Get out of my @%^&! way

This is a good article I've read written by Davin Arul in http://thestar.com.my/columnists/, and it worths reading.

Davin, I hope u don't mind for me republishing your column here in my blog. Just want to make people out there realise. Thanks.

9th Feb 07


Get out of my @%^&! way
Rules of Unreality
By DAVIN ARUL

There are a few things we should remember about this whole rudeness-on-the-road thing

WHAT do the following have in common: a) the titular black demonic vehicle in the 70s horror flick The Car; b) the homicidal truck in Steven Spielberg’s classic TV movie Duel; c) a significant portion of the motoring public that seems to be growing larger?

Answer: Get in their way and you’re toast, one way or another.

Sigh, the things you could say about the behaviour of certain motorists could fill a book. No doubt, studies of their rudeness, arrogance and mental imbalance already have filled volumes.

While we shouldn’t let our sense of patriotic pride run away and presume that it’s a purely Malaysian malady (in a Haley Joel Osment whisper: it’s everywhere), there are a few things we should remember about this whole rudeness-on-the-road thing.

First, how can we expect politeness from those in the public sector and the service industry when we can’t even be civil to one another on the road?

Second, as the following example will illustrate, what kind of message are we sending to our children?

A friend told of how his wife pulled up in front of a school to drop off their child. Unfortunately, her car broke down right in front of the gate.

So there she was, stuck in an awkward spot, impeding traffic flow and with a crying baby in the car, too. Dozens of parents were driving up to drop off their own kids. A member of the school staff was on hand to usher the children inside. What do you think happened?

In Fantasyland, the staffer would have helped her call AAM while some gallant fathers would have got out of their own vehicles to help her push the car – if not to start it, then at least to push it out of the way.

In our waking unreality, she was honked at and yelled at by the parents, and the school employee came up to shout at her, too.

People had schedules, agendas, and were probably in a hurry. But ... couldn’t they have diverted the energy spent on shouting and tooting their little horns to help for just a couple of minutes?

Worse still is the effect their little tirades would have on their children. It would show them that it’s all right to be uncouth and abusive towards people in trouble – because Mummy and Daddy do it all the time. Isn’t it time we licensed parents?

Let’s consider another incident. A senior citizen was trying to make a U-turn which had been partly blocked by illegally parked cars. It became a three-point turn instead of one smooth U-turn.

Somewhere between points two and three, a large black luxury car came roaring up and tooted the usual “Get out of my way!” greeting. The senior citizen, fed up of being treated rudely on the road, honked back.

The driver of the other car then stopped and looked back in a “cari pasal?” (looking for trouble) way before eventually driving off. If the Neanderthal’s thoughts could have been recorded at that moment, they may have registered as “... and stay out of my @#$% way.”

Every day, thousands of scenes like these play out on our roads and well-tolled highways.

The most familiar of them would go something like this.

You’re driving along in the fast lane at 110kph, occasionally nudging up to 120 when you think no one’s looking. Without warning, a monstrosity appears in your rear-view mirror.

You think: My, what big headlights you have.

He thinks: All the better to flash you half-blind so you’ll get out of my way, you space-consuming waste of petrol and oxygen.

Let’s face it – this whole get-out-of-my-way attitude is getting pretty annoying and it’s you nice people that this column is aimed at this week.

I wonder what it is that gets a person thinking the driver in front of him is just an obstacle. Is it a sense of superiority? The absurd notion that you are the only part of the equation who has a right to be there?

Or worse, is it that you have simply ceased to consider the person in the car in front of you ... as a person?

I’m no angel behind the wheel but, lately, since observing the way some drivers treat my dad and other senior drivers on the road, I’m making a conscious effort to keep my hand away from the headlight controls or the horn when there’s a slow driver in my path.

And after forcing myself to slow down and just be content to follow for a bit, I’ve found that it is actually quite calming. That pressing appointment suddenly doesn’t seem so imperative, the actual time you lose amounts to just a few seconds, and the effect on your blood pressure is nothing but beneficial.

But for those who haven’t yet tried (hey, I’ll slip some day, I know) to make the change, here are some things to keep in mind.

1. Slow down, for your own sake. As naturalist Robert Winkler noted in his 2005 New York Times essay “The flicker fusion factor”, our perceptual abilities are just not good enough to allow us to react in time when we’re travelling at high speed.

We think we’re free as a bird once we’re behind the wheel but the way we process information at speed is far inferior to our feathered friends’ ability – and even they go splat against an obstacle now and then.

This is just how our brains are wired; and while a small percentage of us may have sufficiently fast reflexes to react, the vast majority of us really were never meant to go over 30 miles an hour.

As Winkler wrote: “The power we feel when we get into a car or an SUV is illusory. When we become motorists, we actually get weaker. We leave our natural bipedal realm for ? one in which we are out of control. Our self-absorption prevents us from accepting our limitations, though every day we see the consequences in untold deaths ?.”

(Read the full article at http://pages.cthome.net/rwinkler/fff.htm)

2. Leave early for your appointments so you aren’t always in a bloody hurry.

3. Bear in mind that the driver in front of you has just as much right to be on the road as you. If you really can’t stand it, just unleash some choice expletives, but keep it within your own vehicle – no splendid gestures, please.

4. Spare a thought that the other driver may be experiencing some difficulty or confusion.

5. Your large car does not make you superior, especially if you’re over-compensating.

6. Your small car does not give you licence to squeeze past others in a hazardous manner, especially not on the left.

7. Find your heart song (penguins optional) and stick in a CD or tape that calms you. Gangsta rap, Kenny G and anything with an ah beng base line are strict no-no’s. OK, so maybe Kenny is acceptable. To some.

8. Remember your children and the effect your tirade is having on their mindset. Think of the recent public service message on TV about the impatient father who embarrassed his daughter by harassing her friend’s parents on the road.

9. That mental health check-up you’ve been putting off for years? Go for it.

10. If all else fails to get you thinking, consider that the driver in front is your father or mother (or if they’re younger, your spouse or sibling) and consider how you would feel if someone treated them the way you treat others.

And if all this fails, and you really must flash something, go put on a raincoat and hang around outside a playground. At least that way, we’ll get you off the streets for a few years.

But rather than overcrowd our prisons, it would be so much simpler if all of us decided, today, to just let someone get in our way.

Davin Arul, vice-president of the I.Star Division, puts on the Ghostbusters soundtrack when he’s driving while stressed out, since it’s infectiously happy without being sappy.