DC Says: Look at the big picture

(image source: deviantart)

It is said there is nothing new under the sun. What is, has been. The more… mature I become, I tend to agree. It’s all the same, but in different form and guises.

Let’s take a look at a growing phenomenon in Malaysia – drivers who have no business getting behind the wheel. If you believe Darwin, what we are now is based on evolution. So why are there still bad drivers on the road? They missed a turn somewhere on this glorious path of evolution? Or did they come missing a couple of gears? And whose fault is it really?

It’s really simple actually. Firstly, Darwin is wrong. Secondly, evolution or not, some are just bad drivers. It’s in their genes. Plain and simple, they have no mechanical empathy. The great majority of bad drivers lack the basic skills due to a few reasons:

1) Their background lack any such exposure, and therefore they have nothing to base as a benchmark for “good” driving, as opposed to “bad” driving. These are known as 1st Generation (1G).

2) The only exposure they had to driving were all bad ones. They do not know any better. These are known as monkey-see-monkey-do (MCMD).

3) They are simply incapable of handling a car… and breathe, think, stay awake at the same time. This is an issue of capacity and driving is a sensory and mental overload for them. These are known as the Commodore 64 (C64).

4) Fear. These folks are just too afraid of something bad happening on the road, so they are all tensed up and they just look ahead of the road, fearing if they look at the side or rearview mirrors for a moment… disaster would happen. These are the scaredy-cats (SDC).

5) These lacked the proper training when they were in the phase of learning how to drive. And they probably paid a “fee” to obtain a driving license. These are also known as the Kopi-O drivers (KOD).

There are three other categories that need mention, but they don’t fall into those who I would consider as naturally-occurring bad drivers. Firstly, they are the older folks who basically drive poorer due to their age, those who choose to drive badly perhaps in anger, and finally those who are really good drivers but made a mistake on the road.

Let’s look at all the above over the next few days.