Conference turris::womannotes-v3

    
    my father maintains that a certain class of women are bad drivers.
    they are women of middle- or upper-middle-class background, aged
    50-70. they are bad, he says, because they weren't taught the
    concept of 'right of way' properly, but they were taught the
    concept of 'ladies first' properly.
    
    

Hate to sterotype, but just about every derned time the car behind
me is opertating tooooo close to my tail end,,, the driver is
a woman...........

On the other hand,,,,  Men drivers are the most discourteous, impatient
lot of humans I've  pleased o be associated with.


Viva-la-difference....

(by the way,,, My wife of 14 years, has been in one auto accident, not
her fault,,, I've been in at least 5, two of which were my fault.)

/ray

    Scaredest I ever been in a car, she was doing 75 in heavy traffic, 
    15 feet away from the car in front of us. Don't get me wrong, I 
    like going fast, but not in heavy traffic. I want a lot of 'elbow
    room' when I zoom. 
    
    Then again, my mom drives so slooooow it scares me :-)

    I remember reading a report a number of years ago, that claimed that 
    women were involved in more accidents than men, but that the accidents 
    men did have tended to be much more severe.  This is born out by the
    auto insurance rates that men pay, especially young unmarried men.  
    
    As far as the reasons for the above phenomenom go, I think it has more
    to do with the known fact that men are better in dealing with spatial
    relationships than women, rather than differences in education.  In
    other words it may have more to do with biology than culture.  IMHO, of
    course.
    
    Mike
                                                                     

    Hmmm - I wonder how much early sports involvement for boys figures
    into this.  You learn there, in a relatively safe environment, how
    to estimate the size, speed and trajectory of moving objects, such
    that you either avoid or deliberately impact them.  'Twould seem
    to have a high correlation to the skills needed in driving.  Could
    be that with the increased emphasis on girls sports, we'll see driving
    skills even out between the sexes over time.  Then the only differences
    will be ones of relative levels of aggression - which seem to be
    biologically wired to be somewhat higher in males than females -
    and which might account for the differences in accident severity
    vs frequency stats already cited.
    
    Alison

    I think the woman-driver image is completely stereotypical. My mother
    insists that the latest crop (read under 45) of women drivers are sent
    from hell to plague the rest of the people on the road. I've dealt with
    bad drivers of both sexes. To me the bottom line is: We have all done
    and do particular things while behind the wheel that might get us a
    ticket if a cop was around and at the least got us screamed at by
    whoever we almost killed in the other car(s). I think the worse thing I
    did was go from Rte 62 in Burlington Mass. to Baboosic Lake Road in
    Merrimack, NH, (the catholic church) a distance of approx. 25-30 miles
    in 20 minutes on a Saturday morning in 1972. I had 30 min. to get there
    for a wedding and I made it. This included stopping for a toll gate.
    
    Getting clocked at 135 in a 60 MPH zone in 1971 at 2 O'clock in the AM
    was a close second though. :-)
    
    Phil

    re: .6 (Alison)

    You may be right, but let's talk about this some.
    
    There is at least one physical difference between the male and the
    female brain; the corpus callosum is thicker in the typical female
    brain which allows for more possible connections between the
    hemispheres of the cerebrum.  Anyway, that difference has been
    hypothesized (by the people who worry about such things), as accounting
    for some of the differences in the ways that men and women think.  

    You raise an interesting point, but I am led to wonder if boys play the
    games they do because other boys do, or do they play them because they
    are boys?  Ditto for girls.  My inclination is to say "yes" to both
    questions for both genders.  Obviously, I talking in very general
    terms, here.  Equally obvious, there is a wide range of variation in
    both instances.

    Anyway, what we are talking about is the classical argument of
    environment vs. genetics.  That's a "discussion" that's been raging for
    many a year now, and will for many more years.  Still, it is all
    extremely interesting.

    Mike
    

    
         WOW!    What a *great* note to stay away from!
    
    
            Yes...the "kid" has been made to blink more than once!  I'm
    outta here!
    
