Don't be so negative

We had the whole descendant family visiting in series and parallel over the holidays and inevitably (with my two week event horizon) people were remember whenning . . . events I didn't recall. One of the tasks I (was) volunteered for was to mind a neighbour's dog and cats. They live about a mile [1.5km] away and Green Me decide to toddle back and forth twice a day by shank's pony, rather than firing up the Little Red Yaris to drive. To make the Winter's day outdoors as long as possible I did my pet-duty in the gloaming. To get as much positive as possible from the experience I ran down the lane [300m] recovered my wind <puff puff> and then also ran along the section of "main" road [200m, slightly uphill] to limit my time in the peligro de muerte baol báis zone. Of course, the family insisted that I wear my Farmer's Journal /RSA Hi-Viz jacket. It's a desperate bit of road for pedestrians or cattle drovers because two relatively straight stretches are connected at a junction with a blind corner:

One evening, on my safe return, Dau.I shared the time when 10 y.o. her was walking the late lamented Rashers-the-Dog along that road when a boy-racer careened round the bend far too fast, missed the pedestrians by about 3m and elbowed into the fence at ⬇ stopped, got out, inspected the damage, and zoomed off on his urgent business. Not a glance at the girl  to ask if her PTSD was developing nicely!

Did someone mention the RSA, the Road Safety Authority? Every year about this time they count the bodies killed on Irish roads in the previous calendar year and see how we're doing on the lethal weapon stakes.

Whom	2019	2018	%diff
Drivers	81	56	45
Passengers	16	20	-20
Motorbikes	16	15	7
Pedalbikes	8	9	-11
Pedestrians	27	42	-36
TOTAL	148	142	4

Because RSA is a bit dull, they just report the data with some helpful interpretive glosses. The total fatalities are up, sure, but the average loss of life for each month is the same in 2019 as in 2018. Which encourages the belief that we're about the same as last year. And indeed, statistically [5 x 2 contingency table with Chi.Sq test] showing the expected values on the assumption / null-hypothesis that the values are the same in each category:

Whom	2019 (Exp)	2018 (Exp)	Row Tots
Driver	69.9	67.1	137
Passen	18.4	17.6	36
Mcycle	15.8	15.2	31
Bicycle	8.7	8.3	17
Pedest	35.2	33.8	69
TOTAL	148	142	290

Chi.sq = 8.2 p = 0.083. So 2019 v 2018 not significantly different overall using an appropriate statistical test. You'd be amazed if exactly the same number of people died each year, month, day, so you shd expect some differences just from sampling error and accidents like that of Boy-racer and Dau.I [above] that could have been a fatality but providentially were not.

But goddamn journalists don't do dull, they only do sensation and preferably a disaster. The Journal shamefully rotten-cherry picked the data to make this shouty headline:

45% increase in number of driver deaths

on Irish roads in 2019. 

Which is technically true but does not convey the boring reality. They could have mentioned that innocent by-standing pedestrians are 36% safer from the tyranny of the private car. I've sounded off a lot about road traffic accidents 2018 - 2017 - 2016 - 2015 - 2014 - 2013 [worse things than dying]. One of the shockin' good things is things are A Lot Better than in the past in 2005 there were 396 deaths on Irish roads 2.5x as many as last year. And, unbelievably, in the 1970s it was habitual to report 600 deaths a year . . . when there were fewer targets people and far fewer cars. I feel safer in 2020 already.

Another victim-blaming headline about death-by-car.