Do Not Disturb

Once a teenager turns sixteen, all breaks loose because that is when they receive the ability to get a driver’s license. After a couple of years, one can gain experience but there are still some human mistakes that could turn fatal. Even if a person may have scored a good grade on the driver’s test or is a very cautious person in general, accidents can still happen so it should be society’s goal to make sure that people are educated the most when regarding safety on the roads. Driving is a big responsibility it is not a step-in life that should be given away to anyone.

Since technology has been effective and influential in this new era, it has been one of the biggest problems in road safety causing accidental collisions and deaths daily. People shouldn’t want to turn into a statistic, so doing the simplest of tasks like putting your phone on “Do not disturb” or placing it in the backseat will less likely make people react to their phone if a notification pops up.

The word should be spread out more and efficiently so the youth of the next generation can learn from our mistakes and make their life safer in general because they can decrease the chance of the statistics from happening in the first place. There should be classes or specific organizations that can come to different schools and teach about the effects of distracted driving while being interactive so students can pay attention and not blow it off as something unimportant. People should also understand that waiting for those 30 minutes from one place to your destination will not be a detrimental factor for the rest of your life. Even if you must answer a phone call, one should do it from the safety of going to the side of the road or finding the nearest parking lot so you don’t have to be worried about swerving but have your complete attention to the call or text. Being on your phone while driving can affect your life, but most importantly the others around you who may not be able to live out their lives because of one small mistake. Even at the end of the day if you don’t cause harm to yourself, causing harm to an innocent person will follow you if you end up going to court and found guilty. The young population who is usually driving are about seventeen to nineteen years old which means that their brain is not developed until twenty-six, but in the eyes of the law, you are perceived as an adult so that excuse cannot be used. You can come right out of high school, graduating with your friends to becoming a prisoner, affecting your future relationships, job opportunities, and how regular people can view you.

Before phones, people would live and drive without that specific technology taking over their attention, so we know it is possible to get those collisions down in size which benefits everyone. Now technology has kept on improving with audio detection so drivers don’t even have to touch their phones, but can tell their phone to do it for them which might seem “cool” but has probably prevented many accidents from ever occurring.

I’ve only experienced the results of distracted driving through an outside perspective. In my sophomore year of high school, I got a text message on my phone at eight in the morning from my friend saying that one of our volleyball teammates had died. I immediately turned to denial as I didn’t think it was true. Afterward it was confirmed from her sister and the toll that it had on me at me bedridden for two days just crying out all of the tears I had till no more came out. After a month a memorial service was set up in honor of my teammate where all of her friends and people who knew her could show up and spend time together in celebration of her life. There was a chance for people to go to a microphone and say a couple of things about what my teammate meant to them. As I saw people going up one by one you could tell the impact she had on people and how much she was loved. At the end of the services, there was dancing held by her parents and even they were so grateful to see the support they had and how we all enjoyed spending our time with her. I was able to talk to her parents and I saw her father in grief which was very strange for me since he used to be my volleyball coach with a smile always on his face. In going through that I could tell that the loss of a person’s life is not worth getting distracted even by the slightest of things. Her life is still celebrated every year but I know it has taken a big impact on her family member’s lives to the point where it will never be the same.

In the end that phone call or text message will probably be forgotten about or seen as unimportant in a week so it won’t have any life-lasting effect on your life just to not look at it for that certain moment in time. We all should learn to put our phones down for a car ride since those opposite actions can lead to a detrimental impact.