Aside from the last sentence, the GOOD, I agree with this completely. Fine, call me evil. But it impossible to get hit by a train unless you’re doing something stupid.
Interestingly enough, I heard this on VOA radio here yesterday.
The Professor on the radio was saying that the cognitive ability required to listen to music while performing another function is so low that it has no effect on a pedestrians ability walk safely.
I guess I challenge the underlying assumption- just because someone’s acting stupid doesn’t mean their death is not a tragedy.
People make stupid mistakes all the time. Doesn’t mean if they die from it it’s not terrible- what a wasted life, what a tragedy for the people that loved them and for the innocent people involved.
Kids and teens in particular are prone to very poor judgment- it’s why we protect them legally from their own inexperience and youth. Was walking on the train tracks act? It was extremely foolish. Does he deserve a gruesome death and to be called an idiot- no.
Train Kept A-Rollin’.
Last year a pair of teenage girls near here thought it would be a good idea to take a nap on the train tracks while playing hooky. They missed out on winning a Darwin Award because while they both lost limbs, they survived.
That’s not a valid comparison. Yes, you can listen to music without suffering the ability to walk and visually avoid traffic. No, you can’t listen to music without losing the ability to hear things approaching in your blind spot.
Any pedestrian who dies in a traffic/train accident with earbuds in is a fucking moron. My sympathies are only for the victim’s famly.
I used to play near the railroad tracks all the time when I was a kid. I loved putting pennies on the rails and letting them get smashed flat by the train. I was smart enough to be afraid of trains though.
If the kid was walking on the tracks when he died, I think it was a suicide.
dnoonan, did the news story you didn’t link to say that the earbuds *caused *the dead kid to be unaware of the train? Usually even if you can’t see or hear a train, if you’re a pedestrian you can *feel *it coming, especially if you’re on the tracks. I doubt the kid died because of the earbuds.
Please take another look at the last line of your OP, because it’s the ONLY relevant point. He didn’t die because he was listening to his ipod. He died because he was walking on the train tracks. That was stupid. Sometimes we are punished disproportionately for doing stupid things. It’s the way of the world.
I’m the first to admit that effectively deafening yourself isn’t always a smart thing to do. Personally, while I’m walking, if I’m having any trouble at all seeing (too bright, too dark, wearing my glasses instead of my contacts), I don’t use my ipod, because that’s just too many of my senses compromised. But to blame this on the earbuds, when the kid was walking on the railroad tracks, is ridiculous.
Maybe he was also chewing gum.
Along with all that’s been said about how loud a train is, you can feel the things when they get close.
Oh man, on so many levels.
dnooman has obviously never actually stood on railroad tracks or worn earbuds. In addition to being able to hear outside noises through your earbuds and having the option of looking around to be certain of your surroundings, you can also FEEL the train coming through the railroad ties you are standing on.
Also, I guess he doesn’t understand the difference between Broadway (with cars) and the subway where it’s odd to be standing on the tracks for any reason.
When I am walking with my earbuds in, I am in the habit of doing a 360 rotation every once in a while to be sure I know what’s going on with my surroundings.
I think a bigger problem perhaps is that some people either use music to tune out the world both sound wise AND mind wise or that listening to music tends to DO that to them even if it isnt the purpose of listening to the music in the first place.
I know damn well I’ve had interactions with people that were highly engrossed in something visual, acoustical, or mental and it took MUCH effort to shake them out of their own little world so to speak.
If only. I picture a bystander screaming at him, “TRAAAAIIIINNN!!!” and the kid replying by pointing at his ears, shaking his head, and shouting back, “NO, NO! GOO GOO DOLLS!!!”
Sure. I find for myself that it’s better to do that at the park than on the train tracks.
My father was the editor of that journal for more than a decade. Rodale Press it ain’t. I don’t even need to read the published results—that brief synopsis alone was sufficient to make me sit up and take notice. From now on the phone stays in my pocket while I’m walking.
I think most people wear them shoved halfway into their ear canal.
Probably humming Casey Jones
They shoulda had a sign like this one. (The missing letters said “Don’t play on the tracks.”)
Sure. I’ve never seen anyone wear them the way Starving Artist insists they go. How would that even work? They’d be falling out constantly, if you could even get them to settle in the right place at all.