English 102 McCrady Humans in the twentieth century live in an era characterized by an unrelenting desire for speed. The ability to go faster and accomplish more often seems to be the option of choice. Everything from the information super highway to the interstate highway is dominated by this need for speed. Whether it is fast food or fast cars, more powerful search engines or automobile engines, the fact of the matter is people rarely stop to catch their breath. Ever since the wheel people have tried to get from point A to B in as little time as possible. This idea is evident every time someone turns the ignition of his/her automobile. Cars were designed with the ability to travel faster and reach destinations sooner, but now it seems that these conveniences have been stretched and abused to the maximum. The question at hand is not whether or not speeding exists, which it does, but rather is it a problem? In addition, what are the consequences and/or ramifications of speeding? The notion of fast is usually associated with better, but is this really the case? These questions will be discussed in this paper.Speed sells. Many people don’t realize this, but automobile manufacturers do. In the November 1999 issue of Car and Driver there are over fifteen ads that advertise cars driving at speeds that are not reasonable or prudent to existing conditions. Some of these ads have small disclaimers at the bottom of the page, but many don’t. When a new model year car comes out, the majority of the manufacturers advertise more horsepower, which translates into more speed. There are also many people who, on their own, attempt to make their cars faster. This is very similar to what happened during the muscle car era of the 1960s. Instead of using big, American cars with eight cylinder engines, people are using small import cars. These cars are relatively cheap to purchase, and even easier to make dangerously fast. Thi...
