Except people frequently do get charged with murder for pedestrian fatalities, all over the world in fact. If you can prove intent, it’s murder.
This is a rubbish take.
Wtf?
- Premeditated Intent: Murder
- Intent without premeditation. Heat of the moment: 2nd degree Murder
- Doing something you weren’t supposed to and killing someone: involuntary homicide
- Failing to do something you were supposed to and killing someone: negligent manslaughter.
Who made this meme (and topic) and why is everyone so ignorant of the law? This almost certainly is vehicular manslaughter case or… If it can be suggested that it’s the pedestrian maybe was partially at fault it might be negligent manslaughter (ex: failed to stop when someone jumped out).
In the US, deaths deaths cars are treated less harshly than deaths involving firearms. One common example used to teach about jury biases is deaths due to drunk driving. Many jury members can empathize with driving drunk because many Americans have driven after drinking, even if they were under the legal limit
IDK if you should be calling other people ignorant if you didn’t even know that much
“less harshly” is not what the meme is OP responding to is saying. The meme is saying “vehicular manslaughter goes unpunished and you won’t even be arrested” which isn’t true at all.
What the fuck in the George Zimmerman are you talking about? Did you fall asleep through the entirety of Black Lives Matters?
Top 20 craziest random escalations | Number 5 will shock you!
I point out that in the USA, a dude can literally shoot an unarmed teenager with skittles in their pocket (likely 2nd degree murder or worse) and a Jury of his Peers will acquit him.
You can kill someone with a gun and have it be called an accident. You can also intentionally run someone down with your vehicle and have it be called vehicular homicide.
We can say “fuck cars” without false equivalencies.
To me whether this comic is being fair hinges on stuff like, how many people are being intentionally murdered with cars but the killer gets off easy because of the method? How many accidental gun deaths are prosecuted more harshly than they should be? I don’t actually know the answer to these. It does seem relevant that guns are a tool designed for killing.
When dangerous design is inherent to the system and deaths are treated as the cost of doing business on the roadways, when does it go from accidental into societial negligence?
Guns may be a tool designed for killing, but cars are certainly able to kill as well and should be treated as such. Pointing a gun at someone is dangerous. Pointing a moving car at someone is dangerous. We are gentler on car accidents because almost everyone relies on them and they are so normalized.
Pointing a gun at someone is dangerous. Pointing a moving car at someone is dangerous. We are gentler on car accidents because almost everyone relies on them and they are so normalized.
Is that a wrong approach though? I don’t have to point a gun at anyone to visit family, but practically I do have to get behind the wheel of a car. That can be fixed by being rich, but not everyone can be rich. The reason people drive despite the inherent risk to themselves and others is more about infrastructure than poor personal choices. I think it might be better to focus on solving the infrastructure problem than being more willing to put people in prison for driving mistakes, because the latter isn’t going to deter people from driving when most of us basically have to in order to live a normal life.
Like you said, it’s societal negligence. With guns, owning one is truly optional for almost everyone, and I think it’s reasonable to impose a much higher standard of personal responsibility on their use than with basically anything else. If you have a gun you better be capable of always using it correctly under pressure or else you should not have chosen to have one and criminal liability makes perfect sense.
It could even be murder, if you can prove the driver had intent/premeditation.
But to answer your questions RE: meme/law, look which comm this is in lol. Can’t let logic get in the way of “car bad.”
This is a bad take lol. You can be charged with manslaughter if it’s an accident and murder if you were trying to kill someone with your car.
Blatantly wrong takes like this just increase the cognitive dissonance between the anti car movement and everyone else.
Somebody (@Jhex) else posted that there is apparently research giving some creedence to this.
But I agree, this meme is death-spiral-cult level. It’s for fellow anti-car folks to commiserate, but it’s probably net negative overall to post memes like this since they can be easily mocked by carbrainers.
You can be but often aren’t, especially if the pedestrian or cyclist was on the road at the time
I suppose when you remove intent and literally all other context, this makes sense.
At what point is driving a car (outside of a closed track; thwts fine) not murderous intent?
Literally every single time you don’t intend to murder someone.
What a dumbass question.
Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down? Thats not my department!
Again a ridiculous argument. One is literally intended to kill someone, the other is a means of transportation. I’m not a fan of cars either but if you actually want to get people on board with the cause equating anyone who drives with Wernher Von Braun is a bad move.
Rockets don’t exist purely to kill people.
In fact, they are a mode of transit! Can you get a man to the moon in a car?
tone policing from someone who will obviously never be an ally
Cool story.
The rockets you were referencing were never a means of transport, only a long distance weapon used by Nazis. And apparently I’m not an ally because I don’t think literally everyone who drives is as bad as a Nazi war scientist who made some of the Nazis deadliest weapons? Are literally just a troll to make this sub look bad?
