Mucho serious thread: Religion, Sexuality and Traffic

[Guest]

I’ve read nor contributed nothing new to the “religion and sexuality” thread. No one really has anything new to say, we all have our beliefs or disbeliefs, etc., and there’s no logic to most of the arguments. But—a recent conversation in RL has me thinking more than I’d like on a twist of the topic.

As a nearly full-time pedestrian (I do use cabs and public transport)—what is it about a culture that produces murderous and/or psychotic drivers? Here are my samples, not all personally wrought.

Mexico: Among the most frightening experiences of my life was crossing any major boulevard in Mexico City. I felt the necessary act was an enforced suicide attempt. After that I would rate riding in a Mexico City cab; I stopped counting the people we almost ran down. Side note: Mexican highways are awfully unkempt, and dangerous for that reason, plus the terror of bandits and guerrellistas; I found that atmosphere primitively arousing, especially within the more tropical areas, e.g., surrounded by mango groves.
Facts: Mexico is a predominantly Catholic country with pagan-mythical roots. It may be a cliché, but I can attest to the hot-blooded sensuality of the race.

Boston, MA: After La Ciudad one risks life and limb crossing streets in Boston. Same experience riding in a cab there. In my one week in this city I saw a pedestrian hit by a car and one bicyclist knocked down.
Facts: Boston is a predominantly Irish-Catholic environs with puritanic-mythical roots and a colorfully political history. We know there’s lots of sex given the Catholic part, but I’m not certain it’s all that hot.

Los Angeles: There one is judged personally, culturally and morally by their car. No one walks so there are no pedestrian accidents or deaths. Driving the L.A. freeways was among the sensual highlights of my life (all those amazing curves, entrances and exits); the earthquake fear added to the excitement of driving on a multi-level freeway.
Facts: L.A.’s cultural foundation and religion is Hollywood (with disproportionately pagan-mythical roots). Sex is rampant but very superficial.

Moscow: Mhari shared her journals with me from her time in this capital city whilst doing research for her dissertation. Her descriptions of traffic and drivers in Moskva called to mind Mexico City.
Facts: We all know that until recently the city ruled the Soviets, godless and communist. I do know that Russians are not comfortable acknowledging/discussing sex in public; they have a unique modesty about such private matters. Yet they have produced great works of art in literature and music that belie that modesty.

Rome: Based on friends’ commentaries and on films, the eternal city seems in competition with Mexico’s capitol; Vespas seem to enhance the dangers. Re. romance and sex, think of "Roman Holiday" or "La Dolce Vita".
Facts: The seat of Catholicism, the country of sensual culture and great art. Case closed.
(A vignette: A friend was driving a van in Rome, a huge traffic jam stalled all vehicles. A luxury car in front of her would not stop honking its horn. The driver got out and went to the car in front of him and yelled, cursed and gesticulated in Italian at the driver. Returning to his luxury vehicle he found that he’d locked himself out. Then my friend recognized Marcello Mastroianni.)

OK, I hope others will post similar opinions (and facts) on the influence of sexuality and religion on traffic.

Perdita

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I will give you the low down on New York.

All the pretty red, green and yellow lights and the cute yellow and white stripes painted on the road are strictly for decoration. They lend a festive air to the city, but have no meaning beyond that. Cab drivers seem to think killing or maiming passerby is part of the ambiance of riding in a NYC cab and work hard to make sure noone makes it safely across the streets they are driving on. If you drive there be prepared to owe your soul to the local body shop.

Edited for Dita

Facts: The city is based in immigrant migrations with infusions at various times of religions as diverse as Catholisism, Protestantism, Hindi and even Voodoo. Despite being dirty and at time dangerous the city is infused with a latent erotic energy that is hard to explain but is defintely there. Sex here is cheap and plentiful, but it is just as likely to be love between two kids as sex between a john and a prostitute. It is one of the most diverse laces on earth and that latent eroticism proably means different things to different people.
-Colly

 

[Guest]

Thank you, Colly. I too have been in Manhattan traffic, and in a cab in a traffic jam at 4am when my cabbie got out of the car and tried to pick a fight with the driver in the next lane!

But you've ignored the critical religion/sexuality aspect of this thread. As it's your town, please do so (I wouldn't dare).

regards, Perdita

 

[SummerMorning]

Hmm...a central European city, with strong cultural ties to Germany.

Lots of people cycle and walk, there are lots of buses. Most of the time people wait when the light is red and move when the light is green. The exception are the police, who turn on their sirens whenever they break some traffic regulation (and show off doing it in their souped up VWs). The other exception are Italian tourists who seem continually confused that people actually stop at red lights and that pedestrians don't try to get hit.

Facts: the country's Roman Catholics say that it is a catholic country. The country's atheists and agnostics claim it is a secular country. Most people don't give a damn, having accepted that a shiny car and fat paycheck are all the religion they need.

