Traffic, again

Status
Not open for further replies.
(From The Karate Kid)

Mista Miyagi say, "Damyouson, best defense is no be there to begin with."
 
quote:

Originally posted by Dagwood:
As difficult as at may be at times, I just try and go with the flow. There are too many crazy people out there. Think about how many people are carrying weapons in their vehicles! No thanks, I prefer to stay out of the mix.

I think there is a pretty big overlap between subsets of those with rage problems and those carrying weapons.
 
I wonder if this research is funded by the trial lawyers association.

Road Rage is nothing but the expressive state of normal people being subjected to needless frustration. Road rage is just "postal" in a different environment. Each of those people, those who went "postal" and those who have committed road rage, somehow managed to interact with humans without major difficulty for most of their lives.

Now the difference in this person (the subject of our OP) is that he's also an offensive person and probably does have some delusions of him being the victim to allow him to reflex like that. Otherwise ..he's usually the cause of someone else going postal behind the wheel.

Nope ..it's not a treatable condition. The solution is customer service that actually serves the customer, people who learn not to act like they have all the time in line while you're behind them, fast food orders that don't get screwed up .....essentially where more things are working more like they are supposed to ..and not what we've gotten used to them decaying into.

The movie, Falling Down, although not considered a great work, clearly depicted the reasons for such behaviors. It's simple disenchantment with the way things are ..and refusing to accept them without protest ..violent protest, granted, but that merely shows how severe the degradation from "right" things are.

 -
 
When I'm in the car, I follow the old saying "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." I also have no problems with agressive drivers. It all comes down to your own attitude IMO. Sit back, relax, go with the flow, give people their space, try to avoid the idiots and don't let the fact that people will do stupid things get you bent out of shape.

Concerning the root cause of such behavior, I don't think there's anything new happening here. Road rage, as it's called, is only a modern manifestation of the same thing that has caused people to commit wrongs against each other since Cain murdered Abel. People (all of them) simply have a predisposition to bad actions. The more-well-adjusted among us are able to recognize this fact, fight it and not allow themselves to be mastered by it while the lesser among us let their emotions take over and do things they'll later regret. Furthermore, I think society as a whole is becoming more selfish, which naturally will lead to an increase in this behavior. I also think a lot of people are never taught to function in a group. In other words, they're overly individualistic and get stressed out when they have to deal with large groups of people. If that stress is uncontrolled, the smallest thing can set them off into a rage.
 
Matt, the key word in your post is "stress". Why is it an issue of increasing importance? Why can't we navigate through our entire lives without encountering it?

While I agree that some can look at this as a problem ..I submit that these acts are more of a symptom of the decaying social environment.

Crime is a problem ..but it's more of a symptom of a delinquent society in one manner or another.

Although there are surely personal responsibilties to be accessed and managed ...it's kinda igorant (as in ignoring/discounting) to say that these these behaviors grew out of a vacuum. Many who commit Road Rage and gone postal are my age ..or older if they're still alive. There's no youngster social theory applicable to them
dunno.gif


A guy that killed a young girl by running her off the road on the NE extension of the turnpike (she was in his way daydreaming and refused to move over) ..is about 60 now ..in prison.
 
quote:

Road rage, as it's called, is only a modern manifestation of the same thing that has caused people to commit wrongs against each other since Cain murdered Abel.

After that Bible rage incident, the Almighty signed bad boy Cain up for an anger management class.
 
It's good to say, go with the flow, but that does not always work. I drive beaters, stay away from everyone. Anyone can have the rightaway in front of me, please take it. When I arrive at an intersection, I make sure the other driver has the right of way, in front of me no matter what. If he waves me through, I break eye contact and stay put, no matter how long it takes to get the message. I don't want an intersection accident and the problems that brings. If I do have the rightaway and he waves me through and we hit, he/she might forget that they waved me through. Last summer, driving a beater in the slow lane at 65mph, I had someone come up behind me and got really close. I could not see his grill or headlights. There was no one in the other lanes and no up comming ramp, withing sight. He would not get off me. Then he honked. Then flashed his lights, and honked and flashed. I did not dare slow down, and just kept driving. We finally passed several off ramps and he was still there. I was now upset, too. Then good luck. A cop was giving someone a ticket and I pulled myself over and parked behind the cop's car. And my friend went by. The cop finished his business and then came back to me. I volunteered my license and told my story, gave him a description and plate number. I know nothing will be done, and if it came to filing a complaint, he gets all my info and I don't get his. To avoid that I passed on filing a complaint. I know of nothing that I did to set this guy off. The Cop did not see it happen so he can't help me. What do you do?
 
quote:

Originally posted by Louie's gone fishing:
We finally passed several off ramps and he was still there.

