USE AND MISUSE,

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 214, 29 November 1927, Page 6

USE AND MISUSE,

THE DRIVING OF CARS. EFFECT ON CHARACTER. Tt has long been tacitly recognised, llthough not so often stated, that when j man gets a car for himself he acquires a perfect means for the expression of his characterEveryone is bound to admit that no •ransportation medium of the past lias iver had anywhere near the capabili‘ics for use and misuse that the motor-car-now offers, and the judgment of a nan by others, as to whether he is a 4ood or bad operator, will always be jased upon how he expresses himself by the use of his car. Character as used in this connection must not be confused with morality. Bather, the word includes, besides common attributes, all those individualities and idiosyncracies which, while not always reprehensible in themselves, make their possessor enough different from other men in reaction to take him out of the average and place him in the class of the potentially unsuccessful or unsafe. This average of performance is fortunately high. There is only a minimum of people who are bad. According to statistics about 85 per cent, of all drivers have those qualities which make them desirable, while out of the 15 per cent, remaining the whole gamut from a slight tendency towards absentmindedness to actual criminality is run. The safety and transportation problem is to make more people attain the average. The means used to secure that end are education, discipline and general character building. All this is readily apparent to any thoughtful reader, but what is not so plain, but nevertheless worthy of note is what driving a car does to a man. No person can successfully operate an automobile without correct reactions to the various situations in which he is bound to find himself. These are primarily mental, but followed by the correct physical application to accomplish the indicated result they must be correct or safety is sacrificed.

On the level, some cars can go any Where in high gear.