The flawed presumption that murder and maiming by car is an "accident"Published August 17th, 2006 by C.I.C.L.E.
Contributed by Simon Baddeley :: UK
The social blindness surrounding road death statistics (compared for instance to reactions to rail "crash" fatalities) means that neither the victim nor their friends and neighbours know how to take on board an event whose gravity is still widely contested. Imagine the circumstances surrounding loss in war or someone murdered by a stranger: such terrible things can at least be subsumed under imperfect but still widely understood mores about giving and seeking comfort and consolation. (Read on in the comments)
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In the case of road deaths, however, there seems, even at times among those survivors or relatives most directly affected, a willingness to accept as a "tragic accident" what an objective eye would treat as criminal. This flawed recognition of the gravity of an event because it was perpetrated by a man or women in the role of a "motorist” or a "driver" - its seriousness minimized because it involved a car or motorbike or truck and occurred on the road - creates a social limbo that compounds the isolation of those bereaved by reckless driving. Most of those around us are not child molesters, murderers, or people otherwise inclined to violence, but a large percentage of the population are drivers who can often acknowledge - privately to themselves, or even publicly among other drivers - that they have themselves acted with less than total responsibility while at the wheel. But for far too many regular drivers there is a gap between minor delinquencies with fatal consequences and major delinquencies with equally fatal consequences.
Such circumstances muddy the moral waters of those who serve on juries and, in other ways, influence the popular mindset compounded by advertising, by magazines, and newspaper supplements and TV programmes celebrating and promoting speedophilia in motorized vehicles. Changing the values that relate to the moral standing of reckless driving involves taking on a culture propped up by millions of fallible humans who drive cars and who are exposed even peripherally to the casual fall-out of the mass medias collusion with ugly impulses that attach to driving large heavy metal boxes at speeds which make them as dangerous as loaded guns or the personal knives we so rightly deplore as the cause of far too many deaths and injuries. Social sharing of what has happened will continue to be more difficult than during "normal" tragedies until norms about the use of cars alter. This will require a wider view in the population at large of the gravity of the offence of threatening, killing and maiming by motorized vehicles.
Imagine, for a moment, if an alleged rape, mugging or incident of GBH was referred to as an "accident" mitigated by sexual frustration, social deprivation or drunkenness. Because having a car in our auto dependent culture elevates perpetrators to the subjectively defined population of "ordinary decent people", the default assumption is that "car murder" or "vehicular maiming" is lazily presumed by the far too many people to be an "accident" unless and until proven otherwise. The police are regularly rebuked for victimizing motorists and asked to deal with "real crime" - but look at the statistics.
In a saner world, so-called road traffic "accidents" should be getting the forensic attention given to a serious crime scene. Recall the arrogance with which the Count, whose carriage runs down and kills a child in Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities", concerns himself for his horses and then regards a gold piece as compensation for the "accident" and reacts in cold fury when the coin is thrown back in his face. This extreme fictional example is used by Dickens to make a point about the cruelty of class, but I have often experienced this kind of assumptive arrogance among drivers of their right to use the road over walkers and cyclists, and it was from such a population of road users that District Judge Bruce Morgan was recruited and from whom he learned and sustains the attitudes that led to his decision in the recent case of cyclist Peter Cadden.
Firmer legislation is not in itself enough, but one may still work to implement better laws, while acknowledging that there must be more attitude change influencing the actual behavior of judges, magistrates and juries - of whom the Shropshire judge who penalized Cadden £300 ($525 USD) for "obstructing traffic" is a pernicious example.
Although changes are needed in the law there are already fairly stiff penalties, which courts refuse to apply. Changes in laws, such as those imposing the death penalty for petty theft in the early 19th century, were eventually abandoned because juries simply would not convict. This interrelationship between public opinion and legal action can be healthy - but in this case it reminds us of the need to press on in pursuit of changing attitudes, and seeking to exercise influence on these through letters to Members of Parliament, local councillors, (members of the congress and city councils) and media and via articles, and public statements that will get through to the smallest and largest possible groups, both to change opinion and equip those who accept the case for change withy better arguments for it.
About the Author: Simon Baddeley, born Clavering, Essex. Lived 4 years in the American mid-west, has spent time at sea – Atlantic, Mediterranean and the Caribbean, now resides in Handsworth. He is an honorary lecturer at Birmingham University, using film to explore the working relationships of politicians and professionals. Non-academic publications include evidence submitted to the committee on “The Future for Allotments; a history” - "The Founding of Handsworth Park 1882-1898"; as well as being an advisor to The Handsworth Park Association, which he helped found in 1994. He was part of a campaign to save the Victoria Jubilee Allotments,
A member of Friends of the Earth, RoadPeace, Transport 2000, Streets for People, the Cyclists Touring Club and is an enthusiast for cities as places where people desire to live. Simon also prefers his folding bicycle to get around cities and railways in order to travel between them. E-mail: s.j.baddeley(at) bham.ac.uk
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