Kaitlyn Dunaway seems like a perfectly normal freshman at Sonoma State University. She likely had lots of fun stuff to tell to her BFFs, and unlike a certain old curmudgeon, thought nothing of using the ordinary medium of her crowd to get it out there. She texted. Cool.
Kaitlyn texted while she drove her car. Oh come on, my fellow fuddy-duddies. People do it all the time. Constantly. If they don’t have a cell phone glued to their ear, then they’re busy thumbing in hip things like “lol” or “ROFLMAO,” if it’s really good. Like if Tiffany was on a date, and the guy drooled. That’s not something that can wait.
So Kaitlyn texted while she drove her car.
As the 18-year-old Dunaway texted, her Honda slammed into [2 year old] Calli and Ling Murray at the corner of Snyder and Medical Center Drive, killing the girl and badly injuring her mother, authorities say.
“Do it for the children” is the most abused justification in the law, but it’s not without proper application. There is simply no need to text while driving that makes the death of this little girl an unfortunate statistic. My own sensibility is that the same is true about talking on a cell phone, which I similarly believe to be unworthy of a single dead child. But that’s just me. Your chats while driving may be so much more important that it’s worth a dead child. Mine aren’t.
Kaitlyn Dunaway has been charged with the misdemeanor of vehicular manslaughter, a show of remarkable restraint given the tendency to manufacture a felony charge whenever a horrible and needless tragedy occurs. I suspect she will suffer a self-imposed life sentence for what happened.
For those readers who enjoy texting, and who are confident that they can do so, even just reading the incoming texts of others when they hear the Pavlovian ching, know that your having done so a thousand, ten thousand, times doesn’t mean that one time you will lose your focus and an accident will happen. Accidents are never anticipated. They happen out of nowhere. They happen.
For those readers whose kids text, tell them how much you love them and how you don’t want to lose them to someone who gets a funny text message. The accident in which they kill another can kill them as well. At least Kaitlyn Dunaway lived to be prosecuted. Not everyone does.
For those whose politics preclude their ability to balance risk and reward, I appreciate your “right” to do as you please. For those whose love of shiny gadgets and technology overwhelms good judgment, whether in a car, in a meeting or at lunch with an actual person, I appreciate that you can’t accept the idea of being out of the loop even for a second. Really, I do.
But there is no text, no email, no twit, no IM, no phone call, that is worth your life. Or Calli’s life. There are things worth dying for. These things are not one of them. They will all be there to enjoy, to appreciate the lulz, to laugh about, when your car comes to a rest. Innovation is great, and will remain great when you can enjoy it without putting a life at risk.
This time, do it for the children applies. And if you don’t think it does, then do it for yourself. Whether you think your life is worth saving, this old curmudgeon does.
H/T Turley
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Cute little girl. Was.
I’m on a day trip today and this reminds me to keep a sharp eye at other cars.
As it happens, she’s adorable. Even if she wasn’t, she should still be alive this morning.
I agree with your conclusion, but I disagree with laws defining so many specific acts of say, gross negligence, so arbitrarily. Texting has been proven more dangerous than DUI, yet we know she’d be facing felony charges had she blown a .08.
Then there’s the putting on makeup, turning around to chastise the kids, picking things off the floor, etc. I think cell phone use safety is an individual quality. I can drive and talk (though not dial) on my cell at the same time on most roads quite safely, and avoid it when it’s not safe. Some people simply can’t do it at all.
The proof should be in the pudding of how you drive. If you can’t stay in your lane, etc., you’re busted – regardless of the reason-of-the-month. And of course if you cause an accident you’re liable for the consequences based on both the degree of negligence and the end result of the conduct.
“I can drive and talk (though not dial) on my cell at the same time on most roads quite safely”
Of course you can. 75% of drivers consider themselves above average.
I, too, am special. I have unique skills that make me unlike the filthy mass of humanity.
Welcome to the club of narcissist – which includes everyone in the United States, and thus means you’re just a regular unwashed peon like the rest of us.
I know I’m better than average–Mom said so!–but I also know I’m not competent to talk on a cell phone and drive safely, simultaneously. I just don’t use it while driving. I cannot fiddle with the phone, never mind talk on it, when my attention is directed toward all the drivers on the road who are actively trying to kill me through their inattention to what they’re doing.
If there’s a call that’s an emergency, then I get off the road to deal with it. No text message will ever qualify as an emergency, even if it comes from the White House. My family knows this and they respect it. Even better, they do the same thing.
How to text while driving a car, in three easy steps.
1. Decide you want to text.
2. Pull over to the side of the road when — and only when — it is safe to do so.
3. Text.
You’re welcome, teenaged blonde who just missed running into me the other day.
No need to get so personal, Mike. I think lots of people, probably the majority, can talk on the cell as long as they don’t dial on it.
The point of my post was rather than have the law create arbitrary lists of what are bad things to do while driving, the preferable course would be to treat equal degrees of negligence equally, and judge by the results – including pre-accident results.
I can’t speak for others, but my personal preference is not to have someone kill me and then go to prison for it later. Someone else’s need to chat, no matter how well they think they can drive while on the phone, just isn’t worth my life. Some things are. This isn’t.
And she usually drives so well while texting.
Oh yes.
You know I still haven’t gotten a cell phone. To hell with them.
Back in the old days, it was much more difficult to text from a car, and you could only drive as far as the extension cord for the Selectric would let you.
I’m quite surprised in the misdemeanor result. But I’m also disappointed that plain old negligence can be criminalized.
Mike is right that a laundry list of per se criminally negligent things is a bad idea. It’s a great thing for prosecutors, whose jobs get far easier when they don’t have to prove mens rea. It’s a bad thing for the rest of us.
Thank you for the phrase, “There is no text message that is worth a 2 year old’s life.” – which is how I translated your post.
It’ll be with me for a while.
Again, thanks.
Victor
I would hate to be turned into the pudding that proved somebody could drive while talking on the phone quite as well as he thought he could.