drinking and driving is extremely unsafe. but, you can go for years and years of doing it, and be fine every single time. every time you do it successfully, you get more brave, more sure that you are fine. i am a neurotic sleeper and i need to be in the right condition to sleep or else i wont sleep. so i used to justify it as i need to drive home so i can sleep.

i dont do it any more, too may buddies of mine have gotten DUIs and a girl i dated was killed by a drunk driver. i risked it too many times, and im lucky no one was ever hurt. and i didnt get caught. those days are long gone.

its not fuckin worth it. think about it next time.

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You're a sick bastard.

I responded to hundreds of alcohol related accidents during my EMS career. I've seen more than my share of dead or mangled individuals because of alcohol. You know what? I still have nightmares. It's been over 10 years since my last EMS call and I can still see the faces of some of these people. Stupid not, they're still a human being.

That's still someone's son. Someone's daughter. Someone's husband or wife. They made a bad decision, and paid a serious price. You're going to judge their entire existence because of that? I hated the ones that hurt someone else because they were drunk with every ounce of my being, but I still did everything I could do to save their life.

Good to know that you're such a virtuous individual that you can pass judgement on another. We should all aspire to be such a glorious individual like yourself.

Yeah, that's really messed up. Any one of those DWI's could have been a damn saint but made one fatal stupid decision. Are you really that high and mighty? I agree with Squanto. Yes drinking and driving is a terrible thing but it doesn't characterize a person's life. I had never before gotten a single ticket and then a year and a half ago I got a DWAI. I was at a bar, a fight broke out and decided to leave. I live one block away from the bar in an area where no one is out and about walking. Cops pulled me over because they thought one of the guys fighting was trying to leave. That decision on my part sure as hell doesn't characterize me as a person. Same thing if you were to take one really good thing I have done and paint me as a saint. We're all more than just one decision or one event.

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I understand 1980. If you've gotta deal with dead bodies all the time, you're going to be desensitized. Why would the first ones that you didn't feel sorry for not be the ones who did something stupid as shit first?

Mistake or not, it's not like it's the first time or they were unaware of problems with drunk driving. If I was in the position that I was seeing dead every day, I'd certainly feel more and longer to the innocent casualties.

By the way, a DWAI is not even comparable to a DWI. If you have a couple glasses of wine with dinner, leave the restaurant, and forget your turning signal and get pulled over, a douchebag powerhungry cop can give you a DUAI for blowing a .01 when God and all his followers know that had nothing to do with it.

I blew a .16. Most people that get a lawyer and have no prior offenses can plead out to a DWAI....which I did. I could have very easily been given a DWI but luckily my background, clean record and education influenced the judge into giving me a break. I shouldn't have been driving at all, I know that. That being said, I live right around the corner and it's a pretty lonely quarter mile, not a suburb or anything. I keep a breathalizer in my Jeep just in case now and even if I have one drink I'll blow just to be sure I'm under .08.

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if you were only a block, why wouldn't you just walk? maybe i'm not a good impartial party. i lost my figurative big brother when i was 15 so i count and make sure i can drive.

Like I said, dumb decision. At the time I was thinking that my wife wouldn't be too happy to know first that I drank more than usual, second she wouldn't think it was very cool to drink to the point I had to leave my Jeep at the bar and lastly it was thanksgiving the next day and I needed to pick up my sister-in-law from the airport in the morning. I just thought that I was okay to drive such a short distance. If I had a longer drive then no way but around the block I though it would be okay. Turned out to be a big mistake but at the time I wasn't even worrying about being pulled over or safety.

The point is that I made a shitty decision but it doesn't sum up who I am as a whole. Over simplifying the point and essentially saying that a dead DWI had it coming is sick. Plus, when you show up to the scene and haven't had a BAC done...how do you know the person had way too much or was just over the limit? Was it something the person did all the time or did they make a crappy decision after an office party? Seems like a lot of assuming to me.

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maybe it's just reading tones, but to me the only oversimplifying was those who were mad at 1980. i dunno. no one is happy that people die...but if you see this all the time, you have to find some way to cope.

doctors often crack jokes about patients and do not feel anything when they lose drug addicts and stuff to OD's, but might bawl when they lose a kid who has a terminal disease. it's just being human.

I don't agree with that from my experience. I worked in inpatient and outpatient substance abuse clinics and in hospitals. My wife has also worked in hospitals for years and most of my friends work in medical fields. I have never seen a doctor, tech or nurse "not care" when we lost someone to an OD or to withdrawals. Is it worse when it's a kid or a mother? Of course but to not have any feelings when you see a deceased drunk driver is sick. My ER and EMT friends hate drunk drivers but even then their feelings when they are confronted with a drunk driver's death is a mixed bag of anger and sadness. At the end of the day it is still a person lying there.

