I agree strongly with your overall sentiment, but you're quite wrong on this: > I think every reasonable person would answer that they would [run the red light

I agree strongly with your overall sentiment, but you're quite wrong on this: > I think every reasonable person would answer that they would [run the red light in the middle of nowhere]. I tend not to do it. Not because I have some overinflated worship of the letter of the law, but simply because it doesn't matter to me. If I'm in a hurry, I'll probably blow through it, but by default, probably not. Edit: I also agree that you're being downvoted simply because people disagree with you or your style. It's something I'm getting somewhat tired of on HN. I think they need some concrete guidance on what's acceptable to downvote and try to keep it as much to "rules violations" as possible, because it's increasingly being used as a disagreement flag lately, in my observation, which is just unhealthy.