    Dave     ;^)

    Actually, as far as eye-hand coordination goes, women have an
    advantage, NATIVELY. But maybe the greater participation in
    aggressive games aids the men in driving.
    
    I find that both genders do stupid things in automobiles. Women, I
    think, tend to err on the side of over-caution (and thus lose
    "opportunities" on the road - a cause of consternation to the guy
    behind her in line. "Geez, Lady, Ya coulda *made* it!"). Men, on the
    other hand, seem to err on the side of aggression, and have perhaps
    more high-speed, lane-cutting types of accidents.
    
    Statistics (which the insurance companies thrive on) indicate that
    females have better driving records.
    
    And for the chauvinistic (location-wise, not gender-wise) point of
    view: I don't think California drivers are any better than Mass.
    drivers. The greater the concentration of cars, the greater the
    concentration of jerks. Jerkiness is genderless.
    
    --DE
     
    
    

There's no doubt in my mind that women are safer, better drivers than men.

Being a "good, safe driver" is distinct from "handling a car," for example, in
a high-speed chase.

The drivers who make me want to spit nails are almost always men.

Vicki Meagher

As said earlier, insurance rates hang the halo on women.

The most dangerous drivers are males 16 ~ 28, with an agressive
dispostion, who drink.  These are the drivers who cause
80-90% of fatal accidents. [source: an unpublished California
Highway Patrol study, discussed on public radio in LA]

In my daily commute of 76 miles, it is usually the menfolk
of an elderly bent who cause problems. A total lack of
rhythm.  They don't blend.  &  B e w a r e  t h e  h a t s.

An aside. Two summers ago a Boston TV show was harping about 
truck drivers being a problem.  As I rarely had problems with
trucks, I did a "private study" on the way home in heavy traffic.
I assigned fault to either a car or truck driver each time I saw
brake lights when two of these creatures in disharmony. The final
fault total: auto driver faults 29; truck driver faults 3. (I didn't
track sex. If I remember tomorrow, I'll try it.) Meigs

	Ok folkes, so what's "better"?

	Insurance companies are there to make money, they wouldn't give 
	cheaper rates to women, or to over 30's, or more to over 50's if they
	didn't think they had less accidents.

	But, is having less accidents "better".

	Is driving up-to the speed limits "better"

	Is driving 20% under the speed limits "better"

	Do women, in general, drive less miles?
	But most accidents are within 5 miles of home, so this doesn't really
	count.

	In the UK it's not the insurance companies that pay out for many 
	accidents - Digital itself does it's own cover - but they do this
	because there are so many accidents in company cars that they couldn't
	afford insurance through standard insurance brokers. Digital UK has many
	more male company car drivers than women, and many more accidents than
	"normal".

	I - like most people - believe that I am a good driver. I have taken a 
	defensive driving course, and had some good praise, and hints on a 
	couple of areas that I could improve.

	I actually counted the last time we (well my husband) drove to my
	parents (210 miles).

	He is always very verbal when people do crazy things. If it's a bloke,
	then he says - look at that twit (actually his language is not quite
	that polite), but whan it's a women, he says *=)#"! women drivers!

	We had *no* women do anything crazy (yup, I was amaized too), we had
	11 male car/12-seater drivers, and 5 male lorry drivers. Most of this 
	was the first 90 miles - very heavy traffic, and the last 30 miles -
	smaller roads and more local traffic.

	I am personally very wary of men in caps, women with blue rinses, and
	anyone who drive a Morris Minor or Cortina Mark 2.

	Heather

    
    
    Maybe it is just me, but I have always found just the opposite. 
    Whenever I have someone riding the tail it is most always a man.
    Also, I find that when it rains/snows the folks that go flying
    by like crazy people are most often men. 
    
    Mi

    
>    Heather, why are you wary of people driving Morris Minors?  The things
>    are so beastly underpowered and flimsy that they can't pose a hazard! 
>    :-)
    
 
	Since you asked so nicely, I'll tell you a story.....................

	I was driving down to Plymouth, when I reached the A38 at Exeter, I
	was looking forwards to being at my parents in about 40 minutes.

