Opinion: Dear douchebag drivers of Vancouver, please slow down
Dear douchebag drivers of Vancouver,
I’m about to devote the next 500 or so words to something that I feel, for most people, doesn’t need to be said.
Something that the majority of the population know is inherently wrong; like wearing socks with sandals, cooking fish in the office microwave, or buying DVDs of Mark Wahlberg movies.
And yet in a week where the headlines have been dominated by douchey drivers clocked doing ridiculous speeds in their sports cars (and one weapons-grade idiot in a SmartCar), it feels like we have to say it again.
So here goes…
For the love of god please PLEASE stop speeding!
Look I get it. You didn’t buy that over-priced, turbo-powered, convertible penis extension because it was fuel efficient and had plenty of trunk space for the weekends.
You want people to look at you while you slowly roll your way around the city’s streets.
And that’s fine, because while people probably aren’t thinking how cool you look as you cruise through Vancouver with some Pit-Bull blaring through your speakers, at least the only thing you’re putting at risk is your own street cred.
But here’s the thing.
Just because your motorized midlife crisis can reach speeds of 240 km / hr out on the open road, doesn’t mean that it should. Especially when those speeds put other peoples’ lives at risk.
Put simply, speed kills. In fact according to ICBC it’s one of the major contributing factors to car crash fatalities in BC.
You see, the faster you go the longer it takes for you to stop. But speed doesn’t just make accidents more likely, it also increases the chances that you are going to kill or maim an innocent bystander.
For example, a pedestrian hit at 30 km / hr has a 90% chance of surviving, whereas a pedestrian hit at 50 km / hr has an 80% chance of being killed.
Perhaps the most frustrating thing about some drivers’ insistence on speeding is that it’s entirely avoidable. You could so easily save yourself from that driving penalty, save the police’s time, and save peoples’ lives from being destroyed simply by not being a dick.
Indeed despite what seven mind-numbing instalments of the Fast and the Furious franchise might have taught you, driving fast isn’t cool.
And that goes for Joe Schmo driving their family sedan too.
Sure you might tell yourself that you’re a good driver, or that you’ve got somewhere so important to be that you’re justified in breaking the speed limit.
But unless you’re a first responder who’s been specifically trained how to do so, then you have no right to ignore speed limits that have been carefully thought out by people much smarter than you in order to keep us all safe from harm.
So next time you’re about to squeeze your foot down on the accelerator, why not take a moment to think about the damage that your selfishness could cause. Because your selfish decision to choose to ignore the posted speed limit, could cost you, or someone else, their lives.
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