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Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

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Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#131

Post by stronglikedan »

jawns wrote: post #52

My first year of college, I was cited for jaywalking. I was walking across a barren street in our small college town on my way to class, and there was a town cop standing against a wall of a nearby building waiting for an easy catch. I had fully crossed the street and was walking to a nearby building when I heard someone yell "Hey" behind me. I contemplated not even turning around, because I wanted to get to class on…

My boss decided to jaywalk an otherwise empty street in downtown LA during a conference (not a big deal where we're from). When he got to the other side, a cruiser pulled up onto the sidewalk blocking his path, and the cop got out and berated him while writing him a ticket. Crazy and overzealous to say the least, but we still haven't let him live it down to this day.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#132

Post by altdatathrow »

Leherenn wrote: post #124
jawns wrote: post #52

My first year of college, I was cited for jaywalking. I was walking across a barren street in our small college town on my way to class, and there was a town cop standing against a wall of a nearby building waiting for an easy catch. I had fully crossed the street and was walking to a nearby building when I heard someone yell "Hey" behind me. I contemplated not even turning around, because I wanted to get to class on…

Is jaywalking illegal all the time? Here it's only illegal if there's a crossing less than 50 m away.

> small college town

That's the key phrase. Police in small towns of America have nothing better to do than setup ways of levying fines against outsiders so they can afford to upgrade their cruisers to the latest dodge chargers or outfit everyone with DOD hand-me-down weaponry.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#133

Post by BitwiseFool »

tom_ wrote: post #126
umvi wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why do you think the default should be that it's your right of way in the car? a) Because it's the law, b) because there's a power dynamic. I can accidentally kill a pedestrian, a pedestrian can't accidentally kill me unless they throw a brick off an overpass. > Why should pedestrians keep out of your way and not cross your path? So that they take responsibility for their own safety. > Why don't we instead say you…

Why can't you take some responsibility for their safety? You're the one in a 200+ bhp murder machine, not them. If somebody can dart out into the path of your car, you should be asking yourself why you let yourself get into that situation.

>"You're the one in a 200+ bhp murder machine, not them. If somebody can dart out into the path of your car, you should be asking yourself why you let yourself get into that situation."

If somebody can dart out in front of my car, isn't that the fault of the person who darted? Or, the civil engineer who designed the road? How can you possibly say that I let myself get into this situation?

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#134

Post by 627467 »

"the auto industry made it a crime", I mean, we hear lots of allegations that USA is actually ruled by corporations but was this crime not established as such by elected officials in an elected institution?

Jaywalking is a ridiculous "crime", no doubt. But let's not go blame some abstract group (auto industry) for democratic society's failure.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#135

Post by maccard »

vorpalhex wrote: post #108
LordDragonfang wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I have unfortunately seen a pedestrian get hit by crossing on a red walk sign Which is an indication that jaywalking isn't the real problem here, it's inattentive drivers. How many of the 36 above were similar situations?

You're right, drivers should simply pause physics and magically stop their vehicle or wear nightvision goggles at all times. I was making a right turn on a 40mph road on a green light. There's a crosswalk there so I checked and the crosswalk was vacant, made the turn and proceeded to get up to speed on that road. And then immediately did a hard brake because a woman was illegally crossing the road around a bend, cove…

> You're right, drivers should simply pause physics and magically stop their vehicle or wear nightvision goggles at all times.

You're being ridiculous here. Nobody is asking for that, they're asking for sensible road design and sensible rules.

> because a woman was illegally crossing the road around a bend, covered by trees, with a kid being dragged behind her, 40 feet from a crosswalk that clearly indicated DO NOT WALK.

That's shitty road design (if the crosswalk is 40ft from a blind blocked corner in either direction, someone might not see it travelling at speed), and arguably careless driving - blind corners could have a deer, pedestrian, broken down car, etc.

> Having the right away is not the same as being impervious to being struck by a moving vehicle.

