• grueling_spool@sh.itjust.works
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    25 minutes ago

    One of these things is purpose-built for the deliberate infliction of harm. The other is vastly more popular and merely causes harm through negligence.

    Sort of like the American political parties, I guess

  • SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world
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    54 minutes ago

    That is a pretty high number of shootings then. Practically everyone drives so that is a lot of miles/person. You have to drive, you don’t have to be shot, that is why it draws media attention.

  • Rolling Resistance@lemmy.world
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    2 hours ago

    Traffic engineers use decades-old manuals that ignore safety in favour of driver convenience. This has to change. Streets built by them are a huge public safety issue.

    We should never accept crashes that result in serious injuries or deaths as if they are an inevitable force of nature or something. They’re merely a predictable outcome of a badly built system.

    • sunzu2@thebrainbin.org
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      1 hour ago

      Traffic engineers

      They are just doing what they are being told. They don’t have the authority to diviate in practice.

      This is a political issue. Everything is captured by the shittiest lobby.

      Health care > health insurance and pharma

      Infra > cars and oil

      Privacy > tech firms

      There is nothing a slave can do via direct action in these jobs since they will fire you and out somebody in place who will follow orders.

  • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    4 hours ago

    Craah = Probably unintended
    Shootings = Probably very intended

    Besides. There are loads of local crash/emergency reports in the local newspaper.

  • BottleCaptain@feddit.nl
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    5 hours ago

    Given the strong correlation between these two, I hypothesise that in Chicago, cars rather than bullets are shot from guns.

  • elvis_depresley@sh.itjust.works
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    7 hours ago

    I guess it’s because one of these things is a widely used tool, a requirement for work / living in the USA and gives people freedom.

    The other is just car.

  • count_dongulus@lemmy.world
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    15 hours ago

    Neither of these topics should even be drawing media attention, considering how frequent and non-notable they are. They just report on this stuff every day because it’s cheaper and easier than exclusively finding and reporting on real notable local news, and television news needs filler content for selling ad spots. Ever had a day where there was no news, and they ended early?

  • infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net
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    15 hours ago

    I think the math works out that each year the average American has roughly 1 in 10,000 chance of dying in a car crash and a 1 in 200 chance of being injured in a car crash (Though the second stat likely leaves out a lot of unreported injuries). The average American rolls those dice once a year, so plan to live til 75? 1 in 133 chance that you die in a car crash, 1 in 3 chance you’re injured in a car crash at some point.

    I’ve known two people who died in car crashes, and at least several dozen who were injured in crashes including several really gnarly pedestrian bystander injuries. And I’m barely middle aged.

    • LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe
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      11 hours ago

      Yeah, cars aren’t even designed to kill people and they still do it just as much as guns. They’re way too dangerous to be legal.

      • Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        9 hours ago

        That doesnt make any sense. Since card have other purposes than killing they can be legal.

        Since guns only exist to kill they should not be legal. But it is a fight against wind mills since americans love their ability to kill who they want more than they love their kids.

        • LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe
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          7 hours ago

          Car drivers kill more people without even trying than shooters kill. Imagine if the car drivers were actually trying to kill people. Cars are probably a hundred or a thousand times as dangerous as guns if you control for intent.

          • Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            3 hours ago

            Yet cars are not made to kill and have a purpose in everyday life. Guns dont. But sure, I am all for building more public transportation.

    • Goldmage263@sh.itjust.works
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      12 hours ago

      Are you saying that OP is making a “cheap false equivalence”? They are commenting on news coverage, so I don’t follow what you mean.

      • breecher@sh.itjust.works
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        8 hours ago

        Yes, OP is very much doing that. They are commenting on how they think that news coverage should do a false equivalence on those two things.

    • Dozzi92@lemmy.world
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      15 hours ago

      Right. I can’t ride my gun to work or the grocery store. I get that there’s a lot of negatives associated with car culture, but it’s a tool in a way that firearms are not.

      • SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social
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        10 hours ago

        An automobile, at the end of the day, is a luxury item. A toy. Humanity existed for most of its history without cars, and even today, you can get to work or the grocery store without one. (Granted, often not easily, but that’s only because we’ve made it difficult to get there any other way. But making it difficult was a deliberate policy choice designed to exclude poor people.) One could argue that the automobile is an anti-tool, as its use is making our lives materially worse (traffic violence, health impacts, pollution, ecosystem destruction, climate change, the burden on government and personal budgets), but that ignores a car’s major function as a cultural identity marker, and for wealth signaling. We humans value that a lot. Consider, as but one common example, the enormous pickup truck used as a commuter vehicle, known as a pavement princess, bro-dozer, or gender-affirming vehicle.

        In that way, they’re exactly the same as firearms, which are most often today used as a cultural identity marker. (Often by the same people who drive a pavement princess, and in support of the same cultural identity.) Firearms are also also luxury toys in that people enjoy going to the firing range and blasting away hundreds of dollars for the enjoyment of it. But beyond that, the gun people have a pretty legit argument, too, that their firearms are tools used for hunting and self-defense. They are undeniably useful in certain contexts, and no substitute will do. One certainly wouldn’t send mounted cavalry with sabers into war today.

      • LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe
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        11 hours ago

        Your car is just as dangerous as a gun. You’re not allowed to wave your gun around at McDonald’s, so why can you drive your car through it? It’s corruption. Cars were going to be banned in cities before the auto industry started passing bribes around.

    • limer@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      16 hours ago

      Cars, roads, and car culture are inflicting harm though, even if it’s seen as a neutral tool by many

      • Zorque@lemmy.world
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        14 hours ago

        Lots of things cause harm while also doing good things. It’s a balance.

        The problem is when that balance skews more one way than another.

  • maxwells_daemon@lemmy.world
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    18 hours ago

    Driving is orders of magnitude more likely to kill you at any second you’re in a car, than flying is at any second you’re in a plane.

    People who are terrified of flying will get in a car and drive like a monkey like it’s no big deal.

    • mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      11 hours ago

      Driving is orders of magnitude more likely to kill you at any second you’re in a car, than flying is at any second you’re in a plane.

      This is an oft-repeated factoid that comes straight from the airlines bending statistics to meet their desires. It’s true that on a per mile basis, planes are safer. But on a per trip basis, cars actually win on safety.

      And this makes some sense once you actually think about it. A car ride is typically going to be a frequent, short distance; An average of like 90% of all driving happens within 5 miles of the person’s home. Whereas air trips are infrequent and cover huge distances. So the accident-per-trip stat is watered down with cars having lots of trips, but the short distances tend to inflate the accident-per-mile number. In contrast, the accident-per-mile stat is watered down with planes covering a lot of miles per trip, but the infrequent nature of the trips means the accident-per-trip number is inflated.

      And airlines conveniently only ever quote the accident-per-mile number when comparing safety statistics, because they have a vested interest in making airplanes seem statistically safer. If anything, seeing this factoid repeated is just a reminder that even math can be intentionally biased to fit a certain agenda.

        • mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          11 hours ago

          My point is that the “planes are safer” stat is, at best, disingenuous. Any single trip is going to be more dangerous in a plane. But people tend to fly less than they drive, so cars are cited as being more dangerous.

          • LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe
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            7 hours ago

            Any single trip is going to be more dangerous in a plane

            So you’re saying driving from London to Shanghai is safer than flying there?

    • AmidFuror@fedia.io
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      17 hours ago

      They should fear neither. Orders of magnitude relative risk to a minute risk is still very little.

    • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
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      8 hours ago

      cars, like guns, should require a mental check and a license to even purchase and own, be kept in secure storage, and only used in highly regulated locations where safety is guaranteed.

  • ohwhatfollyisman@lemmy.world
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    19 hours ago

    this is not a valid comparison. the number of people in and around cars–and the amount of interactions that the average person has with a car–vastly outstrips those near or using guns. by at least two orders of magnitude, one would estimate.

    it’s like saying that the number of papercuts received is marginally higher than the number of intentional stab wounds and the media only focuses on one.

    that’s how it should be. one of those two things impacts a larger percentage of the people that encounter it.

    • Goldmage263@sh.itjust.works
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      12 hours ago

      That doesn’t make the comparison invalid, it can just be misleading to those with poor data literacy. Knowing how many “preventable” deaths from each source is valuable, but only if people are planning to do something about it.

      • Korhaka@sopuli.xyz
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        11 hours ago

        No one does. Every road safety measure is pretty universally lobbied against.