Friday, March 12, 2010

Driving is a privilege, not a right. This phrase was repeated so many times, the only way the speaker could hope to make it stick even more would have been by actually pounding it into our heads. Drive safe was forced on all of those who wished to drive themselves to school in the upcoming year. I don’t exactly understand the reason behind making us sit through this little seminar on how not to die.
That night started off with a very amusing dinner. Complete with creepy little waiter people and Allison freaking out. It was pretty awesome. Then arriving at a confusing jumble of kids and parents all congregated around tables. At first, a feeling of hope overcame me as we thought that it would be only looking at the tables and info then getting to leave. No such luck though.
After signing a sheet of paper and taking a slip, we filed into the auditorium. Settling into the uncomfortable seats, we began to receive the rules of the night and what consequences would await those who dared make even the slightest disturbance. With that out of the way and the auditorium as close to silent as it would ever be, the lectures started flowing. The first speaker some how managed to every student (well at least all the ones I knew) against him within the first sentence he put forth. Between the unnecessary yelling into the microphone and acting like we all lacked the brain power to understand normal words, I could not wait for him to give it up and pass the night on to someone else.
He finally stopped talking, but only to show us some videos. These clips were so disturbing that I’m sure most students never wanted to drive again. It was all centered on the devastation of accidents. The first was caused by some pretty stupid girls texting on the phone while attempting to drive. Scenes showing what the collision looked like from inside the car were very unsettling. Between the blood resulting from the girls being thrown around inside the car and the sound of necks breaking, I was pretty disgusted. Added to this, was the showing of the other family. With a child screaming for her dead parents and a dead baby, I think they over did their point. It would have been better to simply leave out the dead child and the orphaned child.
Along with that video, we were presented another with clips of people just getting destroyed by careless drivers. It was rough watching people vs. car. And the shots of recovering patients with metal rods holding their heads and limbs together really made you think about what damage is done. But after these gruesome videos passed, a detective/cop came on the stage and shared the tales of horror he had witnessed. After all of the lecturing and videos and stories presented, kids will probably shape up their driving for about a week, or until the memories of death are pushed from their minds. In the end, nothing really changes. It was a good attempt though.

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