance while using cell-phones and that it may be particularly important to target educational campaigns on driver distraction towards female drivers for whom there tended to be a greater discrepancy between driver perceptions and actual performance.
PMID: 15003592