>Texting and driving ought to be treated similarly to a felony DUI.
And that's how we have a police state. Honestly, emotions and laws really don't mix, that's how we have more people incarcerated both per capita and in total numbers than any other country in the world.
"Super-predators," gets votes, but the repercussions were pretty horrible.
Something much less horrible would be to make gasoline super expensive like in Europe, or lower the speed limit to a speed that is much less likely to cause fatalities, or do an old fashioned marketing / awareness push. The More You Know.
Also, the article seems to be speculating on the cause:
>How many of those deaths involved distracted driving?
>“It’s much bigger than the data show,” said Bruce Landsberg, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. Data collection methods are so riddled with problems, he said, that reliable estimates are difficult if not impossible.
So it's bigger than the data shows, but reliable estimates are difficult or impossible, so it seems he's talking out his ass.
Maybe it's because many more people were working at home in 2021-2022.
Studies have shown that texting while driving is about a high a risk factor as drinking alcohol. If not classed as a felony (and intrinsically more difficult to control) - the state should at least do something to seriously discourage people from doing it.
When you drive after using alcohol, you are drunk the entire trip. When you text and drive, you are distracted for five seconds. This is scientists seeking headlines, not a rational risk assessment.
You can tell from accident statistics that risk has not actually gone up as much as if every driver had started drinking alcohol in 2008.
When you drive after using alcohol, you are drunk the entire trip. When you text and drive, you are distracted for five seconds.
Apples and oranges.
When you are drunk, you might be 20 percent or more impaired - continuously. Sufficient to cause an accident.
When you text - you are 100 percent impaired for 20 or more seconds. Sufficient to cause an accident.
Reducing your comparison to just one dimension ("duration") while completely ignoring the other ("severity") is just - silly.
Also, your estimate of 5 seconds total duration for texting is plainly unrealistic. It takes 5 seconds just to find the chat bubble (assuming your phone hasn't gone into sleep mode) and adjust your cognitive focus.
But this whole exchange is silly, so I'll stop there.
It's plainly obvious that texting causes considerable impairment, not just for driving, but for walking, or just standing there oblivious to everything happening around you ... for just about everything, actually.
I think making texting and driving a felony is an absurd emotional overreaction and would cause more harm than good. I think we have many laws on the books that are absurd emotional overreactions that put a lot of non-criminals in the system, and frankly, it disgusts me.
I think people who are proponents of that either aren't very thoughtful, or are just outright cruel, or perhaps both.
> And that's how we have a police state. Honestly, emotions and laws really don't mix, that's how we have more people incarcerated both per capita and in total numbers than any other country in the world.
But… traffic laws isn’t how you got there. Most of the rest of the developed world has stricter traffic laws, lower rates of car accident fatalities, and much lower incarceration rates.
And that's how we have a police state. Honestly, emotions and laws really don't mix, that's how we have more people incarcerated both per capita and in total numbers than any other country in the world.
"Super-predators," gets votes, but the repercussions were pretty horrible.
Something much less horrible would be to make gasoline super expensive like in Europe, or lower the speed limit to a speed that is much less likely to cause fatalities, or do an old fashioned marketing / awareness push. The More You Know.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_More_You_Know
Also, the article seems to be speculating on the cause:
>How many of those deaths involved distracted driving?
>“It’s much bigger than the data show,” said Bruce Landsberg, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. Data collection methods are so riddled with problems, he said, that reliable estimates are difficult if not impossible.
So it's bigger than the data shows, but reliable estimates are difficult or impossible, so it seems he's talking out his ass.
Maybe it's because many more people were working at home in 2021-2022.