State vs aftermarket exhaust

[tbigity]

Laws are not secret, however, it takes effort on the the citizens behalf to read and keep up on all of the changes. The burden is on the citizen to know the law and obey, not the government to keep the citizens informed.

Normally I would agree. I am a law abiding-citizen...pay my taxes, stop at stop signs, never murdered a guy...love the work cops do and respect them. However, as far as keeping up with laws, I must agree and disagree. It is our job to keep informed of them...after all we are the ones that must abide by them. However, I almost think that some enigma is purposefully left in the law.

Here is my case >> when I was underage, I was under the assumption that it was legal to drink IF, and ONLY IF you did so with your parents' consent, and you did not drive for a 24 hour period. Why did I think that? I asked a cop, a member of the executive branch of government, figuring he had to know the law in and out in order to execute it...moreso than a citizen. That was his response, what I mentioned above. However, that raised some concern with some parents who I described it to. So I went back to the same cop (was campus police at my HS). He went as far as to tell me that he was at a local restaurant and a minor requested a drink with his rents' permission. When the manager refused, the cop interjected and told the manager the law, the drink was served. However, my point is this. I have since asked 3 other cops. 2 agree with the first cop to the most part, though they have never mentioned a specific period of time that one must not drive after. The other cop I asked said if you are under 21, the law says you can't drink.

Well, wanting personal clarity (and to drink b4 turning 21) I consulted the OK laws via the state website. All I could find was the first law under the alcohol section stating it is unlawful for anyone under 21 to drink. i have since sent a barrage of emails to the state asking for clarity, non of which have been returned.

Therefore my [conspiracy] theory is that some level of obscurity is in the laws to keep people guessing so that if a cop wants to, he can find a reason, lawful or unlawful, to pull you over/inspect you/question you, whatever he wants to.

[tbigity]

I also wanted to mention this that is more on line with the thread topic. I can relate WG :

Last time I got pulled over (bout 3 years ago) I was courteous as could be to the officer, like I have been taught. After all, they are just doing there job. However, on that instance [,the last time i got pulled over,] the cop gave me a warning on 2 bogus accounts. Said I was going 3 MPH over (no joke...3!) AND that I ran a yellow light. In 100% honesty, the light went yellow as I was in the intersection. I explained to him that I thought (being not too far out of defensive-driving school) that yellow was safe to pass the intersection, with discernment, as it gave you a warning that red was coming next.

This is the part I love. At that point, he explained to me that if the light is yellow at all, the intersection is "not to be traveled in." And that I "should have known that." My thinking was "if you are not supposed to be in the intersection at all when it is yellow, why not go right from green to yellow?" Point being, the cop just wanted a reason to pull me over. Sub 20 yr old male, driving a nice 05 Jeep (father's)...surely he had to pull me over just for some good ole fashioned demographic profiling, something had to be wrong with that picture. I lost a lil respect for the cops that fall into that category on that day...the kind that follow the typical hard-nosed, jerk ace, don't-let-them-have-fun mentality.

On a side note, later I was talking to a truck driver bud of mine about the situation. He just finished his yearly driving test with the company he worked for and told me that the handbook they have says that if the intersection is yellow when you are in it, and it then turns red you are still legal to pass. The reasoning is that the duration of "yellow" will vary, a substantial amount, from light to light as will the physical size of the intersection. So even if proper discernment puts you smack dab in the middle of the intersection when the light turns red, if you enter it while it is yellow, you are not breaking any laws.

Thus, my point is proven, and I feel that WG has been screwed.

