So when you're creamed by a drunk driver while doing 58 in a 55, we shouldn't give a damn? Afterall, if you were doing the speed limit, maybe you would get to the intersection after the other driver passed through the red light.
So when you're creamed by a drunk driver while doing 58 in a 55, we shouldn't give a damn? Afterall, if you were doing the speed limit, maybe you would get to the intersection after the other driver passed through the red light.
And if you were going 100mph you never would have even crossed paths. Really, if you drive 100mph you'll be on the road less total time and thus your exposure to accidents is lessened. Clearly, driving 100mph is the safest way to drive. Oh, wait, I get it, you're trying to draw some sort of line between "kinda breaking the law" and "totally breaking the law." Right. Got it. At what point does one become the other? At what point do harmless transgressions become potentially lethal infractions? Who makes that distinction? You? A group of your peers? I'm truly curious.
(As for your specific scenario, 3mph could be 100' traveled when you factor in reaction time. So yeah, it is critical. Like all the ads say, slow down and save lives.)
Last edited by thesameguy; October 20th, 2015 at 04:04 PM.
As you say "the step in a series of events". Yes it does make a huge difference which step you talk about.Originally Posted by thesameguy
The only way "action A led to action B which lead to result X" was due to the brain of the driver. It is not a natural or expected outcome of overtaking (legal or illegal) that another driver would attempt to run you off the road.
That both steps are required doesnt mean that the steps are equal or that the people taking the steps are equal in responsibility.
The steps of "deciding to ride that day", "illegally overtaking", "swerving at a passing bike" are all required for the end event to happen. But they are not equal.
All of them took deliberate decisions by people. That is important - they were not some physical process. They were human actions.
Each action should be judged on its own - you dont judge the riders decision to overtake on his decision to ride that day. The are independent decisions.
That two of them were decisions to do something illegal also doesnt magically remove responsibility and mean you are to blame for all future events.
The drivers action was based on his decision. It was the final decision that could cause or avoid the collision.
The collision was not in anyway inevitable, it happened only because all these decisions were made.
And yes order here is extremely important.
The final outcome radically changed from what anyone would expect due to the drivers actions. The result was not an outcome of physical processes set in motion by the rider that could only be avoided by him not acting that way. It was not inevitable because the riders decided to do something illegal.
The legality of the riders overtake made no difference to the physical processes. It only affected the decision made by the driver.
Ill say that again - the legality of the overtake only affected the drivers decision. It did not in any physical way contribute to the result except thru the brain of the driver.
That makes that LAST decision the SINGLE CAUSE of the collision.
The driver can say "but he was riding illegally" and blame it on the riders previous decisions. But the riders actions did not cause the driver to do what he did.
Humans are responsible for their actions. You cant say "the riders actions caused the driver to swerve". It wasnt some automatic response or result of a threat. The driver chose with complete free will to swerve. His decision is 100% of his own making.
The driver can say "but the rider broke the law" - but the riders actions did not cause the collision, they only caused the driver to make a decision. The responsibility for the outcome of that decision is only with the person who made the decision.
Both parties should be held responsible for their illegal actions - the rider should get a ticket for illegal crossing of a line.
The driver should be charged with assault or equivalent.
The rider is not in anyway responsible for the collision.
You want to victim blame, but its faulty logic and the sort of thing that leads to people doing this sort of thing.
It requires someone with your mindset to do this sort of action in the first place.
Your lack an understanding of "responsibility" indicates that you blame others for outcomes from your actions. And yes Im saying "you", because your logic should hold up if you swap yourself for that driver. You are saying what the driver said "it was the riders fault because he broke the law and had it coming".
There is no sharing of blame here.
I find it scary that people think that way, even scarier that they are on the road.
This is where I am coming from, and this is the last thing I am ever going to say about stupid people doing stupid things with or to other stupid people. It’s my manifesto, so to speak.
I think I’m an intelligent, responsible person. I’ve got skills, knowledge, and talent that true or not I credit for my survival and success. I believe that I am the person best suited to maintaining my health and my prosperity. I believe I am the person looking out for me. The idea that I am reliant on others is an awful feeling – knowing that I was unable keep myself happy and healthy would probably destroy me.
The bulk of humanity is not very effective. A significant part of humanity is, in fact, anti-effective. To be reliant on random people out there in the world for my continued existence is an idea that I simply cannot accept. They can’t take care of them – why would I even want them taking care of me?
As such, I take responsibility for my success and my failures. When I accomplish something it’s because I put in sufficient effort to complete it. When I fail at something it’s because I did not put in sufficient effort. I examine events in my life and capitalize on the things I’m good at, improve the things I’m not good at it, and avoid the things which are unfixable. I don’t expect others to make up for my inadequacies unless I am paying them. I am in charge of me.
When I get bitten by a dog it’s not the dog acting against me, it’s me not planning for the dog. When I get rained on it’s not the weather acting against me, it’s me not planning for the rain. When I nearly die in a boating accident it’s not the water or the boat, it’s me being a shitty wakeboarder and not learning my lesson. I don’t blame the dog or the weather or the water in the same way I don’t blame the dude in the other car or the road or Bill Cosby. They are monsters and animals and mindless forces of nature. They aren’t looking out for me. I am. My welfare being dependent on monsters and animals and mindless forces of nature is cripplingly depressing. Why would I want to live in a world where I am reliant on these types of things to keep me safe? It is utterly nonsensical.
