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Comment by hylaride | Hacker News Reader

Some cultures are more sticklers for creating and following rules and bureaucracy than others, though.

A good example: Here in North America I'll jaywalk without a thought if there's no traffic. In Germany, you'll get grandmothers calling you a child-killer for setting a bad example if you did the same.

Another example: Both France and Germany spend roughly the same amount (in raw Euros) on their militaries. France (which ALSO spends and develops a lot of their own kit) has a functional and effective military, including the only non-American nuclear aircraft carriers, and a bunch of nuclear attack and ballistic submarines and it's own nuclear deterrent. Germany is barely able to maintain their much smaller infrastructure because of its ineffective bureaucracy (there was a scandal a few years ago where over 80% of their euro fighters were combat ineffective due to lack of maintenance).

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Of course, the very idea of jaywalking was created to remove the obligation to not kill people from drivers and shift it to the very people being killed, but this doesn’t seem to bother the meddling grandmothers.

> Of course, the very idea of jaywalking was created to remove the obligation to not kill people from drivers and shift it to the very people being killed, but this doesn’t seem to bother the meddling grandmothers.

I'm kind of curious how you expect this to work.

A driver is driving down the road at the posted speed limit. Instead of crossing at an intersection, a pedestrian steps into the road from between two parked vehicles directly in front of the moving car. By that point the car cannot be stopped before it hits the pedestrian because of the laws of physics, so who would you have at fault and how was that person expected to prevent it?

The driver needs to go at a speed where they can stop in that scenario. We’ve normalised the idea that they shouldn’t have to, unfortunately.

These are generally the same boot licking demographics who'll sit and wait out a 2min light cycle at 1:45am rather than treating it like a 4-way stop. Putting their money where their mouth is puts them head and shoulders above the types that tend to dominate the discussion on such issues.

I was in Germany once at a red light for a pedestrian crossing. After the last pedestrian had fully crossed the street and the pedestrian light turned red I drove off. I did not wait for my own light to turn green which is typical in my country.

The person behind me flashed their lights. Cultural difference I guess. Why wait when there is nothing to wait for.

I live in Australia, which is culturally the polar opposite of Germany[1], and you'd get a similar response here. If the police saw it, you'd be fined at least $500, and risk losing your licence.

1: Australia is very egalitarian, rather than hierarchical. Pragmatic, rather than bureaucratic. Australians are direct and emotive communicators. Spontaneous planners, etc. etc.

In Southern Europe, not many people wait for a red light if there isn't anything to wait for. Even the police blasts through red lights if nobody is using the pedestrian crossing.

Risk/cost ratio? A pedestrian acting irresponsibly can of course do a lot of damage, but the likelihood of killing someone is much lower than if a vehicle is breaking the rules.

Isn't that the argument for the alternative? The risk of being distracted by other traffic and missing a pedestrian who was obscured by another vehicle is much lower when there are no other vehicles or traffic, and then the rules are indecorous for not taking into account the change in risk.

"Bootlicking"? I guess you'd love if non-bootlicking neighbors decided to do a rave party outside your window at 3am. Every day. Or maybe a nice drag race on your street at 1am.

I mean, only people who think for themselves can do that!

There is a huge difference between someone being annoyed by some thing based on how it affects you and that thing just so happening to be against the rules vs being annoyed by a thing that's of no consequence to you for no reason other than because it's against the rules.

Regardless, I don't share those values. I have stared into the abyss of what people who praise conformity and the common good will do to a municipality if given free reign to regulate it's minutia and I do not want. My neighbors on one side blast music in a language I don't speak until a couple hours after my bedtime most nights and the neighbors on the other have barking dogs. I don't even notice them anymore, same with the nearby highway noise.

What consequences? Who doesn't like music?!? Oh, and I'll just throw that candy wrapper on the ground. After all, it's of no consequence.

You THINK that your rule-breaking has no consequences. This is called in the safety science "normalization of deviance", and it usually leads to more and more rules being ignored. And not necessarily by _you_ but by other people.

This is colloquially known as "being a bad example".

Litter is a great example. You people and your rules for everything weren't what changed it's prevalence. Social changes and general attitudes were.

Like I said, I've stared into the abyss of what you people will do to a society if left unchecked. You are worse than the alternative. That's why I live where I do.

Well, yes. By making sure more people are bootlickers and don't want to challenge the authority.

Have you lived in any country where you are not coddled by the society?

That’s not boot licking, that’s “I don’t want to get a ticket, and just because I don’t see a cop doesn’t mean there isn’t one.”

Fine then. They drive the speed limit in the left lane or whatever. Point is that the people who advocate for the rules in obscenely trivial situations when deviating them them is in fine taste tend to be drawn from the pool of "robotic rule follower with no extra thought given" type people. Which has the side effect of making them consistent with what they preach.

> "In Germany, you'll get grandmothers calling you a child-killer for setting a bad example if you did the same."

Yeah, some Bavarian villagers can be hylariously weird. I, personally, have jaywalked all my life growing up in East and West Germany, and I only got "the lecture" twice: once in deeply pious Bavaria, and once in... Spain. Both involved the rolemodel-shaming routine as kids were to be seen, but only one came with a small fine attached.

> "Here in North America I'll jaywalk without a thought if there's no traffic."

Most likely not a POC and not from NY or Washington D.C., I see (I'm reporting for a friend). Ah, anecdotes. The spice of life!

Nobody cares if you jaywalk as long as no children are around. If there are children around, most people will avoid crossing a red light even if they otherwise would cross. But that's not a rule-following thing, it's a "don't set a bad example to children" thing. It's easier to teach children the rules about how to behave in traffic if you have fewer adults obviously violating them.

That would make sense, except that one of the universal rules of childhood is, "Adults get to do things you don't get to do, usually for damn good reasons, so get used to it." Every child knows this in their bones, even when they don't like it.

Kids are stupid and follow what adults do. If I judge that I have the time to cross the street at red light without getting hit by the incoming car doesnt mean that the kid standing next to me is even seeing the car and crossing right after me.....

Showing kids good example is good. What you mean is showing them bounderies. Getting shit drunk in front of kids and telling them how much fun it is but they cant do it is behaving like a child

> A good example: Here in North America I'll jaywalk without a thought if there's no traffic. In Germany, you'll get grandmothers calling you a child-killer for setting a bad example if you did the same.

This varies wildly in Germany. In Hamburg, at 7 - 9 in the morning near schools or kindergartens with kids around, many people are following good traffic behavior. At 9 on a university campus, or at 9 at night no one really cares.

Note that what is eschewed and illegal is crossing at a traffic light when it is red. Just walking 50m away and crossing there is fine.

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