New Cell Phone Legislation

As many of you may know Connecticut recently passed a bill that requires motorists to use hands free devices when talking on their cell phones. The law took effect Saturday the 1st of October and already I’ve heard stories of people being pulled over and receiving a ticket for talking on their cell without using a headset or other hands free device. I find this hilarious and not a little bit annoying. I find this amusing because as many studies have shown the hands free devices do not decrease the risk of causing an accident when using a cell phone while driving. The studies found no difference; this leads one to the conclusion that something else other than pressing the phone to your ear is causing a distraction that reportedly leads to an increased risk of traffic accidents. The commonly accepted theory is that the attention that a cell phone conversation requires is the culprit. So then what purpose does this law serve? In one sense it requires people to be aware that cell phones do cause a dangerous distraction. However, the way the law is currently written it does not require changes to be made that will eliminate the distraction. This is what is annoying to me. Basically to eliminate the distraction the law would have to prohibit talking at all, but apparently there is not a large enough threat for the legislature to attempt to pass that one.