I don't know what's stupider. People that get run over because they're on their phone (I know, I know, that's what Madame Korma said would happen to me, but I don't believe that for a moment), or people that decide that laws will fix the issue. Looking at the photo at Senator Kruger's website, I'm even less sure.
I should point out that I am no fan of people listening to music in public, with their headphones turned up far too loud, interrupting in a very tinny manner any hope I might have of concentrating on anything other than identifying which one of many iPod suckers staring into space is the most irritating. Nor can I abide by the number of people who not only shout into their phones, but have them set on speakerphone as they walk around, or use them as walkie-talkies with beeps indicating when the next person may have their voice projected irksomely at remote passers by (have you noticed how these people are always too large to safely assault?).
Here's the letter I've written to Senator Kruger (if indeed that is his real name) hoping that he will back down from his foolish proposition.
Dear Senator Kruger,
Although I do not use an iPod as I walk around the city, and although I am careful not to use my cellphone as I cross the street, I feel your proposal to ban them is ridiculous, poorly thought out, crude, short-sighted, probably illegal (and so hopefully doomed to a very short lifespan) and above all utterly missing the point.
Just as you teach children to look both ways as they cross the street (and take time to educate them in the dangers of not paying attention to large hulking chunks of metal potentially driven by fools) rather than banning them from crossing the street in the first place, so the money that will be wasted in misplaced police efforts to enforce the proposed law should rather be invested in an education program similar to that reminding people that it's a good idea to buckle up. Just remind people to check for cars when they're crossing the street regardless of what else they might be doing (whether it be eating a hot-dog, buttoning up a coat, petting their Chihuahua, reading the New York Times or indeed listening to music). Granted, seat-belts are enforceable by law, but there is longstanding empirical evidence linking them to prevention of deaths and reduction in injury in both the people wearing them and in others. Not wearing an iPod has not been shown to prevent death and as far as I can tell wearing one is only in passing linked to incidents that could have been avoided regardless; remember that careless and stupid people are run over, injured by machinery and fall off things all the time.
As a pedestrian in New York, I am much more afraid of cyclists riding the wrong way through red lights than I am of cars that I cannot hear, but I am prepared to tolerate them and look both ways on a one-way street because I expect idiots wherever I go, and because I prefer my food delivered warm.
Please, if you hold your reputation or rational reason at all dear, don't divert perfectly useful funding into firstly a campaign to introduce this law and secondly a doomed enterprise to enforce it.
Sincerely yours,
Nicholas Furness.
