Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/10/man-found-guilty-of-using-phon.html
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So if it was connected to the car via Blueooth, the car would be part of the phone and then could not be used while driving.
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Am I missing something. Why did he have headphones plugged into a dead phone?
Also, is it illegal to use headphones for making calls? I do that all the time because it’s less distracting than holding a phone up to my head and I don’t have a way to connect my phone to my car’s stereo…
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So, when a plane is refueled by a tanker truck, it enlarges the aircraft and the truck becomes a part of the aircraft. This makes the fueler driver a pilot, temporarily. Or does the airplane pilot become a trucker? I’m confused.
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Keep in mind this is Canada, so laws may be different…
Apparently, BC bans those on the graduated licensing program from using even hands-free.
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He was wearing ear buds, but his battery was dead?
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So, am I also my wife when she and I are… oh, never mind
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What’s more, the headphone was plugged into the driver’s ear, making the driver part of the electronic device. The driver was in the car making the car part of the electronic device. The car was driving down the road, the road went into the city, the city was clearly “plug in” to the country, the people are in the country. The judge should have recused themself from the case as clearly they were also part of the cell phone.
On one hand I’m glad to see that this kind of - to my mind correct - thinking has made its way into the everyday world. On the other, that’s not what the law means, you dumbass.
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ok so the phone was enlarged. It wasn’t being used…
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The answer is - it depends:
https://drivinglaws.aaa.com/tag/headsets/
In some states and provinces it is illegal to wear headphones while driving - the general reason is that they can block out external sounds, such as emergency vehicle sirens, which are intended to alert the driver to take action, such as moving out of the way.
There may be other laws that come into play as well. For example, Florida only allows the use of a headset with a cellular phone in one ear, the other must remain unobstructed: https://drivinglaws.aaa.com/tag/distracted-driving/
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Odd. Sounds to me like the conversation should have gone like this:
Officer: “Sir, it seems you are using your phone while driving.”
Driver: “Oh, sorry. The phone is dead, I can see why you might think I was.”
Officer, looks at phone: “Oh, yes, you’re right. Perhaps you could remove your headphones in the future, so others won’t make the same mistake I just did.”
Fin
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You, as a presumably reasonable human, are presuming that those charged to act on behalf of the state also will conduct themselves as reasonable humans. Although this is a common thought process, it is a grave error.
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Soon as I read the headline, I knew it was BC.
People have been ticketed for just having it on the seat beside them. The law states that it must be secured to the vehicle or driver and that only one ear can have an earbud in.
If it was in a mount on the dashboard and he didn’t have an N (or L) license, he might have gotten away with it, with just one earbud in.
I agree, the decision stretches things, but welcome to BC. The distracted driving laws have been pounced on with glee by those who are least affected by it. Someone who can afford a mount and a Bluetooth enabled stereo will likely not be fined. But unless you have both… Well, they interpret things like putting it in the glovebox as concealment. Or, to quote the ICBC ad “Your cellphone hiding antics are no match for our tactics”.
Again, I am not defending this. I am just laying out the reasons that I am not surprised. Distracted Driving laws in this province borderline on Kafkaesque.
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Hm. Yeah I don’t see the logic. I can hear sirens and horns and all sorts of external noises just fine when wearing my earbuds. Sirens are friggin loud man.
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Habit maybe. I often leave my earbuds in even though i’m not listening to anything. I suppose it can be seen as lowkey rude because when people talk to me they think i’m not paying attention to them because i’m also listening to something (which i’m not). I usually end up having to apologize for the buds and that i was in fact paying attention.
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Conversation avoidance is one of the main benefits of wearing headphones, whether I’m listening to something or not.
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I don’t really use it as a way to avoid conversation (i do just not often), most of the time i just forget about the earbuds 
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It shouldn’t even matter if you can hear them or not. In the U.S. at least deaf people have the same right to drive as anyone else, and are no more at risk of accident or issue. Visual cues, like other cars moving over to make way for emergency vehicles, or the sight of police lights in the rear view mirror. Sirens help, certainly, but people seem to be able to do just fine without hearing them.
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Little sympathy…wearing earbuds while driving severely reduces your situational awareness by blocking out external sounds, and …why the heck would you wear earbuds attached to a dead phone in the first place?
I imagine the earbuds to a dead phone thing happened for the same reason I often have to be reminded not to wear my headphones into restaurants by my wife, you stop noticing them after a while.
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