CULLMAN —
Those late-night public service commercials about driving under the influence and scrambling your brains on drugs have given way to a relatively new menace of human creation: texting while driving.
States slowly responded to this growing threat on the roadways by passing laws, many of them quite weak, that allow police to ticket offenders. How much good a slap on the wrist will do for a generation raised with cell phone in hand is difficult to tell. The carnage to life and property will eventually cause a more stern reaction from government.
Experts about driving, such as state troopers and others in law enforcement, have long been aware of the importance of remaining focused when operating a vehicle. Loud, thumping music could be the reason a driver doesn’t hear an approaching ambulance. Alcohol and drugs alter perception and make a driver slow to react to problems on the road.
Texting is among the worst actions a driver can take. The act of punching out a poorly worded response to whatever nonsense someone sends requires driving on faith. Closing your eyes while driving along a county or city street wouldn’t about be the equivalent of texting behind the wheel.
Before the problem gets any worse, states should look at including a test on texting for anyone seeking to obtain a driver’s license, and not just a written exam. Anyone with a cell phone should be required to bring it on the driving test and have a state trooper send texts randomly along the way. Anyone who bothers to grab the phone and look at the text should automatically fail the test.
Teens and young adults are not the only offenders when it comes to texting and driving, but they should certainly be the starting point for testing.
Understanding why anyone feels compelled to answer the load of nonsense that is sent to their phones by friends and family is difficult to understand. But it happens. And preventable tragedy happens, too.
The need to educate driver’s about the danger of texting while cruising the streets is real. Some Alabamians objected vehemently to the law requiring seatbelts for drivers and passengers. The death toll on the highways silenced most of that uproar. Getting a jump on the texting problem should be a priority.
Editorials
Texting, driving and dying
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