Doubts About Scare Tactics on Drivers Who Text

American safety advocates, concerned about the dangers of texting while driving, have enjoyed a boost from an unlikely source: the chief constable of Gwent, a small county in southeast Wales. The Gwent Police Department produced a film on the subject to be shown in Welsh schools this fall. And with zero promotion by the police, a gory, explicit four-minute excerpt from the film went viral and has been viewed more than four million times on YouTube and other sites. Some American organizations are making their own ads to publicize the growing awareness that texting and driving is dangerous, but most avoid such violent imagery. Though the Welsh video has clearly struck a chord, some safety advocates maintain that blood and gore is not the best way to stop drivers from doing something that is legal in most states.