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Same reason we just accepted increasingly loud exhausts. Too many selfish idiots on the roads to enforce it effectively.
Same reason we accepted living further and further away from amenities. Cars are a self-reinforcing malady.
Because lobbying and "market gods" worship and because "driving is for peasants"
I know they have gotten brighter over the years but that's not what's been the biggest issue for me. To me it's the fact these trucks keep getting taller, 3 feet ago it wasn't as bad because the lights were closer to the road, now the headlights on these trucks are damn near eye-level.
Because we decided we hated to have our vehicles inspected. If we still did that these people would get violations.
A huge number of people are unaware that headlights must be aimed. Some are not adjusted by the manufacturer or dealer before sale (Tesla, Toyota). Sometimes a large enough pothole or going over a speed bump too fast will knock alignment off.
Couple this with American police driving primarily SUV's (higher up, less bothered) and no longer issuing "fix-it" tickets unless using headlights as an excuse to pull over minorities, and we wind up with tons of issues. Feed the prison system- Don't waste time making the roads safer!
Lawmakers are increasingly separated from those they are elected or appointed to represent by heightened economic status, and are not affected by issues that plague everyday citizens. No longer are they accountable to their constituents- Money drives their political aims.
As a frequent night driver, I often see people late at night using only the decorative running lights (because they don't understand the light controls?) or with one or both headlights aimed at the ground just a few feet ahead of their car from hitting a bump or a minor accident. Sometimes one or both headlights will be pointed too high. Other times, drivers have their brights on purposefully because their low beams are burned out, or perhaps for their own benefit.
It is a complex issue that I can see only getting worse in the future. Social consciousness needs to become a thing in America.
Because consumer protection and regulation seems to have stopped being a real thing after Reagan. Since then everything good has been legacy agencies patching at the edges where they had authority (all gone now thanks to the Supreme Court - see Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo).
Buckle up. It's only going to get worse.
(This is extra ironic because buckling up is only even a thing because of consumer protections. So I guess get ready to be thrown through a windshield.)
its just so american to only think in a timeline of presidents :) always gets me
i guess adaptive headlights were also invented by reagan
My apologies.
Deregulation happened completely randomly in a vacuum like a decaying lump of a radioactive element with no cause.
In all seriousness though... yes, ALL changes happen in a sea of social, economic, and political factors, but someone pulls the trigger, and it's fair to point at the gunman.
Adaptive headlights only recently became legal in the US.
There's been a few campaigns against this sort of thing: https://www.theringer.com/2024/12/03/tech/headlight-brightness-cars-accidents
In Canada, the federal government just put out a nationwide poll for input on this exact subject, as it’s coming near to the time to review the related legislation. It’s very possible that some of the headlight implementations currently on the road will soon be illegal nationwide.
Thank god, I've been sick of this shit for over a decade. I don't know who would vote against dimmer lights. Do you have a link for this poll?
The poll closed 20 April: https://tc.canada.ca/en/corporate-services/consultations/canadian-experience-vehicle-headlights-glare-night
I seem to recall it opened in February. There were lots of news articles on Lemmy about it at the time.
In regional areas the extra light at night is genuinely helpful.
However, thats on unlit roads with so little traffic that you only see an oncoming car once every 5 or 10 minutes.
On roads with more traffic theyre just not necessary because there aren't any animals or other obstacles.
In regional areas the extra light at night is genuinely helpful.
Bro, that's what the high beams are for.
The current situation is the normal (low beam) headlights on some "newer" cars are so bright, I could turn of my headlights at night and the car behind me gives enough light for me to see without a problem.
Oh I thought thats what everyone was complaining about.
Everyone here has after market LED light bars or spot lights. Factory lights and evern high beams are no big thing but light bars have the fire of a thousand suns.
I'm passionate about this issue, between this and the size of the vehicles it has made night driving miserable, I used to love a nice relaxing night drive.
