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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I feel like the tailgaters are playing a broken record:

You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane.

I get tailgated in the right lane.

You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane.

I drive above the speed limit, with the flow of traffic in the left lane, as I’m passing cars on the right, and still get tailgated.

You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane.

I drive with the flow of traffic, at or above the speed limit, in the right lane with multiple lanes available to the left of me that the tailgater can use to pass me, and I really wish they would.

You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane.  You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane.  You deserve to be tailgated for driving slowly in the left lane. . .[/quote]

You also sound like you need a remedial driving school. Kindly meant.[/quote]

If you are being tailgated everywhere you go then it sounds like a you problem. 
[/quote]

pp here

I’m not the only poster on this thread who has explained there are tailgaters everywhere and how the driver being tailgated is driving is irrelevant.

I also see drivers everywhere who apparently don’t know how to use a turn signal.  Does that mean it’s also a me problem?  Do you think I have some mysterious force field around me that makes other drivers lose their common sense and drive dangerously?       Maybe the effect rubs off on my car, which would explain why I once came back to my car parked solidly in its parking space to discover that someone had hit it.  An area effect might even explain the (uninsured) addict who passed out as they were driving through the neighborhood in the middle of the night and wiped out not only my husband’s car, parked in the street, but all three of my neighbor’s cars parked in their driveway.  Maybe people get drunk or used drugs ahead of time because the magic of my force field thinks I might be in their vicinity later when they are behind the wheel.  Clearly, for their safety, everyone should flee the DC area lest my curse turn them into collateral damage, or even force them to tailgate against their will.

Or, perhaps, there are actually a lot of bad drivers out there.

Moreover, unless there is some sort of magic that takes away free will, regardless of how bad someone is it doesn’t justify someone else’s bad behavior.  Even if I were the worst driver on the planet, that doesn’t justify someone else driving more dangerously.  I think everyone understands that an abuser claiming they beat up their spouse because the spouse made them is a ridiculous, pathetic, excuse.  A tailgater is more like an abuser saying their spouse made them so mad that they were forced to take a machine gun and spray the other with bullets - they weren’t exactly trying to kill the spouse but if they did, well the spouse shouldn’t have made them mad, and if someone else is caught in the fire, that’s the spouse’s fault for pushing them into it.

I think the idea that tailgating is prompted by the other driver’s behavior is completely invalid in the vast majority of cases.  However, even if it were true in EVERY case, that still doesn’t justify anyone making the road most dangerous.  Call and report them if you feel that strongly about it, but you do not have the right to put their safety at risk, much less the safety of everyone around you.

Have you ever been in a really bad accident?  Do you truly understand how quickly, in less than the blink of an eye, a situation that seemed completely under control turns into a hellish nightmare?  Can you fully appreciate what it’s like to go from one moment thinking about ordinary things like where you’re going, what’s for dinner, you don’t like the music on the radio, you wish traffic wasn’t so heavy because you want to get home, etc., to having your life change because you’re badly hurt and wondering if you’ll be paralyzed, and/or you see the person you hit being taken away with a head wound and you wonder if you’ll spend the rest of your life in prison and even worse, have to spend the rest of your life knowing you killed someone, and/or watch helplessly as the emergency crew tries to remove a victim from the third car which was hit when the car you hit ricocheted into theirs, having no idea what their status may be.  If someone is permanently blinded, crippled, paralyzed, or killed because you hit someone you were following too closely, you’ll have to live with the legal and financial consequences of that, even if you lack the conscience to carry the guilt for your actions.  If someone loses a husband or wife, a mother or father, a child, a loved one of any relationship, you may blame the “slow driver in the left lane”, but the grieving survivors will blame you.

Imagine if your child was turned into a vegetable because a tailgater was teaching another driver a lesson.  Instead of making plans to send your pride and joy to an Ivy, you’re praying they’ll wake up from a coma, but know if they do, they’ll need lifetime care.  Instead of sending them to Europe for a graduation gift, you’re scouting rehabilitation centers.  Instead of buying books and booking airline tickets to college, you’re buying a wheelchair and adult diapers.  You’d probably be able to go after every penny the tailgater owned and garnish their future earnings, but it might mot cover the medical expenses and lifetime care that your child would need.  It certainly wouldn’t compensate you for the loss of so much potential, so many lost dreams.  You’d never see your child graduate high school, much less college.  You’d never attend their wedding or hold their child.  You wouldn’t see them launch a career, make their mark, celebrate promotions.  You might not even be able to hold a conversation or have them recognize you.  You’d have to face the reality that you would probably die before them and worry about who would take care of them when you’re gone.   Think of all the agony and rage you’d have over all the misery that came since that one instant changed everything and what you’d like to tell to the driver who first hit another car, starting the chain reaction that forever altered the lives of your entire family.  Consider carefully your message for that other driver and then please, please, listen to it before you risk actions that could require a grieving parent to have to deliver the speech personally.  Even if you’re willing to jeopardize others as collateral damage, spare yourself the hassle of financial and criminal liability, the hassle that comes with any accident, and the general malice that will be directed at you as the cause of the accident - even if the other driver “forced” you to tailgate.[/quote]

I don't think anyone is defending the practice of tailgating. It's wrong.

What you are missing is that the slow drivers in the left lane are just as much of a danger. [/quote]

I’ll concede that slow drivers in the left lane can be a danger.  I am dubious that they are “just as much of a danger”.  Even if they were a far greater danger, however, someone tailgating them only multiplies the danger.  If someone is driving slowly in the left lane and you feel it’s dangerous, call and report them.  Get a dash cam so that you can record footage of them to give the police and the police can track their license plate and give them a ticket.

I’m all for making the roads safer and that includes reducing the danger (of whatever degree) posed by slow drivers in the left lane.  That will eliminate the danger not only caused by the slow left-lane driver but also that caused by the tailgater who blames their tailgating on a slow left lane driver.

That still leaves us with the dangers of tailgaters in other lanes (whether the driver ahead of them is slow or not), and tailgaters in the left lane who are following drivers who are not slow.  Now that we’ve addressed the problem of the slow left lane drivers, can we please address tailgaters who don’t have that excuse?[/quote]

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