I was embarrassed for the Santa Monica Daily Press to see the low reasoning power shown by the editor in her rush to connect the recent occurrences at Fisher Lumber with the tragic occurrences at the downtown Farmers’ Market and, through that to the alleged dangers of older drivers and drivers with disabilities (SMDP, Dec. 22, page 1). What you never clarify is that the man who caused the accident was not the driver of the pick-up truck but the passenger. He had not driven himself on public streets to arrive at the lumber company, but had been driven there by a young man who left him in the passenger seat while he went into the store to shop. He was therefore not a driver and therefore the public could not be protected from him by retesting of elderly drivers. How could the public be protected from someone who decides to try to drive the car from the passenger seat absent the licensed driver?
Further the editor, who wrote the story, states that this “driver” got the gas and the brake pedals mixed up, thus again neatly connecting this incident to the Farmer’s Market tragedy and the general unreliability of older drivers early in the story, without mentioning that all the “driving” was being done from the wrong seat and the sheer physical difficulty of doing such a difficult maneuver with your legs and arms could fully explain the accident without the implication of senility. And, by the way, who told her that he had gotten the brakes and gas peddle (sic) mixed up?
Building on her story line, which had little to do with the later revealed facts, she quotes an onlooker to the effect that no one using a walker should be allowed to drive. Note that the driver at the Farmer’s Market did not use a walker. What should not be allowed to happen is that passengers not lean over and try to drive a car. But exactly how do you prevent that rare a deed?
The way that the story is written, if carried forward logically to more stringent regulation, one would conclude that there should be a law against leaving elderly passengers in an illegally parked car lest they try to drive the car from the passenger seat. What a weird looking law that would make.
As to the quote from the bystander about not allowing people with walkers from driving, a guide to quotes is usually that the person you are quoting has some credibility on the topic you are dealing with, in this case disabilities and driving. Instead the editor clearly chose this quote to buttress the fear-mongering argument that she is promoting of the killer old. Of course, people who cannot control their legs, whether young or old, should not drive cars that are not specially equipped. But, again, the painfully constructed connection between this accident and the Farmers’ Market one does not hold, nor does the connection of this accident with controlling elderly licensed drivers hold, since this man was not even the driver and would not have been prevented from what he did, no matter how many tests of elderly drivers were introduced, particularly since the Oklahoma plates on the car suggests that no California driving testing would affect this person.
What scares me is that sloppy stories like this one are building a witch hunt atmosphere against drivers with gray hair or even those with a wheelchair symbol on their license plate, generating fear and resentment and an assumption that any accident is their fault. The fear and contempt of the old and disabled, increasingly prevalent in a society fixed on youth and bodily perfection, needs no added fear mongering from you.
My experience with disabilities has been great. I have driven with a very famous disabled woman who could only move one arm back and forth and sideways when Velcroed in position, yet she drove her own specially equipped van. I’ve seen a cerebral palsied woman who was so uncoordinated when she moved and walked, yet when she sat down in her Jag sports car became as smooth and snappy a driver as one can imagine. I’ve seen a tiny dwarf step into his expensive sports car and whip away.
I myself have been driving specially equipped vehicles of many sizes and shapes since my first year in college in 1952 with an outstanding safety record. The last accident that I had was when a semi headed straight at me forced me off a narrow Baja road and onto an average sized boulder without injury to me or my two young sons. That was about 1980. I regularly did the driving to find lonely beaches on which to camp. The car was a 4WD Toyota Land Cruiser station wagon.
Now I drive a lift equipped van with more sophisticated, power-operated controls that allows me to drive from my power wheelchair. The only difference in my driving as I age is that I am even more cautious and never in a rush.
What I dread, though, are people like you who will create a loathsome stereotype of people like me, with gray hair and a physical disability, that can result in horrendous problems for me from being blamed and attacked for something that I did not do to being eaten alive by stupid bureaucrats at the DMV simply covering their asses with armor plating in the name of a misinformed public. Truth is that people with physical disabilities are safer drivers. Truth is that I had the body of an 80-year-old when I was 2-years-old, thanks to polio, so, in a way, I have been driving as an old person for decades. I’ve had lots of practice at it. As with other disabled folks, I look at it as a practical problem of providing for my physical needs while others without disabilities are terrified.
Please try to hold your inner terror of aging and disability down to a quiet roar in your future reporting and deal more logically with the facts. Remember, if you are lucky enough to live a long life you will be unlucky enough to be old and have to live with disabilities. So don’t recklessly feed the fear. Otherwise you may end up a victim yourself. Don’t rearrange and stretch the facts and the connections to fit your inner fears.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 28, 2004. Read the original PDF.