I’m open to the possibility that it’s just me being more aware/sensitive to how people are driving around me too. And I’m not necessarily talking about drivers I have to interact with myself but just seeing what people are doing in general.
nah it’s fucked now. and as a result, I’m more aggressive as well
had a guy last night with LED bulbs in halogen housings pull up across the red light. put my highbeams on because I couldn’t fucking see. he turned his LED highbeams on. when the light turned green, they swerved towards me.
funny thing is, that’s similar to what I do when I’m being blinded - I drift towards the center of the road so I don’t go into the ditch. but this guy thought I instigated the situation when I was just responding to him instigating the situation.
nobody won. we’re both pissed off. it’s stupid. but fuck the assholes, nothing will change unless there are consequences. so I’m gonna try to make consequences for them. and that means I appear as just one more asshole on the road to others.
another peeve of mine is driver aids. it’s made people so goddamn bad in parking lots. I don’t give a fuck that your backup alarm wasn’t going, I’M WALKING HERE, and “I didn’t see you” isn’t a fucking excuse or apology for you being a dangerous shit driver. fuck you.
They’re easy to identify around here, most drive a pick up. As for the uptick, a lot of people only were decent drivers because they drove regularly. COVID and they lose the constant practice they needed to remain just decent. Add in that there’s a lot of anger directed by males, who I find a higher percentage of these drivers, to others around them and yeah. It’s a breeding ground of shit drivers. Add in that younger drivers are hot blooded typically and it answers the majority of them.
I wonder if the most recent people to switch to public transport and cycling were the nicest remaining drivers. Where I live at least, it seems this could be playing a major role.
theory holds out for me. I cycle a lot more now when I used to drive. I drive less now because it fucking sucks and makes me angry.
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Might be a couple of reasons. Corvid, economic downturn, political turmoil. People are just more stressed - and rightfully so, as the world is a clown show, currently.
Since 2020. Covid broke a lot of brains. Once people started driving again, it’s like they forgot (or rejected) all the rules. Bad behavior that I rarely saw, like blatantly running red lights, aggressive driving, using turning lanes as passing lanes (even through intersections) went from rare to daily.
The red light situation is insane since then. People would always push it a bit here and there, but now i routinely see people with a red fly through an intersection after people with the green light have already entered the intersection. Social media has convinced simpletons that because they see “movies” of their own life on their devices that they have plot armor. And it will take a serious accident to make them learn otherwise. Its frightening as fuck to share the road with people like that.
Reminds me of an old joke:
My car was in the shop, so I asked for a ride to the grocery store from my neighbor. He agrees, no problem, and we’re off. The first time we come to a red light, he floors it and we dart through the intersection. There’s a cacophony of horns and squealing ties, but we’re unscathed.
I whip around to him, wide-eyed, and yell, “What the hell are you doing?! That was a red light!”
He smiles and says, “Don’t worry, I watch my brother do that all the time. No problem.”
I try to argue, but he keeps doubling down: “Never seen my brother get hit. Everyone just stays out of the way. It’s totally fine,” as we fly through one intersection after another, ignoring seemingly every red light in town.
Finally, mercifully, I see us pulling up to a green light. I reassure myself that we’re almost there, and I’ll be home soon.
But as we roll up to the green light, my neighbor slams hard on his brakes. The car behind us lays on their horn and skids to a sharp stop right behind us. I’m white as a ghost as I turn to my neighbor and demand to know why the hell we stopped at a green light.
“My brother could’ve been coming from the other way.”
Yup. I saw this twice this week, the first happened at a 4 way stop and everyone took their turns until one car just followed the car in front of them, knowing people will still be paused. The fucking gall of someone to not only skip the line, but blow a stop sign to do it. 4 way stops I’ve found to be the worst at seeing this kind of behavior.
