Trains Are Faster Than You
So I was browsing some news today,
regarding trains and how people keep getting minced by them or having serious injuries / near misses. to combat this, there is this new advert campaign titled 'trains are faster than you' and the news link embedded a video snippet of a surgeon having to operate on someone who had lost and arm and a leg to a train, citing how the victim had asked to simply have his life ended, as what life could he lead with such an impairment.
I am of the stance that in the case of an accident, such a thing is tragic, but if someone freely chooses to attempt crossing the rails of a train, outside of the designated crossing points. Then my only sympathies are with the driver of said train. If someone wants to catch a train, but are on the wrong platform, suck it up. should of planned your trip better. if you're some kind of thrill seeker or daredevil who wants to see how long you can leave it until you make it across, please, do the public a favor and just fucking don't.
now I swear by driving as my main method of transportation. I dislike trains for a number of reasons including petty things like lack of space for someone of my height, being around other people while trying to maintain a sense of manners and dignity. But these issues don't change the fact that there was a year where I was forced, by my own stupidity, to make use of trains for my work commute. ( I lost my license by way of running out of demerit points for those interested )
while one perk of training to and from work was being able to sit down and write private journals to myself, I didn't really like the whole idea. This was made worse with service failures by either a fault or incident. There is one that strikes to mind, two stops down the line, someone was either pushed, or chose to step out in front of a train, I never found out which but was frustrated that either a lost soul, or some heartless one, had caused the service to be cancelled from that second stop to the end of the line, normally a 40min train ride.
so now i had to get off, with all the other passengers, and board a bus which would proceed along the trains route to collect / drop passengers off. and take it from me, trains are luxury compared to busses. So whatever the cause, what do we have to show for it? many people pissed off at being late home, one hell of a mess and a poor train driver who may be traumatised.
looking back at this advert, I'd of liked to ask this double amputee the circumstances of his accident, was he freely choosing to ignore the danger? why didn't he make it safely? if the answers to these questions are 'because i was in a rush/looking for a kick and /because i tripped or misjudged the platform height, I'd like to say to him, after a slap to his face 'then why did you do it despite sense?' I won't say common sense as it is getting more and more rare, and he obviously was ignoring it, assuming the above scenario.
my point is this; for those that continue to race against large metal blocks with lights on the front, why do they so blindly feel safe? there has been warning material posted about never crossing the tracks, that they have large amounts of electricity going through them and that if they fall, a train isn't like some kind of over-sized soft pillow. no, those wheels may as well be guillotines for how well they could cut flesh and bone. yet despite knowing this, despite the 'don't cross the tracks you stupid fucker' posters, people still do.
this, to me, is a big breakdown of sense. it must take a special kind of dumb to think 'oh hurr, i can just jog over the rails and skip up the platform, it'll be cool.' so i feel that all in all, the so-called sixty thousand dollars spent on creating these new adverts are for moot. people like these seem to think they are more lucky, better or somehow not subject to the facts. and for this, i think they deserve whatever they get. safety labels should become a way to strop people from being stupid, it should serve as good information on the proper usage of something.
so called common sense is a combination of knowledge and experience, as intelligent people we learn from others or for ourselves, and develop the knowledge that something isn't safe, like walking in front of moving trains. when we ignore that information, we become no better than a baby in an adults body. in that form, i do not see any amount of shock ads affecting their way of thinking, so why bother? sure a nice, intelligent lady with years of good common sense under her will be shocked by these tales of people becoming disfigured or worse, but then is she the kind of demographic likely to walk across those tracks? if she tells her thrill seeking teenage son that he shouldn't do these obviously stupid thing, will he listen?
so this campaign is a waste of time and money in my opinion. it will not reach the very people who should be receiving it. and even if it gets one or two people to stop doing it, wake up to themselves, I would still call it a waste. sure a human life cannot have a value put on it but what is the point of placing value to life when so much more will continue to waste itself in some kind of blatant ignorance?
what would be nice is if guards were able to be at each station 24/7 and if someone is caught crossing the rails, ask them if they want life imprisonment, solitary confinement, or if they would just like to be thrown under the next train. because if they care so little about their lives, then let it be over. For those that slip, fall or loose their balance, I feel sorry for. for those pushed onto the rails, I feel the need for justice. for those that choose, i feel disappointment. as for every day they are alive, others will believe that the rules simply don't matter, and the helpful advise looses it's value.
Accidents aside, this kind of shit just shouldn't happen.
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