8 ms·

Jaywalking always seemed like such a weird “crime” to me. I’m surprised I don’t hear about it being abused more.

by TylerE 4y ago

ehnto 4y ago
You are right to feel that way, and I think it helps to picture what life was like when the term showed up. These days we take it as almost an immutable fact that cars are on roads, and people are wherever else they can fit. But back then (1910s) streets in city centers were still commonly unsealed dirt roads. While cars were starting to get popular, they still moved at walking pace, and people using roads were still a mix of adults and kids just walking about, bikes, horse drawn buggies or carts. Looking back at photographs from the time you notice that the roads are just full of foot traffic, they weren't crossing the road, the road was how they got around. But cars were getting faster and more dangerous, and it was no longer compatible to have mixed traffic. Rather than ban cars from cities, we convinced people that actually, it was the car's road afterall and you shouldn't have been there! During that time the term jay walking came about, and it was used to paint the pedestrians as the one's getting in the way of the automobile driver, rather than it being the automobile that was out of place. If we use a very cynical lens, and I think we should, it was a essentially a marketing campaign from automobile makers.
BoxOfRain 4y ago
Yeah as someone from the UK the idea of crossing the road being a crime is mind-blowing, getting around would be intolerable as a pedestrian sticking to crossings.
skissane 4y ago
The term "jaywalking" itself is of US origin. Most of the rest of the English-speaking world doesn't have any offence by that name. While they do tend to have certain traffic regulations prohibiting pedestrians from crossing a road in an unsafe manner, those regulations are generally narrower in scope than many "jaywalking" laws in the US are.

Jaywalking always seemed like such a weird “crime” to me. I’m surprised I don’t hear about it being abused more.

by TylerE 4y ago

Jaywalking always seemed like such a weird “crime” to me. I’m surprised I don’t hear about it being abused more.

You are right to feel that way, and I think it helps to picture what life was like when the term showed up. These days we take it as almost an immutable fact that cars are on roads, and people are wherever else they can fit. But back then (1910s) streets in city centers were still commonly unsealed dirt roads. While cars were starting to get popular, they still moved at walking pace, and people using roads were still a mix of adults and kids just walking about, bikes, horse drawn buggies or carts. Looking back at photographs from the time you notice that the roads are just full of foot traffic, they weren't crossing the road, the road was how they got around. But cars were getting faster and more dangerous, and it was no longer compatible to have mixed traffic. Rather than ban cars from cities, we convinced people that actually, it was the car's road afterall and you shouldn't have been there! During that time the term jay walking came about, and it was used to paint the pedestrians as the one's getting in the way of the automobile driver, rather than it being the automobile that was out of place. If we use a very cynical lens, and I think we should, it was a essentially a marketing campaign from automobile makers.

BoxOfRain 4y ago

Yeah as someone from the UK the idea of crossing the road being a crime is mind-blowing, getting around would be intolerable as a pedestrian sticking to crossings.

skissane 4y ago

The term "jaywalking" itself is of US origin. Most of the rest of the English-speaking world doesn't have any offence by that name. While they do tend to have certain traffic regulations prohibiting pedestrians from crossing a road in an unsafe manner, those regulations are generally narrower in scope than many "jaywalking" laws in the US are.