ridelikeaturtle

Jesus, the amount of passive-aggressive whinging; and finally, a link to a chiropractor website for whiplash? C'mon.

Mandating helmet use won't make cycling more accessible, more attractive, or safer.

Improving cycling infrastructure does.

Stadjer

That may be the case, what I mean is that despite their everyday reality people should not give up on the idea of circumstances safe enough to ride without any passive safety measures.

genec

Uh, so the fed is going to mandate helmets eh? In cars, right... after all that is where 40,000+ Americans die each year... seems like the obvious place for helmets. I applaud this forward thinking safety measure... helmets, seatbelts and airbags for all motorvehicle occupants.

This is what we are talking about, right? Can'tbe for cyclist... heck, less tha 2% of America bikes... and only about 700 deaths a year occur from cycling...

But the automobile, man, that IS a dangerous beast.

livedarklions

Specifically, the recommendation that is being objected to is for elected state legislatures to enact mandatory helmet laws, so that generality is completely irrelevant here. This board is not acting as a dictator but as an advisor to elected officials. I was responding to a ridiculous comment and you're now defending that comment absurdly.

Stadjer

The comment was a bit hyperbolic, but that doesn't make it nonsensical.

They are unelected. They advise on what's a political decision, but they can't make a whole policy, they don't have a budget to improve safety in other ways and they are not in a position to consider other relevant issues than safety that are related to their advice. They are a single issue board with a very limited scope. Their expertise and possibiliteis dosn't stretch out over the whole issue, but their advice limits the issue to their expertise and possiblities. The board argues that they want zero deaths but they can't deliver zero deaths themselves and following their advice won't either, so it's not a valid argument.

It's just an advice, but it makes it very easy for elected politicians to claim to just follow the advice. They say it's safer and who can be against safety! It makes it harder for elected politicians to have to go against the advice with an integral cycling policy. It's an excuse for elected politicians to make what's really their own decision, and it's a difficulty for those who want to. To consider the full issue in relation to for example infrastructure budget, law enforcement and free choice is what offcials are elected for.

Paul Barnard

Yeah, that sounds like a bunch of poppycock to me. Will the commuters take to commuting by car because they would otherwise have to wear a helmet. Will the roadies suddenly retire to their Peloton because they would otherwise have to wear a helmet. Will the homeless or those who cannot legally hold a driver's license suddenly give up cycling and walk?

Notso_fastLane

Since this thread is getting a little hot, and could use some levity....

True story: My buddy and I, way back in the late 80s, were coming home from another friend's house. He was driving, I was in the passenger seat. I don't know what prompted it, but I had my motorcycle helmets with me, or he asked me to bring them, I forget.

Anyway, sitting at a light in pretty heavy traffic near the end of rush hour. We managed to be stopped at the front at a light, 4 lanes N-S, 6 lanes E-W. We both grab a motorcycle helmet and put it on while we're sitting through the red. We look around, and everyone stopped has noticed this (this was in the days before cell phones!).

Light changes, we take off.

.....every other car at the intersection sits there and waits until we are well clear before they move. We were probably 100+ yards through the other side before anyone started rolling through.

Good times.

rydabent

I never ride without my helmet, but I hate laws telling people what to do. Just more b'cratic nonsense of gov trying to run peoples lives.

livedarklions

Move the goalposts much?

Whatever the flaws in the recommendations and the scope of their expertise, the one thing you really can't plausibly accuse them of is acting as a dictator. Your post is so convoluted trying to make that dictator thing work that it made my head spin.

You want to play along with silly bumper sticker accusations, go ahead.

livedarklions

So do you advocate repealing laws that require people to have brakes on their bikes?

I'm not for mandatory helmet laws, but some regulation of riders is necessary.

All laws tell people what to do (or not do). Do you hate all laws?

