4 ms·

There are risks associated with driving. You could hit a deer, or slip on black ice. Unintentional behaviour by pedestrians is exactly the same. It is just u

by 7952 8y ago

There are risks associated with driving. You could hit a deer, or slip on black ice. Unintentional behaviour by pedestrians is exactly the same. It is just unreasonable to expect pedestrians to be completely attentive to safety at all times. That would require an unpleasently authoritarean set of rules. Do you really want public spaces to be so strictly regulated?

bitL 8y ago
But here you have two legal persons (or more) - driver and pedestrian; it's not like inanimate subjects (environment) or legal non-persons (deer). If pedestrian does what the poster implied, resulting in killing the driver (+ perhaps the whole family, including small kids), why would you place the guilt/blame on driver? Where is justice in that? I am sure you can find videos on Internet where pedestrians by their actions caused fatalities when drivers tried to avoid & save them.
- 7952 8y ago
  As long as the act was accidental I don't see any need to assign blame or guilt to anyone. This need for regulation simply dosn't apply to pedestrians, and strict rules just seem extreme and uneccessary. There simply isn't the evidence that pedestrian behaviour is a cause of death and injury among drivers. So why bother inflicting unpleasant rules and laws on people? Especially when the pedestrian themselves is likely to be the only person injured or killed. Of course some places do have jay walking laws, and I would agree that people should follow the law. But those laws exist solely for the benefit of motorists and not the safety of pedestrians. I just don't see any strong moral case for those sort of rules to exist. I think that cars create a uniquely weird set of circumstances. We impose a set of rules and restrictions on people that are more aggressive than would normally be acceptable. They are completely against free will and liberty. They are a total drag. And people reactively assume that the same rules should be applied to other road users. But that is categorically unfair and uneccessary. Should drunk walking be banned? Should kids cycling to school be banned? Should we have a law that punishes careless walking? No, that is ridiculous. But we have to have those laws for drivers.
malandrew 8y ago
If you're crossing a road way outside the crosswalk, yes, it's completely reasonable to expect complete attentiveness comparable to the attentiveness of the driver.
- 7952 8y ago
  Some people are unable to show that level of attentiveness. They may be disabled, kids, short sighted, drunk, etc. Should those people be morally and legally banned from the road? As a driver you just have to accept this kind of stuff when you drive in peoples communities. Unregulated humans are not always predictable. Sometimes accidents happen.
malandrew 8y ago
How about this situation where a pedestrian caused a driver to swerve and kill another pedestrian: https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article120372008.html https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article120372008.html Let's assume that the pedestrian was jaywalking.
- 7952 8y ago
  If jaywalking is illegal then that person should be prosecuted for that. The rest is just an unfortunate accident (assuming that the driver was at the correct speed). It is horrible, but hardly evidence that strict regulation needs to be applied to pedestrians. This is a ridiculously unusual situation after all.

by 7952 8y ago

bitL 8y ago

But here you have two legal persons (or more) - driver and pedestrian; it's not like inanimate subjects (environment) or legal non-persons (deer). If pedestrian does what the poster implied, resulting in killing the driver (+ perhaps the whole family, including small kids), why would you place the guilt/blame on driver? Where is justice in that? I am sure you can find videos on Internet where pedestrians by their actions caused fatalities when drivers tried to avoid & save them.

7952 8y ago
As long as the act was accidental I don't see any need to assign blame or guilt to anyone. This need for regulation simply dosn't apply to pedestrians, and strict rules just seem extreme and uneccessary. There simply isn't the evidence that pedestrian behaviour is a cause of death and injury among drivers. So why bother inflicting unpleasant rules and laws on people? Especially when the pedestrian themselves is likely to be the only person injured or killed. Of course some places do have jay walking laws, and I would agree that people should follow the law. But those laws exist solely for the benefit of motorists and not the safety of pedestrians. I just don't see any strong moral case for those sort of rules to exist. I think that cars create a uniquely weird set of circumstances. We impose a set of rules and restrictions on people that are more aggressive than would normally be acceptable. They are completely against free will and liberty. They are a total drag. And people reactively assume that the same rules should be applied to other road users. But that is categorically unfair and uneccessary. Should drunk walking be banned? Should kids cycling to school be banned? Should we have a law that punishes careless walking? No, that is ridiculous. But we have to have those laws for drivers.

malandrew 8y ago

If you're crossing a road way outside the crosswalk, yes, it's completely reasonable to expect complete attentiveness comparable to the attentiveness of the driver.

7952 8y ago
Some people are unable to show that level of attentiveness. They may be disabled, kids, short sighted, drunk, etc. Should those people be morally and legally banned from the road? As a driver you just have to accept this kind of stuff when you drive in peoples communities. Unregulated humans are not always predictable. Sometimes accidents happen.

malandrew 8y ago

How about this situation where a pedestrian caused a driver to swerve and kill another pedestrian: https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article120372008.html https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article120372008.html Let's assume that the pedestrian was jaywalking.

7952 8y ago
If jaywalking is illegal then that person should be prosecuted for that. The rest is just an unfortunate accident (assuming that the driver was at the correct speed). It is horrible, but hardly evidence that strict regulation needs to be applied to pedestrians. This is a ridiculously unusual situation after all.