	The motorway ends at Exeter, it then progresses into a treble
	carriageway, and then a dual carriage way.

	There I was, travelling along at a sedate speed - 70ish, when this
	little moggie minor joined the carriageway doing about 45mph.

	As it was just narrowing to 2 lanes, I had to break, cars on the 
	outside were manoevering for the other lane.

	The moggie then pulls over to the righthand lane - and decreases to 
	35 mph.   Now do we have fun, 3 lanes into 2, noone in the inside
	lane, and the overtaking lane very overcrowded.
	Now, as this is a continuation of a motorway into treble into dual,
	some of these jokers are treating it as a motorway still, and coming 
	into the rear of the queue that formed doing 100mph+.

	After a couple of miles, some people were a little upset, dispite
	the flashing of lights, and the blowing of horns, this moggie stayed
	stubbornly in the overtaking lane.
	Some overtook on the inside, their anger getting the better of them.
 
	Then, it indicates RIGHT, now this could be a possibility, it was
	a dual carriageway, with some right-turn accesses.

	But does it turn right, nope, it slows to 20mph, and takes
	the next left, crossing the inside lane and straight off the exit ramp,
	with no hint of looking in a mirror.

	I was astonished that it didn't cause a nasty accident.

	It was also a bloke in a cap, I can imagine him saying - yup, been 
	driving 30 years, and never an accident!

	Now if you want a story about garages and car insurance, I've got
	one that will stop you snoring!

	Heather

All the toy cars in TOYSRUS are not painted pastel yellow,blue,pink.

	Driving is a skill.  Like playing a musical instrument, most people
get better with practice, and some folks never get the hang of it.  I read
somewhere that mechanically inclined people tend to be somewhat better
drivers, but I don't remember the source.

	I commuted to work via train for three years, and during that time,
my driving skills (especially high-speed, highway) deteriorated significantly.
Then I joined DEC and commuted 50 a day miles round trip, all highway.  I
found that my driving skill improved greatly, and I used to get peeved at the
"amateurs" who were out on the highway on weekends.

	One of my sisters is an awful driver.  My grandfather has never been a
very good driver (he's 83) and only drives during the day now, but still
drives.   I've seen good & bad of both genders.  Admittedly, most of the
asshole drivers I've seen have been men. (Doing dangerous things in heavy
traffic.)

	On the "most accidents within x miles of home" argument.  (I've heard
that statistic as 10, but I think it was heather who used 5 previously in this
string.)  The statistic is somewhat misleading.  What you're really dealing
with is "exposure".  A 10 mile radius of my home covers my job, half a dozen
supermarkets, at least two malls, a couple of movie theaters and a lot of
restaurants and gas stations.  A great many people (and I think a lot of
Digits are exceptions because DEC tends to shuffle groups from site to site
and thus people find themselves with long commutes) seldom leave a 10 mile
radius of their homes.  If 97% of your time is spent inside the circle, the
chances are pretty good that, if you have an accident, it's going to be
within 10 miles.

							--Doug

    without reading any replies.............
    
    I don't know about any sexism in the base note story, perhaps a
    little....
    
    But there are some very good and some very bad drivers of both sexes
    out there.
    
    A large truck once pulled out in front of me in the right lane of route
    2, and I'd have been squashed, except the girl in the left lane coming
    up behind me braked hard and gave me the room and waved for me to
    quickly get over. She sure knew what she was doing..........
    
    I don't really see much difference myself................
    
    ....Bob
    

    I've noticed with each year passing, and now with almost as many
    woman out driving during rush hours... it's about 50-50 when it comes
    to aggressive driving. When I look in my rear-view-mirror, half the
    time it's a woman tailgating me at 75-80 mph.
    
    

    >...except the girl in the left lane...
    
    Boy, what amazing skill for a child!  I didn't know they were letting
    them drive these days!!!  Wish I could have gotten my liscense that
    young.
    
    D!   1/2 :-)

    re .21
    
    picky, picky...............
    
    OK,      YOUNG WOMAN..........
    
    8-)
    
    ....Bob