And honestly, he got off pretty easily. The people who blow my mind are the ones with the multiple DUIs. That doesn't even make sense to me. You have 20 year olds in jail for a little bit of weed...but this 43 year old drunk can't get some government housing for his fourth DUI blowing .16+, driving on a suspended license, violating all kinds of terms of his probation, after running his truck through a fence? Splain that to me. edit: I do think MADD uses some fairly bullshit, guilt inducing tactics that the states ultimately support because revenue generation! The six month suspended license is worth it to not blow.
Our police are very nice. I got pulled over a little bit ago and I didn't even notice he was behind me with lights flashing as I was fiddling with something and had my music real loud. When I finally realized and pulled over he was super nice and didn't even give me a speeding ticket but reduced it to a moving violation so I got no points on my license and it didn't affect my insurance. And I didn't even cry Kubla! I don't know what you guys are talking about. I'm sure you all must be doing something to antagonize them. It's the only possible reason.
The legal limit is so low I can't imagine too many people who haven't left a restaurant or sports bar or pub legally drunk. Thinking about the serious financial (and professional) consequences is why I'm the slowest drinker in the history of ever. A beer will take me almost an hour to drink. That said - I know I've left the pub driving when I shouldn't have, legally. I don't want to keep dancing that dance. No thank you.
How many people do you know who went to jail for "a little bit of weed?" Because I don't know any. Hell even the people I know who were busted dealing, distribution charges with over an ounce etc, didn't see jail time. We all know at least one guy who had multiple DUIs and fucked up his probation..... That's aesthetically pleasing female privilege for ya'.
If you're actually interested in finding out why police have changed over the last 30 years, I suggest Radley Balko's book, 'The Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of American Police Forces.' It's quite eye opening. The author was on Bill Maher for an interview. He told the story of how his publisher called him and said, 'hey, the picture on the front of the book, we need to know what movie that's from so we can properly credit it, etc.' His response: 'That's not a movie. That's the RNC Convention in Tampa, 2008.' Scary stuff.
I think - in the case of the guy I'm thinking of specifically - he was a young kid who didn't look like he belonged in that small town (RHCP shirts, skater hair, Docs, shredded levis in a ranching county who still thought Waylon Jennings was at the top of the charts) who people always thought was up to no good (when in fact - yes he smoked pot but in reality he just wanted to sit in his garage and shoot pool and play guitar) and when they had the opportunity to catch him, caught him but good.
Shimmered: Couple of beers and 1/2 a bottle of wine over dinner followed by driving home is something I used to do every 2-3 weeks for the last decade. Now I get a Taxi and am the good friend policing my friends who want to DD. Going through the system and having to spend time in court with the unwashed, neck tattooed, window licking masses isn’t worth it. Fuck, the suit I wore was better than 75% of the lawyers present. It's not a nice place.
Indeed. It's simply not worth it. ESPECIALLY around major 'drinking' holidays. Independence Day? Fuck yoouuuuuu I'm not drinking and driving. Same goes for Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and NYE. No refusal - you blow or they get a warrant and take your blood. fuck that shit.
So letting your friends drive drunk so you don't catch the wrap sheet isn't good friend policy? Also, my time in court while expensive as fuck and insanely stressful at times was more often than not, quite entertaining. Nothing like watching low educated low income folk cause hilarious scenes while worsening the situation and ruining their already pathetic lives.
Mine was a week before Christmas last year. Like a golden dumbass. Also kids watch out for the morning after, younger brother got pulled over at 8am driving home from a party where he crashed on the couch at 3am+/-. He blew .06 (more than I got hammered for) the cop let him leave his car on the side of the road and told him to call a taxi and piss off.
I don't even see how...as a female....I could go to dinner and have more than one drink and not be legally intoxicated. Especially since I don't drink horse piss beer.
Whereas I think it's crazy how many people have driven drunk. I have done it exactly zero times. Not once, not ever in my entire life have I driven a car with alcohol in my system. It's never been a challenge to accomplish this; even on the few occasions I drink I simply take a minute to plan ahead and make sure that either someone else is going to be driving or that I'll have time to be fully sober before getting in the car. It utterly astounds me how often people talk about having gotten away with drunk driving.
