Rusty Saber: Road rage rogues come in varied forms

Rusty Saber pop-quiz: Which of the following is most irritating? A. Telemarketers, B. Political Attack ads, C. Road Rage, D. All of the Above. Conventional wisdom might lead to the conclusion that all three are equally annoying; thus, the answer is D. Both A and B are as irritating as irritating can be, but neither is likely to cause bodily harm or death. Not so with road rage: If you answered C, you aced the quiz.

Most everyone who drives or rides in a car has encountered some form of road rage. I have been on the receiving end of venom from the lips of road rage rogues (my term) because I have committed such grievous malfeasance as driving at the posted speed limit. I caused another driver to erupt like a red-hot volcano because I had the audacity to stop at an intersection just as the light turned red, keeping the driver from running the red light, which he apparently believed was his God-given right.

Once, I merged into the vacant lane next to me, causing the road rage rogue who was about half a block behind me to go ballistic; I assume he believed this lane to be his private domain.

My most recent encounter with a road rage rogue was this very week. With malice aforethought, I went through a four-way stop intersection when it was my turn. A teenager, who thought his turn came whenever he wanted to take it, honked his horn and flashed his single-digit IQ at me. He was shouting something that I presume comes from the lips of one with a single-digit IQ. I'm probably lucky he didn't crash his pickup into me.

I believe road rage is a more complex issue than drivers becoming irate because other drivers stand in their way of doing what they want to do when they want to do it. My theory (we academic types always have theories) is that this is only one face of road rage; I call it Reactive Road Rage. It takes actions by someone else to trigger the rage, hence a reaction, sometimes violent, to the event (it sounds like I actually know what I'm talking about). Another genre is Proactive Road Rage. No event is necessary to trigger their rage. They are so aggressive that they initiate rage with little or no provocation. They act, daring others to become reactive.

I suppose the worst case scenario is when a proactive road rage rogue encounters a reactive one; get out of the way. It's demolition derby time.

My theory began to take shape recently when I clipped a couple of articles about the dangers police and fire officials face when duty calls for them to be outside their vehicles on streets or highways. Proactive ragers rear their ugly heads at such times. One Illinois state trooper is quoted as saying that he has a better chance of being struck by a car than a bullet. Another officer reports that it is rare for cars to yield to police and other emergency vehicles. He says many drivers ignore emergency vehicles, failing to pull over to let them go by. These are proactive road rage rogues, nothing slows them down.

A Chicago fireman was killed by another proactive rager who sped past flares and emergency lights and crashed into the back of the firetruck.

Within the next 12 hours in the Chicago area, a sheriff's deputy was killed as he helped a tow truck driver at the side of the road, and a firefighter and a paramedic were seriously injured by speeding cars. Proactive road rage rogues at work.

Chicago doesn't have a corner on the market of nincompoop drivers. A Washington, D.C., firefighters union official said that it's becoming more and more difficult to get to fires."The community as a whole has gotten to the point where they ignore warning devices the same way they ignore traffic lights," he said.

A Boston fireman says that drivers often speed up and deliberately drive over firehoses. If there are people who go out of their way to run over firehoses, why am I not surprised that one will make an obscene gesture as I go through a four-way stop intersection when it's my turn?

The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund reports that last year, 20 police officers were killed while outside their police cars. An Arkansas state policeman said, "I'm amazed at how many troopers are killed strictly in accidents."

Something needs to be done to rid ourselves of road rage rogues, be they proactive, reactive or both.

(Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury University and a Springfield public relations consultant.)