I’ve heard it said that in other countries, particularly in Europe, specifically in Germany, it’s not anywhere near as easy to get a driver’s license as it is in the United States. Does anyone have any experience with that data to either refute or confirm? Regardless, any time spent on the roads is likely to leave me wondering, “Why is it so easy for complete morons to get a driver’s license in this country?!”
Almost any trip on our nations streets and highways, no matter how brief, can expose you & your loved ones to folks driving while on the phone (illegal in many states including here in CA), driving while texting (ditto), running red lights and stop signs, speeding way in excess of what’s safe (let alone the posted speed limit), pulling out into traffic and blocking lanes to make illegal left-hand turns, failing to pull over for emergency vehicles, turning right across railroad or bus tracks when there’s a clearly marked “No Right On Red” sign and a red right-turn arrow showing, driving without wipers in the rain, driving without lights at night…
As a card-carrying father, I’m especially fond of parents whom I see driving like freakin’ idiots with their kids in the car. They’re a special breed of stupid, and I hope for two things when they die causing a multi-vehicle, multi-fatality Sigalert while being freakin’ idiots. First, I hope that the kids are at home that day and don’t have to pay for their parents’ arrogance and ignorance. (“Are you ignorant or arrogant?” “I don’t know and I don’t care!”) Secondly, I hope that there’s a special level of Hell reserved just for them and their ilk.
Last week I saw a woman stopped at a light (Victory Boulevard, eastbound, near Pierce College), texting, and completely ignoring what was going on around her. The light turned green, she didn’t notice, and sat blocking traffic until folks behind her started honking. (Not me, I was happy to be in the lane next to her.) She then sped off like a demon, until she had to stop at the next red light, this time stopping in the left turn lane. Again she started texting, again ignoring her surroundings, again not noticing that the (short) left-turn light had turned green. Again folks behind her started honking and she finally noticed – but by this time when she floored it, the left-turn light was turning red. She sailed off right through the red light, now dodging oncoming cars (who now had a green light), leaving them honking at her and wondering what kind of freakin’ idiot she was.
For the record, she did all of this with two kids in car seats in the back seat.
I’m sure that there are a lot of folks who believe that having a driver’s license is a basic right, along with the freedom and independence that go along with it. But it’s not a right, any more than anyone has a “right” to own a house or a “right” to go to MIT or CalTech. It’s a privilege, one that has to be earned and maintained.
I have no hope at all that we will ever make people more responsible or make it more difficult for the incompetent or ignorant to get licenses. We can’t even get convicted drunk drivers off the road, repeat offenders!
So let’s hope that high tech finally gets to the point where it overtakes human stupidity and irresponsibility, especially behind the wheel. Let’s hear it for Google’s self-driving cars and all of their competitors.
I can’t wait for the day when the only way to get a driver’s license is to prove that you can do a better job than the built-in autopilot, and only about one in a hundred folks even bother to try. Let the masses get carted around by the robots, and they can tweet, talk, and text to their little heart’s desire.
Meanwhile, when driving, stay safe!! Assume that 99% of those around you are not paying attention to what they’re doing and may do something unexpected, irrational, and dangerous at any second. Your fellow drivers (at least in the US) won’t disappoint you often by driving safely.
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