I hear you and I understand. I don't think most people get behind the wheel blitzed and brain gone. I think more people than we realize get behind the wheel legally intoxicated. And, if you rarely drink, I can totally see how it's manageable for you to never have driven with alcohol in your system.
One fun fact I learned when I got mine is that there is no legal limit in Ohio. You can blow .01 and still get convicted if the cop can make the case that you were impaired. The only threshold that matters here is .17, which automatically escalates the punishments. We also prosecute all forms of driving while impaired under the same statute, which means that driving while tired our "emotionally impaired" gets you the same draconian minimum punishments as the scary drunk drivers. The most frustrating thing is that the conversation on DUIs doesn't ever mention that some drivers at an impaired level are still more competent than some of the fucking sober morons on the road. I'm willing to bet I could pass the driver's exam at .10, but that's mostly because of it being way too easy to get a fucking license.
And DUI and DWI aren't quite the same thing. AND you can get a DUI for driving after taking benadryl, or Sudafed, or Claritin. You can get a DUI for taking a xanax in the morning and driving yourself to lunch at midday...or having a panic attack and taking a xanax, then getting pulled over on the way home.
I started driving drunk about a month after I got my license at 16. I'd go up to the bar with three of my friends and the waitresses knew two of our brothers so they would serve us. About 6 beers later we'd be thoroughly drunk, stumble out to our cars and drive back. I drove drunk (normally about 6-9 drinks I'd say, but there were times where it was more) pretty regularly up until about 6 months ago so for about 7.5 years probably averaging around one time per month. The last time I drove drunk the last thing I remember is puking outside the strip club, next I'm rapidly approaching an almost 90 degree turn. In my defense I had a designated driver planned for that night who gave me the keys once we got back to his place because I somehow convinced him I was cool to drive and I wanted to sleep in my own bed. I know I'm supposed to feel sorry for doing it and that it's not the right thing to do and very dangerous, but I never got caught and I never hurt anyone. I totally get why people drive drunk, it's convenient and the odds are heavily in your favor for getting away with it. It's a pretty common thing, like most everyone I know does it. Pretty much everyone I know thinks it's perfectly fine to drive if you've only had a drink or two, so in my mind when I was a bit younger what's a couple more really gonna do? Now I've just got too much to lose I guess, haven't done it since and hope to keep it that way.
What he said. I can drink a whole bottle of red over an hour long dinner and you would have no idea I 'd been drinking by talking to me or observing my behaviour. By bottle 1.5 things begin to become more apparent. Lesstalkette starts to sound a bit boozed after 1 glass and doesn’t like to drive even after 1 drink.
Wine affects me more rapidly than beer does. Even good beers...I can have two (assuming I've eaten that day and not lived on protein shakes and pre workouts - as I did when I was coaching back in Texas) and you'd never know. Three is the cutoff point where it's like....aaaaand I'm impaired. But after one, legally, I'm done. And I don't drink wine when I go out.
I don't mean to be a stickler, but it shouldn't matter what day of the week, month or year it is. It's not okay to do it. Switch the perspective - forget all the MADD stuff, all the "elephant in the room" advertising... what would you say if the person who drove home after a few too many beers at the bar was one of your kids? I hope you'd lose your shit on them.
Back in college my roommate from hell decided it would be a fun idea to get kicked out of the bar because he drank way too much and started arguing with a bartender. We decided fuck him we weren't going to leave because he got kicked out. We decided to put him in our sober drivers car and let him pass out. I was walking with him to the car, when some officers approached me. Apparently they saw me taking him out to the car and wanted to make sure I wasn't going to drive. They made my sober driver come out of the bar, and I had to hand the keys to them while they watched. I thought it was all bizarre and weird. Apparently in Colorado that could've got me a DUI. Walking visibly drunk to a car with keys in hand.