[reportingsjr]

It's amazing the narrative that is spun around cars and the deaths they cause.

Take a closer look at the "accident" reports you see in newspapers. It's disgusting how many times reports of people and children getting hit on sidewalks, sitting on benches, etc is spun as their fault for not getting out of the way of the person driving the car!!

There's been a bit of a grassroots push to get journalists to stop calling them accidents and start calling them crashes, so drivers aren't automatically pardoned in reader's minds.

[SamBam]

While we're at it, let's see if we can fix "officer-related shooting" too.

The most recent one I saw: "A trooper-involved fatal shooting in Leonardtown that ended in the death of a 16-year-old."

Both the "trooper-related" and the "ended in" passive voice to avoid saying "a trooper shot and killed a child."

[natmaka]

"Children getting hit on sidewalks, sitting on benches" don't threaten anyone, and nobody calls any car driver upon them. The car driver is clearly the culprit, source of the danger.

At least in some cases (more often than not, as far as I know) a police officer is called by someone who noticed a dangerous/chaotic situation, and the officer isn't the cause of it.

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/04/14/us/peyton-ham-maryland-tr...

[SamBam]

Thank you for linking to the article showing that they improved the headline (possibly as a result of people pointing it out) to the significantly-better "A state trooper shot and killed.."

Are you suggesting that they shouldn't have changed it, because the kid was at fault?

"A trooper-involved fatal shooting in Leonardtown that ended in the death of a 16-year-old" could mean anything. It could mean that someone shot at a trooper, missed, and hit the kid. It could mean that a trooper shot at a dog in self-defense, and a kid was accidentally killed by the ricocheted bullet. It could even mean that someone shot at a trooper and the kid died of a heart attack from the noise.

"A state trooper shot and killed.." describes what happened. It's factual. It doesn't assign fault. If you think it creates too much of a gut-reaction that a trooper killing a 16-year-old is a problem, well, maybe that's a good thing because it suggests we should have more options to prevent that from happening. And if you think it's a good thing that the trooper shot him, well, the headline satisfies that as well.

[natmaka]

> Are you suggesting that they shouldn't have changed it, because the kid was at fault?

No. "A trooper-involved fatal shooting..." is indeed blurry, and in my opinion the active voice isn't much better because for many (most?) readers it conveys that the cop action was fully intentional, however in such a context things are much more complicated than that.

It doesn't assign fault, indeed, but a more adequate title may be "In a chaotic situation a trooper shot and killed..." because when someone points a gun at you the danger grows as you take time to assess the situation, there is no way to assess from a distance if someone is or isn't able to mount an attack, the "Tueller rule"...

[mindslight]

The act is fully intentional. When you pick up a gun, aim it at someone, put your finger on the trigger, and pull, your intent is to kill. That's like one of the first things they tell you in any gun safety course.

That intent may have been an overreaction. It may have been a mistake. It may have been based on an incorrect understanding of the situation. It may have even been justified. But regardless, the trooper did intend to kill.

[natmaka]

Indeed, and I didn't deny it. We all call for a more objective and neutral way to concisely describe the facts. In my opinion it implies to state any pertinent element. Here: the context, which always has a major influence on intentions/choices.

My point is that a press title "In a chaotic situation a trooper shot and killed..." seems more appropriate to me. Do you agree?

[selestify]

The police officer is still very much the one who shot and killed the teen. The use of the passive voice is biased.

[salawat]

Source or example?

I have difficulty in believing anyone in their right mind would victim blame someone sitting on a bench for not getting out of the way of a car. This reeks of urban legend or motivated anti-motorist propoganda. The motor vehicle would have to have completely departed from the designated motorway and would as a result be completely at fault. Failure to respond to signal is also the motorist's fault, and even when out of compliance signalwise on a crosswalk, the pedestrian has right-of-way. It's right in the driver's manual for most States in the U.S.

Unless we're talking somewhere with much more fluid road laws. For the record, I've been that pedestrian getting clipped several times, and people on bicycles make me so paranoid in city driving, I've been known to lower windows to try to verbally communicate.

My issue is generally with other motorists for the most part.

>Automatically pardoned in reader's minds

There was a time I'd say you were over stating tilted journalism's influence. Nowadays I'm not so sure anymore.

[reportingsjr]

It's been quite a while since I read the article blaming people for sitting on the bench. Here is a kind of similar style article I came across that tries to blame people on a sidewalk for getting hurt: https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/07/04/toronto_car_cras...

Notice how half of the article is dedicated towards blaming people for entering crosswalks when they have right of way, just because a signal is changing?

Here's the kicker: the 10 (!!) people injured were on the freaking sidewalk! Why is this diatribe of blaming people for entering a crosswalk even in the article??

This isn't just urban legend or anti-motorist propaganda (really? come on). There are quite a few studies out there that look in to this and it's a real phenomenon. I don't have time right now to dig out individual studies to link, but they're fairly easy to find.

[salawat]

Oof. Okay. I agree that particular article could have been arranged better. For the curious.

Money shot:

>Two vehicles smashed into each other and then into a group of people and a lamp post at the intersection at about 1:20 p.m.

>According to police, both vehicles were travelling west on Lake Shore Blvd. W. when one vehicle turned left across the path of the other to proceed south on Bay St.

So the actual injuries to pedestrians were an example of collateral damage from people screwing up while behind the wheel.

The author does embark on a secondary train of thought, highlighting a bit of trivia that people may not know abouut the local traffic regulations:

>How pedestrians interpret the newer countdown-type pedestrian signals is becoming a major concern for police, said Const. Hugh Smith of traffic services. Many don’t really understand what the timer means.

>Apparently their handbook states that once the countdown starts, they assume no new pedestrians should enter the crosswalk, thereby allowing vehicles to execute turns once the initial group clears.

I didn't personally read it as blaming the pedestrians for getting hurt, as it seemed like a more Public Service Announcement sort of thing tacked on the end, but I do agree that that could have been transitioned to or arranged better.

I've just been around placeswith some fairly militant anti-motoring sentiment (like do away with all motorways type), so I assure you it is a thing. I think Britain was having some troubles with it in London, and it's growing in popularity around some urban centers in the U.S.

It tends to go hand-in-hand with zoning (which is a nightmare in and of itself), and has a great deal of impact on your ability to freely get places in the U.S., which is why I always try to be sensitive to trying to counterweight the "change it now" crowd to "incremental implementation".

I don't mind public transit, but I'm very againnst throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

[putnambr]

It's not so much anti-motorist propaganda, but rather street safety advocacy to remind drivers that 'accidents' are mostly avoidable.

I don't have any news stories at the ready, but next time you see an article like 'Man, 30, dead after being hit by SUV' take a look at the comment section. I guarantee there will be multiple people asking if he was outside of a crosswalk, or noting how people need to get off their phones when walking. There's usually an absence of talking about the driver, because usually they are not mentioned apart from 'the driver stayed on scene and is cooperating with the police'. Advocates of 'crash not accident' would like the headline to be rewritten such as 'Driver hits and kills 30-year-old man with SUV'. A headline like that hopefully leads people to question whether the driver was speeding, on their phone, etc.

https://www.roadpeace.org/download/crash-not-accident-briefi...