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Exactly.

I clearly remember an accident on the 33 at the 198 split. Car plowed right into the barrels at the split. Woman in her mid 40s, groggy as hell, smelled like wine coolers. Cops had her up and walking around the accident scene before we even got there, which is a big no-no, because they thought she was just some crazy dunk lady.

Turns out she was in hyperglycemia because of diabetic ketoacidosis. Not a drop of alcohol in here system.

It really scares me to think that there are emergency responders out there that are playing favorites based on unverified assumptions. Triaging based on guesses at how much someone has been drinking and a personal dislike of DUI's also seems irresponsible.

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Squanto, DF -

You guys are making some big assumptions now. Working a fatal wreck involves multiple tasks. EMS is usually there first and already treating injured. I would have to start working on other things initially, anywhere from assessing safety risks (gasoline leaks, other traffic, etc), interviewing witnesses, coordinating perimeters, taking measurements. I can't possibly list them all. No matter who is involved, I can't start focusing on the victims and fail to do my job. Certainly - and this pisses me off that you guys would assume this - I wouldn't fail to perform CPR or whatever life-saving efforts were necessary. The DWI crashes I refer to are the ones where open and broken alcohol is all over the place and the bodies reak of it.

I've done CPR well after I knew they were dead, just in case somehow I might be wrong and EMS might be able to do more once they arrive. I've picked up body parts that were missed by fire/ems and rushed to the ER in case they were still needed. I picked through bloody car interiors to find something important that a loved one wanted to remember somebody by. Fuck you all to hell if you seriously want to assume that I didn't do everything I could in those scenarios.

Doing your job and what you feel about it are two different things though. The robbers that got shot in the process, the ones that splattered themsleves against a tree trying to speed away, they are just part of my job. The little kids that got smeared on the road, or shot from a stray bullet from one of the above, etc...they are the ones that you can't help but have to take a deep breath before finishing the call, and think about after. There IS a distinction between the ones that caused their own fate, and the ones that suffered because of those actions. Either you guys can't relate, or just enjoy sniping at me at every chance since you both think I'm a huge asshole.

Saying this man deserves his death makes you a huge asshole.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

I didn't say he deserved it, I said he (and anyone in general) evenatually has it coming to them if they drive DWI and recklessly. The odds are bound to catch up at some point.

I think this quote is what people are jumping on 1980

This type of statement can be taken that you not only don't care if these people die but in fact think they deserved it. Like B&Y said, it makes you sound like a big asshole. I agree with you in all respects about drinking and driving and i think most people here do as well. Everything except that quote.

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I never assumed (or implied) that you didn't do anything you could for a victim of an accident. So I won't even comment on that.

My objection is that you aren't bothered in the slightest, by your own words, for some of these people. Yes, they caused their own situation by their own choices, but how it couldn't bother you, even in the slightest, about a person's life snuffed our, whatever the circumstances, is beyond me.

Well, I read some nasty stuff in your readings that kind of sounded like you think he deserved it. Like the example Displaced Fan pulled out.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

You reap what you sow. That's pretty much all there is to it. Yes, it sucks.

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Yup. There's also the legal ramifications. Let's say I'm sober and driving the speed limit, safely, hands at 10 and 2 on the wheel. Then some car veers in my lane and I run through a pile of leaves on the side of the road to miss him. And there was a kid playing in that pile of leaves and he's now dead. It's a tragedy. Obviously everyone is more sad about losing the kid than anything else, but the parents feel sorry for me. Everyone feels sorry for me. Nobody even considers any charges of any kind.
Okay let's do a do-over where I have 4 beers beforehand. Soon I will be entering a court building in shackles and a bullet-proof vest, facing 15 to life or something, because I am now the scourge of the earth. Is this fair? Arguably not, but it's a pretty damn good deterent in my mind.

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This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it.
--Emerson

Because I don't feel any special sorrow about them doesn't mean I'm judging their entire existence. I'm simply not moved for them in that moment.

It's good that you would still do your job despite how you felt...so would I. Typing that sentence though does imply that you thought otherwise.

This happens all the time in here. I post something that doesn't sit well with you or DF, and I get the riot act back at me. People jump to conclusions and it all goes down hill. If something doesn't read well, just simply ask for some clarification instead of calling me a "sick bastard". Is that really so hard? And what if I was really just totally desensitized? Does that really make someone a "sick bastard" because that's how they get through their day/week/month. I know a few officers like that, close to retirement (30 years here). They're perfectly good men that are simply mentally drained, not twisted assholes.