 

[A7inchPhildo]

I too have had the unwanted pleasure of traveling through NY. NY. I find it most humorous that the fine to be caught in grid lock is more than the fine for an accident and insurance. Thus one can deduct if caugt in grid lock it is cheaper to hit the vehicle in front pushing him forward. As far as I could see the religion seems to be up yours! With a loving gesture hand signal. Sex is bought and sold frequently with little though as to whom it is.
Facts The only faith you need is to think you might be safe, or that the police will actually help you. Sex is not an act of love it is only for money. Nothing in NY is really a fact!



Jacksonville Fl. It is the largest city in Florida even though it is not the capital. Being such a large city it is amazingly clean compared to most. Having the City separated by a river only adds to the fun of the multiple bridges. People are very rarely born raised Floridians so it is a mosh of other cultures and states. Do not expect someone to put on a directional. If they do they certainly aren't from around here (just a visitor). What makes it interesting is all the different driving habbits. Expect at least 4-6 serious accidents a day and several other minor ones.
Facts The majority is Baptist/ Southern Baptist which makes for a real friendly place. The locals fuck like bunnies as there is not much else to do. The warm climate is a great excuse to wear little to nothing for clothing. Most singles have at least two children before the age of 20. Single women seem to out number the single men.

 

[Icingsugar]

Hokay den...

Ma' hood:

Stockholm, Sweden: Lou Reed said in the movie Blur In The Face "I get scared...in like Sweden. You know, it's kind of empty. They're all drunk. Everything works....". And that's pretty much what you can say about this place. Especially that last bit. Everything does work. It's so neat that it becomes scary. Drivers stay reasonably within speed limits. Drivers are apologietic if forced to double park. Drivers stop at unlighted pedestrian crossings. It's the law. And it is followed.
Facts: Swedes are said to be the most secular people in the world. The dominant chuch is protestant and so politically correct about everything that it is almost inpossible to call it dominant at all. So when it comes to sex, the average swede does feel that Darwinist kinship with the rest of the monkeys. So we tend to do like them. It's the survival of the spieces, baby, and the Stockholmers are doing their part. (We're also Europe's most avid banana-consumers, whatever that has got to do with anything.)

Still, the most common reason for the Swedish sin is much simpler: Despite claiming to be a Mecca for design, culture and the fine arts, we ARE miles behind the continental life in this regard. We're marginalised reindeer herders. So frankly, what else shall we do with our spare time?

 

[Guest]

Cakesven: you thoroughly crack me up. You have the only type of cute element I can endure; no wonder you're covered in icingsugar. I wish I knew a Swede in real life so I could show them your post.

you're the best,

Perdita

(don't ask the best what, though )

 

[Icingsugar]

(don't ask the best what, though )

Um...'dita?

Never mind...



/Ice - on the ouitskirts of cilvilization.

 

[shereads]

Statistically, Boston has the most dangerous drivers in the United States and Miami has the rudest.

I don't know how rudeness was measured, but on behalf of Miami drivers I can tell you all to get the hell out of my way.

I hated the traffic in Houston, but I will say that Miami is the only city where I've had irate drivers in the cars behind mine honk their horns at me because I waited for an elderly man to finish crossing the street even though the light turned green.

I also saw a wheelchair tip over sidewalks when attempting to climb the curb after crossing a busy intersection. The light changed after the man in the wheelchair hit the pavement, and while he lay there, the four cars in front of mine carefully steered around him - and drove away.

I stopped my car in the right lane along with another woman and went to help him. We couldn't get the wheelchair upright - it was a heavy motorized type - and had to flag down a man to help us. There were a lot of honked horns and a few shouted insults while we blocked traffic.

I don't know which of our many cultures to blame it on.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Miami is also home to the “ghost driver”: You see cars moving with no one at the wheel, and only on inspection do you see the wizened octagenarian behind the wheel, barely able to see over the dash.

Machinery in general is Northern in temperament—Northern European, North American, whatever--and Northerners make the best engineers and drivers because Northerners are more rational. (I know: If they’re so rational, why do they live in the North?) Things get less rational and more emotional as you head away from the poles, and the drivers in Ecuador are probably totally insane.

Boston deviates from this formula because Boston is a pre-automobile town, originally designed for pedestrians and horses. Boston is full of those lethal amusements known as roundabouts, which are the predecessor of the familiar bumper-car rides. Bostonians learn early how to drive with their eyes closed.

---dr.M.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Miami is also home to the “ghost driver”: You see cars moving with no one at the wheel, and only on inspection do you see the wizened octagenarian behind the wheel, barely able to see over the dash.