So when I say don’t pass people where the law says it’s not safe to pass and when I say don’t take blue pills from a celebrity and when I say don’t get in the way of a car on your bike, what I am saying is take responsibility for your own welfare and pretend like everyone around is at worst out to get you, and at best indifferent towards you. Because they probably are.
If you have limited mental faculties or physical capabilities and you need a 2nd party caretaker this probably doesn’t apply to you. But assuming those are not your issues, you should be reliant on you for taking care of you, and when you fail to take care of you and you get hurt, you need to take a big step backwards and think about where you went wrong. There is a high probability that something in your path immediately preceding getting hurt led to you getting hurt. A thing you might not have done, or a thing you might have done differently.
It is of course possible you did not go wrong. It’s possible you were victimized by a unstoppable force totally beyond your control, prediction, and most importantly your ability to avoid. But that really doesn’t happen very often. That is the drunk driver on the sidewalk, that is the stray bullet through your house. Hell, maybe you took sound-seeming advice from a reasonable-seeming person and that steered you wrong. The best of us get duped. That is you doing everything right and still getting hosed. But these are the exceptions in life. In my experience, they don’t happen very often.
If you pass that guy in that place at that speed and you get hurt and can’t figure out what happened or why it happened to you, I don’t have a lot of sympathy. I wouldn’t have or expect sympathy for me, either. Because I am pretty smart person, I would have evaluated the risks, I was the one who took the action, and I believed I had the ability to complete it. If I went wrong, then my judgment or talent was lacking. Because the guy in the Thunderbird is a fucking animal who doesn’t care one iota about me, and I know that without ever having laid eyes on him.
If you want to live a life or in a world where everything is beyond your control and you need other people to keep you safe, well, I guess that’s good for you. I find that nerve-racking, depressing, and sad commentary on my capabilities and, quite frankly, just maybe a little component of a greater evil at work in the world today… a lack of personal responsibility. A little too much “not my fault” and not enough “you made your own bed.”
I typed out something, but realised I'd have to bill you guys. So I won't contribute kthxbai.
Just a parade of assholes, that's all I can say. An asshole pride parade...
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/21/us/child-road-rage-death/
Why are people so shitty? I am people. Why am I so shitty? Let's just start over, leave the assholes at home. Good people only. There are no good ones left... Fuck.
On a slightly lighter note, but still aggravating, what is with people who decide that their lane is moving too slowly, so they merge into your (faster) lane, but don't speed up to match the speed of the faster lane?!
Whoomah!
I dunno, but that just happened to me like an hour ago. This particular Einstein confused acceleration with speed, and after cutting me off went rocketing away from the stoplight and then set in at 35 cruise just like everyone else on Watt Avenue, blocking miles of open road that I'd previously had access to. The other day while driving home, I watched a guy who had previously been going with the flow of traffic hit the gas in order to prevent someone going faster from getting in front of him. I really cannot get in the head of someone who isn't interested in setting the pace, but doesn't want you to do it either. Sometimes I feel like it's just misplaced competitiveness - suddenly there is someone to beat and by God they will be beaten! Other times I feel like it's an unconscious reaction, suddenly someone is going faster so I should be going faster too. Both are examples of really poor situational awareness, and a failure of comprehension. It's like the person who, when you're totally riding their ass, keeps driving faster instead of just moving over. I mean, I generally like to be in front as I'm generally driving faster than everyone else. But sometimes I'm driving the Falcon or the Fleetwood and that's not practicable, so I get out of the way. No biggie. Like I said, they're all animals. Crediting them with more thought process than a cow is gross excess.
... or the guy who suddenly stops on the sidewalk or the hallway to text someone, or the guy who reads the menu once the server has appeared and won't let them go until he's figured out what he wants, or the guy stopped at a stoplight who could EASILY move forward a foot or two to give people access to a turn lane, or the guy at the check out who holds up the line while he organized his wallet, or the guy who stands with the refrigerator door open while he fingers every soda in the case, or the guy who keeps yelling WHAT??? to his kids instead of turning off the thing that's making all the noise.
Pretty much. I mean really, there's always going to be a car and/or driver out there who's "faster" than you anyway, so what's the point? I suppose the only example is if you really think the other guy is a dick but if you want to escape him you really floor it and leave him behind, and if you can't then just let him run off and kill himself. Save of course for extreme examples where he is really threatening you with a gun/vehicular assault, in which case you can always try to pull over and call the cops...
There are those people, then the other day I was walking along the street and this guy staring at his phone just decided to walk in front of me at a 30-degree angle. I let off a sound of exasperation as I swerved to avoid him and he looked at me and said "What for?" I kept walking and shook my head, in response to which he yelled some incoherent abuse at me. I just ignored him as I had much better things to do than argue with an idiot like that. I mean, really, originally you might have said it was questionable, as he was facing that direction and was sort of strolling, so I could be expected to have taken steps to avoided him (even though conversely it was his fault getting in my way by looking at his phone). But it was when he tried to escalate matters with that stupid attitude of his that I realised that he was just an idiot.... or the guy who suddenly stops on the sidewalk or the hallway to text someone
Then of course there was the dude who tried to run me over when his light was red (admittedly a confusing junction) and the crossing signals for me were green. I was crossing and kept pointing at the signals and saying "What are you doing? I can cross!" Yet he decided to stare at me and edged forward. So I ran to the pavement, took out my phone, which he sees me do and tries to wave either sorry (bit late you mofo) or bye. Reported it to the Police, he got prosecuted for driving through a red light with 5 points (out of 15) on his licence and a fine. WIN.
Last edited by Yw-slayer; October 21st, 2015 at 09:22 PM.
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