# No, you can't just drive through people who are inconveniencing you **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 27, 2017, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945 "2017-10-27T03:49:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/41 "2017-10-27T23:05:44Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > No, I’m not under that impression? What makes you think I am? > > My point is that blocking traffic is not simply inconveniencing others, it can also be a violation of their rights. I’m not sure why you and others jump from that point to the assumption that the remedy should be the violation of even more rights. So, if there is a concert, or a game, and lots of people are crossing the street to get to it, blocking traffic, they are violating your rights, and can be run down at will? Or is it just if it is for a protest that you don’t support? ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/42 "2017-10-27T23:12:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Brea Police Chief Jack Conklin said none of the demonstrators sought first aid but the SEIU United Service Workers West union later released a statement saying six people were taken to a hospital for evaluation. > > The union helped organize the protest and President David Huerta said the four union members and two staff were “victims of what appears to be a deliberate and hateful crime.” Oh Jesus those snow flakes. And fuck them. Protest all you want, but your pet cause doesn’t give you the right to shut down roads when you feel like it. It’s too bad they arrested the driver instead of the protesters vandalizing his car. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/43 "2017-10-27T23:28:08Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > So, if there is a concert, or a game, and lots of people are crossing the street to get to it, blocking traffic, they are violating your rights, and can be run down at will? Or is it just if it is for a protest that you don’t support? To paraphrase… **RTFirefly** : blocking protestors are an inconvenience, nothing more. **Pleonast** : blocking protestors are sometimes violating others’ right to travel. **Ravenman** , **Kimstu** , **k9bfriender** : since they’re violating rights, we’re allowed to assault them. You’ll have to explain what you’re talking about better because I don’t see any connection between my words and what you’re saying. ---
**Author:** ![purplehearingaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@purplehearingaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehearingaid)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/44 "2017-10-28T00:04:18Z")
> [@BubbaDog](#): > > Yep, it appears the asshole in the car did a criminal action. > It also appears that the people he was trying to get through weren’t “crossing” they were “standing” and could have very easily “stepped aside” and let him through. What is especially interesting is that the guy jumped on his hood “after” he had pretty much cleared through the crowd that remained unharmed. > > I know I’ll catch shit for this here but it’s obvious to me that an asshole in a car met up with another bunch of assholes on the street. I would have trouble taking sides on this since no one was harmed in the outcome. The people were walking slowly across the street not standing still . What I find troubling is the police didn’t seem to be trying to prevent cars from driving through the protesters . ---
**Author:** ![Pippers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b5a626/32.png) [@Pippers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pippers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/45 "2017-10-28T00:05:32Z")
I watched the video and it didn’t look like he was TRYING to run people over. Just another white, male butthead that wasn’t going to have brown people tell him he couldn’t go thru there. The whole blowing his horn and inching forward even tho he could clearly see the pedestrians were using the walkway was the pinnacle of his stupidity. The police Lt. even said in the article he didn’t think the guy was trying to hit people. I wonder if he’ll try to claim against the people there for the damage to his car? ---
**Author:** ![Pippers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b5a626/32.png) [@Pippers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pippers)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/46 "2017-10-28T00:08:50Z")
> [@treis](#): > > Oh Jesus those snow flakes. > > And fuck them. Protest all you want, but your pet cause doesn’t give you the right to shut down roads when you feel like it. It’s too bad they arrested the driver instead of the protesters vandalizing his car. I wonder if your tune would have the same lyrics if it was a brown woman driving thru a white mans protest against jobs lost to equal opportunity employment. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/47 "2017-10-28T00:19:50Z")
> [@Pippers](#): > > I wonder if your tune would have the same lyrics if it was a brown woman driving thru a white mans protest against jobs lost to equal opportunity employment. In that case the cops should beat the black woman, toss her in jail, and kiss the white guys’ boo boos. Obviously. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/48 "2017-10-28T00:38:42Z")