[tbigity]

HOLY CRAP! Don't turn me loose on a subject I am passionate about. I just realized I wrote a freaking multichapter novel in the last few posts

[etlsport]

i always heard similar about being able to drink with your parents being OK.. i always thought it was more of that, 'if its only in our house, whos going to know' sorta thing, not actual law, of course i have never really looked into it either. when it comes to yellow/red lights, i know its legal to go through an intersection on yellow, take left turns while yielding to an oncoming green for ex. if you go halfway out into the intersection and the light turns yellow, you cant just stay there! at least in PA, i think situations like that are more the reason for being able to use yellow to clear the intersection, because yellow light durations are regulated here. when putting a light in, theres a whole bunch of equations that are used to calculate a safe duration for the light to be yellow based on how far away you are when you can first see the light, speed limit on the road, size of the intersection etc. lights are very rarely set up to those specifications though, so if you ever get busted for 'running' a red light, look into that. if you can prove the yellow wasnt long enough, they cant charge you (thats how i learned about all of that stuff, my roommate is a civil engineer and got pulled over for running a light, so i helped him go out and take measurements of the intersection for the calcs.)

[kpaske]

In WA it is illegal to enter the intersection if it is not clear all the way through, so that left turn where you wait for the light to turn yellow is actually illegal.

Alcohol laws vary from state to state. I remember being served in a restaurant in Tennessee when I was about 10 or 12. We were drinking wine that we brought ourselves (restaurants there could not sell alcohol, but could serve it if you brought it yourself). I got drunk as heck and fell out of my chair in front of everybody.

[WormGod]

Knowing the law and following the law is more trivial than you think then. If signing a paper to get a permit to drive concludes that you KNOW the law, then nobody, including police, should have a permit. Laws change by the day, and as you can see by all the research I have been doing, it it NOT stated clearly for us to find. Makes you wonder just how many of the DMV manuals are actually up to date even.

I was just about to put an catback on my WRX, that is even approved by Subaru, but this whole ordeal is making me think twice.

And I agree, it is the responsibility to know the laws, but, if the administration is unable to provide literature, or a means for us to keep up to code, I do not think we can be held responsible.

[Icekold]

Hey WG, I wouldn't sweat it. Go ahead with that catback. I think you just ran into the wrong cop on the wrong day. I say this because in 7 years I've been pulled over a few times in My 3000GT and once in my VX which both have 20% tint that you can barely see through and not a word was said about it. I've seen (and heard) many a ricer with cops in the same general area and have never seen them pulled over for it either.

[Ldub]

In WA it is illegal to enter the intersection if it is not clear all the way through, so that left turn where you wait for the light to turn yellow is actually illegal.

Alcohol laws vary from state to state. I remember being served in a restaurant in Tennessee when I was about 10 or 12. We were drinking wine that we brought ourselves (restaurants there could not sell alcohol, but could serve it if you brought it yourself). I got drunk as heck and fell out of my chair in front of everybody.

As a youngster back in the mid seventies (18 was the legal drinking age) I was visiting friends in Montana. Much to my suprise, at closing time, if your drink wasn't finished, they gave you a to go cup & sent you on your merry way.
Another thing I noticed while traveling narrow, winding mountain roads on the same trip...there were no guard rails, just little white crosses where people (presumably to go cuppers) had gone over the edge & died.

[WyrreJ]

Therefore my [conspiracy] theory is that some level of obscurity is in the laws to keep people guessing so that if a cop wants to, he can find a reason, lawful or unlawful, to pull you over/inspect you/question you, whatever he wants to.

Follow the money. It's not set up that way for the cops, they are just a piece of the machine.

Who writes laws? Lawyers. The vast majority of legislators and the lobbyist class are lawyers, although it has not always been that way.

Who makes money when there is a question of law? Lawyers - all 3 parties in court making money are lawyers - counsel for defense, counsel for plantiff and the judge. Even if the issue does not go to court, chances are at least one lawyer gets paid as part of the process - the one who gets consulted by the defendent for advice.

Such a result is the inevitable result of the way the system is set up -- its the equivalent of letting the wolves guard the hen house.

[tbigity]

Follow the money. It's not set up that way for the cops, they are just a piece of the machine.

