Do you happen to Drive a car?
I know I can’t change the world, but if this saves even one life by bringing awareness to the forefront, it’s well worth my time of writing this letter.
I can’t help but notice how everyone is busy on their phones while driving.
Talking on the phone (without a headset) and driving distractedly.
Texting and driving.
Texting while at the traffic light and not moving along with traffic when it starts and then suddenly moving when honked at without looking first to see if anyone is walking.
There is a mitzvah of VeNishmartem Me’od Lenafshosechem. Your life should be precious enough to you to protect it. But besides for that there is another mitzvah at stake here –
Lo Sirtzach!
THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE THAT YOU ARE PUTTING IN DANGER!
If you don’t care about your own life that is one thing. But my life, and other people’s lives, you need to watch out for too. And I’ve had to dodge distracted drivers and have seen too many close calls on the roads. (Needless to say we’ve seen countless videos and letters of drivers running bus stop signs, I wonder if they were distracted on their phones too!)
We have enough tragedies already. Please don’t cause the next one.
Put your phone down when you drive or pull over to call or send that message.
Again, I can’t change the world, but I hope this letter brings awareness and saves someone’s life today. And Every day.
A concerned resident.
TLS welcomes your letters by submitting them to [email protected]
nothing to add
Agreed. But I assume everyone that’s doing it knows already…
I can’t understand for the life of mine why so many people drive with the phone to their ear, every car made for at least the last 10 years has built in Bluetooth, figure out how to set it up!
If you don’t like how it sounds then get a Bluetooth headset or airpods.
Thank you for shoeing your care and concern for the safety of every yid in klal yisroel and also for posting the exact letter I’ve always wanted to post but didn’t have the time to come up with the perfect wording like you.
May it be a merit to save many lives and may everyone reading this letter take it seriously.
Good Letter: But I guarantee that not one driver will be putting their cell phone down as a result of this letter.
We need State Troopers to constantly ticket them. No other solution.
And Mutty,you are a moiser.
This is not true. Don’t scream ‘moiser’ when someone mentions the authorities. Sometimes the authorities are there to protect us. Poskim specifically permit reporting people who drive dangerously. See Minchas Yitzchak 8:148, Teshuvos v’Hanhahos 1:850 and many other poskim.
Megaaskan: You are a Rotzeach!
I will relate a story that happened over 50 years ago. I was a bochur in BMG and it was my turn to drive Reb Shneur ZY”L to a meeting in New York. I was an experienced driver but had not driven on the NJ Turnpike. In the days before EXPass you took a ticket when you got on and handed it over when you got off to determine the toll. i was holding the ticket in my hand and Reb Shneur insisted on holding it. He said, it is a Kal V’Chomer. “Madach when one is davening it is Ossur to hold anything in your hand except for a siddur since you need it to daven, Kol Sheken when you are driving it is Assur to hold anything in your hand”.
Next letter should please be about wearing reflectors!!! You may not care if I crash into you, but I have to live with that guilt all my life because of YOUR negligence!!
I agree to Mutty and I didn’t notice him calling the troopers. He’s definitely not a moiser. Megaaskan probably wrote his comment while driving!
If everyone will put down the phone or connect with the ear piece, they might be saving a life or lives. Perhaps that will be incentive enough.
The alternative – with the Satan’s help – can take 60 seconds or less and then crying I’m sorry, will be worthless. Especially when we’re more distracted with more details before Pesach– SAVE LIVES.
You drive, You text ,You PAY!!!!!!!!!
‘Distracted Callers’, A New Epedemic?
Cell Phone Companies Warn that, “Distracted Callers Who Use Their Cell Phones While Driving Often End Up Dialing The Wrong Numbers And Speaking To Perfect Strangers!”
Have you ever received an annoying phone call from a perfect stranger, only to hear the caller apologize to you and say, “I’m sorry, I must have dialed the wrong number?”
Well, according to experts at the Verizon Center of Research and Technology, Distracted Callers – who use their cell phones while driving – run the risk of dialing the wrong telephone numbers, reaching unintended recipients and speaking to perfect strangers on the other end of the line.
According to Dr. Neil Phonely, chief analyst at the Verizon research center, “Americans are getting tired of answering their phones only to hear the fellow on the other end of the line say, ‘Hello, Sammy, is that you?! What? You’re not Sammy? Sorry, I thought you were Sammy – wrong number, my bad.’ ”
Dr. Phonely says that, “‘Distracted Calling’ – a situation that occurs when people drive their vehicles while making telephone calls – has become an all out epedemic in this country!”
“Recent polling has shown that Americans no longer feel comfortable, or safe, picking up their telephones,” Dr. Phonely noted, “for fear that the person on the other end of line might be a stranger by the name of Alex – a person they’ve never met, or spoken to, before – who just happens to be one of the millions of ‘Distracted Callers’ who inadvertently dials the wrong numbers on his cell phone while driving.”
In Princeton NJ, a Verizon customer is curently being sued by dozens of cell phone users who allege he’s a ‘Serial Distracted Caller’ who – while driving his vehicle – inadvertently dials the wrong phone numbers on his phone, including their phone numbers – and wakes them up in the middle of the night.
“Distracted callers, who drive, and inadvertently dial the wrong numbers on their phones, should be punished to the fullest extent of the law,” said Brian Texteria, an attoney who is representing the aforementioned aggrieved call recipients. “If you receive a call, and the fellow on the other end of the line says to you, ‘Hello, Sebastian, is that you?’, then you should be allowed by law to sue that distracted caller for every penny he’s got.”
Your saying good say better
There’s always the other side of the story
I know a girl that hadn’t been setup in over a year. While driving to volunteer at a Chesed org she had her phone in one hand & a Tehillim in the other. She misdialed a number while trying to call her Chiropractor Velma.
She asked, “Is this Velma?”
The person who answered said, “No, this is Velvel.”
She said, “I’m sorry I must have dialed the wrong number.”
Velvel said, “Don’t hang up. Everything happens for a reason.”
Sof kul sof a Shmooze turned into a date. Dates turned into a Chasanah & B”H 9 years later they have 7 beautiful Yiddishe kinderlach.
All because a distracted driver pressed 7 instead of 4.
And now, Velvel’s wife has reportedly added her 4 daughters to Velma’s list of clients. When asked whether it’s a good idea for the children, at such a young age, to visit a chiropractor on a steady basis, Velma reportedly told reporters: “Why not? Every child could use a reassuring pat on the back every once in a while. Of course, my pats on the backs are a little bit more like heavy blows to the backs, but ultimately they eliminate all the kinks and they instill a more forceful kind of confidence in the kids.”
Another problem are the drivers doing 40 miles an hour through neighborhoods that have a 25 mph speed limit.
I questioned a driver about it and he said go to sleep which I am assuming meant drop dead.