Machinery in general is Northern in temperament—Northern European, North American, whatever--and Northerners make the best engineers and drivers because Northerners are more rational. (I know: If they’re so rational, why do they live in the North?) Things get less rational and more emotional as you head away from the poles, and the drivers in Ecuador are probably totally insane.

Boston deviates from this formula because Boston is a pre-automobile town, originally designed for pedestrians and horses. Boston is full of those lethal amusements known as roundabouts, which are the predecessor of the familiar bumper-car rides. Bostonians learn early to drive with their eyes closed.

---dr.M.

 

[A7inchPhildo]

Miami is also home to the “ghost driver”: You see cars moving with no one at the wheel, and only on inspection do you see the wizened octagenarian behind the wheel, barely able to see over the dash.

Boston deviates from this formula because Boston is a pre-automobile town, originally designed for pedestrians and horses. Boston is full of those lethal amusements known as roundabouts, which are the predecessor of the familiar bumper-car rides. Bostonians learn early to drive with their eyes closed.

---dr.M.

Actually Miami has much fewer Ghost drivers than the western part of the state. That side is scary little old dead people driving around in big cars.

Boston, Ah yes home of the masshole. God, I do not miss it! Actually yes you are trained to drive with your eyes closed this is true. More to just ignore the fact someone else drives on the same road.
Lesson one: never I mean never allow the car in front of you to be more than one car length away. Or you are looking to be fairly (by the rules) cut-off by another motorist.
Two: There is a green light and a red light, the yellow light means go faster!
Three: sidewalks are part of the street.
Four: one way signs pertain to other people.
Five: use caution with reen lights (as your brother could be comming from the other direction)
Six: Stop signs are really just big Christmas ornaments.
Seven: Speed limits are only enforced if your caught.
Eight: Pedestrians have the right of way, but a car is much bigger.
nine: Gas stations on the corner are an easier alternative than waiting at the light.
Ten: When in a round about it is fun to cut off the inside driver making him/her miss the exit. This helps to free up the already crowded road you are going to take.


As far as the mini roads go that is why they are doing the big dig! Basically it is going to place most roads underground. Did I mention never trust a city or state street sign in Boston.
http://www.boston.com/beyond_bigdig/

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I've got just two words for you wimps.

TOKYO

PARIS

Not only are there no atheist in the back seats of cabs in those two cities, agnostics, New Lifers, and Amway distributors are hard to find.

Right Reverend Rumple

 

[shereads]

Good point, Rev.

I was 6 years old, but I remember my mom squealing in the key of G while my dad negotiated a roundabout in Paris. I know we went around at least twice, maybe more times.

Later, I caught a pigeon and my mom wouldn't let me keep it. I blame her traumatic front-seat experience on the roundabout.

Does anyone else think that roundabouts are a bad idea?

 

[The_old_man]

Roundabouts are the traffic engineers way of limiting traffic flow. Once full the roundabout will block all traffic until all exits are empty.
The one at the entrance to "The Cape" is what keeps the cape in its rustic state, no one can get in or out.

The "Diamond lanes" on California freeways tend to serve the same purpose, they insure that the worst backups are just before interchanges.

Boston, being Catholic uses Halos. California, an atheist capitalism, does it linearly.

 

[Dirty Slut]

Machinaw Island: Only horse drawn vehicals, and bycicles are allowed on the island. You get there by boat only. Traffic is sparce, and polite to pedestrians. As part of Michigan the inhabitantants, and visitors vary in religious beliefs, but fuck like bunnies as they are almost alway made up of newly weds, and people cheating on their spouces. Located between the lower, and upper peninsulas, and lies across the channel between the two from Mackinaw City, and St. Ignace. The movie "A Place in Time" with Christopher Reeve was filmed here.

DS

 

[A7inchPhildo]

Does anyone else think that roundabouts are a bad idea?

Roundabout/rotary they are fine as long as you are not driving the most expensive car. You always see the 1975 buick running at the speed of light just trying to get hit in the rotary.

I hear the roundabout is the longest road in poland?


Sorry, I couldn't resist.

 

[Mhari]

What an interesting thread. I'll have to think on this one a bit.

About Russian drivers, though.... Russians are uniquely repressed, and not just because of former Soviet rule. The Russian Orthodox Church also has a great deal to do with it. I would not be at all surprised if their repression does come out in psychotic driving.

Also, it's just a lot of fun for them now to be able to afford cars. Real cars, not Moskviches. And not to have to wait for 5 years on a list to get a POS car that arrives with no headlights or windshield wipers. (Why? Well, because auto workers would steal those items off the new cars to sell on the black market. And why not? It was the only way they could get real money. One of the mantras of the USSR was "We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.") I suspect that also contributes.

Of course, it probably also helps that all their driver's licenses come out of Crackerjack boxes, too.

