Dangerous driving?

A ban on cell phones in the car? We see the reasoning, but have a few concerns.

If your best friend – sitting shotgun next to you as you cruise down Baxter Street – starts talking to you, tape her mouth shut.

Don’t even think about switching on the radio, much less singing along to Celine Dion while driving.

The National Safety Council is advocating a ban on all cell phone use – hand-held and hands-free – for all drivers.

Apparently, the organization believes drivers are distracted by even hands-free devices. If that’s true, the radio or passengers should be silent, too.

The Red & Black agrees with Georgia’s cell phone law as it stands now. School bus drivers can’t talk on the phone while taking children to and from school. Good. That should be a given.

We understand if the state outlaws chatting on hand-held phones behind the wheel.

But prohibiting the use of hands-free phones while driving? That’s unreasonable.

Cars today have built-in radios and CD players. SUV companies advertise their vehicles based on the amount of seating, and the general consensus seems to be the more, the merrier. So if we can drive while listening to Project 96.1 or carrying on a conversation with four of our passengers, why shouldn’t we be able to drive talking to one person on a hands-free device?

Well, according to Janet Froetscher, the National Safety Council’s president and chief executive, talking on cell phones is just as risky as drunk driving.

But according to a risk-benefit study conducted by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis, “a driver’s average risk of being killed while using a cell phone is less than seven in a million – 80 percent less than the average risk of fatality to a driver with a blood alcohol level of 0.1 percent.”

So we’re pretty sure people are more impaired when intoxicated than when talking on a phone.

We in no way encourage dangerous driving.

We’re simply not convinced talking on a hands-free phone poses a threat on the road.

- Kelly Shaul for the editorial board