Sunday, July 02, 2017

Road Raging

No one wants to listen to me prattle on about the evils of cars, but driving does make people MAD, and that rage is amplified by misogyny. Women friends have told me about how men have followed them, enraged, after incidents on the road, though fortunately no one I know has been shot. People like to feel in control, and despite all the tributes to the freedom of the road, etc..., in a car you are barely in control and the slightest incident can wipe that illusion away. Also, guns kill people.

It was during the peak of the homebound commute, witnesses said, that they saw a dangerous “cat-and-mouse game” in which two motorists were jockeying for positions on a quarter-mile stretch of highway where two lanes become one.

When it was over, an 18-year-old college-bound Chester County girl was dead, her family and friends were devastated, and a nationwide manhunt had begun for the driver of a faded red pickup who shot and killed Bianca Roberson in what police said was a road rage murder.

People are bad at distances, so a "quarter-mile stretch" is basically a merge lane on a highway, 15 seconds at 60MPH, 30 seconds at 30MPH, hardly enough time for a "game" just a typical "let me in the lane before I crash, asshole."


...and he turned himself in.


by Atrios at 11:30