His claim is that we need to raise the legal driving age from what it is now. It seemed that the general population that responded did not agree primarily those who are parents of teen drivers.
In his reasonings he gives some statistics that "the rate of crashes, fatal and nonfatal, per mile driven for 16-year-old drivers is almost 10 times the rate for drivers ages 30 to 59" and that traffic accidents are the leading killer of american teens. I like how on the subject for his reasons he didn't just give negative reasons but that he gave some of the positive benefits that would come from raising the age. although some of them were more assuming than more facts. none the less it at least made me think about those things such as traffic and the assumption that the teenagers would increase there cardiovascular activities more. Over all I felt that he did give some good reasons, and specifically at the beginning of his article, he presented his reasons and assumptions well, but for some reason on his last paragraph he seemed to lose some of my trust. he seemed to be very one sided and I feel he didn't think much about what his audience that will have differing opinions claimed. Example as I read I was often saying in my mind "But what about....." He should have read read Writing and Rhetoric haha :)
Here is some food for thought. He claims that the rate of accidents for sixteen-year-olds is ten times that of 30 to 59 year-olds. If you assume that this is in part because the 30 to 59 year-olds are more experienced then the 16-year-olds then raising the driving age will only make drivers less experienced at a given time. Who is to say that a 16-year-old new driver is going to be any worse then a twenty-year-old new driver? Of course this is assuming that the primary factor that contributes to safety is experience and not another something else.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you both. It is a really good thing that the aritcle looked at the good and bad so that the claim did not seem unresearched. This would help the audience to trust the article I think, but then if they lose trust at the end that is obviously a bad tactic. The end needs to hit the message home!
ReplyDeleteAlso that is an interesting thought that Troy has. Personally I think that one of the reasons that teenagers have a higher rate of accidents is because they generally are not as responsible, yet I believe a lot of it is also due just to the fact that they are unexperienced. Why keep putting off teaching people to drive when the accidents are highy connected with experience and not age?
This is an interesting claim. I agree with Troy, if we keep on putting off teaching people how to drive until they are older, then they will be just as inexperienced and irresponsible as they were when they were younger. I like that he addressed both sides of the issue, but I believe his argument is still too weak to make any actual changes in driving age.
ReplyDeleteYeah Troy I thought the same thing! and if you read what other people had responded to the writers claim... many stated the same response... there is no need to put of the teaching.
ReplyDelete