I do not like the phase "it's the kid's fault" for a kid being hit by a robot-car.
It is never a 6 year old's fault if they get struck by a robot.
It is never a 6 year old's fault if they get struck by a robot.
If you want to see an end to this nonsensical behavior by parents, pressure your local city into having strict traffic enforcement and ticketing during school hours at every local school, so that the parent networks can’t share news with each other of which school is being ‘harassed’ today. Give license points to vehicles that drop a child across the street, issue parking tickets to double parkers, and boot vehicles whose drivers refuse to move when asked. Demand they do this for the children, to protect them from the robots, if you like.
But.
It’ll protect them much more from the humans than from the robots, and after a few thousand rockets are issued to parents behaving badly, you’ll find that the true threat to children’s safety on school roads is children’s parents — just as the schools have known for decades. And that’s not a war you’ll win arguing against robots. (It’s a war you’ll win arguing against child-killing urban roadway design, though!)
There are always systemic factors that can be improved, for example working on street design to separate dangerous cars from children, or transportation policy by shifting transportation to buses, bikes, and walking where the consequences of mistakes are significantly reduced.
Cars are the #2 killer of children in the US, and it’s largely because of attitudes like this that ignore the extreme harm that is caused by preventable “accidents”