Depending on location, a bicycle is not a viable alternative. Driving is a condition of living if food is 30 minutes of driving into town.

I’m am not advocating for lax DUI laws, but a driving ban is the equivalent of house arrest or forced relocation for some people/locations unless they have people who can help them with transportation.

Moving to a city with public transit would provide the most autonomy, but would also mean uprooting one’s life, leaving family behind, etc.

The total impact is indeed very harsh, even if it is necessary for the safety of others.

>>Depending on location, a bicycle is not a viable alternative.

I understand. That doesn't change my stance on the matter.

> get a bicycle or something

So the suggestion was untenable from the start.

Driving drunk should be penalized, even harshly. But people should have a chance at rehabilitation.

In a car dependent society/region, a permanent ban without an opportunity for reform is cruel and unusual punishment.

If self driving cars were 100% here right now, or if we had better public transportation, I think it’d be a different story.

What about my right not to be murdered by a habitual drunk driver?

All rights are a balancing act between the rights of the individual and the rights of society. Thinking about them as one or the other is a pretty dangerous line of thinking IMHO.

If it makes you feel any better, you don't have much of a right in the US not to be murdered by habitually sober drivers either [0-4].

Other drivers are often very aggressive [5], there's not all that much you can do to mitigate harm at the time, there's practically nothing you can do to discourage that bad behavior if they didn't actually crash into anything, and even if they do your options can be limited.

[0] https://www.startribune.com/probation-for-negligent-truck-dr...

[1] https://www.annarbor.com/news/motorist-sentenced-to-probatio...

[2] https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/driver-in-hit-and-run-that...

[3] https://www.fox2detroit.com/news/driver-in-crash-that-killed...

(if you kill enough children you can get a little jailtime, but again the fact that you were driving really dials back the sentencing) [4] https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/man-accused-in-deadly-wi...

[5] Not a source; I'm just appalled at the utter disregard for human life I see every time I compare SF drivers to the rest of the country. It's not everywhere that you'll see a car speed >60mph around the shoulder (dodging pedestrians) to pass the car stopped waiting for the kids to cross at the well-marked flashing crosswalk in their school zone, but that level of misbehavior is commonplace here. Why? Is it a sampling artifact? Other major cities don't _seem_ so bad in comparison.

I can’t compare directly to SF, but I’ve noticed a similar trend in Chicago. Drivers here have always been a bit aggressive, but in years past, I wouldn’t have classified it as downright dangerous.

The things I see now are mind bogglingly stupid and dangerous.

I was specifically addressing the argument that driving drunk should automatically result in a permanent ban regardless of frequency.

If it’s happening habitually, the penalties are generally more severe, and that seems reasonable.

If someone reforms themselves, gets sober, stays sober and can prove that, they’re no longer a habitual drunk driver.

To add to a sibling comment, the level of distracted driving happening right now is insane. I’ve been almost hit as a pedestrian and as a cyclist about a half dozen times in the past year due to drivers looking anywhere but at the road. Something changed during/after lockdowns. I think people got more addicted to their devices, and take that on the road with them.

IMO, DUI needs to roll up to a “driving while dangerously distracted” category. Checking instagram, FaceTiming, etc. while driving is as dangerous as driving drunk, and seems to be happening everywhere.

To be clear, my argument is not that people should be excused for bad behavior. But penalties need to be balanced against basic human rights, and should be applied fairly to bad driving behavior across the board.

Take a ride on a tall (or double decker) bus, and just look down into random people's cars as they drive. Last time I did that, I'd say close to 80% of the drivers were scrolling through social media or texting while they were driving. It's a massive problem, and I agree it should be treated exactly like DUI and people should have their licenses revoked for repeatedly doing it. Playing with your phone while driving is probably even more dangerous than DUI because it's been so normalized that people doing it don't even realize how much of a menace they are.

We have ruined people's lives in this country for selling a bit of weed, but we wouldn't want to disrupt someone's life too much if they drove drunk THREE times!

[delayed]

> Driving drunk is stupid, dangerous, and should involve serious penalties. We should not ruin people’s lives over it.

After getting caught 3 times doing it? Meaning they do it very frequently and will never stop doing it? It's not an innocent mistake at this point.

Yes driving privileges should absolutely be revoked over it and if that ruins their life maybe they should have thought about the consequences of their actions?

I'd argue that we should ruin people's lives over it. Why stop driving drunk if there are no serious consequences?

Texting while driving (or other similar distractions) results in slower reaction times for drivers than even drunk drivers. Yet it doesn't carry the same stigma. I would even guess a big portion of the people who have absolute disdain for drunk driving are guilty of distracted driving from time to time.

I don't know what the answer to that is, since it's more difficult to catch and prove But at the least we should all call out our friends or family if we see them doing it, the same way we would if they were about to drive while drunk.

This is going to sound maybe insensitive but I've noticed driving drunk is a cultural thing. I've been with certain groups of people and pretty much it seems everyone and their cousin has a DUI and no one regarded it as a major crime.

It sounds crazy but I bet if you were born 40 years earlier, you wouldn't care. Drunk driving wasn't even a thing until Mothers Against Drunk Driving made it a thing in the 80s.

I don't support drunk driving at all but it seems our views on right and wrong are just products of society, lol.

There's also drunk driving the crime and drunk driving the act.

What I mean by this is that when people go out to eat lunch or dinner, they drive to the restaurant. They obviously need to drive back when they're done. They obviously also had some good drinks while they were there; beer, wine, the works. Even just a sip of alcohol will count as drunk driving, legally speaking.