Trucks with 3 sets of LED lights blinding me all the time
Because it’s the sole responsibility of the owner to repair the car (and sometimes passengers) when it hits a wild animal, and brighter bulbs are an inexpensive preventative measure. And you really can’t replace people.
Other people complain about the bright lights, but they get real quiet when you say you hit a deer and now you have to pay hundreds you can’t afford to fix your car.
It’s the same with ad blockers. People say they cost websites money, but as soon as you get ransomware they say that’s on you, you should have used an ad blocker.
It’s a catch 22. Those who are proactive are painted as the problem by those who won’t help those who aren’t and wind up owing or paying more.
That’s what we gotta figure out. Otherwise we’ll all just keep talking past each other.
So basically what someone wrote above: "what's important is that me and my family and property are safe". Fantastic way to live in a society with other people.
Other people complain about the bright lights, but they get real quiet when you say you hit a deer and now you have to pay hundreds you can’t afford to fix your car.
What are you saying? Why would other people get quiet about what's bothering them because you have to repair your car? Why is that everybody else's problem? You are aware that you could slow down at night to avoid hitting wildlife, right? Blinding other innocent people at night is not "being proactive", and it's in no way morally comparable to ad blockers. The people being subjected to this aren't trying to harvest your data to make money on you.
So that's what I'm saying. People are talking past each other, no one is accomplishing anything.
And yes, the lives of my partner and kids is worth more than your inconvenience. I'm sure your partner and kids are worth more than my inconvenience. That's just how people are. Maybe you don't have kids, maybe you have elderly parents you care for. Maybe you're a lone wolf and you don't have anybody, but surely you recognise that there are other people with people they love and value over the convenience of others, so the point stands.
I don't like bright lights either. But I'm also not donating to some stranger's GoFundMe because he hit a deer being a nice guy who put your convenience over his safety, and now he's got a broken leg, smashed fender, thousands in hospital bills, and hundreds in auto repair bills. I'm a nice guy, but I got needs and I also got wants. Does that make me an arsehole? If so, then so be it. The question is, are you donating? You said "why is that everybody else's problem" implying it isn't yours. So you aren't, either. You put the blame on the guy for not driving slower. You're saying his safety is his problem. Okay, fine. Now you don't get to judge how he fixes that problem.
But don't get me wrong. It's the Internet, you can say what you want. But talk is cheap. Or as we said in the 1980s, "money talks and bullshit walks." All we're doing is walking in circles. I'm not going to convince you and you're not going to convince me. Therefore, the problem will not get solved, at least not between us. The silver lining there is that it is statistically unlikely that we will ever meet face to face, or on the road.
It is interesting, however, that you take the opposite position with ad blocking. True, they are not exactly the same thing, but it is a similar situation. And, like headlights, or slowing down, there are multiple solutions. But you passionately defend both sides of a similar argument when the subject changes. That should at least inform you that you are capable of reason, and that you can see that there are valid arguments on both sides. So, if nothing else, maybe you can at least appreciate that we will solve nothing by talking past each other. We're tilting at windmills.
There was one moderately useful comment when I made mine: someone mentioned adaptive headlights. What they failed to mention, likely because it would undermine their point, is the cost of adaptive headlights. Ars Technica recently (week or two ago, I'm not gonna go dig for it) had an article about adaptive headlights. They sound great. They sound like they are the solution. In short, you get extremely bright light when you need it. When you have oncoming traffic, you still get stupidly bright light, but a smart array of LEDs makes sure none are pointing at the oncoming driver. Everything around them is lit up like high noon, but the other driver isn't inconvenienced. That sounds awesome, but it's also prohibitively expensive. The good thing is, cars will have this standard in a decade or so. Just like things like power windows and locks, power steering, and automatic transmissions became standard, so too will this. Then people will look back and call us savages.
This is why we’re in such a mess now. People have been trained that society sucks and it’s every man for themselves now.
Here's my take:
There used to be a time when headlights really did not penetrate the night as much as they could, esp. with increasing speeds.