I watched the video and immediately knew it had to be a blue state. In Trumpia, the cops would have been cheering for the motorist. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/49 "2017-10-28T00:43:35Z")
While the driver of the car was definitely in the wrong, I take issue with the characterization that they were trying to hurt anyone. They were simply trying to get past the protestors (many of whom were throwing objects at the car and striking it with other objects, in addition to those who jumped on the car). I can sympathize with someone getting spooked at a large group of protestors aggressively preventing them from driving away. Again, the driver should not have “plowed” thru the crowd. But even so, I think a fair characterization of the driver’s actions is warranted. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/50 "2017-10-28T12:17:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > My point is that blocking traffic is not simply inconveniencing others, it can also be a violation of their rights. I can think of numerous times, then, that my rights have been violated. Just within the past few years, my planned routes have been blocked by a parade in Alexandria, a 10K run in D.C., and a policeman’s funeral procession in Prince George’s County. In each case, they were the devil to get around. If I’d only known I had _rights!_ I would have insisted on my rights being recognized (well OK, not in the instance of the policeman’s funeral, since there were hundreds of police cars in the cortege, and they wouldn’t have been eager to enforce my _rights_) and done my best to worm my way through whenever there was a clear foot or two in front of my car. Say, didn’t they always tell us that driving was a privilege, not a right? And I can’t find anything about a ‘right to drive’ in the Constitution. Maybe I’m just not looking in the right place. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/51 "2017-10-28T13:44:03Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > While the driver of the car was definitely in the wrong, I take issue with the characterization that they were trying to hurt anyone. They were simply trying to get past the protestors (many of whom were throwing objects at the car and striking it with other objects, in addition to those who jumped on the car). I can sympathize with someone getting spooked at a large group of protestors aggressively preventing them from driving away. Again, the driver should not have “plowed” thru the crowd. But even so, I think a fair characterization of the driver’s actions is warranted. And I take issue with the characterization that he wasn’t. What you just described was him trying to hurt people. He is in a car. Pushing them to get by is an action that would reasonably hurt them. Therefore, the fact that he chose to commit that act means he was trying to hurt them. If I wave around a gun and shoot around people, and someone gets shot, I can’t claim I was not trying to hurt them just because I wasn’t aiming at them. My choice to shoot randomly into the crowd means I wanted them hurt. You can’t commit an action and say you weren’t trying to hurt people when you are aware that the results of that action will likely be people who are hurt. Either he intended to hurt them, or he is mentally unstable and didn’t realize the obvious consequence of his actions. The whole reason you can’t drive through crowds is because it will hurt people. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/52 "2017-10-28T13:45:38Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Say, didn’t they always tell us that driving was a privilege, not a right? And I can’t find anything about a ‘right to drive’ in the Constitution. Maybe I’m just not looking in the right place. 🙂 While you are at it, look for the right to walk/stand in the middle of the road. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/53 "2017-10-28T13:55:56Z")
> [@treis](#): > > Oh Jesus those snow flakes. > > And fuck them. Protest all you want, but your pet cause doesn’t give you the right to shut down roads when you feel like it. It’s too bad they arrested the driver instead of the protesters vandalizing his car. And this is why we are fighting to get our country back. There is nothing about this that isn’t absolutely awful. Snowflake is a term made up by bullies to ignore the concerns of people other than them. To believe in it shows a fundamental lack of empathy. And now you’re denying the right to use a crosswalk because it halts traffic. You say they can protest, but you want them to be arrested for crossing a street. You don’t even acknowledge that a pedestrian always has the right of way, and that the cops themselves were letting them through. And then you don’t care about the guy committing an assault on these people and not caring who he hurt, but want them to be arrested. So you want people to be able to try and run over protesters. This is the authoritarianism we see on the Right. And it is why the alt-right isn’t really that big a change. The Right is largely just people who don’t get the difference between right and wrong. Why not throw in racism and Nazism into the mix? It checks all your boxes. I long for the days of the Right that was moral. But I see so little of it anymore. The divide is largely the fault of one side, because one side has gotten more and more depraved. There is no way my conservative grandpa would have defended the guy in the car. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/54 "2017-10-28T14:05:49Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > It depends on whether you think there’s a useful distinction between doing something _because_ it could harm people vs. doing something _in spite of the fact that_ it could harm people. Of course there isn’t. If you know your action will reasonably hurt someone and you choose to perform that action, you intend to hurt them. Otherwise the fact that you could hurt them would stop you from performing the act. The intent is the same. You intend to hurt them. Unless you have some reason that makes it worth it to hurt them, you have committed the same horrible act. Imagine if it were otherwise. Everyone would argue that they didn’t intend to hurt the other person. “Yes, officer. I shot a gun at him, but I intended for it to miss!” Bullshit. You drive the car into them, you intended them to get hurt. This guy decided it was worth it so he could get through. This was assault with a deadly weapon. He chose to commit the assault to try and get by, but he still committed the assault. In fact, the whole idea is that his threat would make them move out of the way, lest they be hurt. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/55 "2017-10-28T14:11:28Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > And this is why we are fighting to get our country back. … > Snowflake is a term made up by bullies to ignore the concerns of people other than them. Who is “we” and who are you trying to take it back from? If you mean the people who call other people “special snowflakes”, I think that you’ll find that this is quite possibly the most petty-whiner-tolerant generation that has existed since Columbus Sailed the Ocean Blue. You think the people crossing oceans, exploring new lands, genociding natives, pooping in holes and using squirrels for toilet paper, fighting wars every 1.7 seconds, dying from paper cuts, etc. were compassionate and accommodating to people who don’t like the word used to describe them or think that you are wearing the wrong clothing? Or for most of history, would those people be ignored, scoffed at, told to “suck it up, buttercup”, or possibly tarred and feathered? No, toughness was the standard for most of history, it is this new “to whine is to be right, _always_” attitude that is new. you can’t “take back” something because _the whiners are the ones who have taken it_. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/56 "2017-10-28T14:12:45Z")
Driving a car through a crowd hurts people. This guy was trying to drive a car through a crowd. Therefore, this guy was trying to hurt people. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/57 "2017-10-28T15:59:19Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > To paraphrase… > > **RTFirefly** : blocking protestors are an inconvenience, nothing more. > **Pleonast** : blocking protestors are sometimes violating others’ right to travel. > **Ravenman** , **Kimstu** , **k9bfriender** : since they’re violating rights, we’re allowed to assault them. > > You’ll have to explain what you’re talking about better because I don’t see any connection between my words and what you’re saying. In a thread about a person who assaulted people because they were inconveniencing someone, you stepped up and said that the protestors were violating the traveller’s rights. That seems like a defense of the travelers actions as well. Apologies that I misunderstood, but it did seem as though defending the traveler’s actions was what you were doing. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/58 "2017-10-28T16:07:50Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > While you are at it, look for the right to walk/stand in the middle of the road. “car pushing through a line of demonstrators marching in a crosswalk” Please tell me where in there it gives a right to a car to drive into an occupied crosswalk. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/59 "2017-10-28T16:54:19Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > And this is why we are fighting to get our country back. There is nothing about this that isn’t absolutely awful. > > Snowflake is a term made up by bullies to ignore the concerns of people other than them. To believe in it shows a fundamental lack of empathy. No, snowflake is a term for people that think they are super important and gosh darn it the world should just revolve around them. Protesting and no one cares? Just be obnoxious and force them to pay attention to you because you’re special and everyone else needs to pay attention to you. Need to fake some injuries to make an incident look worse? Why just go to the hospital and tell them all about it. Because our hospitals definitely aren’t over capacity and doctors love to waste their time. ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2017, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945/60 "2017-10-28T17:15:43Z")
FWIW, I agree that this guy was an asshole for moving forward through the crowd in his car, but that someone who “inched forward” (from the OP) is not trying to injure people; even the police don’t think so. There are, unfortunately, any number of examples of people using their cars as weapons to hit crowds if anyone is really confused about the difference. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-you-cant-just-drive-through-people-who-are-inconveniencing-you/799945.md?page=4)