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All it takes is a jerk of someone else’s wheels and within seconds, a normal commuter is taken over by a power of anger that is so strong, it affects more than sixty percent of drivers each year. Road rage, something that has always been on the highways of America, is now the strongest yet. The number of serious incidents of road rage has risen more than fifty-one percent since 1990. (3) More than ten thousand examples of road rage have been documented nationwide over the past six years which are only a small part of what is really going on. On the west coast, a good-natured person stops to help a stranded motorist, then tries to get back onto the freeway in front of a slow-moving truck. The truck driver won’t let him in, and within seconds, the nice person has gone bad, pounding on the truck hood, pulling a knife and killing the driver. In Los Angeles, actor Jack Nicholson, jumps out of his car and smashes in a cars’ windshield with a golf club just because the car had cut him off. Outside Washington D.C., two angry drivers chasing each other, at more than eighty miles an hour, crash into commuter traffic, leaving three people, other then themselves, dead. Like other violence in America, it’s not just the numbers, but the severity of road rage that is rising. People used to scream at each other, now they shoot at each other or run them over with their cars. It’s a major contagious disease.(3) Road Rage has become so serious that big companies, afraid of losing one of their best workers or going through a major lawsuit if one of their drivers loses it on the freeway and kills someone, are sending their employees to counseling sessions to help their drivers understand the seriousness of road rage. Psychologists are now treating road rage as a mental disorder. People guilty of road rage need to admit they have a problem because, just like any other disorder or addiction, they don’t consider road rage a problem.(2) Many states are working on the problem of road rage by making costly fines for dangerous drivers and speeders. Some other states are looking into a new system that automatically takes pictures of the license plates of cars that run red lights and can get accident scenes for police reports hoping this will better the community and work to the advantage of the people’s safety.(1) More than 41,000 innocent people die in traffic accidents a year (which is still escalating) and the government agency says that two-thirds of those deaths were the result in road rage. Road ragers have caused 12,610 injuries a year in accidents according to an “aggressive driving” survey.(3) It also found that the majority of offensive drivers are young, poorly educated males who have criminal records, histories of violence, and drug or alcohol related problems. But hundreds of angry drivers are successful men and women with no known histories of crime, violence, or alcohol and drug abuse. They are the typical people described as “the nicest man” or “a wonderful father.” Whoever it is, they all have their own ways of getting mad. Some slam on the brakes, jump out of the car, open the trunk and grab tools, or any kind of weapon. Some use baseball bats, knives, Mace, pepper spray, fists or, in the case of the elderly, canes to beat on the annoying motorist. They have been known to throw anything that comes in hand as they fumble around the car. And yet there’s the few that pull out the gun and start firing away. However, police officers always say that after talking to the offenders, they always feel stupid and don’t know how they got so out of control. (3) Research has shown that road rage is all about space. All day long, people are at work for long hours and are told what to do all the time. At home it’s the same thing. So when they’re on the roads, they’re in their own space. If someone interferes with that space, they get upset. If you’re in a crowded mall and someone bumps into you, you say “excuse me” and so does the other person. If that happens on the highway, you get on the horn, yell as loud as you can and give some kind of sign language. There’s just not as much respect for other people as there should be. Motorists are being shot, stabbed and ran over for ridiculous reasons like “they wouldn’t let me pass” or “why are they going so So what do you do about it? How is this dangerous problem going to stop? Will it ever stop? Don’t become part of the problem. Don’t show who’s boss. If someone wants a fight, back away. Driving a car, you are already a potential risk to other drivers. Driving is dangerous to yourself and others. Don’t make matters worse. Bibliography: Word Count: 888
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