You’re driving down the I-696 on your way to work, when a buzzing goes off in your pocket. Your phone is ringing. What do you do? Do you answer it regularly? Do you reply with a text ‘drvng ttyl’? Do you fiddle with your Bluetooth trying to figure out how to answer the call? Or, do you use new-car technology and have your cell phone hooked up to your car stereo system? Keep in mind this is all done before you even begin the conversation.
Once you decide on how to answer the call (if you do so at all) you now have the conversation itself to deal with. It might get you really happy, pissed off, excited, determined, or stressed out. All of the above can change your destination from work to the ICU at the nearest hospital. Why, because any way that you answer a call, and then the call itself, can be a distraction; a distraction that could end your life. A lot of people think texting while driving should be illegal. Should it be? What about a phone call itself? Should phone usage (in any way, shape or form) be illegal while driving?
It seems that this has become a problem racking America for quite a while. Many accidents lately have uncovered the fact that we use our cell phones almost the entire drive – in many different forms, navigation included. So instead of two hands on the wheel, two eyes on the road; it has become send a text with two thumbs, balance the wheel with pinkies and a knee (Sundeen). That definitely is unsafe. The question is what do we do about it? Can we pass a law to ensure that you don’t do so? Would such a law be possible to enhance? Let’s take a look at both sides.
If you have ever played football before, you know firsthand just how big the field is. Ever try running it blindfolded with all the players on the field? Have you ever tried it at 55 mph? Try a combination of the two. That’s what happens every single time you simply send a text. To quote R. L. Olson: “Sending or reading a text takes a driver’s eyes off the road for an average of 4.6 seconds… that’s like driving the length of a football field blindfolded” (Qtd. in Bratsis). That is just a small text.
Imagine texting ‘drvng hme frm wrk now – plz put dinner in oven. Be home in 5. Love u, ttyl!’ That would probably be like driving four football fields. Maybe even five, and the whole time driving at least at 55 miles per hour; chances are you’ll be doing 60-70. How many people are you willing to wound in order to ensure that your pineapple chicken will be ready on the table waiting for you as soon as you walk into the house?? Do you want to add to the numbers of casualties a year due to distracted driving? In the year 2009 alone, there were 5,500 deaths reported, and 450,000 injuries – all due to distracted drivers (Johnson). Sadly, the numbers have been increasing drastically ever since.
Why is it that drinking while driving is illegal? It is because it’s a distraction that is harmful to others, or even yourself. So, it is safe to assume that the issue isn’t the drinking itself, per say, but the distraction issue. The harm to others issue. Using the phone has the same problem, does it not?
Let’s say that you even have a new, high-tech, in-car phone hookup. What, all of a sudden the call is not a distraction? Of course it is! Whether it is news that your wife had a baby girl, or that you were just fired from your job of twelve years, or even that you should pick up a pound of potatoes on your way home; it will be distracting. A distraction involving a phone usage will reduce the amount of brain activity associated with driving by 37 percent (Neil Issar) and increases your chance of crashing by 20 (Romoser). In ways this may be worse than drinking and driving, simply because it is much easier to recognize a drunk’s reckless driving in time, than the four to five seconds a guy is sending a text.
We now established that any use of a phone, whether texting, calling, reading a message, listening to a voicemail, Bluetooth, hands-free etc. is a distraction to your driving. But, if you say it should be made illegal, than perhaps you should ban changing of radio stations, drinking a slurpee, setting a GPS, or even adjusting your rear view mirror?! Are they not also distractions – regardless of how small or long?
What constitutes as a distraction, and how do we decide if a law should be created regarding it? How do we even know if the law will work, or just simply backfire? Is it fair to blow ‘phone usage while driving’ out of proportion and actually pass a law making it illegal? Even more so, will that make one iota of a difference?
We all have been in school before. We all had our fair share of rules. How did we react? If you will be honest with yourself, you will admit that if you did not like a rule – whether it made sense or not – you would deliberately break it every chance you got. It is no different in this case. “Texting bans might even increase the risk…for drivers who continue to do so despite the law” (Adrind Land). If you don’t like the law of no phone usage, you won’t uphold to it. I mean come on, will patrol cars have guns seeing ‘Oh, license plate 385GH4 sent a text nine seconds ago. Let’s pull him over to see if it was the driver or not.’ Even if it’s a good idea for a law, it is highly impractical.
Not only is it impractical; it would most likely be counterproductive! As explained above, people tend to break laws they don’t agree with on purpose. Tests done in states like California, Washington, Minnesota, and Louisiana, have shown that not only do texting bans not stop the texting, it increases it drastically. “The increase of distracted drivers [due to texting] varied from 1% in Washington, all the way to 9% in Minnesota! The text addiction may turn into an epidemic that no state or federal law can stop (Holbrook).”
Let’s say they even pass a law to illegalize a hand on a device; are you going to get a ticket for adjusting the heat? If a cop is specifically looking for drivers who use a phone, then they can’t be looking as prudently for things more important – like speeding, no headlights, no blinker turned on, and more. Just like we cannot multitask (text and drive); so too them. They will concentrate on phones, and not much else.
If one thing is a distraction, then anything is. It’s useless to try to stop it – it’s going to occur one way or another. “Part of it [the problem] is that distracted driving is much bigger than just phones. Focusing on phones doesn’t deal with the full spectrum of things that distract (Radar).” People will come to the realization that they need to concentrate on the road either through brains, or once it hits home, G-d forbid.
So what do we do? Do we pass the law, because danger is danger? Maybe we should put it aside saying that whoever believes in it will follow it, but there is no reason to turn people against the law? Well, we know that if someone is a potential danger to himself or others, he is kept under strict watch, sometimes he may even be put under house arrest. That being said, it seems to me that if this law can save even one person’s life – then it is our obligation to pass it into finality. As it says in the Talmud: “And whosoever preserves a single soul…, scripture ascribes [merit] to him as though he had preserved a complete world” (Bavli, Sanhedrin 37a). It is true that phones are not the only form of distraction, however drinking a latte doesn’t involve as much concentration as texting your boss that you will be five minutes late today.
A distraction that takes away your eyes from the road/hands off the wheel is deadly. Just because last time you did not hit someone, G-d forbid, doesn’t mean that this time you will be so lucky. You cannot rely upon miracles to take place just so you can find out the score of the NBA game last night. We must all do our part to stop this idiocy of ‘it’s only a few seconds, what’s the worst that can happen?’ What’s the worst that can happen, you ask? You can have innocent blood on your thumbs.
Why is it that drinking while driving is illegal? Doing drugs while driving? Having an open bottle of alcohol in the car? Why, simply due to the fact that they are all different forms of distractions which can be harmful to yourself and/or others. Any way that a phone is in use while driving is a distraction. It is a distraction that could cost someone their life, and maybe even your own. Concentrate on the road, not your phone. Otherwise, you may end up texting ‘at hospital – come visit.’
