Werner Herzog's harrowing documentary on texting and driving

Powerful movie. Watch it even if you already agree

 

'Harrowing' kind of sounds like someone saying 'Halloween' with an asian accent.

 

According to mythbusters, #3 is the worst. They concluded texting is 5x worse than driving drunk. Hands free headsets are just as dangerous because being mentanlly distracted is basically like putting blinders on. You are fully incapable of paying attention to 2 things at ounce. We are terrible multitaskers.

 

Not trolling, just lazy. What I meant to say: it is dangerous, and therefore you should be advised against doing it, but I don't think it should be illegal. (I also don't think driving while drunk, high, sleepy, changing radio/CDs, looking in the back seat, talking, dancing, or anything else should be illegal - but this isn't the D&D so we'll leave it at that.)

I have a hard time seeing this texting while driving thing being more than just the latest "scary thing" that's got people in their 50s and older all in a tizzy.

I'll probably get around to the doc before too long. Herzog's film on the death penalty was very well done, so I'm sure this is too.

 

It's illegal here in Indiana, but it's tough to enforce and widespread. I don't even have a truck/SUV that allows me to look down (literally and figuratively, I guess) on drivers who are doing it from above but I still see it every time.

Every time I do see it, though, I hit the horn. I lean on it. I don't give two taps, like you would with someone who is too lazy/inconsiderate to pull up at an intersection to let someone into the right hand turning lane, I hug that horn.

I want them to know -- and I'm not making jokes here -- the sheer terror that comes from paying attention to your phone, and immediately having something terrible happen to you. I want to frighten and shake them as much as I can, thinking that they're about to be in an accident.

It's only going to get worse, from here on out, which absolutely slays me. And I have two daughters that will be getting into a car in half a decade.

 

I hear you, and believe it or not, I'm not in my 50's (despite KingCheetah's campaign to convince people I'm much older. ). But as per the info in this thread, it's a lot more dangerous than other distractions.

But yeah, just watching it because Herzog rocks is a good idea. That was originally the only reason I clicked on it.

And KellyDwyer, interesting take. Thank you. I will try that.

My best "hang up, damn it" gesture is kind of like the gig em sign (?), thumb and pinky finger extended and slammed downward in an exaggerated motion. Watch B-Bob get in a wreck now doing his stupid "hang up" gesture. LOL

EDIT: as per enforcement... not to be creepy, but if they can give remote automated-tickets from traffic cameras, it would be pretty trivial to automatically detect if a driver sent a text while his car was moving. Boom. Ticket in the mail.