Health and Safety Departments across the UK are becoming ever vigilant, cutting down ancient trees that might fall on people, kicking over gravestones that are seen to be 'hazardous', and upholding laws that prevent the erection of memorials of those who have been killed on Britain's roads because the 'might be a distraction to drivers'.

There are some local authorities that have even banned bake sales at school for fear of selling cakes that may not have been baked in EU standard kitchen facilities.

But apart from smoking, the biggest public health and safety hazard of all does not cause armies of Health and Safety Officers out to stop dozens of deaths every day that occur on our roads, pavements, and shopping plazas. Maybe these people just dont see the forest on account of the (dangerous) trees.

You see, us humans can get used to just about anything. If cars in their present stante were suddenly to appear one day, say, in 1850, they would be considered an unacceptable outrage. Of course, this is just what happened when the early automobiles began to make their debut, and the famous 'red flag' laws appeared, whereby a man was meant to precede an automobile with a red flag, and the speed limit was 4 mph.

I'm not advocating a 4 mph speed limit, nor the need for a flagman to preceed cars, but the Victorians were hardly health and safety freaks, and as motorcars presented a new mechanized threat, they reacted to it in a way that seemed sensible at the time. They weren't crazy, just uncharacteristically erring on the side of caution, aware that these things were a menace.

Today, 'Business As Usual' carries on in the Automobile Apartheid system that is the United Kingdom. It's a pretty civilised country by and large, more so than the one I came from (the USA), but the same selfish ape lies beneath the surface decorum. I've looked the beast in the eyes many times when having an altercation with a motorist, either as a pedestrian or a cyclist.

It's far too difficult to take a monkey's driving privileges away from them in this country (I'm sure the kid who was driving the probably stolen car on the right got off with a wrist-slap and will be at it again pretty soon). It's just too bad more people dont see these machines for what they are---lethal weapons that need to be handled with great care and respect for others.

So Automobile Apartheid system prevails, where pedestrians are forced to wait to cross the road until a pelican signal finally changes green (crossing the road is a human right, whereas driving is a privilege, and yet people nice and warm in their cars are given right of way over pedestrians at these crossings).

However, I'm not pessimistic. The effects of smoking and excessive drinking on innocent bystanders are finally being seriously addressed in the UK. It seems this mentality is also affecting just how much bullying pedestrians are willing to take from motors.