Stadjer

They want to force helmets on people's heads, you could argue that it's beyond the scope of policy in a free country, and characterize that as 'trying to be dictators' to get your point across. I focussed more on the 'unelected' bit because there is an issue with all kinds of boards and committees preluding on political decisions.

livedarklions

And a cat can cough up a hairball to get the hairball across.

Hyperbolic language about dictators is a pretty silly rhetorical device. You can argue that any regulation of any kind is beyond the scope of policy in a free country but in this case, it's going to sound pretty hollow.

Honestly, the best argument against it is that we already have a fairly high acceptance rate compared to other countries, so the number of people who would start wearing helmets because it was made mandatory is probably very low, and some percentage of that increase will be people for whom wearing a helmet is likely of little benefit.

From a moral standpoint, unlike the lack of brakes, if I choose not to wear a helmet, I'm putting no one but myself at risk.

Moe Zhoost

And would there be a small number of helmet wearers who would choose to doff their lids in protest if this becomes mandatory? Darn likely, I'd say.

mr_bill

Yee-haw! Damn, I haven’t worn a seatbelt to spite my legislator for years! How ‘bout you?

The kooks shall inherit.... ....the everlasting gobstopper thread.

-mr. bill

livedarklions

I do remember people going to elaborate lengths to disable the buzzer that would go off if the driver didn't wear seatbelts. Contrarianism is a real thing, but I don't think enough of a factor to drive policy.

This thread died months ago, now we're reacting to a coughed up hairball.

mr_bill

I’m sure there are three or four kooks in the Live Free or Die state who currently wear seatbelts, but will immediately stop wearing their seatbelts if HB1622 becomes law, just to spite Skip.

-mr. bill

Moe Zhoost

Apples and oranges, mate. The probable severity of a motor vehicle injury and the proven protection provided by seatbelts makes it a no-brainer to wear them. Although severe head injuries do happen to cyclists, they are uncommon. Lid-less cycling is not courting death as is riding belt-less.

I'm not advocating that folks abandon their helmets. I wear mine all the time. What I was musing about was reactionary behaviour changes to the contrary in response to new laws not based on comprehensive science.

livedarklions

I think they already have an organization:
https://www.fsp.org/

livedarklions

I think the question is really are there or are there not a very few people who are wearing helmets now who will stop if helmet wearing is made mandatory. I suspect a few such people might exist, but far too few to think about them from a policy perspective, while Mr_Bill is skeptical they exist at all.

I would put the importance of this argument somewhere between "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin" and "who's faster underwater, Flash or Aquaman".

rydabent

The fewer regulations the better. Every regulation means less freedom for some one.​​​​​​

livedarklions

And the lack of necessary regulations has led to the death of innocent people. I'd say the dead people had their freedom reduced big time.

Notso_fastLane

This has to be one of the most shortsighted, simplistic, and just plain wrong (ethically, and factually) posts I've seen on BF recently.

And in so few words.

Congratulations, I guess.

livedarklions

I demand my right to sell tainted meat!

starkmojo

Actually you should try looks like you would fit right in.

I ride 2-3K per year and almost never wear a helmet. So we must have missed eachother, and I live in the "weak cycling culture of Eugene Oregon https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/05/...the-northwest/, so I guess your argument is invalid.

I-Like-To-Bike

Since you have resurrected the Dude's previous strange comments on this thread, I thought it time to correct another of the Dude's misstatements directed at me that has been repeated by another poster on this thread. The Dude and livedarklions raised a fabricated strawman that I claimed on another thread to never see a Specialized brand bicycles "in the Land of RAGBRAI" and dissed my powers of observation (and implied I am a liar). I made no such claim in any post on this threads or on any otherthread.

For clarification, on another thread I asked about where was the location of a poster who claimed that a specific high priced model of Specialized - The S-Works was "everywhere" and the Dude has proceeded to go into a misquoting tizzy about a claim from me about never seeing Specialized brand bicycles and therefore don't know what I am posting about, with livedarklions piling on as is his wont. See Original post