u/tragedy719

In my general experience across various contexts, most appeals to common sense happen when someone wants to assert their opinion without any rationalisation, and so they effectively call on a reptilian herd mentality as a lowest common denominator. This is especially true when talking about traffic situations where they don't understand the rules. They will take their observations of repeated rule breaking or general ignorance as evidence that there's an unspoken norm which is somehow more important than the actual law.

For instance, in most (if not all) Australian jurisdictions we have this rule that is very seldom mentioned which says that when turning at an intersection, you must give way to pedestrians crossing the road you're turning into. Very often, when you bring it up online or point out that someone has broken this rule, someone will respond like "well it's common sense that when crossing you wait for cars from all directions to pass".

At worst, this boils down to the idea that you always have to yield to whoever is biggest, fastest, strongest, higher status, or most willing to break the rules, which is the most degenerate way to understand behaviour. So let any turning driver continue without any regard for people crossing, and don't act surprised if they beep at you for trying to cross. At best, it's a call for caution that ends up distorting the law, for it encourages pedestrians, instead of showing any assertiveness, to effectively wait for an indication of permission before doing what they're legally entitled to do, which defeats the purpose of the rule and also slows everyone down. Generally, the commenter won't even acknowledge the actual rule; they'll treat it as useless. They won't even say "yes that is the rule, but we must apply it cautiously"; rather, what they call "common sense" reigns supreme.

I'm tired of this attitude and it shouldn't be tolerated anywhere.

The old Players nightclub which is a former bank is on fore on Brisbane St