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Who knew that Toonces the Driving Cat was science fiction?
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20th century attitude.
In the 19th century and the first half of the 20th, engine driving was a highly skilled job which involved a fair degree of mechanical knowledge. Express trains were driven by expert drivers because otherwise it is hard to get a steam train to keep a schedule. In the 21st century train drivers are there in case the computer fails, and to ensure safety at stops.
On modern roads with lots of traffic the whole idea of āskilledā i.e. fast drivers is obsolete. Roads are a way of getting from A to B, not a form of amusement for yahoos. For them, there are track days.
I am alive today largely because I confined being stupid on motorcycles to tracks. Falling off in a bend at 85 or so was uncomfortable but walk away. I knew (slightly) someone who came off at a similar speed on a similar bend, but on a public road with lampposts. He died at the scene. I could go on, but basically on todayās roads testosterone has no place.
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And so, too, do people who drive in the passing lane when they are not passing. 
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That video isnāt anything. Shitloads of people reduce speed to reenter the right lane after overtaking. Shitloads. Shitloads of smart people who want to merge back at a comfortable 90-100 kph as opposed to the 100-120 kph they employed to overtake.
Also, was Texan drove alot. If youāve got 3 lanes going in your direction, the far left is often a through lane in practice. Itās where you go when youāre not planning to use an exit for a long time. Trucks bypassing cities hang out in them, people that think itās only a fast lane hang out in them, and generally they are faster, but not exclusively because they are a fast lane or an overtaking lane. Asshats that get onto a freeway and get far left only to have to merge back over 4 lanes to exit after just a mile or two suck ass.
If there are just the two lanes going your way then yeah keep right, unless you want to exceed the flow of traffic by 50% so youāre Mr. AlwaysPassingAsshat, then fine, fuck off either way.
Except on I-10 in the desert. then both lanes are racing lanes as we all recognize that no one seems to get ticketed for consistently driving 120 mph, so deathrace rules apply until you re-enter a civilized zone.
Oh and making your brake-lights activate is not a brake check, if your speed goes from, say, 75 mph to 74 mph when activating your brake-lights then youāve done it properly if you must needs to do it at all, which you donāt. Done well means no change in your speed at all. But done this way only a swaddled baby could get into an accident as a result and TBH I think swaddled babies are prohibited from driving to begin with.
If you jam on the brakes at all, thatās a brake check, a racing maneuver, you think you racing bro?
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I agree 100% with this, but I think you are misunderstanding my point. Having an understanding of the machine you are controlling is never the wrong attitude regardless of the century. Very few people need to go to race school, but I feel like a majority of drivers need hands on training on how to drive and react correctly. Iāve seen people loose control of a vehicle from hydroplaning on a straight road. Saw someone almost roll a car by not paying attention, hitting the outside curb on a sweeping on ramp and then over correcting. I can go on as well, but my point is a lot of things happen because people just donāt have proper understanding of how/why/when their vehicle is going to react. Itās not about making people think they are Ken Blockā¦there is an area between not knowing enough/being afraid and being overly confident in your skills. Thatās the area we should strive to get drivers to. Someone who knows how to drive on ice but knows when it is bad enough they shouldnāt. You can go down the ābut technology will make all that obsoleteā route, but how does ABS or any form of stability control fair in severe adverse weather? It all works great right up to that point that it doesnāt, and then you are left literally holding the wheel and have no idea what to do.
As far as self drive cars go I think by 2030 you may see āmanualā drive being banned M-F. However I think the push back will come from the police more than anything. Since a decent percentage of their revenue comes from traffic violations Iād expect a sort of grassroots campaign of something about FREEDOM, the American Dream, or something along those lines to get people to vote against laws that would limit driving. Given the fact that cars are such a big part of our history I think itāll be a long time before you can eliminate driving altogether.
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When Iām getting tailed closely by dangerous schmucks every night on my way home, I fantasize about signs or pictures to display in my back window that might discourage their reckless driving. For a while, I displayed a page that said
ACME CUT-RATE
EXPLOSIVES TRANSPORT LLC
THANKS YOU FOR
KEEPING BACK
100 FEET.
What would really be nice is a monitor taking up the whole back window, displaying a looped video of this tailgater losing control and crashing his/her karma.
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I used to be much more emotional about driving until I started commuting and happened to run across Tom Vanderbiltās book Traffic. While not about tailgating specifically it did shed light on a lot of highway behavior that used to trigger an emotional response. Now If someone tailgates me in the left lane I donāt take it personally, move over to the right lane when I can and let them by. If someone tailgates me in the right-lane I just keep slowing down till they get annoyed and pass.
Being cursed with good night vision though makes me desire a some sort of roof mounted auto-sniper rifle to take out the ridiculously over-bright headlights everyone seems to favor these days. Maybe a paintball gun with semi-opaque paint just to dim them down?
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Yeah. It took me a very long time to learn how to drive, and it takes a considerable mental effort for me still. I am a very vigilant driver, and while Iām not a very good driver, I at least am always trying to avoid dangerous situations.
