Save lives, stop abusing your privileges
Sarah Zeeck
Issue date: 4/10/09 Section: Opinion
That time of year has come again: springtime. Proms, Easter, concerts and other big events are occupying our time. Farmers have come out of the frameworks, preparing to cultivate crops. Motorcycle enthusiasts have also taken up the open road again. A lot of motorists are sharing the roads this time of year.
It seems like there are more accidents during the springtime than any other time of year. According to the Department of Transportation, in Illinois so far this year, there have been 184 fatal crashes and 198 fatalities within those crashes (be they driver, passenger or pedestrian). Additionally, 31 of those crashes were alcohol-related.
Honestly, it's easy enough to get into a car accident without a disregard for the law, but mixing alcohol or other negligence only increases these chances. I've been in a fatal car crash in which the vehicle was traveling at the designated speed limit, the occupants of the vehicle were sober and wearing seat belts, and other rules of the road were followed. Bad things will imminently happen.
It's difficult to understand why one would impair him or herself while driving, but statistics show that people still have not learned. Seventeen percent of the fatal crashes were alcohol-related - and that's not including the non-fatal crashes this year.
It's one thing to have a good time and enjoy oneself, but when altering your body by using alcohol and choosing to drive yourself home, you are not just chancing your own life - you're risking the life of every possible vehicle on the roadway.
Consider this: how guilty would you feel if you were the cause of someone else's death simply because you chose gluttony over intelligence? Take another angle: what if it was your family in that car that was hit? The injustice of incidents like this is extreme, and the story has occurred like a broken record.
Accidents will happen whether alcohol is involved or not, but choosing to abuse your right to drink has far more severe consequences than a horrible hangover the next morning.
How important is driving yourself away from the party to you? A human life or two? You be the judge.
It seems like there are more accidents during the springtime than any other time of year. According to the Department of Transportation, in Illinois so far this year, there have been 184 fatal crashes and 198 fatalities within those crashes (be they driver, passenger or pedestrian). Additionally, 31 of those crashes were alcohol-related.
Honestly, it's easy enough to get into a car accident without a disregard for the law, but mixing alcohol or other negligence only increases these chances. I've been in a fatal car crash in which the vehicle was traveling at the designated speed limit, the occupants of the vehicle were sober and wearing seat belts, and other rules of the road were followed. Bad things will imminently happen.
It's difficult to understand why one would impair him or herself while driving, but statistics show that people still have not learned. Seventeen percent of the fatal crashes were alcohol-related - and that's not including the non-fatal crashes this year.
It's one thing to have a good time and enjoy oneself, but when altering your body by using alcohol and choosing to drive yourself home, you are not just chancing your own life - you're risking the life of every possible vehicle on the roadway.
Consider this: how guilty would you feel if you were the cause of someone else's death simply because you chose gluttony over intelligence? Take another angle: what if it was your family in that car that was hit? The injustice of incidents like this is extreme, and the story has occurred like a broken record.
Accidents will happen whether alcohol is involved or not, but choosing to abuse your right to drink has far more severe consequences than a horrible hangover the next morning.
How important is driving yourself away from the party to you? A human life or two? You be the judge.
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