The second was someone I work with, apparently. Not someone I know but they clearly work on my shift. Our building is right off the highway and I took the offramp to it and waited at the red light. Nobody was coming so I started to turn right on to the road toward work. Then I look left again and there’s a black Dodge ram going easily 45 in a 30 just to slam on the brakes mid turn, halfway into the intersection when that light was red. I pull up behind him and the lights for the side street had just turned yellow, and this cum stain blows the red were stopped at early at full acceleration. Only to turn into the western parking lot of the place we work. The stupidest part of this story? We were 40 minutes early.
COVID demonstrated that the social contract is gone.
SO many people are GLUED to their phones at all times now, too. Every red light the 1st place car sits at the green until someone honks because they just CANNOT STOP DOOMSCROLLING.
I am a technology evangelist and I have been since I was quite young. I’m addicted to my phone. I admit using it while driving on rare occasions to like change to the next song or something, or adjust Waze at a red light. But dude, come the fuck on what are people DOING??
The red light running is fucking wild. I feel like maybe ten times in my whole life I saw someone run a red light and now it’s basically every day.
Using turning/bus lanes to cross intersections is something that I see that went from rarely to daily. It drives me crazy since they usually try to force their way back in to the lane once they cross.
I sometimes see people with their phone on their steering wheel while on the highway (in the US). People just don’t give a fuck anymore and it’s terrifying
You’ve an uptick in this type of behaviour coupled with a decline in enforcement.
You can go to countries where there are no traffic rules being enforced at all, but there’s not the same wanton disregard for life that I see daily on US roads. Recently was in Houston and you couldn’t pay me to live in that hellscape of entitled drivers.
I seriously think this happened. I never used to see people signaling right and then turning left from a MIDDLE lane. People used to at least slow down at a red light before making a right turn. My dashcam went from an insurance policy to a highlight reel of absolute idiocy every time I drive.
I think it’s time everyone gets a road test every time they renew their drivers license.
It might be the age of most drivers around me but they all forgot how to use turn signals, how to merge onto a highway, what a yield sign means (hint: it’s not stop) and how to anticipate that they need to merge instead of waiting until the last minute and creeping into the other lane.
And just about every time it’s someone in a Subaru driving like they were beamed into a car and don’t know what they’re doing there.
Oh, and just about everyone comes to almost a complete stop to make any turn.
I’m generally fine with people stopping at yields. It slows things down, but it’s still safe. There’s actually one near my friend’s house that has hedges blocking all view of the road to the west until you’re right up on it, so I always stop at that one; can’t see if there’s anyone to yield to until you’re almost inside the intersection.
Oh, totally. But if we can all see that there isn’t any traffic slamming to a stop at a yield is a recipe for an accident.
Maybe they’re trying to get me to rear end them.
Yeah. And people honking as soon as the light turns green. I got a dollar says the people that honk like that are the same people running reds making me not go when the light goes green.
Nah it’s because people can’t be off their phones for five fucking seconds and the light usually only lets four cars through so if you don’t get on them quickly it will literally just be one asshole running the red.
There’s a lot of people clearly using red lights as opportunities to check their phone. If I can see a phone in their hand when the light turns green, I’m honking immediately.
When I was younger and had a larger vehicle, if someone honked at me less than a second after the light changes, and especially if I had my foot going for the gas… Well I hope you like sitting still because I’m now hitting the brake instead, and we would sit for another light cycle.
While I probably wouldn’t do that nowadays, I’d be sorely tempted to brake check.
Someone being slightly rude to you justifies you screwing up the flow of traffic for everyone?
You made me hit you
Or the fact that No and mean almost no one moves over for emergency vehicles on the side of the road. Did fucking they stop teaching that in drivers education?
I just had a dude cut me off by barreling through three lanes of traffic with no blinker and then brake check me through the right turn in an intersection only to go ten miles per hour under the speed limit on the next street and hog the left turn lane.
Fuck cars. Fuck unsafe drivers.
I actively enjoy being a polite and considerate driver.
