EDITOR’S VIEWPOINT/Cell phones are driving us all crazy
We all have deep, dark secrets, but mine is particularly ugly: I listen to sports talk radio. This is mitigated by the fact that I only do it during baseball season, but it is, nonetheless, somewhat like admitting that I once kicked puppies or voted for David Duke. (Neither of which I have done, so don’t write.)
The scary thing about sports talk radio, aside from the fact that you become part of a community that lives and dies based on who signs Alex Rodriguez, is listening to the caller introductions. “We’ve got Howard on the car phone.” “Merv is calling from his car.”
I am not a big fan of cell phones, anyway, but I think if you’re going to use one in a car, it should be to call AAA to report that your transmission just fell out and is lying in the middle of I-75. Weighing in on who will be the next football coach at Alabama just doesn’t seem like a good enough reason.
At least four cities and one county agree. Brooklyn, Ohio; the Pennsylvania cities of Conshohocken, Hilltown and Lebanon; and Suffolk County, N.Y., have instituted bans on using cell phones while driving. Hundreds of cities are pondering doing the same. In some cases, they are facing concerted opposition from citizens who believe they have a constitutional right to chatter on a phone while operating a motor vehicle. (The Constitution, as most of us know, does not address that.)
That is the case in Suffolk County, which includes the Hamptons, where some of the country’s wealthiest people live. According to National Public Radio, those people are extremely irritated by legislation, scheduled to take effect next month, that would make it a ticketable offense to drive while talking on the phone.
“There’s been a lot of comment,” says Eric Brown, executive assistant to the town supervisor of East Hampton. “We have an awful lot of people who talk on phones.”
The legislation does not ban hands-free phone sets, but NPR points out that the residents of the Hamptons think those look “dorky,” and dorky is something people with that kind of money just don’t want to look.
Like the other jurisdictions with cell phone bans, Suffolk County based its ordinance on safety factors. Numerous studies indicate that talking on a cell phone while driving vastly increases the risk of an accident. (One study, by the New England Journal of Medicine, says the risk is four times as great.) Apparently in the Hamptons, looking dead is better than looking dorky.
Cell phones are a menace to the safety of our streets, a fact that is beginning to be acknowledged in city councils and county commissions nationwide. There are laws against speeding and drinking and driving. It makes sense to ban chatting on a phone and driving. At least it’s something to talk about.