The late George Carlin, ever the keen observer and interpreter of human misbehavior, asked, “Why is it that everyone who drives slower than you is an idiot, and everyone who drives faster than you is crazy?” There have always been crazy drivers on our roads. He among us who has not exceeded the speed limit on a straight stretch of rural highway to see “what’s under the hood,” let him issue the first citation. Today, though, speeders do not seem to be driving with that romantic, freewheeling, wind-in-my hair, open road anarchism of the 1970s but with the rage, impatience, and narcissism of a spoiled foreign ambassador’s child.
Before I go any further, let me offer a qualifier. I am beginning to think and write like the old man that I am becoming. I am aware that I cannot do much about this biological reality (the thinning hair, aching joints, and pouching stomach), and even less about the psychological effects (namely irritability and tetchiness) this reality has on my experience of the world. I have not enjoyed country music since the Garth Brook era hit Nashville, and I pine for the ‘ole days when baseball fans didn’t mind that a major league baseball games lasted three hours.
With that out of the way, let me say that an excessive, self-centered hurriedness is taking over the highways that does not speak well of its citizens. In my own neighborhood, drivers speed up and down the roads unaware of small children, doting old folks like myself, or those unleashed pets wandering along the streets.
When driving I encounter any number of motorists itching to drive just a little bit faster than the car in front of them. They tailgate inches from one another, while they fearlessly and glibly work their smart phones, responding to a text or post no doubt as urgent as the destination to which they are maniacally driving.
Apparently, I am not the only fogey in my subdivision who noticed the host of speeding motorists on our streets. Earlier this year our HOA board purchased and posted speed limit signs throughout the neighborhood, restricting maximum speeds to 20 miles per hour. It was a commendable though futile gesture. The law is no deterrent for scofflaws with such an appetency for speed. What is causing these motorists – my loving neighbors and townspeople – to drive with such hurriedness? I humbly offer a few thoughts.
Perhaps manifesting power has overtaken neighborliness as a higher human virtue. I suppose there is nothing that demonstrates greater power and lack of neighborly consideration more than topping out a Mustang GT, or, if you cannot afford such, a Kia Sportage, madly down a quiet suburban street.
Perhaps the fast driving and its attendant road rage reflect a rage that people have toward life in general. People are not only angry on the road, but in restaurants, department stores, internet comment sections, and on the phone. More and more people are entering mad fits of rage as they deal with the contemporary milieu of bureaucracy, technocracy, regulation and general complexity.
A general anxiety pervading society could be to blame for this increase in drivers gone bonkers. Speed is proven to be correlated to anger, anxiety and contempt. A report published by the National Institutes of Health, found that “anger,” “anxiety,” and “contempt,” lead to stronger acceleration and higher speeds. Existential crises are manifesting behind the wheel. High levels of anxiety, rage and contempt are showing up on the highway and on neighborhood streets, endangering friend and foe alike.
Perhaps, our contemporary condition of dangerous driving is the shadow side of an Enlightenment individualism. If the individual is the all-important unit of value in society, then “Your safety be damned, I have somewhere to be!” makes sense. If a subdivision, a town, or an interstate highway is merely a collection of atomistic individuals with no philosophical or spiritual connection to each other, then self-interest rules the road. Speed furthers the self-interest of each to get to his destination as quickly as possible, with no consideration for the faceless unit driving the car in front of me and behind me.
It seems a disproportionate number of speeding motorists have those quaint Christian fish signs on the rear end of their vehicles, because nothing says Jesus like barreling down the interstate with your Christian fish symbol attached, while tailgating your neighbor’s car and swerving in and out of traffic at ridiculously dangerous speeds. Praise be to God.
Speaking of Jesus, I have heard biblical commentators remark that Jesus was in a hurry and traveled at urgent speeds, at least as fast as his dust-caked feet could take him. They will refer to Mark’s Gospel, which some 35 times uses the Greek word Eutheos, which means “immediately” or “straightway,” to describe the apparent alacrity with which Jesus moved. For example, Mark often writes that “Immediately [or straightway], Jesus went.” For this reason, some refer to Mark as “The Gospel of Immediacy.” Anyone who has spent time interpreting Biblical Greek knows that context means everything in determining how to apply a word. I think the interpretation says less about Jesus’ alacrity and more about his intentionality. This is the same Jesus who asked, “Why do you worry?” and who stopped to care for each of the sick and rejected he encountered along the way. I think we can be pretty sure Jesus would sigh and roll his eyes if someone were to ask him what he thinks about the fast and furious drivers of today.
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