Sign Of The Times

Walk/Don’t Walk signs can be very helpful when crossing a street. Like stop lights for automobiles they help control the flow of traffic. Without them it would be close to impossible to get across a busy intersection. They are really convenient when intersections have turn arrows for automobiles. Even should cross traffic be at a stop nothing can ruin a day like being hit by a car turning into the path we’re walking.

But are they absolutely necessary? 

I’m talking about when the walk path is clear, no cars are coming –or are a significant distance away to not cause injury or death- and the sign indicates “Don’t Walk”. Should we stay or should we go? Should we cross the street because we can or should we stay put because the sign says so? Do we put all our faith and trust in a machine to tell us when to walk safely or should we use our own intellectual abilities to reason as to when it is safe to walk? When the sign says emphatically “Don’t Walk” although our intellect tells us it is safe to do so, do we obey the sign or our own confidence in accomplishing the task before us, that being crossing the street safely?

I do not raise these questions idly. I have too often seen people standing at a street corner with no oncoming traffic and not attempting to cross for no other reason than that a little square box with a red phrase told them not to walk. These people put more faith in that mechanical sign than in their own common sense. They obey a machine that tells them not to do something they clearly could do instead of obeying themselves.

What does this say about humanity when they more readily obey a machine, while helpful is not the final say on our behavior, instead of our own common sense? What does this say about people who defer solely to a machine instead of themselves when they could clearly make a decision to take the initiative and override the machine’s instructions?

Are we getting too good at following orders? Are we becoming so good at being told what to do that we cannot cross a street confidently without first getting an other’s permission? In this case a machine’s permission? What does it say about us if we cannot act of our own volition but must wait for permission to do something we are clearly capable of doing all by ourselves? 

If we cannot cross the street safely without first getting someone or something else’s permission what more does that say about our individual abilities? Can we trust the people to critically think? Take the initiative? Problem solve? Take responsibility? Question Authority?

One can tell a lot about a person just by the way they cross a street. And what it tells us isn’t good.

And election day is coming up.