Driving during the nighttime is a continual cycle of hell that — like most things in this country — has gotten significantly worse over the last 3 years.
Not a single late-night drive has gone by in the past year where I haven’t had to adjust my mirrors so I’m not blinded because some jackass in a brand new Tesla has decided that seeing an extra 30 feet ahead of him is more important than the safety of his fellow drivers.
As anyone who’s driven at night the last few years will attest, there’s one culprit behind this — light-emitting diode (LED) headlights.
I am still trying to understand why auto manufacturers have decided that the future of travel involves adding two flashbang grenades to the front of every new car, but here we are.
Before the days of LEDs, almost every car on the road came stock with halogen bulbs, according to an article by Axios.
I am a halogen bulb defender for life. They’re not much more expensive than nice LEDs, they have a nice warm glow, and I have never once had a problem with them on the road.
LEDs on the other hand are almost a pure white-blue color that gives me a migraine every time I have the misfortune of driving past any car with a pair of them.
Almost every new, high-end car seems to come with them these days, and they are way too bright. It’s almost jaw-dropping how bright these headlights are, and it seems that nobody on the road who drives with them has any sort of clue.
Unfortunately, technology that allows LED lights to adapt to their environment and become dimmer for other drivers on the road was only implemented in 2022 and has yet to be implemented in any new car, according to the same article.
As myself and many others can testify, LEDs have gotten dangerously bright.
In the past few months alone I’ve needed to duck in my seat or adjust my mirror countless times because of these unholy abominations of wires and semiconductors, and one time one of them caused my girlfriend to veer off the highway.
I have decent vision, but I have very bad astigmatism, which makes bright lights at night smear in my vision. According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology, astigmatism is an imperfection in the curvature of the eye’s cornea or lens.
This makes it even harder to drive at night for me, which has made me even more passionate about this subject.
Driving in the Bay Area in general sucks. Everyone here drives like they want you to die. If driving on the freeway while trying not to die was a competitive sport, I-280 would be the Super Bowl.
Driving in the Bay Area at night is the same except everyone is driving at least 20 mph faster and if you try to merge, you will be subjected to the unmatched power of the sun.
Every night that I have to drive on that god-forsaken highway past 6:00 p.m., it takes 5 minutes off my life from stress alone.
I cannot even comprehend this phenomenon in automotive manufacturing one bit. Has any single person driving their Chevy Suburban ever thought to themselves “I wish my car had a laser attachment because I hate everyone.”Another problem is the ride height of brand-new cars. It’s insane that new trucks and SUVs are twice the size and height of what any car should ever be.
My poor tiny Hyundai hatchback is about half the height of the average Ford pickup truck, which means that I get the light of a thousand suns streamed directly into my eyes. It’s not fun.
If there’s any worst offender in regards to burning my retinas at 11 p.m. when I’m just trying to get home in one piece, it would be Tesla owners.
If there’s any phrase we need to turn into an insult, it would be “Tesla Driver,” because there's no more pathetic or annoying demographic on the road today.
Not only do they seemingly have the brightest headlights of any car on the road right now, but everyone who drives them seemingly wants to kill me, judging by how they’re driving.
I have been blinded, cut off, almost run into, and tailgated by Teslas more than any other car brand and the lights on these cars are so bright that I wouldn’t be shocked if they could cause vision damage.
There seriously needs to be regulations on these lights and I’m not alone in this belief.
A nonprofit organization called the Soft Lights Foundation called for a ban on bright headlights and made a petition that has reached over 41,000 signatures, according to an NBC7 Chicago article.
I’m sick and tired of bowing to the demands of car owners who believe they own the road and can blind and endanger whoever they like.
I am soon going to check on the legality of creating a device that uses a mirror to reflect people’s headlights back at them when they’re too bright.
If your lights are too bright to be deflected back at you, they’re too bright for everyone else on the road.
If there are any powerful automotive executives or lobbyists out there reading this, just know that I despise you with every fiber of my being.
If you own a car with LED headlights, please consider no longer being an asshole and growing up.
