Distracted Driving

[MrCrowesGarden]

I really don't get why anyone texts and drives. My cousin was hit by a distracted driver, thankfully ok but I don't see what's gained from it.

In a group conversation with friends with one who is not only texting while driving but looking up pictures on Facebook. I make mention that he sure sends a lot of texts for someone who's driving. Another friend (a professional truck driver, mind you) says "not like it's hard, especially on the interstate." Well, everyone is great at it until they aren't. And when they aren't, the consequences are so much I don't know what was the benefit in the first place.

I got the bogus "if I upset you, I'm sorry" apology which is stupid for two reasons: apologies aren't conditional, and you and I both know you're going to do it again. You got called out on a [expletive] behavior and I made you feel bad.

[CardsofSTL]

This is a big problem...I drive a lot for work especially on interstates and I've seen way too much of this; especially from drivers that look like they should still be riding a 10 speed to school. The real tragedy is that the person texting often ends up hurting or killing someone else. Makes no sense; but I didn't grow up with a baby bottle in one hand and an iPhone in the other so what do I know...

[stlouie_lipp]

They need to make harsh penalties for people who get caught doing this. Loss of driving privileges for a year or something. I'm at the point that whenever I need to stop, even if it is simply for a stop light, I look in my rear view mirror to make sure the person behind me is looking up and sees the traffic is stopped.

[Swirls]

I got the bogus "if I upset you, I'm sorry" apology

Which he wrote while driving, I'm sure. I admit I am guilty of texting and driving from time to time, but not nearly as much as I used to.

I have my bluetooth set up for text-to-speech in my truck so it will read text messages when they're received, but it won't write them for me. I can use my phone's default speech-to-text engine, however it requires me to doink around on my phone to the specific text message I want to reply to and then enable it for that particular message.

Unless it's an emergency, I normally try to just wait until I've complete stopped at a stop light or until I get to my destination before I respond. Again, I'm not perfect, but I'm a lot better about it than I was 2-3 years ago.

[lukethedrifter]

I just the other day posted in Random about a distracted driver that was about 1/4 second from becoming national news by killing and or maiming 15-20 people had I not realized what was imminent and screamed, alerting him enough to veer off at the last. I would have been first in line to get hit.

[tlombard]

I got a call from a friend one night and she was in tears because she'd just totaled her car. She was driving home and was a block away when she got a text as she was stopping at a stop sign. She went to respond to the text pulling away from the stop sign and just plowed into the back of a parked truck. A block from home. What was so important that you couldn't wait to drive a freaking block before responding???

When I was dating Jen, I was terrified to be in the car with her because she was constantly on her phone texting, looking up a song, or who knows what. It didn't help that she drives like a maniac anyway. She claims she's never been in an accident. My response was to ask her if she ever bothers looking in her rear view mirror to see how many she's caused.

I drive like the old man that I am. I don't speed, I'll stay in the same lane forever if the people in front of me are going slow and there isn't a huge gap in traffic for me to get around in. I'll go around them eventually but at the same time, I'm not in enough of a hurry to cut anybody off or anything like that. I get there when I get there. It drives people crazy which makes me go even slower with them just because I like being a jerk to some friends who get bothered by stupid stuff like that.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

So many are completely addicted to being online all. the. time. It's insidious. I'm guilty of looking at things, talking to a friend via Hangouts, etc. Short of building the driver seat as a Faraday cage, I don't what you do.

[Tim]

The real tragedy is that the person texting often ends up hurting or killing someone else

Link?

[Tim]

They need to make harsh penalties for people who get caught doing this. Loss of driving privileges for a year or something. I'm at the point that whenever I need to stop, even if it is simply for a stop light, I look in my rear view mirror to make sure the person behind me is looking up and sees the traffic is stopped.

So what do you do if that person is looking down? Run the traffic light?

[Schlich]

So many are completely addicted to being online all. the. time. It's insidious. I'm guilty of looking at things, talking to a friend via Hangouts, etc. Short of building the driver seat as a Faraday cage, I don't what you do.

need to make self-driving cars cheap and available ASAP. That means putting pressure on lawmakers to allow them on roads and subsidize costs. If we don't, they will be too expensive and overregulated and thousands upon thousands of lives will be needlessly lost.