Twenty-one-year-old Tina is driving down a city road. The clouds are angelic and life seems perfect. The sun is shining, and her favorite song is playing. As the car glides across the smooth asphalt, Tina hears her phone ding. An “unimportant” text message appears. Tina looks down for two seconds, and within that time has hit and possibly killed a young child. End scene.

This hypothetical story may seem insensitive, but it is the common commercial that everyone has seen on TV or YouTube about the dangers of texting and driving. What I would really like, is for the Department of Transportation to make a realistic commercial, one that doesn’t make us weep at the scenes, but makes us aware that this is truly an issue. The scare tactic may work somewhat, but people need to know that little accidents can happen too when texting and driving. They could possibly show the cost of a fender bender or a side-swipe, or even worse, the rise in car insurance.

As I was driving my daughter to work, I noticed several drivers on the road on their phones. The interesting part was, most of them didn’t seem to be texting, but the majority were looking at Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat and some a weather app. Is it possible that this could be as much, or even worse than texting? I believe so.

Admittedly, it is possible that most people are guilty of this action, including me. Sometimes the pressure of looking at my phone developed so strongly, I couldn’t take it. But this all changed when I had my daughter. It soon sank in that I was personally responsible for the safety of my daughter when traveling from one place to another. That alone takes the pressure of looking at my phone away.