[BurtReynoldsMoustache]

Originally Posted by Spartan198

That specifically works out to drugs =/= problem. If they were legal, it wouldn't be a criminal offense to produce, traffic, or possess them, ergo the police wouldn't have to go out and put the drug dealers behind bars.

Alcohol and tobacco are legal. They are still problems. Problems that can not be solved by making them illegal

Originally Posted by Spartan198

What I do in my car is none of your business either. In fact, you should be more worried about your driving than mine.

What you do in your car is my business, it's everyone's business. That's why we have laws saying what you can and can not do in your car. You may own your car, but you drive it on public roads that you have to share with everyone else.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

I don't know about you, but I sure as hell can't see my ears. Neither does the tip of my elbow magnetically pull my eyes off the road.

You're not getting what peripheral vision is.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

I see cops, ambulance drivers, truck drivers, and dozens of other drivers doing it on a daily basis. I've done it in front of cops, I've done it behind cops, I've done it beside cops. None of them have ever even given me a second look.

It may or may not be illegal in your state, driving with a cell phone isn't illegal in all states either. Anyway, emergency vehicles are given free reign to do what they like. They have emergencies to get to, everyone else has to get out of their way. Cops especially are de facto above the law in this regard. I'm always seeing cops roll stop signs, change lanes or turn without signalling, and stop in the middle of crosswalks. Who's gonna pull them over?

Originally Posted by Spartan198

No, of course I'm not. But looking back, you're right, that didn't make as much sense as it seemingly did at the time, so let me readdress it. Say I somehow crack and attack somebody, beat them and put them in the hospital. However, they don't die. They get well and go on living their lives. Should I be charged with murder as if I'd actually killed the person? Say I'm walking down the street and accidentally bump into a woman walking past me. Should I be charged with sexual assault?

You'd be charged with attempted murder and committing a crime while intoxicated. If you accidentally bump into somebody that's not a crime. If you're running down the street and slam into somebody because you're not paying attention you could be charged with disorderly conduct or reckless endangerment, and the woman would be justified in suing you over any injuries she received.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

In all the thousands of times I've used my phone in my car, I've never caused any accidents or otherwise harmed anyone as a direct or indirect result, yet you're talking to me like I have. You're chastising me for doing something I haven't done.

I'm chastising you for doing something that unnecessarily puts you and people around you at risk for death and injury. I rolled hundreds of stop signs without a problem until the one time that it was a problem.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Me not on the phone = Focused driver
Me on the phone = Still just as focused a driver, despite what your precious statistics claim.

Here's another scientific tidbit (that's been proven with science); human beings routinely overestimate their abilities and are really bad at knowing when they are not good at something.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Let me compare it to speeding. If I'm driving down the road at 80 mph, watching the road and everything around me, while some other guy is weaving all over the road and not paying attention to his driving while going 20 mph, who's more likely to get pulled over? The reckless driver because he's more of a threat than I am.

You'd both get pulled over for that. What fantasy world do you live in where you can blow past a cop at 80 mph?

Originally Posted by Spartan198

But by your logic, I still shouldn't do either because some people can't. And just because the "majority" on some statistic lets a phone call distract them on the road, it doesn't mean I get distracted by a phone call.

It doesn't matter if you do or not. The law is the law and there are no exceptions. Even if somehow you are able to operate a car and a phone at the same perfectly safely, a majority of people can not, and it is in the interest of public safety to make it illegal.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Millions have died from electrocution, so lets outlaw electricity. Millions have died from smoking, so lets outlaw that, too (well, that one I agree with, but that's not the point). People huff paint, so let's outlaw selling paint as well. A classmate's uncle slipped and fell down the stairs, breaking his neck. I'd imagine millions more have done the same, so let's outlaw stairs.

Electricity and stairs are not illegal. What is illegal is wiring a building or installing stairs in a way that is not up to code. If you die because you were swinging your 9 iron out on the driving range in the middle of a thunder storm, or because you were sock skating on the second floor of your house near the stairs, then your death is your own fault. If you go to plug in a vacuum cleaner and the electricity arcs into your hand and kills you, then somebody else is liable for installing faulty wiring in your house. If you walk down somebody else's staircase, slip and fall and die because they didn't install a banister, then they are liable for your death. As for smoking and huffing paint, you only put yourself at risk when you do those. Driving recklessly or in a way that divides your attention doesn't just put you at risk, it puts everyone around you at risk.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Name some random action and I promise you there's at least one way someone can get killed from it. Yours and others' lives are at risk just by walking out the front door every day. You can't tell everyone to stop doing everything because it presents some form of risk.

You can tell somebody to stop doing something if it poses a risk to public safety aka the safety other people around them.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Then how is it I can see without talking and talk without clenching my fist? When I'm on the phone, my eyes don't black out and my hands don't become unusable or immobile, so the conversation in no way interferes with my ability to control my car.

Peripheral vision peripheral vision peripheral vision. What you see in the side of your eye. You can look straight ahead just fine, but you're still blocking out a portion of what you should be able to see.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

The same scientific research that seems to be able to read the future and knows that everyone who uses a phone while driving is, without a shadow of a doubt, going to hurt someone as a result of it?

No, the research indicated that the risk for causing an accident while talking on a cell phone was statistically similar to driving while drunk. On average, human beings are just as likely to cause an accident while using a cell phone as they are to cause an accident while drunk. Neither of those numbers is 100%.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

I never said anything of the sort and you know it. At least not in the context you're putting it. Being a better at a given trade than another person does not make me some form of nobility like you're implying. I don't know about you, but I live in a country where I'm allowed to be an individual with my own unique skill set. The United States may be a lot of things, but an oligarchy which forces everyone to be exactly the same in every faucet, it surely is not.

You are not allowed to be an individual while operating a motor vehicle on a public road. Everywhere else is fine.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

No, I wouldn't. My body is made up of the exact same chemical composition as pretty much every other human being on earth, like how one bolt carrier can function in a number of different AR-15s because said AR-15s are constructed nearly identically. But there's no chemical in the body that determines my "driving while on the phone" level, is there?

No you're not chemically the same as everyone else. Every body is different, and reacts differently to medications. If too many people have an adverse reaction, it doesn't get approved. If only a few people have an adverse reaction, it gets approved. You may still have an adverse reaction, but because you are in the minority, the drug will still be allowed so that it can be prescribed to the majority population for whom it works. Likewise, they're not going to repeal laws against driving while talking on the phone just because you happen to be good at it.

Originally Posted by Spartan198

Some people can't do it, others (like me) can do it.

You're in the minority with your supposed "skill". Most people are really really bad at driving while using a cell phone. If they weren't, then it wouldn't be a problem