It is a rainy day outside, I am without transport of the private kind so instead I am waiting at the bus stop with my raincoat doing wonderfully to keep the wet and cold outside, I am most happy, I like rainy days, the bus will more or less arrive on time, it doesn’t matter, I don’t expect it to be on time, I am in a pleasant contemplative state, levitation being one of the topics my head is musing, when I hear a screeching hard breaking sound, the slippery wet, the unclenching rubber, the imposing red light, a card skidding sideways, and in seconds, a collision is avoided by oncoming traffic, while the car that crossed in red captures its composure, the driver, perhaps startled, after clearing the intersection, parks at the edge. Surprisingly seconds withheld a police car was just around the corner and quickly lights a Christmas tree of lights. I feel the wave of subsided panics that must have gone through the unlucky driver’s gut, levitation harshly forgone.
As I watch the emergency lights chatter the air, I ponder what I would do were I that police officer? From the breaking you could tell that the driver hadn’t meant to cross the red light illegally but had instead found a surprising red light; intent in trespassing the law was obviously none. The car was not a new model car, while I could not place the year it was obvious that the driver was of limited financial means, a ticket was the last thing this person needed. No one was hurt, sure the oncoming traffic had been obstructed but they had adequately, taken evasive maneuvers and continued on appropriately, it all transpired so quickly and smoothly, for such an event, that no one even bothered to use their horns. Concluding that, an unfortunately absent-minded driver had made a mistake, I as the police officer, would not have given the subject a traffic ticket, I would have said, “just be more careful next time.” The officer in charge of this event didn’t feel the same way, a ticket was issued at the scene.
But that act would be a violation of the police officer’s code ethic, “to enforce the law without personal judgment.” In our society rules are not suppose to be broken thus even if they are broken without intent, they then have to be punished. This is considered “reasonable” and it is based on the assumption that punishment is a deterrent and serves to maintain alertness within the common civic mindedness. The assumption being fewer people will run red lights as long as we enforce the law regardless of the particular circumstances.
That is to say, we will not look at the individual nor offer a personalize judgment of an event, in that manner we may remain objective and serve our community’s civic mindedness well.
After a while I started to wonder if the police officer went home and felt bad about giving this particular driver a ticket, but then I figured than an experienced officer could depersonalize the situation and distance himself enough from it so that the good sleep would not be interrupted. But then it occurred to me, “what if it was his wife running that red light, what if by coincidence the person running that light were indeed his wife or even his brother, or even his best buddy,” then I kind of thought that perhaps the officer would become more humane and personalize his judgment of the event, and let them each go without a fine. Sure I think there is any number of police officers that would still have given their best friend a ticket while saying something like, “I am doing this for your own good, I want you alive and safe…” But I think the majority, observing the very uniqueness of the situation: no one was hurt, traffic automatically restored itself to normal flow, the person had not intended to run the light, then the officer would have told his buddy or his wife: “hey, your lucky it was me that caught you, be more careful or next time you might not be so lucky.” And let it go at that.
But then I think the officer might get pissed-off too if, for instance, it were his wife or his buddy with children in the car. The officer might then feel possible personal pain nearer as caused by the loss of a loved one, and thus personalizing hurt issue a ticket in anger that someone carrying children could be so careless.
Regardless the point is that the depersonalization of this event, by justice logic, causes indifference between the officer on duty and the absentminded driver. Neither is allowed to connect with the other, the officer begins to judge the situation more accurately when it is a loved one, but is more sterile in his judgment when it is an unknown person. And the intercourse of the encounter between officer and absent minded driver is one intended not to emotionally touch either one of them, it is almost as if they had put plastic gloves on their minds, for the driver is probably thinking the following: “What was I thinking…” … “How stupid of me…” … “I am lucky to be alive, the officer is just doing his job, I should have been paying attention…” Contextually the absentminded driver will merely justify the legal actions and expect a well-deserved fine, the incident was/is against the law, and for good reason it should have never taken place. The fine will hurt but it could all have been worse.
What both characters in this play fail to do is to connect to one another and they fail to do that because the secular character of their society does not allow it, that is to say that the police officer and the driver agree that the normalization of their relationship has to remain secular and depersonalized so that the system can work, that individual circumstances must be ignored which is why the situation should be judge on its most basic principles, the light was red, you are suppose to stop at a red light, the driver didn’t, there is a fine, that is the law.
This is hard knowledge, this is a fact of life, traffic laws are not very forgiving, thousands of people lose their lives and are maimed in traffic accidents per day, per year, it is a harsh reality that has to be kept to a minimum as transport for us all is not an option but a necessity of the distances between work, home and the shopping center, the three pillars of our existence.
The rain decides to increase, my very nice and lovable olive Sanyo raincoat is beginning to personalize the existing rain, it isn’t keeping out the cold as well, the bus hasn’t arrived, I fancy it will soon, but then I fancy something else more, I fancy that all those empty seats that are passing by, SUVs that can sit 8 people pass me by, endless cars with 3 empty seats pass me by, all that tonnage and energy, with heating inside, not far from me is an untenable option for a ride, even as some of them if not many of them are going near to where I am heading, and could easily offer a lift but don’t and wont.
The reason they don’t offer me a lift its because they too have depersonalized me, if I was their wife, or their buddy I would have been picked up long ago, but I am someone that they don’t know, they would rather not be bothered with helping me out of the rain, besides that there are so many bad people out there that I could be one of them, better not to take a chance, even as most people tend to be honest, and most people are not criminals, and most people waiting for a bus are probably the least likely to be aggressive types, it requires patience and a certain degree of docility to take public transport, still it is too dangerous to pick up a stranger, the probability of picking up a weirdo or a serial killer might be .000000001 percent specially as most aggressors are driving BMWs and SUVs; but the nightly news from all over the world floods us with threats from everywhere, we are logically or should I say reasonably scared, and as such distrustful of strangers, so I fancy no one is going to want to chat with me, at least part of their lonely way to somewhere.
Still I harbor this strange belief that maybe that driver that run the red light might not have run it had she or he given me a ride, as their passenger I might a said, “hey watch out there is a red light.” And then I think if all those empty seats, passing me by, were filled with people going in the same direction pooling riders together, there would be fewer accidents and fewer cars on the road, but that would require so much personalization of our world, and besides that, my bus has arrived.
Ricardo ©
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