Religious tolerance or safety?

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by loinburger


I agree, I think that the Sikhs' protests are idiotic at best. Make a kevlar turban or something, it can't be that difficult...

Why couldn't something that looks like a turban be fashioned around the helmet?

[loinburger]

Helmets might be too bulky for that to work. It would probably wind up looking like a Mojo Jojo style turban.

[Dis]

funny canadians. I'm against helmet laws for kids anyways. I never wore a helmet and look how good I turned out.

Smart kids don't get hit by cars. They learn to ride defensively and look for jakasses.

So in that case I don't give a flying you know what about who wears a turban. They have the right to wear a turban so let them.

crazy canadians.

[MrFun]

No Loinburger, I am not the sole person to determine what is reasonable or unreasonable -- it's an opinion.


Riding without a bike helmet is much more immediately deadly than drinking soda on a regular, daily basis.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by MrFun
No Loinburger, I am not the sole person to determine what is reasonable or unreasonable -- it's an opinion.

Well sure it's an opinion, but when the opinion comes without any justification then you seem to be implying that your opinions' superiority is self-evident.

Riding without a bike helmet is much more immediately deadly than drinking soda on a regular, daily basis.

Even were I to grant you this, it still doesn't change the fact that they're both potentially deadly. What level of personal responsiblity do we let people live with? Or, to put it another way, how much legislative coddling do we force down everybody's throat?

[KrazyHorse]

People in cars have seat belts. In fact the helmet laws in the US would pushed hard by Joan Claybrook in the Carter administration to set a precedent for seat belt laws. Helmets won't help much in most car crashes. They help a lot in motorcycle crashes. The death rate doesn't go down as much as you might expect but the survivors are more likely to recover without brain damage. I recommend full face on a motorcycle. Open face helmets can save a life and still leave a person without much of a face left. Jaws have been destroyed

Yet driving in a car is still more dangerous than riding a bicycle. Helmets help, but shouldn't be mandated, because (unlike seatbelts) the death rate from bicycle accidents is low enough that losses are acceptable.

I wear my seatbelt every time I step into a car. I never ear a helmet while biking (but would if on a motorcycle).

[MrFun]

Originally posted by loinburger


Well sure it's an opinion, but when the opinion comes without any justification then you seem to be implying that your opinions' superiority is self-evident.



Even were I to grant you this, it still doesn't change the fact that they're both potentially deadly. What level of personal responsiblity do we let people live with? Or, to put it another way, how much legislative coddling do we force down everybody's throat?

Well, since you're trying to exaggerate my position with your soda argument, let me try to exaggerate your position.

How about we do away with job site regulations that require workers to avoid wearing loose clothing around dangerous machinery??
It intrudes on their liberty.

I see a significant difference between people choosing to drink soda on a regular, daily basis, and people choosing to ignore laws or statutes that require them to wear bike helmets.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by MrFun
Well, since you're trying to exaggerate my position with your soda argument, let me try to exaggerate your position.

I'm not trying to exaggerate anything, I'm trying to find out where you draw the line and why. So far your only justification has been "your argument is without reason," which to me looks like you're drawing the line wherever the dart happens to stick in the dart board.

How about we do away with job site regulations that require workers to avoid wearing loose clothing around dangerous machinery??
It intrudes on their liberty.

If a private enterprise wants to make rules and regulations in order to prevent idiot workers from suing them for their own idiocy, then this is fully within their rights. It's called "covering your ass." If the government helps private enterprise in this matter, then it simply gives the regulations added legal weight and simplifies the process for private enterprise (producing a net savings in legal costs). Industry regulations are not the same thing as these halfwit civilian regulations that try (unsuccessfully) to sterilize everybody's life, because in the latter case there is no legal ass-covering involved, only legislative coddling.

Ah, the clever "rolleyes" argument. How foolish of me not to agree to your seemingly arbitrary opinions, but all the same I'd still like some justification.

I see a significant difference between people choosing to drink soda on a regular, daily basis, and people choosing to ignore laws or statutes that require them to wear bike helmets.

So you've said before. Why are you choosing to draw the line where you're drawing it? Or, to repeat my previous line of questioning (that you ignored): "What level of personal responsiblity do we let people live with? Or, to put it another way, how much legislative coddling do we force down everybody's throat?"

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Frogger

Yet driving in a car is still more dangerous than riding a bicycle.

Not on a per mile basis.

Helmets help, but shouldn't be mandated, because (unlike seatbelts) the death rate from bicycle accidents is low enough that losses are acceptable.

That depends entirely on what you consider acceptable. I doubt that any parent that has had a child die because it wasn't wearing a helmet thougt it was acceptable.

http://www.bhsi.org/stats.htm

687 bicyclists were killed in crashes with motor vehicles in 2000. This is 8 percent fewer than in 1999 and down 32 percent since 1975.

The death rate has been going down since states started instituting helmet laws.

I wear my seatbelt every time I step into a car. I never ear a helmet while biking (but would if on a motorcycle).

Perhaps you need to breath a bit more on a bicycle so more oxygen gets to the parts of the brain that deal with safety. Bicycles go more than fast enough to kill. Maybe you are just very slow. 20 miles an hour is more than enough to kill.

[Dis]

arghh

There is no doubt using helmets save lives. But should the goverment be forcing people how to live their lives?

hint: no

[Dis]

OK this thread is pissing me off.

Have you every rode a bike without a helmet as a kid?

Yes.

It's not that hard to avoid getting hit by a car. And if you do get hit there are things you can do to avoid hitting your head on the ground.

Only a stupid kid with headphones or brain full of mush could just let a car plow them over. You first try to get out of the way. Then you try to avoid getting run over. Then you try to keep your head off the ground (ie land on but and hands).

Sure that won't work if the car is going fast. But if the car is going fast then you are probably screwed anyways. And you shouldn't be riding on highways anyways if you are kid. You should always be on residential streets.

[Timexwatch]

I'm a big cyclist (For Mr. Fun, et al., I didRAGBRAI and at one point rode 25 miles a day casually)...

One can say that helmets are unnecessary for kids, but in my experience, helmets have saved me major injuries on a few occasions.

One time I was going down a hill about 1 mile from my house at about 20 mph, got a flat and did a flip over my handlebars, landed straight on top of my head and then did a 180. It wasn't fun, but the helmet saved me at the very least stitches.

Another time I was crusing ~15 down a residential street and then got my leg clipped by a driver who wasn't paying attention...I went over the bars again, hit my head on the hood and met face first witht the ground and slip several feet. It was another injury that was confined to simply a nasty scrape instead of a head injury.

A pet peeve of mine are idiots who ride on the opposite side of the road. Too often I've almost been hit by these morons, which again could cause serious injury.

I'm an experienced rider, but I'd never go out riding on the road without my helmet. Never, ever. Accidents happen, and people get hurt. I could've potentially been a vegatable had it not been for my helmet. So don't give kids the idea that it's not safe to ride without a helmet.

[Dis]

of course. If I rode on the road I'd wear a hemlet. It's just too close to traffic.

I usually ride on the sidewalk . Who cares about the pedestrians.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Buck Birdseed
Why should parents be able to decide over the life and death of their children? You americans are so cold-blooded and evil I get scared, often.

The beauty is that we don't even care what our neighbors think, much less what some heathen commie from Europe thinks.

[Heresson]

I think that turban is some protection for head too.
Anyway I'm sure that something in between a helmet and a turban can be invented. Otherwise - ban them!!!!