The Incredible Stupidity of Texting While Driving

main

The New York Times has another well-reported piece in what I hope becomes a crusade on the unbelievably terrifying and widespread new habit of texting while driving. (And I hope Slate's own Will Saletan continues his writing on this issue.) Texting while driving! I understand where you should all meet for pizza is a crucially important piece of information, but how much carnage to we have to endure before we treat this insanity as as serious a violation as drunk driving? Studies have shown people reading and sending texts while behind the wheel are often more dangerous than drunks, yet the laws are lax and law enforcement weak. We need public service campaigns similar to those which have helped drive down rates of smoking, so that people understand the utter devastation that's caused by going 60 miles an hour while paying no attention whatsoever to the road. So Double Xers, have you ever texted while driving? And what would it take to get you to vow to never do it again?

Photograph by Getty Images.

Tags: texting while driving

VIEW THIS CONVERSATION

Emily Yoffe is Slate's Dear Prudence and Human Guinea Pig (emilyyoffe@hotmail.com)

Comments

تحميل برامج تحميل برنامج

By: beckham_250 | Sun, 09/20/2009 - 06:37

تحميل برامج تحميل برنامج تحميل برامج نوكيا برامج
تحميل ماسنجر تحميل موبايل موقع دليل مواقع

texting vs telephoning

By: SmaugJr | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 16:13

I can't even walk and text at the same time, and it appalls me to think that anyone would even consider texting while at the wheel at 70 mph. But texting is different from talking. I can dial, talk, and hang up without removing my eyes from the road. I can't exactly read a text message that way. I, personally, would rather not read anything more from Will Saletan about cellphones and driving; I *can* walk and chew bubblegum at the same time, and talking on a properly-working handsfree device does not distract me from my driving any more than talking to a friend in the passenger seat. I do recognize, however, that this facility does not come to everyone. I was in a collision with a girl who made a left turn into my path. She never saw me, because she was talking on her phone. But I also once had a girlfriend who occasionally ran stop signs while carrying on an in-person conversation, no phone involved at all! What do we do? Remove all possibility of free choice and human error from the equation? Outlaw the private vehicle? Automate the whole transportation system?

It sort of ties in with the whole "multi-tasking" fad

By: WSLers | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 15:52

that's been in the culture for a decade or so, the belief being that a person can do several things, surf the web, watch tv and eat at the same time.

Which can be done, but when you go back and ask that person specific questions about the tv show that was one or the web page they were looking at and you get vague answers at best and hilariously uninformed and wrong answers at worst.

But as for finding out where to meet for pizza, how hard is to do that BEFORE you get in your car? Why can't you do it while still at the office or even god forbid, the night before?

I do try my best not to text

By: icpshootyz | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 15:36

I do try my best not to text and drive, usually by just calling whomever is texting me or just waiting until I get somewhere first. Occasionally I break my own rule, though, as I assume most people break many rules they set for themselves. My question, however, is how does this law against texting while driving work? How often do we really think anyone will get pulled over for this? How often does anyone even get pulled over for driving on a cellphone in states that banned it? I can see it being punitive: get in an accident and the insurance company/police will check your cellphone record to see if you were texting/talking during the crash. But I don't see making it "illegal" having any real effect on whether or not people are texting.

Not really...

By: jennies1897 | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 15:16

Texting while driving is something I can't really do unless I'm at a red light, already at a stop and feel like I don't need to pay attention. Even then, it's still pretty dangerous - just because I feel like I don't have to pay attention doesn't mean I don't have to. Anyone could be coming up behind me or driving around me...texting...I still glance around with a paranoid look on my face looking for someone to hit me.

I am, however, still a major offender in the "talking on the phone while driving" arena.

There are worse things

By: Inci Atrek | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 14:35

Just yesterday I was calling a fellow Californian in response to an open-ended question she had sent via text message. “I’m driving right now,” she said, “can I call you back?” Police have been cracking down on chatty drivers since last July, ever since a new law prohibiting calling sans headset while behind the wheel. I told her sure, before blurting, “And don’t text while driving!” to which she claimed she had been at a red light. Of course, my advice was hypocritical. I, too, have texted while driving (the only time I break my no-abbreviations rule) - because making a call and holding my phone up to window-level makes me a target for the Orange County police, who – let’s face it – don’t have all that much on their plates to begin with. Even though that would take much, much less concentration. Perhaps it’s because I’ve already been in a car accident and figure I can’t possibly live through such hell all over again that I take risks. And although I’ve come to realize the impact of divided attention to my mental and physical safety while on the road, there are times when I simply decide against pulling over to get the job done. One star moment in my driving career was when a source for a story finally returned my call – and I found myself scrawling his comments with eyeliner on a napkin resting on the steering wheel, accidentally honking my way up the 405 North to Los Angeles. Yikes.

Let the campaign begin

By: Samantha Henig | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 14:33

I think one of the greatest victories of the anti-drunk driving PSAs is that, even if it's still, in some circles, socially acceptable to drive drunk, it's also socially acceptable to refuse to, or to say you don't want to ride with a drunk driver. The same is not yet true for the driving while texting phenomenon. So many times I've been the uber-square passenger who eagerly volunteers to write that text for the driver -- or handle the iPod playlist, or enter the destination address on the GPS -- and every time I'm mocked, as though it's totally lame to expect that the driver's hands, eyes, and attention stay on the road. Gah!

"Drive Safely"

By: xxreader | Tue, 07/28/2009 - 14:20

The last attempt I made at a text message while driving was in response to a friend's text saying she was heading home from an out of town trip. I started to text "Drive Safely". But, had I crashed, the irony would have been too much to stomach. I haven't attempted a text while driving since.

There really isn't much that can't wait until you're at your destination to communicate or that a cell phone call on speaker can't satisfy.

Vehicular Homicide