Texting and Driving

Some news reports about people making phone calls or even typing on phones as they drive and the various laws against actually leading to roads that are even more unsafe. Is this a surprise? Really, is it? What did people think was going to happen. The texting takes place out of sight of passersby so as to avoid it being reported to the police or spotted by various patrol cars and is therefore even more unsafe than done in a more sensible manner.

Its sort of like opening a candy wrapper in a theater. Get the darned thing open and get it done with, don't try to sneak it open slowly. That just prolongs the agony!

Now as to speeding. For years enforcement of speeding regulations particularly the arbitrary and capricious ones has been to little avail. It does not get bad drivers it only snags random drivers. One might just as well have a cop toss a pair of dice and issue a citation based on that result. Most "cherry patches" are spots on the road where motorists travel at a perfectly safe but technically illegal speed. Cops issue tickets, the motorist gets sore and loses money but the roads are not particularly safer. Usually the best thing that could be done would be to raise the speed limit sign to what most people drive but that would not bring in revenue so it is not going to be done.

Attention to ones driving is important. When learning to drive few can face the sensory overload of a radio playing. After some practice, the radio and some conversation are almost automatic. Most accidents are due to a momentary distraction such as focusing on an ash-tray or simply having the mind wander from boredom. Very few accidents are really due to speeding drivers. So now there is publicity about texting or telephoning. Egads... one need only look at the modern world. People are living in a merged word: leisure and work are not really separated. Someone can be strolling along, sipping a latte and receiving a report from a construction site. Many people now conduct business meetings at coffee shops rather than offices. There is no "off" for cell phones for many people. Of course this annoys a great many people who don't like living inside someone else's phone-booth but that seems to be what modern life has become. Many calls are too long and too loud. Restaurant patrons get annoyed, pedestrians even get annoyed. Sports books used to ban cell phones but they rarely do anymore. Blackjack players step away briefly but more and more cell phones are a way of life. Many people no longer even have a "home phone" or "landline".

Do legislators really think a law will change driver's behaviors? We have sterile cockpit rules for airline pilots, do you think we will have such rules for car interiors? Its absurd! How could anyone have ever thought for a minute that such Drving While Texting regulations would ever make things better?