Dear Editor,
Recently, I read an article by Randi Brockman entitled, “Driving requires responsibility, common sense.”
Brockman expressed a view that I’m sure we all share, which is, “I just don’t want to die because of someone who shouldn’t be allowed to drive was.”
However, Brockman’s article is one-sided. As if Randi has succumbed to her own point of view, she neglects to consider the flip side of the coin she tosses.
The consequences of the actions she advocates would make victims out of the very same elderly citizens whom she rightly claims can be hazards.
Those who might make you or me an auto-accident victim as a result of their slowed reflexes have needs and concerns which hinge upon being able to travel when and where they desire.
If our elderly population has a viable means of alternative travel, Brockman’s proposal of yanking the keys from their frail grips would be a disaster.
How would these people go about ordinary activities that we may take for granted?
Tennessee has many citizens that cannot take advantage of our transit systems. Elderly residents may only live 10 minutes outside of a city that would offer such alternative travel. That’s 10 minutes too far if they do not have a car to get to the bus stop.
Brockman said herself that “half the state [of Tennessee] is the interstate.”
If so much of our state is highway, how should the elderly be compensated when we take away their licenses? Brockman doesn’t say.
Her methodology seems to be shoot first and ask questions later.
I agree that the elderly should not be permitted to drive if they are dangerous to themselves and to others because permitting such people to drive is in no one’s interest.
However, in the article you touch little on the human needs of the elderly whom you condemn. You present the tenuous discussion of how to treat our elderly in flippant, overly simple terms, which in turn makes your job as a writer easier (less thinking equals less work).
Here’s a quote that leads me to think that Brockman has not thought her words through – “I myself plan to be old one day, but when that time comes, I’ll gladly hand over my car keys, or whatever they have in terms of transportation by then.”
This is a bold statement coming from someone who’s barely been on this Earth one fourth of her allotted life span. I don’t think you appreciate the sacrifice that giving up a car entails.
Perhaps she has already subjected herself to the state of immobility that she asks the elderly to endure. If not, try giving up your driving privileges for a week and see what it is like. As inconvenient as it might be, you could probably get around by riding a bicycle or car-pooling.
However, if you take away an elderly person’s right to drive, you take away that individual’s means for staying connected with the world. They might not have any close, living relatives or few friends who could help them get food and medications. Or, maybe all their friends are elderly too and have also lost their licenses due to an unfortunate new law enacted by Representative Randi Brockman.
Whatever the cause of their immobility, an elderly person without a means of transportation cannot go about the necessary activities crucial for existence in our fast-paced, high-tech society.
I hope my concerns have not crossed your mind and that your article was written in thoughtlessness. It would disturb me greatly if you realized the consequences of taking away the elderly’s driving privileges and still did not revise your view for you would be propounding an opinion that would ensure our elderly receive a quick, one-way trip to the afterlife.
Matthew Schacht

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