You hit the nail on the head for me. I end up getting emotionally triggered by other reckless drivers who force me into unsafe situations. It pisses me off and makes me irrationally angry when they donāt follow the common sense rules and put everyone at risk. I do my best not to nanny people on the road. I never do that intentionally because whatās that going to solve? But when I get tailgated in the right lane(s) I absolutely will just take my foot off the gas and just coast until they realize that theyāre not going to bully me into moving out of their way, nor are they going to bully me into going any faster than traffic. Iām in the right lane, they can use the ones to the left to go around me.
I think the big reason while tailgating is so distressing is that you have no control over it, and the tailgater is violating your personal space.
A tailgater in traffic is like some stranger approaching you on the bus, sitting down next to you, then after a minute, they put their legs up in your lap.
At least on the bus you can shove them off of you and tell them to cut it out without putting other peopleās lives at risk directly.
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No. If the person behind allowed a safe distance, then theyād be able to stop in time even if the front car had screeched to a halt. It is 100% the fault of the driver in back. This is why you hear about 50 cars or 100 cars piling up on the highway in fog or white-out snow conditions occasionally. Because ignorant, reckless drivers continue to drive 60 or 70 or 80 when they canāt see further than 20-30 feet ahead, and they find out the hard way that they canāt stop in time.
If you were injured because of a tailgater hitting someone or trying to avoid someone, it was 100% the fault of the tailgater.
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I really doubt you would be so forgiving, if you or someone you loved was hurt by this. If the car in front HAD to stop, and this happened, yes, youāre right, it would be 100% the tailgaters fault. If you jammed on your brakes just to be a dick, itās your fault too. I donāt care what the law says, sometimes being a grown up, is having to step up and be a better person.
Brake checking is stupid. I donāt do it. I recommend others donāt do it.
But if someone is following so close that they canāt handle a legitimate hard stop of the car in front, then that someone is the only one who is doing anything wrong IMNSHO.
The brake checker is trying to halt an unsafe situation in an unsafe way. Iād say itās comparable to slapping the gun out of the hand of someone who isnāt practicing proper trigger and muzzle discipline.
Iām not going to get angry at the brake checker for the same reason Iām not going to get angry at the gun slapper. They both acted unsafely and usually inappropriately to halt a potentially fatal situation.
The tailgaters have only themselves to blame, because the brake checkers could very easily have a completely legitimate reason to emergency stop anyway. The tailgaters are always more wrong and they have no excuse. None. They have no legitimate reason to follow closer than their stopping distance. They are doing something unexecusable, and they only manage to survive every day thanks to the good attitudes of their victims.
ETA: Just for reference, Iāve been smashed into from behind while in slow traffic. Iāve been tailgated at 1am on a nearly empty freeway.
I believe there should be a law that if you have video evidence of being tailgated, then the tailgater would have their license revoked until such a time that they have taken remedial driving classes (in case they are ignorant and donāt understand the risk theyāre putting on everyone) or anger management classes (in case theyāre using their vehicle to bully and threaten).
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Is every car in America a black SUV now? Kind of bleak.
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Probably a cop trying to get you up to the next level of ticket. 
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This can also sometimes be a function of older style cruise control. As you pass them their wind resistance drops and the older cruise controls donāt respond very quickly so keeping the same throttle makes them go faster. After a bit youāre farther ahead (wind resistance increases) and the cruise has finally realized theyāre going too fast. (Of course this applies to all cars if theyāre not on cruise and also not paying attention.)
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I knew a guy with a 20ft CB antenna bolted to his back bumper with a tennis ball at the end. Most of the time he kept it bowed down to his front bumper but the clip was on his A-pillar, so if somebody wouldnāt get off his ass heād just unclip it and when it whipped up and back theyād get a nice tennis-ball-sized dent in their hood!
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Itās easy, just remember three things:
- the last time you accidentally did something stupid while driving
- the fact that you donāt know their mental state (going to the ER? lost partner/job? etc)
- the tiny percentage of the vehicular population that they represent, for every (supposed) āassholeā, thereās literally several hundred halfway decent drivers, probably even within sight!
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Doesnāt sound like it was a truck but Iāve seen trucks ride up on slow folks (who arenāt passing anyone ā just putting along) in the middle lane. Car drivers sometime forget they often arenāt allowed in the leftmost lane if thereās three.
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Re killing them:
wrecksdart described how he was going to let a tailgater pass him (on a 2-lane road) , but, by speeding up, not allow him back into the right lane - when there was oncoming traffic, ie, about to have a head-on collision. He thought it was kinda funny - but he ādidnāt give a fuckā.
Get it now?
And, btw - in that video - the tailgater almost wound up in traffic on the opposite side of the highway. That was close to being a head-on collision with at least two cars - because some asshole thought he was justified in āteaching a tailgater a lessonā.
A tailgater is guilty of being discourteous. The brake-checker is guilty of deliberate malfeasance with a good chance of bodily injury to loads of innocent people. The tailgator deserves a ticket. The brake-checker in that video belongs in court. In my humble opinion, of course.
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