Raise the Hammer

Perhaps I am using the word "responsible" in an overly specific way (i.e. not legalistic or intentional or morally at fault).

Cars and their drivers are responsible in the sense that cars are the source of the danger and the driver made a conscious decision to engage in this behaviour that poses a risk to others, as other commenters have noted. This is in the same way as a wind turbine operator is "responsible" for killing birds or a subway driver is "responsible" for killing a passenger who falls onto the track.

The response to passengers falling onto the tracks has not been to simply tell them to be more careful (or to sue the dead passenger for causing anguish to the driver), but to engineer safety into the system (e.g. in Paris they are gradually fitting sliding doors trackside to make it impossible to fall in front of the train). However, it must also be remembered that in a great many cases drivers are clearly inattentive or aggressive and are treated very leniently by the courts (why else would a $500 fine be sufficient punishment for a driver killing a pedestrian in a crosswalk, or "I didn't see her" convince a judge to acquit the driver who killed an 87-old woman crossing the road). Here are some statistics from Chicago: http://www.mcnabolalaw.com/Articles/The-...

In order to make our roads safer, we have to start with the realization that it is cars themselves that are the dangerous component, that using cars is a choice that incurs significant risks (to other drivers, to pedestrians, cyclists, and especially to those road users, including pedestrians, who are inattentive or irresponsible).

As I have pointed out through numerous examples, both cultural and legal, our society instead views pedestrian deaths and injuries at best as an unavoidable fact of nature that it would be foolish to try to address, and at worse as the fault of pedestrians for being negligent. It is a well-documented fact that in North America, sober drivers are almost never charged with serious offences when they kill or injure pedestrians, even when they admit to being at fault.

Perhaps "responsible" is too unclear, would "the source of risk" be better?