The Morality of Moving in a Metal Box on Wheels

Last year one of my friends was involved in a T-bone accident as she was pulling out of a gas station. The driver ended up running a red light and hit her family’s car as they were properly turning out of the parking lot. That same day I was supposed to go over to her house for her birthday party. Instead, she ended up canceling and spent her birthday at her aunt’s worried about the possible injuries her family sustained during the accident. At this moment I think I truly realized how important it is not only for myself to know the rules of the road, but to be aware that other people don’t know to follow the rules of the road.

Knowing that my friend could have been killed on the road that day started to make me think about how selfish others are when driving. All of us are probably guilty of making questionable decisions in life, but making these same decisions have no place in being made when you are operating a 2,000-pound vehicle. In my friend’s case, she was almost hurt because a driver made the poor decision of paying no attention to a traffic signal. While this could have been accidental, or just an unintelligent decision, we can see the serious absence of critical thinking regarding the individual’s driving judgments. In my driver’s education class, I remember my instructor told us that just because we may be willing to risk our lives behind the wheel, doesn’t automatically sign everyone else up on the road for it. While driver’s education may be teaching an individual how to operate a car on the road, the moral lessons that go into that same education need to be equally stressed. By teaching individuals that their thoughtless decisions really can cause harm to other drivers, the moral principles of road safety become more enforced. I understand that teaching children not to turn left on red or to stop when a school bus flashes their lights is painfully important, but there is an emotional disconnect between teenagers and the consequences of their driving. Sometimes people really don’t understand how harmful their decisions can be when they aren’t stressed enough. I think this is one of the things that my driver’s education class was lacking; the moral responsibility that we must look out for other people on the road. Emphasizing this would severely reduce the number of deaths caused by possible new drivers, or even individuals that have been driving for years.

One of the most unfortunate things about driving is that while we may execute perfect driver’s safety, we are still subject to another person’s irrational decisions when driving. A family member of mine has severely struggled with alcohol abuse and has made the decision to drive while under the influence. While he may have been impaired and decided to take responsibility for any injury he may have sustained at the time, not once did the thought of injuring another person come up. This mentality of not being responsible for another person’s harm is very problematic. All across the country, people decide to drive while under the influence, text while driving, and drive with individuals who may be a poor influence. All these careless decisions result in the deaths of individuals who had no part in making these judgments in the first place. In order to protect other drivers, as a society we must stress to young drivers, and even new generations of drivers, to make good decisions not only for themselves, but for other people too. It isn’t worth it to carry the responsibility of killing another person because you had to text your friend back. While this solution may be a longshot, it is manageable enough. Parents must establish trusting relationships with their children and instill the importance of good driving decisions. For example, I would much rather my child call me stating they need to be picked up because they are impaired, rather than them risking it and possibly crashing and hurting themselves or another person on the way home. Establishing a relationship like this with young drivers sets them up for a lifetime of positive decision making regarding driving. Circling back to driver’s education, it is also important to stress safety decisions, such as not texting and driving, assigning someone to be a designated driver, or even deciding to drive with trusted individuals. Whether this education be through parents, schoolteachers, driving instructors, etc. it is important for all drivers to know how to make good decisions for themselves and others. Having responsible adults and other people emphasize these ideals will allow us to statistically reduce the number of driving-related deaths overall.

One of the most important things I tell myself when I am driving is to make decisions like I would want a fellow driver to make. Making a left turn moments before the light turns red, or quickly cutting a car off when changing lanes onto the highway is something that I wouldn’t want someone else to do to me, therefore, I wouldn’t do it to someone else. I try to keep this mentality as I am driving to keep myself and other individuals safe. Additionally, I have learned that if I ever see a car that is driving erratically that I suspect is highly drunk, I should call the police to make sure that the person ends up off the road. While I have never had to do this, my parents have taught me that it is better to call rather than risk getting hurt myself, or watching other people get hurt when I could have done something. Overall, having a benevolent mentality while driving allows me to not only keep myself safe, but it allows me to keep other individuals safe as well. By spreading this mentality to other people, we can all learn that we have places to be, but we should be able to get to those places smoothly and safely!