Making them brighter was reasonable. So they invented Halogen lights. But at some point the whole thing ran away I suppose, making them ever brighter became a selling point.
Add to that the SUV effect: "most importantly, me and my loved ones are safe in this rolling fortress", you can see how we got here.
I used to drive a very, very old car. Now there's a law in Germany that allows older cars to keep on running the way they used to even if the same aspects would be illegal in a newer car. This car did not even have Halogen lights. I had trouble seeing, every time another car passed me on the road. The difference in brightness was - well, blinding. It was legit dangerous.
I believe the brightness of Halogen lights is totally sufficient.
Add to that the tone. Most LEDs are blueish which feels worse for human eyes. Regular lightbulbs are yellowish.
I sometimes borrow my dad's truck, a '93 ranger, when my car is in the shop or I need to move something big
And the headlights on that thing are terrible, after driving around in more modern vehicles it feels like they barely light up the road in front of you. It's actually almost a little scary to drive at night sometimes.
It does have halogen bulbs, not significantly different from the ones in my own car, but the way the reflectors and such are designed around those bulbs is clearly very different,.
Calibrated headlights shouldn't impair vision too much. Laser (and matrix) headlights are becoming more mainstream too, those gets even brighter but directed. Do you have an astigmatism by chance? Is it aftermarket and modified headlights causing the issue? My pet peeve is lifted trucks running brights behind me. Could be 6 car length back and still light up my interior like a stadium
Well obviously if its a big enough problem to be regulated its not imaginary, and only due to something like alignement
Poorly aimed headlights are the real killer. They might not even be brights, they're just aimed to the heavens because people don't know how to maintain their car.
walking at night is kinda hard now because your eyes will adjust to the dark and then suddenly the brightest car ever drives by and then you just cant see
There's been a ton of coverage on this, not sure that it matters. The physics of car fired harpoons to attack other cars is eluding me, while I develop many patents on the matter
The adaptive headlights are perfectly capable of blocking out the blinding cold white light modern headlights have, they just don't use it in the US, and it's only partially in use in the EU.
It's absurd that they don't mandate it in LED and Laser headlights for both high and low beams
Conservative governments have spent 3 generations, the world over, convincing everyone that deregulation is always a good thing.
Here in vietnam, probably half of cars and bikes have yellow headlights that don't mess with your night vision, then white brights.
EXACTYLLYY makes me so pissed. I'd like to smash every cadillac escalade headlight.
There’s another way. Adaptive headlights can fix this: https://youtube.com/shorts/AgxVuXC0T44
You’re not wrong though. Even crappy headlights on taller vehicles seem much brighter to observers. My buddy’s 2005 RAM is proof. When we’re in it, I’d have better luck seeing with a flashlight, but when he’s driving behind my car, it’s like someone’s shining the bat signal into my rear window.
Also, don’t get me started on people who replace their bulbs with HID or LED bulbs but don’t spend the money on projector headlights. It’s infuriating.
As someone with an astigmatism, I genuinely don't see the difference. All lights have annoying glare. You learn to deal with it, and see around them.
Here you are lol
https://nightriderglasses.com/product/night-rider-glasses/
I was actually planning to make some of these out of safety glasses and some tinted film i had lying around
but that film doesn't seem to be lying around anywhere at the moment...
Well that's unfortunate. Also it's a bit dumb having to buy more stuff to keep track of in response to cars dick waving over how quickly their low beams can kill a vampire
feels like I'm getting visually assaulted everytime I drive at night.
That is only a problem in these shitty countries where they have neither any rules nor TÜV (and therefore technology remains in the last century)
Example of a modern car light:
That is not an example of modern car light, but Audis plans for a future car light that is not on the market yet.
That is not an example of modern car light
So, you wouldn't call it modern then?
Or not a car light?
Politicians are a million years old and don't drive themselves.
this post was submitted on 30 May 2026
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