 

[Madame Manga]

What makes for supernaturally polite traffic? I just got back from a stay in Ashland, Oregon. I am not a native, so I must extrapolate religious and sexual activity from the local churches (many: mostly small wood-framed mainstream Protestant denominations) the local college (which accounts for the New Age crystal shops and the used bookstores) and the Shakespeare Festival, which is not pertinent in winter. When the actors are in town during the summer, the ambience changes, and I would assume that the percentage of gays in the population goes up by orders of magnitude.

Ashland is a place where drivers stop for you if you hesitate on the sidewalk in the middle of a block in downtown. Not only do they stop, they wave you across the street and smile. It can't be because your tourist dollar is raising their tax base, because there is no sales tax in Oregon. The college students don't drive, because the town is so small you can walk from one end to the other in less than an hour. In play season with lots of Californians arriving, it's a little more hazardous, but anyone who stays for more than a day or two usually picks up on the local customs and slows down. It must be something in the Lithia mineral water, which has no other obvious virtues. (It's certainly not an aphrodisiac.)

MM

 

[damppanties]

India: Sexually repressed people, fiercely religious (with every religion under the sun found here, and then some more) and driving is injurious to your health.

Rules of the Road - Indian Style.

 

[shereads]

Roundabouts are the traffic engineers way of limiting traffic flow. Once full the roundabout will block all traffic until all exits are empty.

Wouldn't a pop-up metal wall accomplish the same thing without the confusion?

 

[Gary Chambers]

Wouldn't a pop-up metal wall accomplish the same thing without the confusion?

It depends whose driving. Maybe you're the lucky type. If I was driving I'd end up sitting in my car balanced on top of a pop up metal gate.

My most interesting driving experience was a return trip between Almeria and Motril in Spain. On the way to Motril I took the main highway, and discovered that Spaniards don't believe in red lights. There were villages all along the way and they all had traffic lights, which I dutifully stopped for when they were red. This resulted in much horn blowing behind me, but I decided to be a good boy and keep stopping on demand, until a large truck got behind and rode my bumper at such high speeds it was obvious he couldn't stop if he wanted to. I had to abandon common sense and start ignoring red lights. To my amazement, the vehicles on the side roads also ignored their green lights and routinely stopped and waited for me and my new anal friend to clear each intersection. Apparently the Spaniards have their own highway code in complete disagreement with their traffic engineers, and the people win, which is very democratic when you think about it.

Still, I found driving through red lights nerve wracking so on the way back to Almeria I decided to take a back road higher up in the mountains. This was a long winding road, mostly unpaved and full of hairpin curves. At each hairpin curve you could look down steep cliffs and see piles of dead vehicles below: cars, trucks, buses, you name it. I thought I was doing quite well negotiating all these twists, bends and straight-aways at about a 50 mph average, until a Merceds Benz appeared behind my Ford Escort. Its driver seemed to be under the impression that the higher the altitude of the hairpin, the more he should impersonate a supersonic jet aircraft, so once again I found myself dancing with a hot blooded Spaniard hugging my behind. Eventually I found a place to pull over and as I watched the Merc pass me I noticed he had his entire family in the car.

Spain is another Catholic country, and having endured one Inquisition I don't think anyone there is keen on breaking Rome's ban on birth control. They use their highways for population control instead.

For sheer driving terror, however, even Spain can't match winter in the mountains of British Columbia. The roads get covered with ice and Albertans. Albertans know that the way to avoid sliding on ice is to leave the brake alone. Touch the brake and you start to skid. That works well in Alberta where it's flat and roads are straight, but in the mountains you just can't take ice covered bends at 50 to 60 mph or maybe more. But if you have a speeding Albertan behind you, you also can't afford to apply the brakes because even if you don't skid the speeding Albertan will, straight into your rear end. Families around here put up little crosses beside the road where loved ones were killed in crashes, and there are dozens of them around here.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Roundabouts are the traffic engineers way of limiting traffic flow. Once full the roundabout will block all traffic until all exits are empty.

Roundabouts are great, but they should all have loudspeakers blaring demented carnival music all the time. I hear it in my head whenever I enter one.

For a really unique driving experience, though, take an interurban bus in rural Mexico. The drivers fancy themselves fighter pilots, and like to show off their reckless abandon on mountain roads. The guy driving our bus even wore a dashing silk scarf and mirrored aviator glasses, and always had a girl or two up front leaning against the dashboard and flirting; one ye on the girl, on on the road.

---dr.M.

 

[shereads]

Spaniards don't believe in red lights.

Ahem. I may not be the most well-traveled liberal in this thread, but even I know that in Spain, red means, "Come on, el toro, do you worst," or in lay terms, "Charge." The other drivers had to wonder why the hell you were stopping.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

YOU're in the outskirts of civilization far away down in Stockholm, Ice!

Me, I'm in the center of the world (Norrland), and our only regrets is that everything else is so un-central.