And guns are just dangerous toys you take out to the range sometimes. It’s cool.
do you work on the moon
You’re really not making yourself look intelligent here.
I havent seen any indicator that’s what this space was for.
When rockets take people to space then we do care where they come down, and that’s strategically decided to avoid killing people. If you mean rockets with explosives attached that are designed with the intent to kill people, then your comparison is equally as dumb as your first one.
Totally different than cars though. Because reasons.
They are. You ever heard of a car being launched from a gun or a plane with the intent to kill someone?
Maybe this will help clear things up…
intent
1 of 2
noun
in·tent in-ˈtent
1 : a usually clearly formulated or planned intention : aim
the director’s intent
2 a : the act or fact of intending : purpose
especially : the design or purpose to commit a wrongful or criminal act
admitted wounding him with intent
b : the state of mind with which an act is done : volition
Cool story bro. Try arguing in good faith.
While working in auto claims, I handled a case involving a wealthy individual who, after drinking at a country club, caused an accident that sent another car into a pond. Instead of calling for help, he drove home to sober up before contacting the authorities. Tragically, the young driver drowned, and his family had to sue the insurance company. This case stuck with me as a stark reminder of how selfish actions, fueled by privilege, can have devastating consequences.
What an obscure and strange tale!!
It’s mens rea, lit. “guilty mind”, e.g. intent. If you take an action with the intent to cause a death, that’s murder (in my state, that would specifically be malice murder). If you take an action that is likely to cause a death with reckless indifference, but not intent, that’s usually something like murder in the second degree. If you cause a death through negligence or by accident, that’s usually some form of manslaughter.
Most traffic accidents are negligent; people don’t (…usually…) get into a car with the intent to kill someone, nor are they usually driving in a way that the know is likely to cause harm to other people. There are obvs. factors that will affect this–such as driving drunk–but causing a death is usually unintentional, and not through reckless indifference.
Reminder to everyone, you can downvote bad memes. No offense to the OP, but I don’t think it’s good optics to have this kind of highly questionable content.
Side note: I gather “singer” must be the author’s signature, but it sure looks like the criminal is being identified as a singer for some reason.
It’s a comic by Andy Singer
deleted by creator
Literally my friend was killed on his bike by a tow truck driver. The driver got like probation or something, maybe. And the company he works for has “move over and slow down, it’s the law Tow Lives Matter”
Assuming those stickers weren’t put on due to your friends death, I’m okay with them. Tow truck divers have to work on the side of highways and some have been struck and injured or killed on the job. Cars and their infrastructure suck, but we should still try to protect those who have to work on our roadways.
We can slow down and move over for both cyclists and tow trucks. It doesn’t need to be exclusive.
Puppies and toddlers have accidents.
Vehicles have collisions.
Would you call a single car roll-over a collision?
If it collided with something that caused it then sure, but it could also just be called a rollover. The whole point is to avoid the word accident as it implies no fault when the fault lies between the drivers and the road design/ rules.
The term accident does not imply no fault.
For example, I accidentally spilled my coffee.
It collided with the environment, so yes.
My brother unintentionally incinerated himself when he put his car into a tree sideways, I don’t consider it an accident.
I’m sorry for your loss.
As a person who spent more than a few days riding around in the back of an Amp-a-Lamps, I’ve never been to any kind of “accident” scene that was truly an “accident”. If you really take the time to look at the scene and trace your finger backwards, you can always see the point where someone got stupid and started the following chain of stupidity. Sometimes others join in the stupid. Sometimes only one person is responsible for the whole stupid. And you are adjudged at least 10% at fault just for being there.
This applies to all those little/minor “accidents” also. Y’all do the stupid. Even me.
Why was the car guy named “Singer”? Was there an infamous hit-and-runner named Singer?
I think they misspelled “Sicko”
If you hit someone with a hammer, it’s assault and you go to jail. If you drop a hammer on someone accidentally, it was an accident and nothing happens to you. See how dumb that sounds?
This is so oversiplyfied that it’s basically just a lie.
no? both of them can be either an accident or murder in principle; maybe it is more common for gun killings to be murders and car killings to be accidents, but that isn’t a matter of law
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea
also explained in comic form here: https://lawcomic.net/guide/?p=173
Let’s not spread misinformation just because it helps a good cause.
It’s not misinformation. It’s explaining that if you want to off someone, proving murder with a car is much more difficult. You have reason to be driving a car. You have less reason to be brandishing a gun.
Yeah, but if you run over your ex while they’re out for their morning jog, for example, the police will absolutely be after you.
And the police can do either and it’s called justice!
