Thread: The loss of common courtesy?

Originally Posted by U.S.Marines

That sounds dangerous to me, I prefer the pass the offending vehicle and get in front of it, then slow down method. If the idiot in front of you applies his brakes abrubtly you will rearend him, and in the insurance eyes you are at fault.

Not necessarily if you know your respective capabilities. So I know that I can follow a large Buick much closer than I would follow an M3 (and people usually don't buy those to drive slowly lol) I also pay extra close attention not just to his brake lights (they can be rigged not to work or just broken) and to our respective position. The other thing is that I limit the time I take to express my disapproval to 5-10sec (enough to let him know he's acting like a jerk but not long enough to create a dangerous situation). Then as soon as I have a good opportunity to pass, I gear down and pass him before he has time to remember to remember to speed up.

Here's a good solution. once the idiot has passed you drive much slower. let him/her find someone else to irritate. No matter how good you are, there's always someone better, and more skilled. Lotsa insurance frauds are committed by goading people to tailgate or try to pass then the person slams on the breaks and causes a rearend hit. These folks do this for a living. I'm assuming you don't. If they test you once or twice to see how long you'll tailgate they'll play it in a way that you get bit. Unless youre God, you'll get bit eventually.

That's why I am extra careful and got hundreds of thousands of kilometers of experience under all kinds of conditions. On a couple of occasions, the person would REALLY want to play like a jerk and not let me pass by any means necessary. That's where I'd make a turn and take an alternative route.
I may be mildly in favor of expressing my outrage, but I'm adamantly opposed to risking my life in dealing with idiots.
Sometimes they REALLY want to act like idiots, but that's when a cell phone and knowing where your local police divisions/outposts are located come in really handy. I guess they do have some use other than swilling Tim Hortons coffee and donuts afterall lol.

Originally Posted by FiReSTaRT

... local police ... I guess they do have some use other than swilling Tim Hortons coffee and donuts afterall lol.

I once really did see two cop cars racing to a Tim Horton's doughnut shop.
The one on the corner of Main & Gage Sts. in Hamilton ON, the city where the legend began.

X

Originally Posted by FiReSTaRT

That's why I am extra careful and got hundreds of thousands of kilometers of experience under all kinds of conditions. On a couple of occasions, the person would REALLY want to play like a jerk and not let me pass by any means necessary. That's where I'd make a turn and take an alternative route.
I may be mildly in favor of expressing my outrage, but I'm adamantly opposed to risking my life in dealing with idiots.
Sometimes they REALLY want to act like idiots, but that's when a cell phone and knowing where your local police divisions/outposts are located come in really handy. I guess they do have some use other than swilling Tim Hortons coffee and donuts afterall lol.

As a police officer, I can tell you we do have lots more to do...but hey, we gotta eat, too.

I've had more negative experiences with the police than positive even though I have a clean record... Just the amount of money that I lost on tickets handed to me without a proper cause outweighs the amount of money that I got back due to police efforts:

1) Money recovered:
-When I got robbed at knife-point, by a person I knew, he got arrested and I eventually got the $230 back.
2) Money lost:
-The light turned from green to yellow while I was in the middle of the intersection. The cop was desperate to meet his quota so he wrote me a ticket for "running a red." It cost me $300 to fight it (and win).
-I had a brand spankin' new insurance policy, but the broker made a dating mistake (dd/mm/yy instead of yy/mm/dd). Since there is no chance in hell I could get my plates without a valid insurance policy, all the cop had to do was place a call to dispatch and resolve the issue. Instead, he wrote me a $60 ticket for driving without insurance.
-I got a "driving in the commuter lane" ticket because I went into it to make a right turn into a parking lot. I even had a government ID and parking slips on me to prove I parked there. However, platoon A of the 22nd division was going on vacation, they had to meet their quotas (so they set up a commuter lane trap with like 6-7 cruisers that morning) and he nailed me with a $80 ticket.

Therefore Money Wrongfully Collected ($300+$80+$60) - Money Recovered ($230) = $440-$230 = $210. That's how much police constables overeager to convict regardless of the facts literally stole from me.

