Men are better drivers: This cliché also exists in France. But the accident statistics paint a different picture. An advertising campaign responds to this and attracts a lot of attention.
On the posters there are men whose faces you can only half see. Young, older, with or without a beard: you casually hold the steering wheel and seem to have everything under control. But the text is shocking: “93 percent of drunk drivers involved in an accident are men. Driving like a woman means only one thing: staying alive.”
The next poster says that men are responsible for 84 percent of fatal traffic accidents. And nine out of ten young drivers killed are men, the third reveals. That’s why the association “Victimes et citoyens” (“Victims and Citizens”) developed the campaign.
Accident victims want sensitize
Club boss Julien Thibault himself was a passenger in a serious traffic accident because the driver exceeded the speed limit. He says: “Let’s stop the traffic violations. Then we’ll have fewer accidents and injuries on the road.”
The association, which also includes lawyers and journalists, works with ministries and is involved in France’s Road Safety Council and the European umbrella organization. He sends accident victims and bereaved orphans to educational institutions, driving schools and companies to raise people’s awareness of driving carefully.
Volunteers go to hospitals, help and answer accident victims’ questions: What will happen to me without my arms, without my legs, without my memory? Who will piece together my fragmented life?
Still many misogynistic Clichés
The news channel BFMTV was in Toulouse. Julie has been driving there for almost 20 years. He was often upset about women behind the wheel. But misogynistic clichés should be outdated long ago. “People always said: ‘Woman at the wheel, death in the corner.’ Maybe a lot of people still think that, but I don’t anymore,” he says. “Women simply drive much more carefully and don’t mess around.”
According to an internet survey, four out of five women had to listen to this saying just a few years ago. Now the women’s magazine with the crazy modified Miss name “Madmoizelle” thinks the campaign is perfect because it breaks down stereotypes.
More awareness of Dangerous situations
Danièle has been at the wheel for over 30 years. What does she regularly experience at intersections? “I stopped to let a person with a disability cross the street,” she says. The driver behind her overtook her. “The traffic light was also red. It was a man.”
Driving instructor Jérôme observes this kind of behavior with his students every day. “I think the girls try a little harder than the boys when it comes to safety and awareness of dangerous situations when driving,” he says. “The boys are less interested in what can happen.”
Higher risk for men in traffic
The behavior of men has consequences: around three quarters of those killed and seriously injured in traffic accidents are men and four out of five driver’s licenses revoked belong to men. They are overrepresented, particularly in accidents involving motorcycles, but also bicycles. The risk of a woman dying in a traffic accident in France is eight times lower than that of a man.
The Observatory for Road Safety reports over 3,400 road deaths in France in 2023, slightly fewer than in the previous year, but we are still a long way from the historic low of under 2,800 road deaths in 2020 – a consequence of the pandemic at the time. The French now have an idea of how to approach this number differently: “Drive like a woman!”