I was driving the other day (not to brag) and I saw a “Baby on Board” magnet.
I had questions.
First: Do the people take the magnet off when the baby leaves the car? Or should I be freaking the hell out when I see that car unmanned in the parking lot?
Second: Do Baby on Board magnets work?
I mean, the idea, I assume, is either to persuade you to not hit them with your car, for fear of disturbing the baby and incurring its wrath, or to persuade you to be more patient with their cautious driving. But if it’s the latter, they could just put their flashers on. That’s what I do when I want to drive cautiously. Put the flashers on, hunch over the steering wheel a little bit, frantically look up and down between the windshield and the dashboard. It works great. People sometimes wave at you through the window to ask if you need help, so you have to wave them off with a “thank you but I need to focus” amount of hurry and smile, which just further makes the roadway a pleasant, safe, consistent-clicking-happening-at-125-beats-per-minute place for all.
So clearly, it’s not about making other drivers more patient.
It’s about getting drivers to not hit them.
Have I missed something? Are we doing bumper cars on the mean streets of suburbia and did no one invite me? Are there people going around revving their engines, licking their lips, and then pulling back and saying, “Oh, gosh, dear, that minivan has a baby on board. Let’s go find a sedan driven by a high-schooler we can t-bone instead.”?
The way I see it, no one’s going to be dissuaded from crashing into you just because you’ve got a baby on your board. They’re either going to 1) crash into you anyway because they’re the kind of person (we all know the sort) who likes to crash into cars, babies be damned (and some of them will be), or 2) are already trying their earnest best to not collide with your vehicle.
So until I see a study proving otherwise, I’m not buying that the magnets work.
And I’m breaking minivan windows in the H-E-B parking lot tomorrow. To be safe.
