Your Speed

Cities and municipalities love using technology to keep people driving at the speed limit. In recent years, freeways, highways and surface streets have acquired strategically placed radar guns that check your speed and then display your speed in a box that says "Your Speed."

This is a strange strategy.

Every driver probably knows how fast he or she is going and probably has a sense of whether that speed is above or below the speed limit. So why project Your Speed for all to see? Do city officials think the public knowing my speed will keep the streets safe? This method of controlling traffic betrays a deep misunderstanding of the American consciousness. In four words: this is not Japan. The nail that sticks out the farthest does not get the hardest banging here. Or if it does, one could say that in America "there is no such thing as bad banging" because, as Martha Stewart showed us, getting a banging only makes your stock skyrocket.

The rationale behind the Your Speed system is probably something along these lines: When a motorist drives and sees his speed projected for all other motorists to see he'll be shamed into maintaining the speed limit. It's a quaint sort of Rousseauean idea that men will act for the greatest good if forced to consider the general will of speed limitation.

But considering the American psyche, broadcasting their speed for all to see is the best way to get citizens to drive erratically and dangerously. When I see one of these signs, I inevitably accelerate to a speed I never would have reached by myself in order to see my speed, my outrageously fast public speed, projected for all to see.

The modern American is not shamed into prudence by being in the public gaze. The opposite is true. There is not a single depraved thing a citizen wouldn't do to guarantee a spot in the public eye. Models eating maggot shakes, short Asian men impersonating Ricky Martin, Flavor Flav taking a crap — these people understand that in America the quickest way to get attention is not to be great, but to be awful.

The word "awful" originally meant a great and amazing thing — something that makes the beholder full of awe. For a while it came to mean something terrible and reprehensible, but the modern media have caused the second meaning to fold into the first. When people get awful, Americans get awe-full.

And when I pass by my speed, my first thought is not "Because my fellow citizens can see my speed, I should consider the public good of speed limits and slow down." I genuinely think, "Awesome! Everyone can see how fucking fast I'm going!" People probably wouldn't have loved The Fast and the Furious if it were titled The Regulated and the Reasonable. I could drive outrageously fast any time, but if I'm the only person who can see my speedometer, what's the point?

When my speedometer is reflected outside my car and the public sees my speed, I am a five-second superhero. I revel in the idea that every driver behind me will say "Oh, that Red Matrix is going so effing fast! Why can't I be seen going that fast?" And then, seconds later, that driver's wish is also granted because it is their turn in to see their speed. It is their turn to be the guest of honor at this magical procession of public spectacle. And by that point I've already passed my window of fame, and return to my alter ego as a law-abiding private citizen.

— Aemilia Scott (aemilia at flakmag dot com)

— graphic by Derek Evernden (derek@ocellus.net)