Poster from Distraction.gov campaign.
One of the things I spend time on everyday is monitoring headlines. I liken this part of my job to a military intelligence officer listening to “chatter” from satellites and other broadcast signals. It’s fascinating to watch various memes and issues go from a tiny whisper to a roar in a matter of hours. Another thing I try to watch for is how the same issue is spun in different ways.
In the past day or so, distracted driving has been on my mind (it actually never leaves my mind) and I’ve noticed several interesting headlines about it. Then this morning, a major regional transit agency put out a message about “distracted walking”. With all this chatter, I figured it was time to talk about this issue again.
In his most recent column titled, How do we curb our careless obsession with cell phones in cars? Oregonian columnist Steve Duin made it clear that he is concerned about this dangerous epidemic. In his piece, Duin points to the toothless penalties the currently exist in Oregon law for people caught using phones while driving. He also points out the vast gap in severity of punishment between drunk driving and distracted driving, event though it could be argued that, “the latter is far more hazardous to your judgment and reaction times”. Not only that, I’d add, but unfortunately distracted driving is far more common and socially accepted than drunk driving.
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