The public service announcement (PSA )video was clever. So clever, in fact, that it stood out from hundreds of other submissions about the implications of texting while driving.
Although it is a very serious matter, one teenage girl took a light hearted approach to what a driver can miss if she is texting and driving. Filmed on an abandoned dirt road that is completely canopied by lush trees, a young girl driving a topless jeep seems to be more focused on her texting, than her driving. As a result of her inattention to the road, this PSA about the the importance of paying attention when you are behind the wheel shows that the young driver misses out on the chance of a lifetime. While she is looking at her screen as she continues down the dirt road, she misses seeing the legendary Bigfoot!
Texting and Driving Is No Laughing Matter!
The winning video about a missed Bigfoot sighting and texting while driving is so clever because it takes a different approach. The more standard approach, it seems, does not always work so this creative teen used an idea that might catch everyone off guard. Instead of telling teenage drivers what they should not be doing, or giving the latest statistics complied by personal injury attorneys, this clever and creative young filmmaker, instead, told her peers what they might miss.
What happens, then, if you take this approach one step further and tell adults what they will miss if they continue the dangerous habit of texting while driving? Would that limit the number of drivers who take their eyes off the road to tell friends about the weekend plans? Let’s give it a try.
- Yelling for the kids to come meet you in the car so you can go get your favorite ice cream from the popular drive in and walk up ice cream place on Main Street.
- Occasions where your sons want you to go play basketball with them in the driveway.
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- Making that long hike to the top of the mountain that you have been taking pictures of forever.
- Ice skating in that backyard rink that you built for your kids when they were little, but still serves as a gathering place for their friends on weekend night.
- Showering by yourself.
- Seeing a sunset.
The list of events that you will miss if you are involved in an accident because you are texting and driving can go on forever. If you are the victim of a distracted driving accident you may need the assistance of personal injury lawyers to even get the resources that you need to be able to ever again do simple things like taking a shower. If you are the driver of a distracted driving accident you may find yourself missing life itself when you are sitting in a jail cell serving your sentence for vehicular manslaughter.
It is good that video contests, PSAs, and other approaches attempt to educate and remind Americans about something that we already should know: when you are driving you need to stay focused on the road, not your phone, not your favorite fast food, not your child in the backseat. In spite of clever commercials and PSAs, however, the fact of the matter is that distracted driving claimed 3,477 lives in the year 2015 alone. More than unfortunate, in fact it is alarming, that in spite of what we all know we should be doing research shows that during daylight hours, approximately 660,000 people are using cellphones while driving. It is difficult to not make the connection between these distracted driving statistics and the fact that there are approximately 6 million car accidents in the U.S. every year. Given that 3 million people in the are injured every year in car accidents on U.S. roads, we can only hope that many of us will make a change.
If you find yourself the victim of someone else’s carelessness, however, you may need to turn to a personal injury attorney to help you recover. A car accident injury attorney, for instance, may be able to help you access resources you need to be able to take hikes again with your family. A personal injury attorney may be able to make sure that your son sees the next sunset!