I would have exited the highway and gotten back on. If he followed me off the highway, I would drive to the nearest police station--even if I had to call 911 for directions.
 
supposedly saying that the 'crazy' folks appear to be drunk gets a good response...

JMH
 
quote:

What do you do?

It won't save you in all cirucumstances, sometimes nothing will work ..but works for 99% of the situations.

LEAD
FOLLOW
or GET OUT OF THE WAY

If everybody did that there would be far less RR.
 
I though about going to the Police station, but where, but the Cop appeared and that was my choice. Getting away anyother way, in an old beater is out of the question. In the future, I may just carry a bat and glove and if stopped, be on my way to a pickup game, so that I can at least carry the bat. Criminals have it all on their side. They are protected. If you hurt one, you'd better be able to stand up to the problems that will come your way.
 
If you hurt one, you'd better be able to stand up to the problems that will come your way.

This is true to a great degree, Louie. You don't want the general population administering punitive justice on their own. You then get the guy who shoots those who are j-walking.

Do any of you guys remember that guy they called the Subway Vigilanty?? If you saw any of the post arrest interviews (they may have been reinactments)...I was right there with him. He sounded crazy ..but he expressed every frustration of contemporary society and how he had been rendered impotent to do anything about it..and society did nothing to remedy it.

There was nothing irrational about what he did. If the society allows criminals to operate with relative impunity ...then you cannot rationally expect citizens to remain civilly obedient and just take it up the keester.
 
Goetz

He sounded like a lunitic ..but, as I said, everything he said ran true. Just an avergage guy who had seen and put up with too much.

quote:

Besides, all across the country citizens who believed they could no longer rely on the police or the courts to effectively protect society from the scourge of crime were taking steps to protect themselves, so why should Bernhard Goetz be punished for doing the same? The Subway Vigilante remained a hero to many; after delivering the verdict, the jurors took turns asking for his autograph.

 
Gary, thanks for the link. I remember the case. I was in NY in 1986 on business. On the subway I was asked for money by a dead beat. He pulled a knife. I shoved my brief case into him, and beat him until he could not stand up any more. Several passengers helped me throw him out the door at the next stop. At the next stop I was arrested and brought to an office in the subway. They held me there in handcuffs. I would probably have been turned over to the regular police if about a dozen passengers showed up and told the subway police what happened. Turns out the gentleman that pulled the knife was just out on bail for armed assult. He was bailed because they had no place to keep him. I had to make a written statement as was treated like I was the criminal. They did not believe my statement, until others showd up, and out of my presense, told the same story. I think the whole problem with the Goetz deal was that he shot two of them in the back. If not that, he would have had as much of a problem. Another not. If I filed charges against the guy in the subway, he would receive my name and address, and I would not get his, because the court protects him, from 'people like me'.
 
"If I filed charges against the guy in the subway, he would receive my name and address, and I would not get his, because the court protects him, from 'people like me'. "
==============================================================

Big part of the problem.
 
Just be nice, until it's time to not be nice.
Did I just quote Patrick Swayze? Oh crap.
Just yesterday, zooming along in the HOV lane, everything fine, and a white Explorer decided to change lanes going 35mph, because the driver spotted the 15 foot space between me and the car in front of me. After a few sceonds of hard braking and cursing under my breath, as well as a bit of the horn, I somehow refrained from giving the driver the finger, even though I could a hand waving at me from up there. I remembered that only a week ago I had done a similar thing, but not on purpose, so maybe this was accidental too.
Besides, my girlfriend was with me, and women (contrary to what many men seem to think) don't admire foul language and bad tempers.
My usual reaction to selfish/careless drivers is just cursing to myself.
As far as "personal Justice" that's dangerous too. You never know what kind of day--or life--someone may be having and they may snap if pushed a bit harder than they thing they already have been.
The last person(minus one) who tried to pull a wepaon on me got a broken wrist, but things don't always work out that way.
I agree with matt about people becoming too selfish, and I'll go a bit farther and say that in my opinion, that's the biggest problem with people everywhere.
 
Okay ..I'll go with the selfish people causing RR ..just that they aren't usually those who commit it.

That is the problem, among other things, RR is just the resultant symptom. Since we treat incompetence and antisocial behavior with apathy or helplessness, and basically have given up on stopping it, RR is a natural reaction to it.

The results are usually sad. Same with "going postal". Don't you think that there's a few widows of overbearing Postal managers that wish that their husbands/wives (whoever) wasn't so overbearing?? I think so.

there's no excuse for the common idiocy we see and tolerate everyday. Most of us can surrender to it and just take the stupidity of the masses as our benchmark for acceptable ...but it's a pathetic resignation on our part. Sooner or later someone is going to decide that the ignoranty antisocial and unaware pay the consquences of the impact upon others ...legal or not.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom