Large Fierce Mammal

“From One Second to the Next,” the rather unlikely film below, came together when AT&T approached the legendary German filmmaker Werner Herzog and asked if he would direct a series of short films warning people about the dangers of texting while driving.

“What AT&T proposed immediately clicked and connected inside of me,” Herzog told the AP. “There’s a completely new culture out there. I’m not a participant of texting and driving—or texting at all—but I see there’s something going on in civilization which is coming with great vehemence at us.“

What appears above is taken from a 9 August 2013 article published to Browbeat – Slate’s Culture Blog. We’ll get on to the film in a minute. First, I have a few observations of my own.

I hate the concept of bans. You know how it goes – If it saves just one life, then ban it! The outcome of social engineering by knee jerk and fear mongering. If I let the government regulate me then I never have to be responsible for my actions. Blah, blah, blah.

I believe people need to take responsibility for themselves and the outcomes of their actions. I believe the raising of children, including what is taught to them in schools, needs to engender and reinforce this.

For many years here in Canada, drunk driving (called “impaired” driving since we’ve come to realize there are so many other things than alcohol that can adversely affect the ability to operate machinery) was more or less laughed at. It was generally accepted that it was something everybody did now and then, and only ever got mention in the press if it was a contributing factor to something really awful. Fines were a pathetic slap on the wrist so, for the perpetrator at least, the consequences for getting behind the wheel with a snoot full on were virtually nonexistent.

That changed when the decision was made to take impaired driving out of the realm of motor vehicle offenses and into the Criminal Code of Canada. What that meant was that getting convicted of impaired driving came with a free prize – a criminal record. The problem didn’t go away completely because getting a license to drive comes absent minimum standards for mental acuity, but the move did cause people with something to lose if they got caught to think twice about how much they drank, or even if they drank at all, before driving.

This summer marks the first time in 40 years of driving in which every road trip, no matter how short, has found me witnessing either close calls or coming upon actual accident scenes. This is the first summer in which I have decided to shelve certain business trips until autumn in hopes that the elimination of tourist traffic and road construction from the equation might bring the enterprise into the realm of acceptable risk as measured against return. As I’ve observed the statistics AND the reality of driving in NS this summer, it has become clear that we’ve crossed a threshold into a new driving reality. The intoxicant that is the so called “smart phone” has reached a level of dangerous saturation in the world. No longer does it simply represent an instrument of bad manners, and inattention to those present in the room in favour of interaction with those who aren’t. It’s crossed the line into the realm of something so addictive to so many that it may just qualify as the first non-chemical “controlled substance”.

An age limit for possession of a mobile phone that can do more than make and receive calls to and from parents, or call 911? Immediate seizure of vehicle and contents leaving you standing by the road after being caught using a mobile phone while driving? Mandatory jail terms and a crippling lifetime financial burden for causing injury or death? Is that what you want? If so, a lot of people are on the right road to all of that and more.

That’s all for now. Please watch the movie and consider whether all of this is about you, giving or receiving.