iPad baby

We label the stuff of living as inconvenience. As a result, we’re experiencing the world from a very distracted place.

The world has become a lot more dangerous for pedestrians. Nearly 7,000 pedestrians died in crashes in 2020. Crashes killing pedestrians have increased by 46% over the last decade (compared with a 5% increase for all other crashes). This is happening for quite a few reasons. People are driving more recklessly. Our roads and highways are designed for speed over pedestrian safety. And, cars are getting bigger. Have you ever sat in an SUV and tried to look down at the crosswalk? That’s a big ass blindspot.

I think about the kind of trucks my dad used to drive for construction work in the late 90s and early 2000s and compare them to the massive trucks you see on the road today. Some might argue bigger trucks are needed for towing power or hauling stuff or what have you, and to that, I can only offer that when my dad retired at 60, his work car had been, for many years, a minivan. An egg-shaped soccer mom “hop in the back, kids!” minivan. And that he was not the only one. According to a carpenter I once knew, a minivan is actually the perfect size for moving standard lumber (btw, a minivan is also affordable on a carpenter’s income, unlike these big ol’ flashy rich dude pickups).

I’m digressing too much; I think because I’m pissed about stolen hillbilly valor, which I need to write about someday. This is all to say that in my opinion, oversized trucks are largely unnecessary, and something else is going on. It has to do more with wanting to be an intimidating presence on the road. The problem is compounded because the rest of us now have to compete with these bigger and bigger cars. With good reason, fewer of us trust other people to behave conscientiously. The belief that we can protect ourselves by being bigger, faster, scarier, I think, creates an unsympathetic worldview - and a world where we have the illusion of safety, but not actual safety. Because if everyone else is thinking the same way, and we keep building up bigger, faster, and scarier, we will find ourselves in a worse place, where the stakes are raised, and the overall threat is increased.

Damn bikes hogging the road!

Pedestrian safety is something I care about, selfishly, because I like to walk places. I think we’d be happier if we all walked more. If cities were designed around foot traffic and not the car. This is my bias. But I think it’s also reasonable to expect not to be killed on the sidewalk by someone ripping a hummer around a blind corner.

I do like driving. The last time I had a car was in 2015. The car itself was from the early aughts. It’s really wild to think about how tech has since become so much more enmeshed in our lives. My car never had a touch display, rearview camera or even an aux cord. This wasn’t actually ever a problem. Perusing thrift stores for CDs or burning playlists myself was actually fun. I have never felt inconvenienced, either, by having to look behind my shoulder and in the mirrors to parallel park. Generally, it was a time when I felt less endangered by other people texting or scrolling through socials behind the wheel. Communication was less constant even 7 years ago. The Olds reading this are nodding in agreement. Only real 90s kids know.

I’m not sure if this is because I have a slight puritanical streak and I enjoy making things harder for myself (typical Capricorn). Or if it’s because I broke out of the matrix somehow and realized we’ve been sold a lie. Do we really want technology to make life so easy we don’t even have to live in it? We label the stuff of living as inconvenience. As a result, we’re experiencing the world from a very distracted place. No different than the iPad babies.

And obviously, I’ve been in new cars. Rearview cameras are nice. Having any song on demand is nice, especially because the radio sucks. I currently rely on the services that cut out perceived inconveniences (or “the stuff of living” as I’m trying to argue, aka, having to be in physical places, doing something tactile or experiential, around other people), like Door Dash, Netflix and Amazon. But what I’m wondering here is if what these things cost is worth their benefit.

What do they cost? Well, our attention spans. Our spiritual wellness. And, in a literal sense, other peoples’ lives. Back to the statistic and article about pedestrian deaths.

So much of the surge of reckless driving and so much of the lack of care for pedestrians has to do with distraction. I’m including, too, the longer-term effects of constant distraction like dulled empathy. There’s another glaring distraction I haven’t seen mentioned much. Many cars have a literal iPad in their dashboard. I’m looking at you, Tesla. Although I can’t blame just Tesla. Most new cars have them because touch screen dashboards are being touted as an advancement. Car makers are always seeking some distinction to justify to consumers why they must purchase newer models - so they can continue to sell more, and sell new.

Capitalism breeds innovation

But imo it’s an example of refinement* for the sake of refinement, or rather, the illusion of innovation. Because, actually, they’re worse.** How can you keep your eyes on the road when you’re playing with that goddamn thing? Isn’t it much nicer to have knobs and real buttons — ones that you can feel for, without looking? I would think in the instances where you have a split second to act to avoid catastrophe, it’s so much safer to rely on your muscle memory instead of having to navigate a glassy interface. The dashboard touchscreen, in the end, is an example of poor design. It does not actually consider the use case.

When I’m crossing the street, I tense up when I see a Tesla. Mostly because I’m wondering if it’s a self-driving car doing calculus on whether it would be cost-effective to mow me over. Shave off some time from the ETA. But also understanding that its driver might be fumbling with their built-in iPad, trying to play the adult equivalent of Coco-melon to pacify the stress of rush hour. As a pedestrian, there’s nothing I can do to be bigger, faster, scarier. I will always lose.

Bigger, faster, scarier. This is an impulse I’ve been contending with personally. Last month I was in the type of car-totaling accident people normally don’t survive. We were all able to walk away because the car we were in was big and designed to be safe for its passengers. I shudder to think about what would have happened if we were in a smaller car.

I don’t feel safe unless I’m in a big honking car, really.

I’ve realized the question itself — “what can I do to protect myself?” — is not the one to ask. Placing all onus on the individual to fix things means that we neglect that this is an institutional, systemic problem. There is only so much one can do to be healthy in a sick society. There is only so much one can do to be safe in an increasingly unregulated road system optimized for speed and commerce.

And in writing this, I’m not sure what it is I want to have happen. A return to tactile design, I suppose, and a rejection of screens and the things that make us so distracted. And pretty please with a cherry on top, adequate pedestrian infrastructure with walkable city design.

*What I mean by “refinement,” from Ribbon Farm’s The Return of the Barbarian: “The reason this seems like a strange phenomenon is that we confuse refinement with advancement. Finely-crafted jewelry is not more advanced than roughly-hewn jewelry.  A Boeing 747 is about a million times more capable than the Wright Flyer I, but it does not contain a million times as much intelligence. It is merely more refined. The difference between advancement and refinement is clearest in disruption. A beautifully-crafted sword is not more advanced than a crude gun. It is merely more refined. The intelligence manifest in an artifact is simply the amount of human thought that has been externalized into it. Refinement on the other hand, is a measure of the amount of work that has gone into it. In Hegelian terms, intelligence in design is fundamentally a predatory quality put in by barbarian-Masters. Refinement in design is a non-predatory quality put in by civilized-Slaves.”

**And since we’re on side notes: sometimes things that are expensive are worse