Dr. Phil Not So "Reasonable"

Tonight I emailed The Dr. Phil show regarding my thoughts about his appearance in the "Season of Reason" commercial even if he most likely will never learn of it (my opinion). Here is another example of my behavior and thought processes that would never in a million years have happened if Dustin hadn't been killed; I didn't even know when I sat down with the computer tonight that I was going to do this.

This is what I wrote:


Dr. Phil has helped a lot of people and given some great advice and tough love over the years. But I just don't understand his reasoning about something he's done recently. I've watched his shows about certain driving behaviors that result in fatalities and injuries (due to texting and drinking), and then he does a commercial where he is speeding, making unnecessary lane changes, and so distracted by being "the voice of reason" that he barely looks at the road. So it's not okay to make impulse buys but it's okay to drive aggressively with no thought to anyone else on the road? Maybe I'm overly sensitive. My 28 year old son was killed by a drunk, speeding, hit-and-run driver in August 2011. Since March 2012, I've been speaking to classes of court ordered drunk and high risk drivers, along with drivers who've killed multiple people and victims who've been paralyzed or suffered traumatic brain injuries because of reckless drivers just like Dr. Phil role modeled. My beautiful son is dead and there is a 19 year old boy in prison because he killed while driving badly. Some people think the commercials are funny. I think they are appalling. They just show how true it is that there is "A Strange Indifference to Highway Carnage" (the title of an article I read online a few months ago). People are killing themselves or other people on US roads every 16 seconds and 90-95% of the "accidents" are preventable. But hardly anyone even notices. So... why, Dr. Phil? Why? Signed, a bereaved mother who can barely drive anymore because now that it's "happened to me" (more specifically, my son Dustin) I don't trust any longer that it "won't happen to me" again.