Right of way or not, you are the operator of the dangerous machine,not the pedestrian. The onus is on you to pay attention to your surroundings. It doesn't matter whose fault it is if you clip a child at 40mph, they're dead.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#136

Post by reportingsjr »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #79
umvi wrote: post #21

Jaywalking drives me crazy... sometimes I wish American culture was more German/Japanese in this area and Americans walked the extra 20 feet to the nearest crosswalk and waited for the light. A few times now I've had to tap my brakes for some guy dashing across the street to the island in the middle because he was too impatient to wait for the light to change. Sometimes it's a lady with a shopping cart. These aren't…

There is a noticeable anti-automobile crowd here on HN. Personally, anti-jaywalking laws just make sense and there doesn't need to be sinister motivations from the auto-industry to explain why we have them.

There are not anti-automobile people on here. There are people who are sick of cars being pushed as the /only/ way for things to be done. Almost every person you see advocating for better safety for pedestrians, people biking, etc understands that cars are necessary for some things. It just doesn't need to be forced for literally every small thing.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#137

Post by mindslight »

ravenstine wrote: post #9
rootusrootus wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume because of selective enforcement. The more that we make normal everyday events technically illegal, the more likely the police will have to pick and choose what they enforce and what they let slide. Then you have ample opportunity for that discretion to be applied in a discriminatory way.

Sure, but why make a specific point about that with jaywalking? Can't that argument be made for just about any crime? Just seems like a useless red herring to make it about race when it doesn't need to be; it's a related but separate issue to whether jaywalking should be a crime in the first place.

Yes, the argument can be made for any rarely-enforced law on the books. But if the people fighting injustice are inspired to do so based on injustice against a specific group, then you should examine your own motivations before discouraging them.

I'm generally opposed to such racism, but it's not like there is a good alternative in these times. It's unfortunate that the campaign against police unaccountability has crystallized around "Black Lives Matter", but it's hard to dispute that Blacks have been feeling most of the pain. If "All Lives Matter" were an alternative non-racist campaign against police unaccountability then we could debate the merits of each. Alas it's just a reactionary stand to maintain the status quo.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#138

Post by mytailorisrich »

DanBC wrote: post #119
castis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a wordpress installation containing news for Virginia in the US. No one outside this area is the target market.

Which means they can safely ignore GDPR. But they're not, they're blocking visitors. That's an incoherent response: if they need to pay attention to GDPR blocking doesn't protect them, and if they don't need to pay attention to GDPR blocking visitors just deprives them of page views.

> Which means they can safely ignore GDPR.

Strictly speaking, this depends on if and how they track visitors.

In practice, though, they can ignore the GDPR because they won't get into any trouble.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#139

Post by mulmen »

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #118
woodruffw wrote: post #100

We in the US do an absolutely horrific job of recognizing and compensating for the externalities of our automotive culture. The criminalization of jaywalking is one major aspect, but also consider: 1. The construction of highways through poor (read: minority) urban areas, causing mass respiratory disease and premature deaths[1]. 2. Allocation of free public space (car parking) to drivers, effectively subsidizing (dis…

1) I will be curious to see if the BEV revolution happens there will be a huge statistical change in cancer rates in the US. 3) as a cyclist who transitions from commuting by bike in the summer to car in the winter, it is astonishing how my psychology is impacted by driving in the two modes. I am so much more impatient and angry from driving. There is just a nasty psychological feedback cycle of the obvious pure pote…

Not sure where you live but I am pretty far north. I'm in a similar situation but in the winter I ride the bus. My psychology changes just based on the lack of light. Driving is definitely super stressful but combine that with short, dark days and less exercise and it just compounds.

Re: Jaywalking decriminalization, 100 years after the auto industry made it a crime

#140

Post by nineplay »

woodruffw wrote: post #100

We in the US do an absolutely horrific job of recognizing and compensating for the externalities of our automotive culture. The criminalization of jaywalking is one major aspect, but also consider: 1. The construction of highways through poor (read: minority) urban areas, causing mass respiratory disease and premature deaths[1]. 2. Allocation of free public space (car parking) to drivers, effectively subsidizing (dis…

> We in the US do an absolutely horrific job of recognizing and compensating for the externalities of our automotive culture.

One of the ways we recognize the externalities of our automotive culture is by making jaywalking illegal.

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