Or, 'Drunk Driving vs. Sober Driving: What’s the Difference?' and 'Drunk-Driving Laws Are Absurd'. I was going to only post one, but found the wrong article (the 2nd one). I decided to leave it in. Food for thought.
Fuck that. You get caught drunk and operating a vehicle, I'm in favor of you getting kicked in the stomach and hauled down to the station. Fuck drunk drivers. J.
The first article asks why other potentially dangerous drivers, such as the elderly and women who apply makeup, are not subject to the same merciless treatment, and does a fairly good job of it. Not that I think driving drunk is a good idea.
If one really wanted to, they could easily defend the "right" to drive drunk using the standard libertarian arguments for defending everything else. I thought about starting a devils advocate-type thread about it a while back, but never got around to it.
I can drink and drive 120MPH better then you fucks, I can fuck your old lady and make her scream and your mama too. all you bitches wish you had my skills. you non drinking drivers can lick my nuts. LOL LOL LOL
I think the issue that the first article fails to address is that dangerous driving behaviors are increasingly being policed. See, for example, cell phones. Running red lights. Work zones. Additionally, the article seems to vilify the frequency of arrests when, in reality, it all has to do with the frequency of the behavior. When you get pulled over, chances are good that you were violating a driving safety law as-is, and being drunk doesn't help your case. And with regards to checkpoints, they are aimed more towards prevention than cure (and yes, in a modern society, we have to have systems like that. Period.). And the reason that there are laws targeting drunk driving rather than "driving while old" or other "crimes" that these articles like to mention is that there is a scientific, consistant backing to them. And, amusingly, things like cell phone usage while driving are being outlawed based on scientific complaints. And with regard to the second article, it is the usual masturbatory nonsense that fails to recognize that it is as much a crime to willfully put others in danger without their consent as it is to actually cause them harm. In fact, the vast majority of traffic laws are designed to help foster a consistant behavior amongst drivers. Human beings love patterns, and we are instantly aware of when patterns are violated. So, in a world of mostly consistant driving behaviors, anything that falls out of the norm is instantly flagged and noted by our brains - it's instinct. It's what we do. And to say that drunk driving isn't a crime until it causes damage to person or property, then why couldn't we say this about speed limits? About tailgating? About merging? About all those laws that are designed to essentially give drivers a baseline so as to better recognize dangers? It doesn't matter that a drunk driver has yet to injure someone. It is a gross disregard for the lives of everyone he would encounter in his journey. He puts other human beings in extreme jeopardy with nothing they can do to help protect themselves. They are innocents in the truest sense of the word. And I would be extremely concerned about any society that did not discourage such behavior at every opportunity. If someone fired into a crowd, but hit no one, is there no crime? Come on. These articles are apologist nonsense for what is truly a disgusting behavior. The authors, and those who agree with them, need to grow the fuck up and realize that we do have, at minimum, the basic responsibility to protect others from ourselves, and our own actions.
How do drunk driving laws change that? If you're not going to be dissuaded from drunk driving by the natural potential consequences, a drunk driving law isn't going to stop you from driving drunk. I don't see how the lack of a drunk driving law is going to change the baseline. It's like a price floor lower than the market price - totally ineffective. You'd pretty much have to make drunk driving a capital offense to change the baseline.
My aunt was killed by a drunk driver who got nothing but a slap on the wrist for it. The author of the articles can go fuck himself.
So, you believe that, drunk driving laws or no, the incidence of drunk driving would remain the same? I find that difficult to believe. The issue at hand is that drunk drivers are not ignoring the 'natural potential consequences.' They aren't even being considered. So, rather than potential consequences, it attaches a solid, immediate consequence directly to the behavior itself, rather than a potential consequence stemming from the behavior that demonstrates how completely fucking irresponsible the behavior is. Because that is about all a drunk mind is capable of processing. I see it with kids. You tell them not to run with scissors. You might even explain that running with scissors is an excellent way to trip and fall onto them, hurting yourself. If they proceed to run with scissors, you don't let them until 'natural potential consequences' catch up. You take the scissors and swat them on the rear, and maybe then they'll learn the lesson. You can apply this to playing ball in the house (property damage), pushing/shoving/roughhousing (serious injury to others), etc., etc. It might sound ridiculous to apply these analogies to adult behavior, but a drunk adult mind needs to be treated very similarly. The concept that actions might have unforeseen or unintended results is not an inherent trait in humans. It's something we learn through experience. And learned behaviors are unreliable at best when you're starving your brain for oxygen. Attaching immediate consequences then acts as a deterrent. It might not work or might not be needed to the sober adult mind. But if this sober adult makes the decision to give up some of the mental faculties of adulthood, he needs to recognize that he should, by no means, expect to be treated like a sober adult, because he is in no way equivalent to one.
I believe he's expressing that contrary to the authors' contention that drunk driving laws should be abolished, he believes they should be more strictly enforced with greater consequences for violations. At the very least, he is expressing that they certainly shouldn't be lessened. And you knew that too. Stop trying to be cute, it's not becoming.
Getting caught by the police is not guaranteed. Why should that enter into consideration any more than death, maiming, permanent disability, or manslaughter charges? This might, might stop repeat offenders, but it's not going to stop someone the first time. And it's not going to stop repeat offenders unless they're caught a solid majority of the time they drive drunk. It's like running with scissors when an adult isn't around.
The articles raise some good points. I really hate laws that were enacted simply because a bunch of overprotective angry mothers lobbied some gullible politicians.
In a way, the author makes sense. Do we punish people for doing things that hurt other people, or for doing things that might lead them to hurt other people? If we outlaw drunk driving because it increases the likelihood of someone getting hurt, should we then also outlaw eating while driving, changing the radio station while driving, and arguing with your passenger while driving? Similarly, can drunk driving laws possibly account for the fact that one person might be dangerous after two beers, while a dedicated alcoholic might be completely unimpaired after six? On the other hand, there are plenty of examples in our legal code of things that are illegal whether they hurt someone or not, on the grounds that the strong potential exists. (Firing a weapon into a crowd is one example.) And driving while drunk is dangerous on a different scale than, say, fiddling with the radio.
God sounds like the guy who drinks all the time shows up to work drunk at the nursing home. He's a full timer who does jack shit. But he whines etc.
