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Comment by erikaww | Hacker News Reader

I think it would be a fantastic idea for the government to surveil road infrastructure. We spend a crap ton of our GDP just on healthcare addressing the negative impact of traffic violence. Not to mention everyone knows someone that has been killed or affected by this. Outright saying the government shouldn’t monitor this is in bad taste.

You can argue that the solution is to stop doubling down on our bad investment, bad that is much less feasible than installing a bunch of traffic cameras.

Meta: I welcome the dog pile that will ensue.

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I don't know anyone who has been affected by "traffic violence".

As big of a source of death it is, it's still an infinitesimally small one in he grand scheme of things.

You’ve never been in accident or almost hit by a car? You don’t know anyone that has died that way? Really?

Infinitesimal? It’s one of the leading causes of death among youth on the order of suicide, homicide and drug overdoses. Calling it infinitesimally small is horribly offensive.

It’s a big reason why our life expectancy is lower than peer countries. Again to reiterate, we spend a ton of our GDP just in healthcare to address traffic violence. Modern fire departments mostly address car accidents rather than fires.

You clearly don’t know what you are talking about and you are going to hit a sore spot in many Americans

I think the revulsion, if I can call it that, is to the apparently-trendy term "traffic violence."

What was wrong with "traffic accidents"? People had gotten used to it so you had to invent something new?

Kind of. Call it what it is. It’s extremely pervasive and has a massive impact on the culture, quality of life and economics in the US.

It is a shame because it would be a fixed problem if we held people accountable or fixed land use or designed infrastructure to be safer

No, they are "traffic accidents." You don't get to rename them so they sound like something else.

You completely missed the nuance that peer countries have up to half an order higher deaths per capita.

This is an easily solved problem. More on the nuance: humans are imperfect when driving, so design infrastructure around that.

What are you gaining out of this? Like do you also look aside when gun violence is brought up?

> What are you gaining out of this?

Stopping the deliberate debasement and pollution of our language. That's what I'm gaining. Or trying to.

Call it what it is ("traffic accidents"), and we can stop arguing. Other countries have fewer accidents? OK, that's worth talking about. I didn't "miss the nuance" because I'm not responding to that right here.

Or "bad road engineering" if that's what you want to talk about.

Jesus get a grip. "debasement" and "pollution".

Language is living. Get off your high horse. People are allowed to invent and use new words and terms. Language evolves with use, not by people like you holding on to dear life for every little thing.

> "debasement" and "pollution"

read https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...

Inventing inflated words to make something old sound like a fresh crisis is indeed debasement and pollution. I guess you don't know or care what that is.

So don't tell me what to say. You can keep doing it and I can keep calling it out, and there isn't a thing you can do about it.

"Accident" implies a lack of blame. The vast majority of vehicle "accidents" are not.

If you're speeding to pass someone and hit an oncoming car, that's not an accident.

If you're impatient and try to squeeze by a bicycle and hit them, that's not an accident.

If you're texting on your phone and rear-end the car in front of you, that's not an accident, it was a conscious decision.

If your transmission seizes or your wheel fails off so you fly off the road into something (and you haven't been ignoring maintenance on your rust bucket for so long that you should expect this), that's probably an accident. But that's an infinitesimal fraction of vehicle incidents.

For those who haven't encountered the term before: "traffic violence" is another way of describing "car accidents" that emphasize that injury due to automobiles is not inevitable and should be worked to be eliminated.

I do find it hard to believe rockson doesn't know anyone who has been involved in a car accident if they live in the US.

It's a propaganda device. Should we rename plane accidents to "plane violence" since they are not inevitable and should be reduced?

Hmm yeah plane failures are totally as pervasive as traffic violence

Calling it propaganda is also crazy. Like you want people to keep dying this way? Great way to show your true colors pal

How about workplace accidents? They are also not inevitable and should be reduced. Are they "workplace violence"? Clearly not, that already means something else.

That is why it is accurate to call "traffic violence" a propaganda device.

Classic propaganda device: if you're against calling X "Y", you must be in favor of X.

"Traffic violence" is not a thing. Call them "traffic accidents" as we always have, and we can move on.

And then, of course, bicyclists often run into other bicyclists, or into pedestrians. So now there's "bicycle violence"?

Soccer players often get injured, or get into fights. So there's "soccer violence"?

Hey, I want to thank you, erikaww, and underbiding for pointing me at a great research topic: a big rock I can turn over and see what's slithering around under there:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41631995

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