In general, I found police constables in Ontario to be more interested in taking money from honest people than investigating the facts before laying charges. That is unless they're dealing with good looking women. They can flirt/cry their way out of speeding tickets in 95% of the cases. I guess Louisiana police has at least one good apple.

Then there is their routine practice of shaking dealers down for their drugs so they can enjoy the product or share it with their buddies. At least public outcry brought mandatory drug testing for Toronto PCs, which made that practice very prohibitive.

P.S. I've always been courteous and 100% cooperative with police constables. I never raised my voice, always had my documents with me, always verbally outlined my actions before performing them. At night, I'd turn the dome light on and keep my hands on the steering wheel. No cop ever got any grief from me until that last commuter lane ticket, when I wrote a letter to the 2nd in command of the 22nd division. And even then, it was phrased as a polite suggestion to re-train the A platoon in enforcement of that particular municipal bylaw.

All this road rage/courtesy talk reminds me of the road rage incident back in the late 80's down in Tennessee where some guy had his lights on bright and his rollbar lights all on. The victim's father flashed him a couple times, then turned his own lights on bright to stay. They heard a loud pop as the truck drove past them, and simultaneously a thud on their car. They pulled over to check it out. Brightlights pickup had fired a .44 as he passed them. It went through the back door and through their son's chest, side to side, through and through. The boy was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics.

That's a 2nd hand story told by a state trooper in Tenn.

Then there's the tale of the Elderly bow hunter who shot in self defense when some guy got sick of his slow driving, passed & cut him off to the point of making him stop, got out of the car and headed towards the elderly guy with his fists clenched. I think they prosecuted the elderly guy.

Then you have Mr. CrossBow out west who fired a crossbow at some guy that cut him off in rush hour traffic and went to jail unrepentant, calling on more americans to get rid of the road trash like he did.

Sad really.

In a way I understand him even though he should spend a couple of decades in prison. The problem is that the police does not prosecute drivers who cut people off, obstruct the flow of traffic or drive recklessly. Those charges are not as easy to prove as speeding. To prove speeding, the constable can refer to 1 year old notes and no documentary evidence. The other violations I mentioned are easier to challenge, so cops let that behavior go on. Since people can get away with it legally, they do it (which brings us back to the original argument of equating laws and morality).

The reason for them not prosecuting those difficult to prove cases is that traffic law enforcement is a money-making machine. They don't want to gum it up with complicated cases, thus slowing down the cash-flow.

Originally Posted by FiReSTaRT

In a way I understand him even though he should spend a couple of decades in prison. The problem is that the police does not prosecute drivers who cut people off, obstruct the flow of traffic or drive recklessly. Those charges are not as easy to prove as speeding. To prove speeding, the constable can refer to 1 year old notes and no documentary evidence. The other violations I mentioned are easier to challenge, so cops let that behavior go on. Since people can get away with it legally, they do it (which brings us back to the original argument of equating laws and morality).

The reason for them not prosecuting those difficult to prove cases is that traffic law enforcement is a money-making machine. They don't want to gum it up with complicated cases, thus slowing down the cash-flow.

I had a very long response, but what it comes down to is police departments are ultimately ruled by politicians. If that doesn't tell you everything you need to know, I can't help further. Elect better politicians, assist police when necessary, and most of your complaints will evaporate. 99.9% of police are honest men/women, working hard and trying to do a good job for very little money and even less appreciation, help, or cooperation from the people they're trying to serve. Prosecution (at least in the U.S.) comes through the courts, not the police.

And as far as women crying their way out of tickets....doesn't work with me. I'm actually much more apt to write a good looking woman a ticket (she's going to have a ticketable offense before I ever pull him/her over in the first place), no matter how much she cries and begs. If you don't, you wind up in hot water, because she'll go to your chief complaining you only pulled her over because you wanted to "look at her" or "get her number". If you didn' t write her up, you really have no defense against a baseless accusation. For that reason, I don't buy all that crying crap...I don't care if she looks like Angelina Jolie. My integrity and reputation are far more important to me than anything she can offer anyway.

Originally Posted by Joe Chandler

...I don't care if she looks like Angelina Jolie.

Good Grief man, you are warped! Any man who would like "Ms. MAN HIPS & toothpick legs" really needs his brain examined! . Course you're confessing to being a cop so . . . . (j/k)