I agree in part. While, like I mentioned, they are part of the executive branch and not legislative (to enforce, not create the laws) they still dictate why they pull people over and I doubt the reason do so is to give some "suit" more padding in his pockets. As was my point, if a cop wants to do so, he will find something to pull you over for. As has been mentioned, could have been the wrong cop on the wrong day. Just like a cop will let a group of 5 speeders all in-tow go by him and only nab one of them...the one he thinks there is more reason to pull over. Just looking for a reason. There is a certain mentaility that goes along with being a cop that simply cannot be avoided to some extent. I cannot recount the name of the Professor of Psychology that did the experiement a few years back...studied it in my psyche class. But it took a group of students and isolated them from everything they knew and put them in a hypothetical situation where they were to role play for weeks at a time with no outside contact. Half where the prison guards (cops) and half where the inmates. Keep in mind that these were piers going in...long story short, they were straight up enemies after the study. One of the "cops" had to be taken out of the experiment because he nearly killed one of the "inmates." Keep in mind this was just roleplaying. Some of the "inmates" had to undergo therapy afterward because of the treatment they received from the "cops." The interesting thing was that the study was performed again this time the students that had played "inmates" where now the guards and anew group was brought in for the "inmates." Nearly the same result. Despite having encountered the brutality of the previous group of "guards", the new guards did not learn from the behavior, but rather, that behavior became all they knew of that roll and so, they adopted it.

The point of the study was that there are certain roles in society where the behavior is governmend more by what you think (consciously or subconsciously) that role is supposed to be and not what you want to be in that role.

However, like I previously stated:

love the work cops do and respect them.

[kpaske]

The interesting thing was that the study was performed again this time the students that had played "inmates" where now the guards and anew group was brought in for the "inmates." Nearly the same result. Despite having encountered the brutality of the previous group of "guards", the new guards did not learn from the behavior, but rather, that behavior became all they knew of that roll and so, they adopted it.

OR perhaps what they learned was that the system dictates (or at a minimum, encourages) a certain behavior.

[tbigity]

that was the neat thing about this...it was technically out of the system. Granted, that mentality could have been furnished by the system, but the only stimulus they had was what was going on in their heads. The only instruction they were given was "these students are guards, these are the inmates." Kinda like a "we become what we know and nothing more" thing. If nothing else it just showed the human reluctancy to change :-/

[kpaske]

I think it more likely highlights some of the natural tendencies of human beings who are placed in extremely unbalanced positions of power.

Then again, maybe they just behaved the way they thought inmates and guards were supposed to act based on previous experience (i.e. movies, tv, etc). It would be hard to eliminate this effect from the equation.

But we're getting off topic...

[tbigity]

Then again, maybe they just behaved the way they thought inmates and guards were supposed to act based on previous experience (i.e. movies, tv, etc). It would be hard to eliminate this effect from the equation.

I suppose I was unclear, because that was my point. In many, MANY fewer words. Can you start writing my posts for me?

[WyrreJ]

Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment
http://www.prisonexp.org/

When I was in 3rd grade, in public school, our teachers made us do a very similar thing. The entire grade of a couple of hundred kids in 7-8 classes was divided in half - kids who had to wear big construction paper blue collars and those who did not have to wear them. The blue collared were "bad" and the others were "good." The "bad" had to sit at their desks, be silent and do nothing as punishment for being "bad" while the good got to play games and stuff - any bad kids who did not behave got sent to "solitary." At various points in the day, the good and the bad got to interact with much more mild results than zimbardo got, but definitely along those lines.

Then after lunch break, the roles were reversed.

I remember being sent to "solitary" for just trying to find out WTF was going on.
And I remember after lunch when we switched roles and no longer had to wear a blue collar, just being so grateful that it was over that I didn't question why I was now "good" when I had been "bad" before.

Then, for the last hour or so of class, the collars came off and no one was "good" or "bad" and they had us all talk about the experience. It was probably one of the biggest, most clear-cut formative experiences of my youth. It taught me that 'authority' does not deserve respect simply for being authority and that societal or group beliefs (or prejudices) of what is "good" and "bad" are just as likely to be false as they are to be correct.