top 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] 86 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (20 children)

I'm sure most people are aware that the difference in danger is quite large but maybe not just how absurdly large.

Sharks kill about 10 people per year.

For cars the number is 1,670,000 deaths. Every year.

As a point of comparison, in 2025, about 250k people were killed in armed conflicts, which was the highest number in decades.

A lot of people think it's weird to hate cars as much as I do. But they are quantitatively in a similar category as the Holocaust in terms of how many people they kill. From the perspective, it seems a bit crazy not to hate them.

Sources: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966692324000267 https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/shark-attacks/yearly-worldwide-summary/ https://www.npr.org/2026/06/09/nx-s1-5850355/data-highest-conflicts-iran-israel-ukraine-russia-world-war-ii

  • source
  • hideshow 20 child comments
  • [–] [S] 23 points 1 month ago (5 children)

    Also, in both cases many more are killed by humans than the other way around.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 8 points 1 month ago (5 children)

    One thing I learned in my journey to power a home and drive an electric car is that automobiles, even small "slow" cars, are thr most powerful thing that most people ever personally own. A firearm will accelerate a 7.5 gram projectile up to 425 meters per second. But my car will accelrate 1600 kg up to 44 meters per second and I can just take it wherever I want. I could even get a larger, faster one if I wanted and nobody would care.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    Unfortunately, evil people are starting to realize that heavy machinery is a far more deadly weapon than firearms in untrained hands. Guns may be for killing, but their chief merit is that they are designed to be reusable and at range, intended to encourage trained soldiers to fight in relative safety for many days.

    The people taking cars and ramming into parades? They don't want to live, so they can use an extremely powerful weapon, no skill required. And this tool is everywhere, just barely regulated.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago*

    This is an important issue. People get upset when I bring this up because usually they're angry and they want to punish someone after these events, so they want to make it about immigrants, or fascists, or terrorists or whoever. But those people exist and frankly you are not going to get rid of them without doing something even worse than what they did.

    The proper solution is to ensure that there is always physical separation between large groups of pedestrians and cars so that these ramming attacks simply cannot take place. Some well-placed bollards are all it takes.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (1 reply)
  • load more comments (2 replies)
  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    While I don't disagree much, let's not be silly. The numbers need to be divided by hours of exposure.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    I think both metrics would tell you different things. Even unadjusted it gives you an idea about which thing you should be concerned about addressing and reducing your own risk or the risk of those you care about.

    Plus, I don't have exposure data like that to make the comparison. If you do then it would certainly be interesting to see.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (1 reply)
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 23 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Stephen King wrote this book and it was made into a movie and a Futurama episode.

  • source
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 14 points 1 month ago
    [–] 13 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Y'know, I think I could believe that cars kill more people than sharks even at sea.

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 12 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Hippos kill a lot more people than sharks.

  • source
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] [S] 32 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    I'm frankly surprised that hippos kill ANY sharks tbh 🀷🏻

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    I'm not. IIRC they're technically herbivores, they just really fuckin' hate other creatures for some reason

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] [S] 8 points 1 month ago*

    Nah, they're just very territorial, protective of their young, and deceptively fast. Long as you steer clear, it's not like they're going to stalk you for several miles to kill you like a tiger might 🀷🏻

    Last I checked, there's very little territorial overlap between hippos and sharks πŸ˜„

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 10 points 1 month ago (7 children)
  • [–] 10 points 1 month ago

    I used to be surf patrol. Would explain it, "You're far more likely to die in the car on the way to the beach. If you survive that, odds are you drown before a shark is even in the area. So stay where I can see you and you might just get lucky one day."

  • source
  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Christine (1983) rolls into the room.

  • source
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    I was just at an aquarium the other day joking that jaws would be a very different movie if you swapped out the shark design for, say, an epaulette shark. Would look too goofy to take seriously.

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 8 points 1 month ago
    [–] 8 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    FuckCars is spreading πŸ˜‚πŸ˜‚

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 6 points 1 month ago* (5 children)

    sharks play into man's fear of nature, and regardless of the reality of shark attacks, the plot is going to seem reasonable. man can't control nature. oohhh, scary.

    a killer car film is generally going to require some supernatural element and then be accused of being 'schlocky' or 'so bad it's good,' like in this thread. if you're killed by a car, most people would consider it someone's fault--either the pedestrian or one of the drivers, and an 80 year old with poor eyesight doesn't make for a good horror film.

    i guess you could make some silly a24 'arthouse' film called 'the passenger.' it would be about a sane passenger in a car driven by an increasingly reckless driver that builds up to a life-altering crash. it could answer questions about 'why didn't they just ask to be let out?'

  • source
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    I kind of think car crashes could fit pretty well into my horror movie idea, Sanewashing; in which an amateur serial killer is clumsily killing people, but an overbearing sense of β€œnormalcy” is preventing people from panicking or investigating, just viewing the deaths as tragedies rather than mysteries.

    Something that could be thematic is to just have someone hear about a friend being killed, and be completely on edge; but then hear it was a car crash, and all tension releases.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 5 points 1 month ago (4 children)

    Pretty sure they made that movie a few times.

    Plus, there's that tire documentary called Rubber.

  • source
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (3 children)

    Plus, there’s that tire documentary called Rubber.

    They dramatized it a bit, but tires actually do kill a lot of people. Mostly by releasing toxic dust as they gradually wear down.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    Did anyone else think this was going to be cows? (more people are killed by cattle each year than by shark attacks)

  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • load more comments (2 replies)
    [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    Jaws theme but all you hear is a rattly bass and the windows close to breaking

  • source
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (1 child)
    load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    It's called Maximum Overdrive.

  • source
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Gonna need a bigger car…

  • source
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    That car is way too cute. They usually come in XXL.

  • source
  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    Compared to shark attacks, more than 1,000 times the number of people each year choke to death. Now THAT'S a movie I'd watch!

  • source
  • load more comments
    view more: next β€Ί