The police largely turn a blind eye to this, because it's so utterly commonplace and a fact and part of life that policing this would quickly lead to a community and public revolt. Restaurants also happily serve alcohol because drunk driving is not their problem, and restaurants that don't will quickly go out of business anyway.

On the other side of the coin however, if you drive to a liquor store at an ungodly hour the police will be on you in an instant to check if you're driving drunk and arrest you if you are. Why? Because everyone wants or needs to eat and drink, but nobody needs to drop by a liquor store at 10pm.

The police will also check if you're driving drunk if they see you on the road and it's blatantly obvious you can't drive straight. This should go without saying, though; and it means most people who drink at restaurants can drive safe (FSVO safe).

Obligatory IANAL, obligatory don't drink and drive disclaimer.

In the US most states have a BAC requirement above 0.00 to be drunk driving (so "a sip" of alcohol doesn't qualify). Also the idea that no one should buy liquor at 10 pm or that it is strange to get drinks for someone's party is odd. Why would the liquor stores be open if no one needed liquor then?

Your statement seems pretty judgmental.

But yes, we agree don't drink and drive.

I speak from experience and what I've heard.

The police are almost never going to police restaurants, bars, wineries, and other such places even though there will obviously be plenty of potential drunk drivers to arrest. Meanwhile, a friend who parted ways with me after a night out stopped by a liquor store on the way home and was questioned and subsequently arrested (he was legally drunk) as he came out.

The point of this story is that the law states absolutely clearly that noone is allowed to drink and drive. On the other hand, practicality and reality means police will turn a blind eye to certain areas while enforcing the law elsewhere; knowing this is how the real world works is handy and important for what I hope are obvious reasons.

There are absolutely states where if the officer says you are impaired, you are going to jail. Even if you blow 0.00. Will you be convicted? Probably not but you’ll still get to deal with court costs and paying a few grand to a lawyer. Oh and you get to explain an arrest, that can never be expunged, for the rest of your life.

Why would you have to explain an arrest? And how does that differ from being arrested for a murder you didn't commit and being sent to jail?

Reminds me of what my dad told me on drunk driving: "It is no longer safe to drink and drive. It used to be the worst that was likely to happen was you would wrap your car around an oak tree and that would be one less idiot in the world. Now the roads are full and you are likely to hurt or kill somebody else."

and I'm sure there's a different timeline where you're a serial rapist.

It's irrelevant to the time and place that we live in now, and drunk drivers are a menace that should be purged from our streets.

It's a good point.. furthermore, there have been studies that show texting or other distractions while driving are considerably worse, but you don't see many people arguing for someone to lose their license when they text while driving

Drunk driving is way more common than you might think.

If we’re ready to cut off ~10% (or more) of drivers for life, we should bite the bullet and mandate ignition interlocks.

Driving is a privilege, not a right. But enforcement needs to help people make the right choice, not just be a lottery for ruining lives in car-dependent places (unfortunately most of the US).

I've mentioned it before on this forum, but before I was a software developer I spent over 10 years as a land surveyor.

I mention that because it involves a lot of road layout and roadside work setting control points, &c. I used to find so many empty flasks of booze, empty syringes, and empty pill bottles in the weeds on the side of the road that drivers had thrown out the windows of their vehicles. Even in some rural areas this was the case.

The point is that there's still a lot of Americans driving impaired. There's a certain amount of risk involved in operating or riding in a vehicle even if you are stone cold sober. You never know if other drivers are impaired until it's too late.

I was curious how many people caught driving durnk go on to drive drunk again, and a NHTSA study found an average of about 25 percent of people arrested for drunk driving had a prior arrest. About 30 percent of people with a drunk driving conviction had a prior conviction [0]. This is pretty high. I'm not sure if it's high enough to warrant a permanent ban, but long-term suspensions and mandatory interlocks seem justifiable.

(Edit) As philwelch points out, the recidivism rate of all drunk drivers is technically different than that of first-time offenders. Accounting for this doesn't seem to wildly change the recidivism rate, though.

[0]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.gov/files/documents/811991...

“Proportion of offenders who previously offended” is not necessarily an indication of “proportion of first-time offenders who will reoffend”.

That's a good point. Since it's looking at offenders and not offenses, I don't think they can diverge too much (but perhaps I'm not thinking of the math correctly). I did find a study looking at just first-time offenders, which found a similar level after five years: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3095888/figure/....

Being drunk on a bike is probably even more dangerous than drunk driving a car. Unfortunately, one doesn't need a license to use public roads with a bicycle.

More dangerous for whom?

Dangerous for all parties involved. Being out in the open with no safety belt, no crumple zones, a bicyclist can be easily killed in an accident. Drivers attempting to swerve out of the way can cause a greater accident with other vehicles, not to mention the possibility of killing a bicyclist. Add to that, the hypothetical of riding a bicycle while drunk, you've now just worsened the problem.

Moral of the story: don't drive drunk, don't ride a bike drunk. Ideally, don't get drunk at all, but if you do, don't operate any kind of vehicle.

Distracted driving is just as bad (or worse) than drunk driving in terms of reaction time. Texting, social media, doing makeup, fiddling with stereo/maps. People routinely do these things and while they are doing them, they are putting themselves and other drivers at serious risk. And yet they don't carry anywhere near the same stigma as drunk driving. My point is, if you're going to be that draconian about drunk driving punishment, you'd better be consistent and adopt the same attitude towards people who text and do tiktoks while behind the wheel.

Personally I don't think either should result in losing a license, at least not for the first offense