[aww_dang]

It should be fair to start with the premise that this behavior creates a noise pollution problem. Otherwise the authorities would not be working to curb it.

Everyone has an excuse, but two wrongs don't make a right. Drivers are not justified to create noise pollution because pedestrians or other drivers are indulging in inconsiderate behavior.

I've lived on both sides of the world and frankly, it all comes down to how the individual regards himself and his social obligations. S. Asia is notorious for it's poor regard of public spaces. These are foundational cultural concepts that I don't see changing any time soon.

Without a sense of personal responsibility the individual is powerless to act. The excuses you provide make the problem perpetually someone else's fault. The comment above spoke to the "entitlement of drivers" and this is the key to the whole issue.

In the west, I've seen known gangsters stop their limo to personally remove a single piece of litter from the street. These are people who explicitly live outside of the bounds of the law. This person could have made his chauffeur or assistant retrieve the trash, yet he took such pride in his neighborhood that he had to do it personally. The contrast is obvious.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3968587/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_from_noise

[kranner]

No one is justifying impatient honking at traffic lights.

My "excuses" as you've put them are situations that occur everyday on Indian roads where honking is an alternative to colliding with and running over people and animals. Noise pollution is the lesser evil.

I would never indulge in causing that kind of situation to arise. That's the limit of what I can do. If faced with that situation my greater responsibility is to avoid a collision.

[aww_dang]

The alternative is to just slow down. If you are driving in a way that puts you at risk of hitting pedestrians, then you might want to look at that...

[kranner]

Obviously. Except when there are four two-wheelers tailgating you and braking would cause them to collide with you, or at least slow down all the traffic behind you so that everyone is now honking at you.

It's probably hard to understand what I'm talking about if one has never experienced traffic like this themselves.

[aww_dang]

Like I said, I've lived on both sides of the world. It is probably hard to understand the cultural norms of living without rampant noise pollution if you haven't experienced it first hand.

[kranner]

I'd love to move everyone in India to the other side of the world so they can pick up better cultural norms and such, but it seems an unrealistic proposition.