it's not a perfect parallel but there is a correlation between the mentalities. Situations like this seem to have escalated in frequency, and I can only assume its the product of the society we live in where it's ok to berate someone anonymously via a message board, or smack talk over a live gaming connection... Obviously, it's not very contructive and definitely not a moral reaction...but I think alot of people are kidding themselves to say that it has never happended to them and would rather get on their soap box than admit they too have been at fault wow...ya'll don't mess around on prison island do you mate?
Pete - i feel your pain, and I am sympathetic. I am the most calm guy in the world - but put me behind the wheel and i suffer through road rage on a daily basis.
fadeaway, Did you have your emergency lights on when you were driving 10mph under the limit? My pet peeves are people that tailgate me when I'm already going 10-15mph over the speed limit (on highways I've been tailgated before going 90-95mph ). I also hate people that turn into my lane and then go slower than the lane they just changed from (and no they don't turn / exit). I'm not sure why people take things so personal while driving. Idiots and assholes will drive like idiots and assholes, its not personal.
Even if someone pisses me off while i'm driving I don't do anything. People are crazy, I don't want to get blasted up.
The ones who get into these little squabbles probably haven't. Road rage is stupid. You have no idea how crazy the person in the next car is. Dodging a swing and getting threatened like RocketMan Tex is just the tip of the iceberg. So, while moes' initial post was a ridiculous exaggeration, there are people who wouldn't flinch at ending your life over say throwing a water bottle at them.
Pete Chilcutt would never have acted like that... the mans too cool in pressure situations. It's funny how when bad drivers get called out for their mistakes, they feel insulted like its the persons fault who was put in danger and is rightfully upset. I guess taking criticism is hard, especially when the word 'pride' appears on their bumper multiple times. By far the biggest doofs are people who put a pair of testicles on their car. Responsible people get their car neutered.
I have a question for the road ragers. Does what you do depend on who you think you see in the other car? For instance: feeble woman = shouting profanities Ron Artest = wave sorry and cower in shame
feeble woman = cue chicafila cup for taking 20 minutes to turn Ron Artest = provoke provoke provoke :$$$:
that is a good question, and I would have to say no... the rage is more of an impulse reaction...the immediate response is ussually a finger... when I pass someone like an old lady, I ussually catch myself saying "oops, it's just an old lady, she can't help it...my bad" but when it's someone around my general age, be it man or woman, I feel like they deserved it and they should know better...as a result I would find a sick justification in my actions... I am not really much for a prolonged "rage" episode where tailgating for an extended period of time is involved. I am more of the quick and dirty, here you go see you later type...with that in mind the guy who was the water bottle ninja victim was around my age and male...if it was a woman of any age, or an older gentleman I don't believe that would have been my response...then again, if it was an older person I don't think it would have been provoked the way it was either...
I used to have HORRIBLE road rage. I would get in some kind of incident just about every time I left the house. Then I kind of grew up and realized that there are people who depend on me that would be SOL if I did something stupid and got shot just because some idiot cut me off on the freeway. My worst incident is as follows: I was on the N Beltway feeder heading east, turning left on Imperial Valley on the way to work. This guy was next to me in the middle lane (to my right). When the light turned green, he tried to turn left (from the middle lane) and get in front of me. I turned and went into the far right lane. He thought I cut him off, even though what he was doing was ILLEAGAL. He pulled up next to me and started asking me what my problem was. I was getting pretty mad because people try this stupid move from the middle lane every day and I’d had enough of it. He yelled, “have you ever had your ass kicked?” and I yelled, “no, but I did spank your Mom's ass last night!” (Come on, you gotta admit that was a pretty good line….) This, of course, sent him over the edge. He got in front of me and started slamming on his breaks. But it just so happened that my turn came, so I turned right onto another street. He tried to turn around and follow me, but by the time he came back around, I was already parking in my parking lot. I got out and thought for a minute. I tried to visualize the whole incident as a 3rd party and realized how STUPID we both were acting. I decided to never let that happen again. But sometimes I still smile when I think of that great line I threw at him….you should have seen the look on that poor sap’s face….
