Seems like people are trying to solve real problems by attacking the ordinary words used to talk about them.
Maybe I’m falling victim to some very subtle difference between the connotations of the English word “accident” and the German word “Unfall”, but last time I checked, accidents are unintended bad things that happen. Accidents become more likely when people are negligent. The more careful you are, the less risk you take, the less likely accidents are to happen. Being perfectly careful is impossible in practice. Not being careful is criminal.
The courts determine whether the amount of risk a driver took with other people’s lives and property was “appropriate” or “reckless”. That’s always a difficult question, because no one has been able to come up with a universal answer.
So if a car accident is not an accident, name one thing that is an accident?
This is a huge problem. We have all kinds of national debate about gun control every time somebody kills someone else with a gun, but never when people kill each other by irresponsible handling of a giant chunk of fast moving metal. This idea that driving is some kind of an inherent human right is totally fucked up, and we should be taking licenses away from a lot more people than we do. At a very basic level, any accident where you are deemed at fault should result in a lot of training to get your license back, and any accident where you’re at fault and someone is injured should have a mandatory suspension for several years. If you get it back after a suspension, and are at fault in a second accident, you should never drive again.
Basically, killing someone by irresponsibly using a car should have equivalent criminal penalties to killing someone by irresponsibly using a gun.
If you’re driving with a suspended license and someone is killed or injured, the law should assume intent. eg murder or attempted murder instead of manslaughter.
Unfortunately, I don’t see this happening anytime soon. The only hope I can hold out is that once self-driving cars become commonplace, human controlled ones will become uninsurable.
First, I resent that, because it feels like victim blaming.
Second, it isn’t even true. It might work in a nearly bike-free environment were cyclists timidly stick to bike paths only, and resort to traffic-free side streets and even sidewalks. But when you’re riding your bike in traffic, stopping to “give the right of way” to a car in a side street when no one else would expect you to is dangerous.
Traffic rules are there for a reason. Not only do they prevent accidents ( ), they make everyone’s behaviour more predictable. And as a cyclist in traffic, I really want motorists to be able to predict my behaviour.
Why should the law ever assume something that is not true? If the penalties for the true crime are not severe enough, then make them more severe, don’t pretend it’s a different crime. I’m pretty sure that hardly any of those drivers intend to kill anyone, so I don’t see how justice can be served by having the law “assume” intent. If grossly negligent manslaughter isn’t punished severely enough, all you need to do is punish grossly negligent manslaughter more severely.
The problem is, we collectively don’t understand the probabilities involved. We can recognize risky behaviour, but we don’t actually know how much risk we’re taking. In an ideal world, we could punish people for taking inappropriate risk with other people’s lives and property, but use insurance to deal with the actual damage. If four people each deliberately take a 25% risk of hurting someone, and only one of them actually does hurt someone, I’d rather send all four of them to prison for one year each than just the one person for four years.
There’s a societal debate waiting to happen here. At some point, a self-driving car will calculate a value that means “estimated probability that a child will jump out from behind this parked car”. And another value, “estimated probability that someone will rear-end me if I hit the brakes now”. And then someone at some big company will get write an if statement deciding which risk to take. Is avoiding a 99% probable fender-bender worth avoiding a 1% probable dead child? What if it’s not a child but a drunk, irresponsible adult hiding behind the car? Does that make a difference? Who gets to set the probabilities?
Arguably, if the negligence is gross enough, how different is that from intent? For example, having your license taken away for causing a crash is saying that you aren’t capable of driving a car without injuring or killing someone else. If it’s clear that that’s the case, and you drive a car anyway, it’s because you’re perfectly happy to kill some random person.
In the U.S., the common law differentiates between negligence (failure to observe a duty of care), gross negligence (a squishy standard that is more than negligence but less than recklessness), recklessness (disregard for a substantial risk), and intent (acting willfully). What Cory is complaining about is negligent or reckless homicide; it isn’t murder absent actual intent.
Having your license taken away for causing a crash isn’t saying you aren’t capable of driving a car without injuring or killing someone–just like putting a person in prison for theft isn’t saying the person is incapable of living in society without stealing. It’s saying you’re not allowed to drive a car because you caused a crash. Violating that prohibition is punishable, and causing another crash while violating that prohibition should generate an even harsher punishment. Sometimes it doesn’t; the law isn’t perfect. But it has to balance the interests of victims against those of the people who cause injuries, and it recognizes that human beings are simply not capable of paying full attention to the task at hand 100% of the time. It also recognizes that, while some people create an increased risk while being allowed behind the wheel, even that increased risk doesn’t result in disaster the vast majority of the time.
This, precisely. I spent most of my life as a pedestrian/cyclist, and only got my driver’s license a few years back. Every time I get behind the wheel of a car, I am acutely aware that I am operating a potentially deadly machine, and that it is absolutely my responsibility to operate it as safely and cautiously as possible. When I cycle, I observe road laws (I even stop at Stop signs, which people seem to insist cyclists never do), but when I’m behind the wheel of a car, I am even more cautious.
Some victim-blamey apologist upthread said that “Bicyclists don’t stand a chance against a car. That’s why cyclists should always give the right of way to an auto.” I draw the exact opposite conclusion. Bicyclists don’t stand a change against a car. Which is precisely why the onus is on motorists to, you know, not kill people with their massive, high-powered death machines.
The law is the same in many of the United States. However, most drivers don’t bother to look to their right when making a right turn. While on a bicycle I’ve had drivers blow their horn at me before turning right to cut me off.
Exactly, that’s why, when driving a car, I always stop at green lights when a truck is approaching the intersection from my right or left. It causes other drivers to get upset and blow their horns at me but I’d rather be safe.
There’s a saying in the general aviation community. If someone mentions that X happened even though they had the right of way; “Put ‘He had the right-of-way’ on your tombstone”.
), they make everyone’s behaviour more predictable. And as a cyclist in traffic, I really want motorists to be able to predict my behaviour.