Inside: The Speed Demon Lifestyle: Why It Appeals, and Why It’s So Deadly. Collaborative post.
If you drive often, then you might see someone speed on the highway from time to time, or even on a city street. On a quiet street, maybe they’re going forty in a thirty-miles-per-hour zone. That’s a little fast, but usually not incredibly dangerous. However, out on the highway, maybe you see someone doing ninety in a sixty-five-mile-per-hour zone.
You can see that’s reckless. You probably want to get away from that person as quickly as possible. You can get into the slow lane and hope they’ll pass you by. You might also see such a person and wonder why they’re acting that way.
The speed demon lifestyle appeals, and some people can’t seem to ease up on the gas pedal, regardless of the situation in which they find themselves. They don’t care much about understanding school bus stop laws and similar concerns that only impact the law-abiding citizen. Instead, they seem to feel like they rule the road and can do anything they want.
In this article, we’ll talk about speed demons and explain some possible reasons why they act that way. We’ll also discuss the potential consequences if you decide you want to join their ranks.
Testing a Car’s Limits
If you ask any two people why they speed frequently while driving, you will probably get different answers. You might see someone who’s trying to get to work and they’re exceeding the speed limit because they don’t want their boss to notice them coming in late again.
That’s understandable, if unadvisable. However, you might also sometimes have an individual who wants to see what their car can do.
If someone buys a high-end sports car, and they see that it can go up to 160 miles per hour, then they might want to test that out. However, they know that they can’t legally do that on any road or highway in the United States.
In some countries, you have highways with no speed limits. You can’t find anything like that in America. That might not stop someone who feels the need for speed, though.
They might get out on the highway and floor it because they want to see if they can reach the vehicle’s top speed that they see on the odometer. It’s not smart, but some people do seem to think that way.
Defying the Law
Others may feel like the law does not mean anything to them. For whatever reason, they might think that it’s just a suggestion, and they scoff at it.
If so, then maybe they’re very wealthy. They might think that since they have so much money, they don’t need to follow the laws that the common people do.
Think about NFL or NBA players that end up on Sportscenter because they went 120-miles-per-hour in their new Ferrari in a school zone. It’s incredibly foolish, but they might think that since they just signed a 200-million-dollar deal, that the cops and no one else can touch them.
Feeling You’re Invincible
Others might speed because they think they’re invincible for some other reason. Maybe you have a CEO or an entrepreneur who just took the company public. They know that they just made a bundle, and they want to celebrate by pushing their car to the limit.
You might have someone who wants to show off as well. Perhaps they just picked up their Tinder date, and they want to show that they’re fun and have a sense of adventure. They might decide they should do that by gunning the motor and taking off at a much higher speed than the law allows.
These people feel they can dare the cops to catch them, and the authority figures they encounter just won’t do anything. It’s a form of thinking that makes little sense, but it seems to infect some people like a virus.
Alcohol and Drug Use
Other times, you might see someone speed excessively because they ingested alcohol or took some other drug before they got behind the wheel. If they just left a bar after downing a few shots, then maybe they speed through sheer exuberance. If they smoked or otherwise ingested marijuana, that’s legal in many states now, but you still shouldn’t drive after doing it.
You might see someone who used some other kind of drug, like coke or methamphetamine. That’s a particular problem in some parts of the country.
These drugs can make you feel like you are flying high. You might think that the speed limit doesn’t matter, and nothing else does either.
These kinds of reckless drivers might think nothing of exceeding the speed limit in residential neighborhoods with kids and pets around. That’s when you can see a tragedy occur.
You Might Kill or Severely Injure Yourself or Someone Else
The speed demon lifestyle, while it can have many causes, usually has only one of two outcomes. The person doing it eventually gets some police attention and winds up in front of a judge, or else they kill or seriously injure themselves.
Either way, if you feel like you have a valid reason to speed excessively, you’re playing with fire. If you’re very lucky, then maybe no one will see you, and you can get away with it.
If you crash into another car, a highway divider, a storefront, or something else, then you may cripple yourself. You may also kill or severely injure someone, and you can never take that back.
Self-control comes with being an adult. That includes taking care of loved ones, being a productive member of society, watching what you eat, curbing reckless impulses, and things of that nature.
If you get away from that mindset and embrace nihilism, that’s usually when you can mess up your life and the lives of those around you. If you kill or injure someone unsuspecting, then you can probably expect to spend the remainder of your life in prison, and rightly so.