Sorry for the thread bump, but this pissed me off so much I had to bring it up. I don't know if anyone else coming back from the game last night took I-10 westbound past 610 to get home, but if you did, you know that there was just horrendous traffic due to the freeway being shut down just past 610. Apparently they've been closing it every night for construction and funneling everybody off at the Antoine/Silber exit. Aggravating as that was, this woman was more so. I'm not typically prone to fits of road rage, but I was reeeeeal close this time. I left the game around 9:50 and get to 610 around 10:05 when traffic just stops. So all the lanes start slowly merging together. I'm in the far left lane, with just a sliver of the lane merging into my lane left. A woman about four or five cars behind me who can clearly see the lane next to her is ending, jumps out into it anyway in an attempt to cut off all of four cars. So she pulls up right next to me and starts mouthing, "Are you going to let me in?" My girlfriend and I both make it very clear that, no, she can wait. Well, this apparently doesn't sit well with her, so she pulls up right on the ass of the car in front of me, literally about an inch from his bumper. Every time the car in front of me moves, I go along with him and she just inches closer and closer to the side of my car each time. After about five minutes of this, she's literally less than a foot away from my car and I'm absolutely infuriated. She's got three passengers with her, and girl in the seat next to her is yelling at her too to quit what she's doing, but still, this idiot presses on. Eventually, my cooler head prevails and I decide that I'm not going to be the one in an accident in this traffic tonight. I slow down, and as she moves past me, she pulls in just close enought to clip my side mirror as she goes past. My mirror's already broken and hangs on the side of my car, so she was probably about 4 inches away from me. Her friends just look horrified the whole time. So now she's in front of me and I've strongly considered pulling a Pete the Cheat and chucking my half full drink at her, but again I think better of it. So when she's adjusting her mirror, I give her the middle finger and think that'll be that. But no, being a b**** to me was not enough. She jumps over another lane to the right, and then attempts to cut another guy off. This guy is more reasonable than me and comes to a stop. Then I sat there and watched as she pulled in front of him and side swipes the front left part of his bumper! I can literally see her think that she's just going to drive away, but about 20 seconds later realizes she's in gridlocked traffic and isn't going anywhere. The guy she hit looks like he's about to tear her in half and I hope he told her off more than I did (I screamed at her out my window that "that's what you get!" followed by a very derogatory string of obscenities). I finally got home at 11 and my pulse was still off the charts... I hope she was drunk and went to jail Sorry for the huge post, I just had to let that one out.
I probably inspire more road rage than I get. When I'm on a two lane road and I see some guy behind me driving really fast and aggressive and darting in between cars I start to slow down so that they think they have an opening to cut me off but then I speed up and then match speed with a car next to me to keep the guy or gal boxed behind us.
I had this one old lady probably in her 60's driving an astrovan cut me off on i-10 one morning. I wailed on the horn. she proceeded to get in the lane next to me and flip me off and shout something at me that im guessing werent bible scriptures. I laughed while smiling and waving at her, which made her angrier. It was hilarious.
I had some road rage this morning. First, let me say that I'm not a morning person at all and I like to get every last second of sleep that I possibly can. This usually results in a mad dash to get to work on time, but I have it down to an exact science and am always there just under the gun. But, to make matters worse, there's an assload of construction going on in front of my apartments. They've ripped up half the road so it's down to just one lane, and it's now a one-way street. There is literally no way to get out of my apartments without going down this one way road. So, I head to my car this morning and I see that there's a dump truck parked on the road, near the parking area. I didn't think anything of it, and went ahead and jumped in my car and pulled out. As I was about to turn onto the one-way road, the dump truck starts rolling and takes off ahead of me. It then proceeds to go about 5 mph down this long road with no way for me to get around it as I watch time tick away on the clock. Needless to say, I wasn't happy and a few profanities were definitely launched at this dump truck driver. In the end, I was 1 minute late to work (they give me until 9:05 to clock in, and I was in at 9:06) and will probably get written up for it at some point.
