Barbara
Benjamin
Prose
Essay
1831
words
Are Red-Light Runners Trying to Get a Power Fix?
"Outa my way—it's
red, let's floor it!"
News item:
Red-light running seems to have become the national
game of chicken in recent years. In
utter arrogance and disrespect of other drivers, the red-light runner's
attitude is, "I dare you to catch me." And while sitting at a green light waiting as
one to three cars go whizzing through the intersection against a red light,
I've actually been flipped off by some of them, as if to say, "Ha. I screwed you, sucker!"
This type of driving attitude used to be limited to
your average, hormone-raging male teen.
But within the last 5-10 years, the faces of red-light runners have
changed. They now reflect a broad
cross-section of society: from teens with an attitude to little old ladies with
cats. What used to occur fairly
infrequently has escalated into the norm.
This deadly serious problem has caught the
attention of
The city of
There was a time when motorists slowed down on a
yellow light and stopped on red. There
was a time when they used turn signals to indicate an intention to change lanes
or to turn. Now, only Edith Bunker or a
dullard would use turn signals to indicate a lane change. Fellow drivers interpret the flashing light
as a warning to speed up and prevent the driver from "cutting
in." Now, when needing to change
lanes, you must appear nonchalant while glancing surreptitiously into the rear
and side-view mirrors. Then, glancing
over your shoulder and seeing a chance, you must quickly dart over into the
next lane—pulling a surprise move on the drivers beside you. Even when always being extra cautious to pull
off this move with plenty of time and room to spare, you may still receive a
middle-finger salute from the driver now behind you. But unfortunately, if you use your turn
signal, you'd be waiting for the next two miles trying to move over since
drivers in the next lane would speed up to prevent you from moving over in
front of them.
Why? What
has changed? Where have these kinds of
rude and possessive attitudes come from?
Sometime between "Leave It to Beaver" and
"Beavis and Butthead," and somewhere between dinner with "Donna
Reed" and "Roseanne" the seeds of our rude attitudes were
planted. They took root somewhere
between leaving Eve Arden's classroom and entering Cotter's. And, sometime between the decade of the
flower children and the advent of the Mac,
Sandy Dornbusch, a
professor of human biology, education and sociology at Stanford University,
comments in a San Jose Mercury News article, "Rude Awakening: Peninsulans Miss
Manners as Boorishness Becomes Norm," that "public rudeness has
increased dramatically" (1). As the
pace of our lives has sped up to a warp 10, we've retreated into ourselves,
becoming insulated little bundles of energy, rushing madly through the world. As we rush about, we lack the patience for
civility.
American life seems to be undergoing a social
redefinition. We live now in a society
which no longer follows a strict code of behavior. Our mothers and grandmothers used to admonish
our bad behavior with, "What will the neighbors think?" But now we no longer have neighbors we know
or care much about. Today, the average
person moves every five years. This
transitory lifestyle weakens, even destroys, bonds with other people—not only
with neighbors, but with family as well.
This growing lack of in-depth contact with others has created a whole
new reality. "We can act with
impunity," Dornbusch says. "You can assume that you will never see
the other person again in your life. In
a small town, to act rudely is to make an enemy for life." The importance of one's reputation in one's
community has dissolved into a vast sink hole of mobility and inconstant
strangers.
Neighborhood grocery and drug stores have been
replaced by shopping centers and large, impersonal chain stores. People who work in
them, drive in from distant communities.
In large urban and suburban areas people aren't known in their own
neighborhoods anymore. Even when
shopping routinely in the same stores over many years, the high turnover rate
of commuter employees and frequently changing work schedules assures that you
rarely see the same checkout person twice.
I recall shopping in the local supermarket with my mother when I was
growing up in the 50s and 60s. My mother
knew every sales clerk, butcher, and bag boy (there were no "bag
girls" then) in the store. She
couldn't go into that store without stopping to chat with two or three people
she knew. Since I've been an adult, I've
never had this experience. No store
personnel recognizes me as a regular shopper, and I've
never run into anyone I know.
Shopping in my "neighborhood" stores is a
lonely, isolating activity. Driving
throughout the Bay Area is irritating and maddening. I asked myself recently while driving, when
did I become so angry? It occurred to me
that I don't drive anywhere anymore when I don't at some point utter
obscenities to, at least, one driver. I
must drive so defensively now that I feel I should don a suit of armor and
carry artillery. Driving defensively
used to mean making sure other drivers were awake. Now, it means defending your right to get to
your destination since most drivers are unthinkably rude, impatient, and
disrespectful. Without realizing it,
I've developed an irritable, defensive posture while behind the wheel.
Once upon a time people were content to follow the
rules and obey laws, since most of us understood they usually promote the
general well-being of society at large.
But when was niceness and civility devaluated? Instead of the rugged individualist, we're
now self-absorbed, self-important individuals.
We lack concern of what others think because we probably won't see them
again anyway. Mark Twain once said,
"Good breeding consists of concealing how much we think of ourselves and
how little we think of the other person."
Our isolation from neighbors and others in society has apparently all
but eliminated our need for "good breeding."
A current of anger runs rampant throughout today's
society, but it's unfocused anger. Instead of directing rage to fix crucial
social inequalities and injustices, this rage is channeled into the types of
rude, intolerant behavior we experience from drivers. As motorists it's easy to become righteous,
indignant, and discourteous. Nothing
breaks down social controls like encapsulation in chunks of steel and the
ability to zoom away. There's even less
impetus to act civil toward other drivers than toward neighbors. Drivers can easily risk rudeness by violating
rules of common courtesy, and flagrantly violate laws because there's little
repercussion for their actions. Also,
shifting responsibility by seeing other drivers as a trespasser—such as lane
changers—justifies such barbaric behavior as speeding up to block the lane
changer's maneuver. In their cars,
drivers become the ultimate big fish inside minuscule, but powerful steel and
glass ponds. They become tyrants and
feel free to give vent to frustrations because they feel
"protected."
Ill-mannered drivers don't consider the effects of
using vehicles as "power" tools, as possible substitutes for the lack
of control in their lives. Nor do they
consider why being inside a car intensifies feelings of power, nor question
their own motives or behavior. Cameras
at intersections may curb the epidemic of red-light running, but they won't
stem the progression of the basic disease underlying the practice. Until we recognize the symptoms of this
insidious, developing social disease, drivers (and, society in general) will
continue the escalation of self-absorbed rudeness and aggression. We need to return once more to courteous,
responsible actions. We also need to
address the problem of inappropriate expression of emotions. Without some kind of natural inner governor
to inhibit aggressive behavior—previously accomplished through our mutual and
communal attachment and dependence on each other—we need to find a substitute,
even if its only the understanding that life is simply
more pleasant when people are polite and courteous. Although, encouraging and developing
self-control seems reasonable, human nature usually requires a force greater
than the self. However, teaching
self-control is certainly an important start.
Beyond that, parents need to instill once again the idea that courtesy
and patience are virtues and facilitate the achievement of a peaceful, sane
society. In the meantime, the storm
clouds have only just begun to roll in just behind the red-light runners.
Works Consulted
1. Leibovich, Mark.
"Rude Awakening: Peninsulans Miss Manners
as Boorishness Becomes Norm."
2. Viloria, Theresa.
"
3. Viloria, Theresa. "