Are we starting to out-whinge the poms?

[camouflage762]

Are we starting to out-whinge the poms?

http://www.news24.com/Columnists/Chr...-poms-20101115

2010-11-15 12:55


We South Africans are a funny bunch. We whinge like crazy about things like crime and then when the cops catch us red handed breaking the law we whinge about the law being an ass and immediately start whinging about police brutality.

Take those 43 people who were arrested after apparently taking short-cuts down the wrong lane near the intersection of Bompas Road and Jan Smuts Avenue in Johannesburg last week. It all started because motorists complained to the cops that taxi drivers were taking short cuts and blocking the road for honest, law-abiding citizens.

So, the cops duly pitched up and started arresting drivers for doing precisely what the honest law abiding motorists where whinging about.

Trouble is, only about six of the 43 people arrested were taxi drivers. The rest were mothers on school runs, a business exec, a deputy principal of a school and other honest, law abiding citizens.

Naturally, all the honest, law abiding citizens who were arrested bitched like crazy about having been arrested.

Whinge, whinge, whinge

I suppose we're all like that in a way. When we are pedestrians we whinge about nasty bastard motorists who almost run us over and when we're back in our cars be bitch about bloody stupid pedestrians getting in our way.

We bitch about BMW drivers hogging the roads and then whinge like nobody's business when we are caught in a speed trap or pulled over for using our cellphones when we're driving.

We get very seriously bitchy and whinge like mad about the way the police just don't seem to be doing anything about drugs that are being foisted on our kids.

Then we bitch like crazy when government doesn't appear to want to do anything to get our kids out of foreign jails when they were found guilty of drug trafficking.

To make matters worse, when those same drug traffickers are eventually let out and arrive back in South Africa, we whinge about the media covering the great homecoming as though the convicted drug trafficker was a returning war hero.

If the convicted drug trafficker is one of our kids we thank the media for their compassion.

Where I live, we have a problem with baboons wrecking homes and turning over garbage bins - scattering rubbish all over the place.

There are two kinds of people down here. Those who have not had a baboon wreck their homes and who whinge about people who don't like baboons, coming up with all sorts of arguments about baboons being here first and that we are living in their territory. And that we should actually hug them when they trash our houses.

A contrary lot

Then there are those who have had their houses trashed by baboons and who, in the space of less than an hour, turn from serial baboon huggers into Rambo vigilantes armed with airguns, catties, big sticks and calling for all baboons to be banished to the Overberg or just plain shot, depending on the extent of the damage caused.

In nutshell, its strikes me that we South Africans are an extremely contrary lot who can change colour faster than chameleon on tik.

In fact, I really am beginning to worry that we are starting to out-whinge the Poms.

Next time I bump into an Australian I'll ask him what he thinks.

[G-force]

I read that one of the complainants (with the traffic story) laid the complaint and one of the arrested was his/her daughter.

[Sean Murphy]

A good column that I think hits many nails pretty squarely.

However, I also believe that many motorists have a point when they bitch about traffic law enforcement. I think this is the case because the laws of our roads seems to get enforced very selectively and this is true speciffically when it comes to extracting money from motorists. It seems that the various traffic authorities spend a disproportionate amount of effort carrying out enforcement where the greatest amount of money can be collected for the least amount of effort. This particularly annoying when we see the least amount of improvement in the driving habbits of motorists for this proffitable effort. It is as if the authorities are looking to treat traffic offences as a sustainable income that can be managed but that they would never like to see illiminated.

This leads to the general public losing all respect for the law and this is the real tragedy of our poor law enforcement. We now have a situation where the public know they are wrong but still feel like they are the victims.

Sean.

[feroze]

JHB metro takes in R850 million a year (2009) in traffic fines, they not going to give it up. Other than saying not all bm drivers hog the road this article is pretty accurate

[Mad Irish]

A good column that I think hits many nails pretty squarely.

However, I also believe that many motorists have a point when they bitch about traffic law enforcement. I think this is the case because the laws of our roads seems to get enforced very selectively and this is true speciffically when it comes to extracting money from motorists. It seems that the various traffic authorities spend a disproportionate amount of effort carrying out enforcement where the greatest amount of money can be collected for the least amount of effort. This particularly annoying when we see the least amount of improvement in the driving habbits of motorists for this proffitable effort. It is as if the authorities are looking to treat traffic offences as a sustainable income that can be managed but that they would never like to see illiminated.

This leads to the general public losing all respect for the law and this is the real tragedy of our poor law enforcement. We now have a situation where the public know they are wrong but still feel like they are the victims.

Sean.

Obey the law; and you won't be stopped......however selectively the laws are enforced.

The same goes for the traffic demerit system where unions are up in arms that people will lose their jobs if they lose their licenses. If the job is that important, they should not break the law to have demerit points against their licenses. Essentially, they are whingeing that they will be punished for breaking the law.

[Paul]

Guys, the OP makes some flawed assumptions and draws ridiculous conclusions.

The motorists broke the law. Absolutely. No question about it.

They didn't, however, travel down the wrong side of the road or in a wrong lane, and they didn't impede other traffic or give rise to a significantly more hazardous traffic situation.

In the interests of keeping the traffic flowing they passed the backed up traffic turning out of their lane by creating two lanes out of one and allowed one set of wheels to cross the barrier line for a brief period. They could have/should have been fined for crossing a solid white line.

Was this an arrestable offence? No!

Did the JMPD overstep the mark and make a major incident out of a triviality? Certainly!

JMPD seems to be by turns either corrupt or officious. I wish someone would re-orient them.

[shooter]

I agree, most winging is unwarranted and when you are wrong, you are wrong.

The example whinge below though does not help to give the authorities the moral high ground. Similar stuff happens every day in traffic and nothing happens to these guys.

Today a taxi made its own third lane to my left at an intersection, almost crashed into my ass and then the curb while swerving out because I did not yield for this POS (taxi was empty, on his way to another pick-up I guess). Then he and another one proceeded to run a 100% red light at the next intersection while chasing each other. Did I mention he was on a cellphone during this?

[BigT]

Unfortunately from what I have observed in general the reason only five or six taxi's were pulled over wasnt that taxis werent causing issues, but rather that metro try ignore them as best they can.

[feroze]

.....nothing happens to these guys.

Just because somebody refuses to obey laws doesn't give everybody the right to break them. I'd say most people belong to civil society, and they act like they do. And if you don't then you cannot point a finger and say its okay because they are doing it, at what point do you draw the line, which laws are ok for you to break but not someone else. Rather stay on this side of the line, you'll be better off.

[ikor]

All true to one extent or another. Still...Safo's got a LOOOOOOOONG way to go before they can hope to out-whinge the Poms!