Let me start by saying I don’t know the answer to the question in the post title, but it is one of the hallmarks of a nanny state. Interestingly, though, while it’s an east-coast, west-coast thing, it’s the reverse of the usual stereotype, in which the westerners are anarchist cowboys, and the easterners civilized obeyers of the rules. Let me explain.

Growing up in southeast Michigan, I remember understanding the term “jaywalking,” but only because someone explained it to me after I heard the term, not because I personally had any experience with it. Or rather, not because I had any personal experience with it in terms of it being illegal, and the law being enforced. I walked across a street when it seemed safe to do so, regardless of distance from lights, or their chromatic condition. And no one ever said boo about it, let alone the law enforcement authorities. I always considered the “Walk” and “Don’t Walk” signs advisories, rather than commands (and I should add that I like the new ones that have a countdown clock telling you how many seconds until it’s going to change, so you can judge whether you have time to start across). This was true in both Flint, the city in which I was raised, and Ann Arbor, where I spent three and a half years at school.

Being brought up in such an environment, I was surprised when I moved to southern California, and was informed by the locals that the gendarmes took illegal pedestrian street crossing seriously (i.e., they actually gave out tickets for it if, for instance, you crossed the street within some specified distance of a traffic signal, but didn’t use the crosswalk). I heard many tales from the locals of such ticketry, and accordingly, I restrained my chicken-like urges to cross the road where and when I pleased (traffic permitting, of course). But like red arrows for left turns, when there was no oncoming traffic, I bridled at it, thinking it idiotic, and being treated like a child.

It got to the point that one of the reasons that I looked forward to business trips back east (generally, in my case, DC) was that I would have the freedom to cross the street if it was safe, anywhere and anywhen I wanted, without first having to check for the gestapo.

Anyway, Tigerhawk had a (to him) disturbing visit to the left coast (Seattle) and was shocked at the level of conformity and groupthink in this supposedly hip and counter-cultural town:

I walked down the hill and up again all before about 7 am. The streets were essentially empty of cars, so being an Easterner I skipped merrily along with little regard for the status of the pedestrian Walk/Don’t Walk signs.

Then I noticed that the few other peds were just standing there waiting for the “Walk” signal to come on even when there was not a car in sight. Not surprisingly, they all looked at me like I was a middle-aged feminist at an Obama rally, so I also stopped violating the crosswalk lights.

When I landed I reported all of this to a friend of mine who claims to hate Seattle — how can anybody actually hate Seattle? — and she said “Of course, Seattle is basically just a suburb of Canada.”

Like that explained it. Although it sort of does.

Anyway, other than in Washington, DC — which back in the day raised money by assigning cops in unmarked clothes to write jay-walking tickets — I’ve always thought of crosswalk signals as purely advisory. Not the command “Don’t Walk,” but more like “probably not a good idea to walk, because the cars have a green light.” That is certainly the rule in any city in which I have lived or worked, including both New York and Chicago. In Seattle, though, pedestrians comply with crosswalk signals almost to the extent that motorists obey traffic lights. You know, they wait for the light to change even when there is neither a car nor a cop in sight. It is bizarre, and really quite un-American.

Well, the “suburb-of-Canada” thing doesn’t explain the attitude in southern California. But it is un-American. A good friend of mine (who has been in LA for the past thirty years or so) lived in Germany for quite a few years back in the seventies, and acquired a wife and step-daughter there. He described the Germans (including his wife and step-daughter) as being hyperobediant to the law, including jaywalking laws, and they would never think of going without permission from the traffic signal, or outside of a cross-walk. At the time I attributed it to being German, but one of Tigerhawk’s commenters notes that the Swiss are similar (though he didn’t say whether it was the French, Italian or German Swiss).

Is such strict cultural regimentation in itself fascist? No. In fact, I think that in general, respect for the law is obviously a good thing. But sometimes, as Dickens put into the mouth of his character, “the law is a ass.” Like the rules of bureaucracy, the laws are meant to protect people with poor judgment (and others who might be affected by dumb decisions) by constraining their behavior. Some foolish people might misjudge traffic, and unthinkingly cross the street against the light, or in the absence of a light, and get hit? Make it illegal. Problem solved. No judgment required. Just follow the rules.

In fact, in LA, I suspect that it has the unintended consequence of actually causing more accidents, exactly because it removes pressure for people to think before acting. Children are taught in school to always use a crosswalk, because in a crosswalk, you see, the pedestrian has the right of way, and cars aren’t allowed to enter it while they’re in it. And in fact, when you step into an unsignaled crosswalk in LA County, traffic will generally (note the word) stop for you. It’s the law, and the culture.

Which can breed a dangerous complacency. That the crosswalk doesn’t contain a force shield to actually prevent cars from crossing it while a pedestrian is in it, and that the law doesn’t involve suspension of the very real physical law of momentum or decrease the stopping distance of trucks, isn’t taught, apparently. I haven’t seen the statistics, but I’ll bet that a lot more people (particularly California natives) are injured and killed in crosswalks, where they have a false sense of safety, than in the “unsafe” areas where they actually have to look both ways and think before crossing the highway. Particularly because they not only have to look out for traffic, but police with nothing better to do than hand out jaywalking tickets.

Too much unthinking respect for the law isn’t fascistic per se, but it provides a fertile breeding ground for someone with charisma who comes along with grand ideas for new laws which, of course, because they are laws, must be obeyed. Thus when it became the law for Germans to turn in the Jews, what choice did they have? It wasn’t after all, their decision. It was the law.

But of course, while LA and Seattle are the west (about as far as you can go west in the lower forty eight and remain above water), they’re not the wild west. They’re in fact (with San Francisco) the bluest of the blue states, chock full of so-called “progressives.” So it’s not surprising at all, per Jonah’s thesis, that they are much more culturally attuned to obeying laws, even senseless ones, and all in favor of more. For the children.

OK, now for the challenging part. How to fit the traffic anarchists of New York City (cue Dustin Hoffman, “I’m walking here!”) into the thesis?