If you’re not in a 2024+ Tesla there’s every chance I’ll let you out, buddy. I use my turn signals every damned time. On country roads I leave a big gap between me and the vehicle in front in case someone wants to overtake and needs to pull in. I move to the side of the lane when motorbikes are coming up from behind me and make sure to leave space for them to pull in too. I let trucks out if one’s trying to overtake another. If someone’s tailgating me, I pull over and let them past, imagining they’re a bomb disposal tech heading to a school for blind orphans to save those poor kids. “God speed, you crazy bomb whisperer!”
Life is good.
The same thing happened after 9/11 and lasted for months. People were stressed, upset and angry and it really showed up in their driving.
We now have the Republicans and their malignant narcissist glorious leader actively destroying this country. Medical costs, housing and grocery prices (among other things) are completely out of control and keep getting worse and Trump claims affordability is a “hoax” while adding more tariffs. Nearly eradicated diseases are surging again and children are dying. Our food has become unsafe to eat. We’re in a war that was completely unnecessary and the dotard in chief is shitting his pants and pretending he’s a tough guy while crawling into food carts to hide. Nero isn’t just fiddling while Rome burns, he and his ilk are smearing shit on the walls and actually lighting more fires.
People are naturally stressed, upset and angry, and it’s again showing up in our driving.
What makes this worse is they actually don’t have the humanity to care because to them you’re just “poor people”.
Actually, JD Vance calls them unhumans in his writings. they don’t deserve human rights because they aren’t human
Hell yes, since the pandemic, it has been nuts. Especially how they behave in parking lots.
I have noticed an uptick in the behavior that when you are backing out of a spot, people are more likely to speed up to get by you than stop and wait. When I can’t see what traffic is coming, I back up slowly until I can see. Recently, I had one guy honk to let me know he was going to speed past. Thanks, I guess?
It’s difficult to discern if it’s statistically significant. Perhaps these are people who always back into their parking spaces due to automated parking on more vehicles. Maybe they have lost their empathy for people who back out of spaces. Meanwhile, I have to guess what they are doing and then wait for them when they suddenly stop and back up towards me to get into a spot they had driven past.
Unless its a pull through spot, this is why you always back into parking spots. Its been this way for much longer than the time frame OP is talking about. Parking lot driving has always been a Mad Max experience
That’s a sure fine plan until you need to load something into your trunk or truck bed. If all you’re transporting is your own two butt cheeks, it works fine.
That said, I waddle my bike backwards into parking spaces because it ain’t got reverse.
People on their phones at red lights is insane. And then they have the absolute fucking nuts to look at you in the mirror when you beep at them for almost missing the entire turn arrow, like you’re the moron. Blows my nuts off. I gotta get out of the city, man.
I’m at a point where i’m glad they use the phone on a red light.
I routinely see people scrolling while driving, if they all kept it to red lights that would be a step up but even then I’ve been stuck between a screaming ambulance and some asshat who is not paying attention to anything but the phone
Not really. It sure can feel like it when you run into one, but people have been shit at everything since forever.
Not really. The roads here have always been filled with jackasses that should never have been given liscenses. Ironic for a city that is pretty much iconic to car heads (American Graffiti was filmed here); full of dipshits that can’t fucking drive.
The city I live in had 15 pedestrian deaths from cars as their previous record, this year we are up to 40.
Cars are rapidly increasing in size and weight, decreasing their visibility, and people wont get off their phones. I do also partially believe that covid hit cognitive function and that tough times are making people antsy and angry too.
Had a few people scream at me when I am cycling to work on the few sections I have to use roads with cars on.
Recent one I was cycling along and someone pulls out into my lane and expected me to move over for them. Nah, you fucking wait, this is my lane not yours. I can stand in the road with you shouting for a lot longer than it takes for you to reverse back to where you should be waiting.
Yes. Society is very ill. (pats society on head)
