Women Drivers. Truth or Fiction?
 

I ran across this video featuring women driving poorly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stMtDzeEq_s

Firstly, are women thought to be bad drivers in your country, too, or is it just a USA thing?

Secondly, how did this idea of women can't drive come about if they pay less insurance costs because they are less of a risk on the road?

Men are by far the most dangerous behind the wheel - that has to be the worst driving!

I think generally they are more cautious than men, less aggression, less speeding, less overtaking etc, hence why they are considered safer. But it's the smaller low speed parking maneuvers they seem to struggle with, especially those that involve reversing, they just don't have the same coordinates as men. My mum openly admits she can't reverse and purposely avoids single track roads incase she has to reverse, her friends are the same.

Not all women drivers are like this of course, I have a friend who's in the Racing series Clio cup, she can probably outdrive and outpark most male drivers. Swings and roundabouts as they say here ;)

It's true! There really are women drivers! My wife hates reverse as well. Other than that it's 100% though. Off topic, what does the phrase swings and roundabouts mean? We have roundabouts here although they are rare thankfully but nothing to relate swings and cars.

Swings and roundabouts refers to a children's play area with swings and roundabouts, it's the same as saying horses for courses, implying different race horses perform better on different race tracks than on others. Get my drift?

Ok, I was thinking playground swings as the only swing I could think of, well other than a baseball swing and that definitely wasn't it, and roundabouts I guess are what we'd call a merry go round. Those were fun as a kid to see just how fast you could get it going and how dizzy by the time it stopped. I was thinking roundabout like on a roadway though and trying to link them both to driving. It makes sense now.

We have plenty of female users on this site, so let's ensure we keep this thread civil.

Slightly related (triggered by what I saw in vid)- why is it in the event of a collision, even the slightest fender bender, diver's immediately stop and get out of car, right there in the middle of the road/intersection/etc? "HEY! I JUST HIT YOU! WANT TO STAY RIGHT WHERE WE ARE AND HOPE FOR MORE??" lol. I can understand if the vehicle becomes disabled, but I see it often here with minor collisions as well. I realize a vehicle accident will hold you up, but why hold everyone else up as well?

Having been in a few accidents myself, I can tell you that shock tends to get the better of you, instinct takes over and gets you out of the situation before you've had time to think. Also, if/when airbags go off, in the panic, you tend to think the car is on fire as they are covered in talc to prevent them sticking, and also there is residue from the explosives. I burnt my wrist on an airbag once, they hurt more than you think, far from soft!

Also you may notice in some accidents, after a collision the car will then shoot off again. This is because you instinctly brace in an impact, and usually accidentally hit the gas as your legs go completely rigid (as does the rest of your body) another reasons why automatics are dangerous. I was in a crash in my mums automatic, and after we'd finished rolling over and landing upside down, my foot was unknowingly on the gas, engine bouncing on the limiter!

Of course! You know us! ;)

Ehhh... I think that's a theory, but I'd wager that in most minor collisions the driver is slamming on the brakes. Which is why most rear-end situations are worse than they should be. Look at the video of the T-Bone incident. They both slammed on their brakes. The driver who got hit is lucky she didn't get hit in the Driver's door. I'd bet if she had slammed on the gas instead of the brake, she may have reduced the amount of damage done.
Going back to a rear-end situation- Assuming the victim of the rear end sees the other vehicle coming up behind them too quickly, instead of standing on the brake, they could let off and attempt to roll to the side/shoulder.
Same goes for the driver who is inevitably about to rear end someone. Instead of slamming into the other driver directly in the center of the mass, I was taught to steer to the right (in most cases, left if there's an empty lane) shoulder to either A- avoid impact entirely, or B- clip corners instead of head-on smash. Again, split second decision making is necessary, and not everyone thinks about it.

I've been behind the wheel with friends who flipped out when the guy in front of me slammed on their brakes last minute. I veered right into the shoulder and avoided contact completely. It bought me that extra foot or two of ground to come to a complete stop. They all thought for sure we were going to impact. None of them had ever heard of moving away from the impending doom. :lol:

There are two types of people when an accident is about to occur, brakers and swervers. I too am a swerver, but be warned, the energy involved in throwing your car in a certain direction can make the car accelerate in said direction too. I've become a bit obsessed with car accidents and how they occur since my big smash, I watch hours of Russian dash cam footage, find it fascinating! But as you say, it happens in a fraction of a second, you don't think, you just do, but it's surprising how your mind takes control. In my accident (which happened when a women driver hit us, coincidentally) the initial impact took both my steering and brakes on one side, even though I tried to brake, I felt the car swerve towards the side the brakes were working on, towards a cliff, so I came off the brakes and accepted we were going to roll over instead, then embraced and prayed my death was quick and painless. Crazy what you think in a blink of an eye!

It has to do more with the person. What kind of person the woman or man is. Where I live now. There are enough who act like they're afraid to drive.

I do admit. Women all over this country tend to argue more when they're wrong. So face it: When they're wrong....they're righter.

I went to traffic school in So. Cal. once. A ticket for 75 in a 65 zone. We had to introduce ourselves and say what we did. Repeatedly.... I'd hear these sweet innocent little voices in the back saying things like: "I was doing 115 on I5 in San Clemente"... Or.. "I was doing 105 on the 405 in Santa Monica".... I was sitting there thinking.... Geesh...If I got caught doing that. They would have thrown me in jail.

I was talking with a couple Vietnamese co-workers. There is a part of Orange County known as Little Saigon. I asked them about the drivers there as I knew they were awful.
One said: "There's something wrong with your country. You give them license. They shouldn't have license!"
Second one said: "I didn't know until I drove in Little Saigon. You take a left turn from the right lane. You take a right turn from the left lane."

Comedian Bill Burr claims there's no middle ground with Asian drivers. Either they can't drive OR they drive as seen in the movie "Fast and Furious / Tokyo Drift". (shrug)

Let's also note that the video shows 11? accidents. I counted 5 where it's not clear if it was a woman driving and 1 where it is most definitely a man driving (the van turns in front of another driver at the end).

So let's not get too stereotypical here. As someone else pointed out, they generally get cheaper insurance premiums, that at least means that the cost of accidents caused by women is most definitely cheaper.

There are some very bad drivers out there, both male and female, I see a lot of bad male drivers, including a lot of commercial drivers, taxis and vans, for example where the quality of driving is atrocious.

I think the police should have the option to force someone to retake the test if they are caught driving without due care and attention.

Here in Ireland "back in 1979 anywhere from 25,000 to 50,000 driving licences were given out to those who had never taken a test" So we have a bit of an excuse.

Oliver.