Police Chases

Nothing unites commonly disassociating people quite like a live telecast of a police chase. It's in that one unfiltered, uncensored moment that wars, economies, and political and religious friction find a seat on the backburner as the eyes of all races, colors, and creeds are congruously fixated on the Michael-Bay-meets-reality visuals of a breakaway renegade eluding an entire county's finest.

Cars swerve. Tires skid. Tensions -- and ratings -- rise. Outside of those speedily traversed roads in that one insignificant portion of Earth, the world's population pauses to unanimously put one arm around his brethren while the other arm convulses into a fist pump.

And I'm pretty sure we're all thinking the same thing: "Man, how free it must feel to be that guy right now just driving 100+ mph with the whole world watching." This is just before the getaway car's tires explode on the barricade of spikes laid out. Suddenly no one wants to be that guy. In a matter of a few minutes and a pair of handcuffs, we go from thinking this guy is amazing enough to get his face on a T-shirt to thinking this is the biggest jackass on the planet.

You kind of have to root for the guy behind the wheel because he has, intentionally or not (most likely not), landed himself in a situation that we have all dreamt to be but are too sensible to actually do. It straddles that fine line between audacity and stupidity. Somehow, though, we faithfully honor the action each and every time it breaks out -- so much so that when the fleeing man inevitably parks the car and tries to make a foot race out of it, we all cast out a big groan, followed by a rambling, profane list of synonyms for "moron," and then openly discuss what an amateur, poorly devised move that was and how we could have easily done better.

It's all one big win-win situation for the viewer. If the criminal gets away, we go, "Yeah! Escaped from the swift arms of the law! Defeated the government and all that it stands for! Stickin' it to the man -- right here on national TV! ...Well, that's that. What's for dinner?" Yet if the criminal gets caught, we say, "Yeah! That's what you get, idiot! Way to be a douche. ...Well, that's that. What's for dinner?" I think we watch so adamantly because we know, whatever the outcome there, nothing changes here.

And then back to the rat cage we go.