Automotive Anomalies

The ’60s Twilight Zone TV series specialized in the thought experiment – the what if? And the what the hell, too.

It’s becoming like this on the road – and in our cars. Bizarre and contradictory exhortations; injunctions to not do this – while that (as bad or even worse) is treated with inexplicable leniency. Let’s take a trip into the Zone – and have a look at some of these things:

Speed limits –

A better example of the abuse of language would be hard to find. Because speed limits are nothing of the sort. They are, in fact, the minimum speed for any given road. To drive below the speed limit is to be a piece of plaque clogging up the arterial. Even cops become impatient with people who drive the speed limit. And to drive below the speed limit is considered by the courts to be inherently suspicious – and cause for pulling the offender over.

If language mattered – to say nothing of equitable laws – a speed limit would be precisely that. A number reflecting the absolute maximum speed of safe travel on a given road, defined by objective parameters such as grip thresholds and sight lines and stopping distances. Instead we have the circus clown absurdity of speed limits universally ignored because they do not even approximate the absolute maximum speed of safe travel – and everyone knows it.

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In other words, speed limits as we know them are useless – except insofar as mulcting motorists, of course. They do not have any informational value; they tell us nothing about safe rates of travel, even in the most general sense. Indeed, they do the opposite. Since everyone knows speed limits are absurd, no one pays any real attention to them – defeating the statedpurpose of them.

But we are punished for exceeding these arbitrary limits, which are established precisely in order to assure that every driver is guilty of transgressing them at least once a day. In order to make punishment for everyone inevitable.

Speed limits are the equivalent of punishing people for eating more than once a day – or walking at a pace faster than a shuffle.

Selective impairment –

A person can be a terrible driver – inattentive, reckless – and it’s not much of a problem, as far as the government is concerned. Provided they haven’t been drinking.

But a driver who is found to have even trace amounts of alcohol in his system – even if his driving is not terrible – can expect nothing less than crucifixion.

This disparity informs us that dealing with impairment is not the true aim of the government. Rather, it is to selectively abuse people who drink, even when their drinking has no discernible negative impact on their driving performance. If this were not the case, then drivers whose actual driving can’t be faulted, who’ve not harmed or given reason to believe they will harm anyone – but do have an arbitrary trace percentage of alcohol in their system – would be more kindly treated by the system than the texter who ran a red light he was too busy texting to notice and – though he had no alcohol in his system – nonetheless managed to kill someone as a result of his inattentive and reckless driving.

Of course, it’s the reverse. The victim of a DWI “checkpoint” – who has harmed no one and may be more conscientious and careful and skillful driver than the current Sober Average – is treated far more severely than the reckless texter, the senile citizen and the worse-than-average driver, who actually does wreck and actually does hurt other people.

We are dealing with, then, a religious jihad – not a public safety issue.

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