

Are Texting-While-Driving Laws Making our Streets Less Safe? - cwan
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/09/29/are-texting-while-driving-laws-making-our-streets-less-safe/

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Sarvin
Maybe texting isn't the cause of most accidents. Maybe people simply replace
the outlawed bad behavior with an equally bad but legal behavior. Maybe we
should stop wasting everyone's time with see useless laws; I'm pretty sure we
already have a law based on reckless driving.

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imgabe
Exactly. Why outlaw texting, but not outlaw eating? Or applying mascara? Or
reading the newspaper? Or searching for a cd that's slid underneath the
passenger seat?

If we're going to expect legislators to spend time enumerating every possible
activity that could cause an accident, they're not going to have time to do
anything else.

You know what the real impetus behind laws like this is? Insurance companies.
What _should_ happen is if someone causes an accident while driving
irresponsibly, they should be held liable in civil court and get sued for
damages. If that happens, though their insurance company has to pay. Hence,
the company lobbies to get things like this made illegal and thus legitimately
excluded from being covered by the insurance policy.

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pyre
Or you could amend 'reckless driving' laws to specifically include things like
texting, etc.

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presidentender
Apply the same line of thinking to drunk drivers - maybe if they were allowed
to drive obviously drunk, they'd go much slower. 5 in a 25 will get you pulled
over as it stands, so our drunk drives 30 and figure on blending in - with,
which reduced reaction times, causes accidents. So in some cases, perhaps
drunk driving laws could be making drunk drivers more dangerous.

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chc
You're not applying the same line of thinking. Their article starts with a
study; your comment starts with a "maybe." If you actually had evidence that
people drive drunk just as frequently but more dangerously because of drunk
driving laws, that would be something.

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arethuza
Every time I see a discussion of texting-while-driving I think of this ad:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0LCmStIw9E>

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balding_n_tired
Or maybe the laws aren't enforced. Using hand-held phones behind the wheel is
outlawed in DC, but widely practiced. I doubt you can stand on a moderately
busy street in Washington for five minutes and not see a driver holding a
phone to his ear.

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blasdel
The cost of pulling over cars in city traffic is incredibly high. In downtown
Seattle the police ignore automobile moving violations as a matter of policy.
I've seen a guy with a car full of rowdy passengers turn the wrong way down a
4 lane one-way throughfare almost hitting a cop car head on, and all the cop
cared about was getting him going the right way.

On the other hand, they will apply the full motor vehicle code to bicyclists,
and they actively ticket pedestrians for jaywalking.

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smokey_the_bear
Maybe people are holding the phone lower while they text to hide it. So their
eyes are farther off the road.

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cma
Never mentions whether it is on crashes-per-mile basis or just total crashes;
around the time period they are referencing I remember a bunch of headlines
like this:

[http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008034444...](http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008034444_gasprices05.html)

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notahacker
regardless of whether the law is effectively enforced or whether text-
messaging is very rarely a factor in accidents, I find it hard to think of any
reason why texting-whilst-driving _shouldn't_ be illegal

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jacoblyles
If you have a law that does absolutely no good, why should it exist? The
politicians should have to excuse their impositions upon us, we should not
have to excuse our private behavior.

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naz
What if having a law against murder didn't decrease the murder rate? Texting
while driving is obviously a bad thing and it should be illegal.

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TallGuyShort
Murder isn't a very good analogy in this case. Don't get me wrong, I'm not
saying I think texting should be legal, but they make a fair point: if texting
is illegal, people still do it, but in a way that takes their eyes even
further off the road. The same can't be said of murder - a law against murder
doesn't increase the risk of someone getting murdered. Drugs might be a better
analogy - making a drug illegal doesn't eradicate the use of the drug. Even if
it decreases use, it will just push a lot of people underground, which might
make the situation even less controllable. It sounds ridiculous to say drugs
should be legal, but the consequences of specific laws against them do need to
be carefully considered if the end goal really is to improve society as a
whole.

Ultimately, I think the only real solution is their last point: as a whole, we
really need people to start realizing how dangerous it is to text while
driving, and how severe the consequences are.

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mcknz
Places that have $1000 littering fines are usually pretty clean.

Changes will start when states issue $1000 citations for phone/keyboard use.
Maybe 2x that if you cause an accident.

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rdj
My concern with texting-while-driving laws is how do they get enforced. Do
your phone records automatically get handed over to law enforcement if you are
in an accident?

