Anyone else find it annoying how the U. S. coddles pedestrians?

[LifeHitMeandRan]

Everywhere else in the world besides Western Civilizations expect the pedestrian to have common sense and cross when it is safe. They still have laws about crosswalks and jaywalking, but they enforce it differently.

In those nations, the car is not at fault if the pedestrian crossed when it was not their turn or when not in a crosswalk because they are expected to have their heads out of their asses and take responsibility for their own safety.

Here in the U. S., a pedestrian can literally jaywalk at a red light and the DRIVER gets blamed if they hit the person instead of braking and causing a wreck. Obviously I will stop if I can because I don't want to hurt someone, but if someone crosses a 50mph road when it isn't their turn and I cannot brake in time, I shouldn't have to be held liable for their injuries.

As an Uber driver, I find this especially annoying. Pedestrians will cross when they are not supposed to and have caused me to sit at 2-3 light cycles. That wastes time and kills business. Also, if someone crosses when they shouldn't, I shouldn't be expected to swerve to avoid them and wreck my car because they can't wait their turn to cross.

[exitseven]

I have a summer house in Maine. Portland has really messed up policies for pedestrians. All a pedestrian has to do is step off the sidewalk and the cars are supposed to stop. One day I was driving down a busy street and I saw somebody step off the sidewalk and I stopped and let him cross and i let the next two people cross but after that I had had enough and started moving again. Some asshole actually followed me and told me I was supposed to stop and let all pedestrians cross.

[Anonymous]

Its about limited harm. We would rather you cause a wreak trying to save the life of a idiot pedestrian given your higher chances of surviving within the protective frame of the car. Then you hit the pedestrian and just kill them.

Obviously the pedestrian should not be Jaywalking particularity on higher speed roads. odds are they will be killed in this offense. So its kind of hard to punish them more.

[LifeHitMeandRan]

Yea, but it is this line of thinking that allows the pedestrians to be so careless in the first place. If they knew they had to be held accountable for their own role in things legally, then a lot of their stupid actions would end. Also, if we need to protect people because they are stupid, they don't need to be around. Let natural selection do its thing instead of trying to protect people from their own stupidity. Kind of like what would happen if we remove the warning labels off certain products.

[Opinion Owner]

@lifehitmeandran In many if not most states Jwalking is a crime, but just like with traffic crimes its really hard to enforce it so its an odds thing of being caught. In the case of Jwalking given how frequently it happens your more likely to get hit

[exitseven]

I worked with a woman that ran down a woman who was crossing the street while texting. She was charged with vehicular homicide and lost her license. She felt so bad about it she had to quit her job. I do not know what happened to her after that but it is apparent that this moron ruined this woman's life by acting so irresponsible

[Dargil]

There is still common courtesy.

[exitseven]

There is an old Alice Cooper song about "Under My Wheels". They should keep this in mind.