[Richard D]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1885000/1885775.stm

Not exactly surprising results...

Personally I hate the things anyway, but why would anyone think they could safely drive whilst using one anyway?

Richard

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[stewartp]

Along with any proposals to ban mobile phones when driving must also come the ban of:
Eating while driving
Drinking while driving
Changing cd/s cassettes while driving
Tuning the radio while driving
Reading/fiddling with the GPS while driving
Applying lipstick/eye-shadow while driving
Shaving while driving
Turning round to shout at the kids while driving
Lighting a cigarette while driving

In fact any activity which can be demonstrated to take your 100% full concentration away from the task of driving.

So its either let things lie as they are, and use exisiting laws and education, or steadily legislate everything out.

Unfortunately you can't legislate against stupidity, and even if the whole damn list was banned, you'd still get eedjits pranging their cars and killing people because they're doing dumb things while driving.

Stew

[John E]

Although Patrick raises an undeniably valid point, I favor banning mobile phone use whilst piloting a motor vehicle. I even more strongly favor imposing greater legal accountability for motorists, including hefty restitution payments (above and beyond their insurance policy limits) and license revocation.

Here in San Diego County, a 19-year-old girl, high on cocaine and a bottle of wine, was driving at 100mph/160kph when she struck a small truck with her Mercedes, killing a 49-year-old husband and father. She received a 4-year prison term, but needs to have her driver's license permanently revoked, as well.

I am a long-time member of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, but I am against distracted, aggressive, incompetent, drugged, and/or reckless drivers, as well. They are by far the single greatest threat to my life and to my right to mobility and the reasonably safe use of our public roadways.

[Matadon]

Originally posted by John E
Here in San Diego County, a 19-year-old girl, high on cocaine and a bottle of wine, was driving at 100mph/160kph when she struck a small truck with her Mercedes, killing a 49-year-old husband and father. She received a 4-year prison term, but needs to have her driver's license permanently revoked, as well.



Sorry to go slightly OT, but things like this piss me off. I have serious problems with kids who never have to work for anything; not because I'm jealous[1], but because these brainless fscktards are so incredibly dangerous to society. In almost every outrageous case of vehicular homicide (hit-and-run), the perpitrator has either been some road-raged steroid-popping moron, or a kid like the aforementioned; driving the [Mercedes|BMW|Audi] his or her parents bought while simultaneously drunk, coked out, and baked off their arses.

I have respect for wealthy parents who, when their sixteen year old asks for a Porsche, they tell him he'll get a Honda, after he gets a job on his own and learns the value of money. Those that shower their kids with stuff to make up for never being home should have never bothered with kids in the first place.

[1] I'm really happy that I've had to work for what I've got; it makes you appreciate it so much more...that, and my quest for frugality led me to things like cycling, learning to cook, and local music, which beat the hell out of things like NASCAR, fast food, and the RIAA.

[Feldman]

And another time to remember that US law is too wimpy for properly managing motor vehicle use--the Constitution does not contain the word "automobile" in it anywhere!

[LittleBigMan]

As a pedestrian who has lived to tell about it, I've seen some scary things done by people who were engaged in a phone conversation and suddenly remembered they were hurtling down the road in their SUV's...

For example, the lady who tried to go the wrong way on a one-way street. I was crossing in the pedestrian crosswalk when she came right for me. She suddenly looked and realized her error, then corrected herself, but the phone never left her ear and her lips never stopped moving (she was that close. ) The most damning part of the story was not that she was trying to enter a one-way street the wrong way, but that if she'd been paying any attention whatsoever she'd have noticed that every lane of the street she was turning onto was completely full of traffic, with no space for her to enter. She might as well have tried to turn into a brick wall (lined with pedestrians.)

Oh, and I can't forget her look of disgusted irritation upon realizing her mistake. No, "I'm sorry!" or, "My goodness!"

:confused:

[Feldman]

I can't top that but one of my customers can-- she saw a SCHOOL BUS DRIVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! talking and driving.

[LittleBigMan]

I hate to say it, but school bus drivers aren't necessarily the most careful. Sometimes, they are more under pressure to speed! I've seen school buses flying down my 25 mph. street at 40 in pitch darkness.

:eek:

(40, shmorty, they were going so fast I couldn't read their number! :mad: )

[Feldman]

Okay here's my plan: Every police department has a few power freaks, a few sickos. They are in uniform for the pleasure of beating up people they don't like, and usually focus on blacks, immigrants, out gays, punk rockers, etc. Allow these fascists to take it out on dangerous and drunk drivers--give them bad drivers as an unlimited sporting target, just don't leave any messy remains. To quote Johnny Lydon, "I mean it, man!"
And remember, the US Constitution does not contain the word "automobile" in it anywhere.

[Chris L]

Originally posted by Feldman
Okay here's my plan: Every police department has a few power freaks, a few sickos. ... Allow these fascists to take it out on dangerous and drunk drivers--give them bad drivers as an unlimited sporting target, just don't leave any messy remains.

But what happens when the power freaks are the bad drivers? It seems we wouldn't have any problems if this wasn't the case.

[stridercc]

Originally posted by stewartp
Along with any proposals to ban mobile phones when driving must also come the ban of:
Eating while driving
Drinking while driving
Changing cd/s cassettes while driving
Tuning the radio while driving
Reading/fiddling with the GPS while driving
Applying lipstick/eye-shadow while driving
Shaving while driving
Turning round to shout at the kids while driving
Lighting a cigarette while driving

Stew

I agree completly. This is pretty much a no win situation. Either there are going to be a bunch of distracted drivers or else we're going to have a light of restrictions on our lives.

-Matt-

[Chris L]

Originally posted by stridercc
I agree completly. This is pretty much a no win situation. Either there are going to be a bunch of distracted drivers or else we're going to have a light of restrictions on our lives.


Nobody ever said life was meant to be perfect. I, for one, think motorists have an absolutely ridiculous excess of priviliges, and I would suggest that a "light of restrictions" is a lesser evil than having people wiped out by incompetent and distracted drivers.

[Feldman]

Bravo Chris! Remember, at least in the US it didn't take horribly long to reduce the number of smokers by 2/3. A change of consciousness about driving is just as possible. You/we have to remember that massive auto use just hasn't been happening for that long--the first freeway in the US is less than 70 years old. It ain't the Great Wall of China, folks!