Today the Globe, echoing my co-blogger’s similar call months ago, has endorsed a bill that would ban all use of cellphones by anyone while driving, except in case of emergency. The reasoning:
It is inherently distracting to talk on the phone while driving. The intensity of conversation drags the mind away from concentration on the road.
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The act of conversation in and of itself is often enough to make motorists dangerously distracted.
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It makes especially good sense in this state to keep the minds of motorists focused on the road and not on their phones.
Mmm, yes. Terrible to have people driving with their minds or attention on something other than the road. Very dangerous. To that end, I propose the following bills which I expect the Globe to endorse promptly:
1. No person shall be permitted to converse with any passenger while driving. The penalties will be doubled for conversing with passengers who are under the age of 16 or are visually impaired, since such passengers are not able to deliver a warning about hazardous driving conditions that the driver might have missed because of being distracted. Come to think of it, maybe we should mandate that all cars install plexiglass shields like they have in taxicabs so that drivers aren’t distracted by their kids fighting in the backseat.
2. No person shall be permitted to drink any beverage or eat any food while driving, unless they are able to do so without using their hands. Penalties are doubled for Big Macs or Big Mac-like foods, which have an annoying tendency to dribble bits of lettuce and special sauce all over the driver’s pants, further increasing dangerous distractions.
3. Attractive and scantily-clad pedestrians of either sex shall at all times remain at least 50 feet away from the roads. If such persons desire to cross the street, they shall cover themselves up before doing so in keeping with the Puritan traditions of this Commonwealth.
You get my drift. I can support a bill like the one Rep. Casey (D-Winchester) is reportedly floating (and which resembles laws in New York and New Jersey), which bans the use of handheld phones but allows phones to be used on speaker or with a hands-free device – an ongoing conversation plus the impediment of having one hand tied up does seem like an unnecessary risk on the roads. But the Australian study touted by the Globe seems entirely inadequate to justify the draconian measure they endorse, at least based on what they tell us about it. Did the study control for other distractions? Did the study compare accidents involving phones to accidents involving other causes? Are there any relevant differences between driving habits of Americans and Australians? Has anyone bothered to look into whether the New York and New Jersey laws have made a difference, or are we just going to assume that one study from Australia settles the matter?
Does a big ol’ ban by the all-knowing and beneficent state really have to be the answer to every perceived problem?
