Don't Shoot The Savior, Driver:  Remember Peter Kennedy

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Back in 1995 a driver named Peter Kennedy agreed to participate in what he must have believed would be an eye opening expose into the real life of a trucker.  It did open eyes and some of it was indeed about the trucker's life.  Unfortunately the message Mr. Kennedy had been trying to get across was sensationalized and exploited by the Dateline NBC program producers and served only to infuriate many in the trucking industry.

The television program that Dateline churned out after following Peter Kennedy around the country was one sided, to be sure.  The driver was portrayed as a greed driven maniac willing to risk the safety of every American motorist for his own gain.  After the program aired, Mr. Kennedy received not only criticism, but death threats.  If the truth is to be told, however, Peter Kennedy was guilty only of allowing himself to be used.  He was actually ahead of his time but most of us were too blind to see it.

He must have known that trucking was on a course towards destruction and he wanted the rest of the world to know it, too.  He knew that the only way to provoke change was to light a fire under the public's collective backside.  The complaints from drivers were not enough.  Good drivers leaving the profession in droves was not enough.  Public outcry and political pressure were the only possible roads to change.  And, in order to create the outcry, Mr. Kennedy must have known exposure was essential.  What better opportunity than prime time television?

I have no way to know just how much footage NBC cut when they released their big expose, but I'm willing to bet that there must have been a lot.  I'd also guess that much of it was the information that Peter Kennedy wanted so badly to be conveyed to the public.  For all of his well intentioned efforts, Mr. Kennedy received nothing but negativity.  The public's misconception of trucking and truckdrivers was already bad enough but now it had been catapulted to an all time high.

Years later some of us can look back on that incident with more clarity.  In the years since, we've seen the trucking industry react to the slightest poke in it's direction with a defensiveness far out of proportion to the prod.  Trucking groups such as the ATA put on a pretty smile and talk a great deal about safe, professional drivers but if you look closely, it isn't hard to see that their agenda does not parallel a driver's best interests in many areas.

Some trucker's advocacy groups have come and gone over the years, but have not been able to stay afloat for long.  The OOIDA is the strongest driver's group, and while they do work for all drivers, their allegiance is to the Owner Operator and related issues.  The Over the Road, company driver, such as Peter Kennedy, simply does not have a voice that can be heard over the constant drone of the large trucking interests.  No one seeks this driver out for input.  No one pays much attention to his complaints.  No one cares if he leaves the industry when he becomes burnt out and disenchanted.  This driver does not present any concern to big industry....until he is able to get the attention of the nation in one television show and give people a glimpse into this dirty little world.

We should not curse Peter Kennedy for what he did back in 1995.  If we truly want significant positive change, we are going to need more Peter Kennedys.

The trucking industry does not care that drivers whittle away their lives and incomes on loading docks.  If the load has to go, they don't truly care if drivers run when exhausted -- as long as they're not caught and the load is on time.  Shippers don't have interest in streamlining their loading practices because there is no benefit in it for them to do so.  Receivers don't care if a truck is unloaded in an hour or a day. 

Even the motoring public doesn't care until a tired trucker runs someone over.  In their distress, the public lashes out at those Monster Trucks and demands yet one more law be enacted to protect them and their families from this scourge of the highway.

The media, of course, joins the circus by learning only enough about the problem to misrepresent it or only half report it.  "Truckers Lie In Their Logbooks!!!" they merrily declare.  They have their villain, after all, and the trucker is nothing if not the perfect scapegoat.

In December 2001, Judy L. Thomas, a reporter from the Kansas City Star and former driver, released a series on the trucking industry entitled, "Dead Tired."  She spent something like 9 months on the road as she gathered interviews and information.  Of course the trucking groups severely criticized her.  They gave a variety of reasons why her reporting was flawed and said she over glorified the problems.  Drivers, on the other hand, applauded her for going further and deeper than any media type had ever bothered to go before.  Ms. Thomas wasn't satisfied to simply point a finger in the driver's direction... she was also interested in the four fingers pointing somewhere else. 

Some trucking industry groups really showed their true colors when they responded to this series of articles.  They would not acknowledge that grains of truth, while perhaps surrounded by some hype, wove a course through her writings.  They simply dismissed the whole thing.  This should send up large red flags to the rest of us as to just how far removed, out of touch and in denial those in power are as to the plight of the American Over the Road Truck Driver.

Just how long can truck drivers live in this state of decline as others firmly maintain their stubborn denial?

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