The Helmet Debate

[Red Light]

Sorry, I've clearly not made myself so. I was only seeking to point out that motorcyclists sit in a cooling breeze not expending any great effort so their helmets can concentrate on protection. Cycle helmets, in contrast, are compromised from the start by the need for the wearer to avoid overheating.

I realised but your post was as convenient as any to hang a post on questioning what the rationale is for suffering any inconvenience wearing a helmet for such a miniscule chance of anything happening where it might help. How many lifetimes would it take any of us to cycle 4 million miles or make 8 million journeys at our current rate of cycling?

 

[Bicycle]

I think very few people take the idea of compulsory helmet-wearing seriously. A fringe backbench west-country MP is currently a bit noisy about it, but that's hardly the same thing as 'it's going to happen'. Some anti-compulsion campaigners get uppity about pilot schemes overseas, but people like to have something to get uppity about. It's a human right.

It reminds me of the kerfuffle about the triple jab a few years ago. All the doctors I knew or knew of had the triple jab for their own children. It was only Internet morons and kerfuffle-makers who decided it was a great big conspiracy. Lo and behold, the doctors were right. Kerfuffle over nothing is a human right and I will defend to the death the right of anti-helmet-compulsion campaigners to howl at the moon from now until Domesday. They are howling about nothing, but it stops them worrying about too much else and it does no harm. They may even be right and legislation may be coming in in 2015. And the Moon might be made of cheese.

I often wear a helmet, but usually I don't. If it became compulsory I wouldn't weep. But I think it would be a poor piece of legislation however worded - and I just don't think it would get through.

Many non-cyclists I know are concerned that I ride on fast roads helmetless and with occasionally helmetless children. Most cyclists I know don't have a view on whether I ought to protect my children's noggins.

Oddly, doctors, police officers and ambulance crew I know tend to be in favour of helmets, but I've never heard one speak in favour of compulsion. I am against compulsion, but in the same way that I am against the notion of government by earthworms. It's not something I need to spend much time worrying about.

Our vicar tuts and gives me a comedy hard stare when he sees my children riding without helmets, but as he is also opposed to yoga being practised in Church property, we may want to make our own minds up about which planet he inhabits.

Well if that doesn't make me a troll and a moron, what does?

 

[Nantmor]

I think very few people take the idea of compulsory helmet-wearing seriously. A fringe backbench west-country MP is currently a bit noisy about it, but that's hardly the same thing as 'it's going to happen'. Some anti-compulsion campaigners get uppity about pilot schemes overseas, but people like to have something to get uppity about. It's a human right.

It reminds me of the kerfuffle about the triple jab a few years ago. All the doctors I knew or knew of had the triple jab for their own children. It was only Internet morons and kerfuffle-makers who decided it was a great big conspiracy. Lo and behold, the doctors were right. Kerfuffle over nothing is a human right and I will defend to the death the right of anti-helmet-compulsion campaigners to howl at the moon from now until Domesday. They are howling about nothing, but it stops them worrying about too much else and it does no harm. They may even be right and legislation may be coming in in 2015. And the Moon might be made of cheese.

I often wear a helmet, but usually I don't. If it became compulsory I wouldn't weep. But I think it would be a poor piece of legislation however worded - and I just don't think it would get through.

Many non-cyclists I know are concerned that I ride on fast roads helmetless and with occasionally helmetless children. Most cyclists I know don't have a view on whether I ought to protect my children's noggins.

Oddly, doctors, police officers and ambulance crew I know tend to be in favour of helmets, but I've never heard one speak in favour of compulsion. I am against compulsion, but in the same way that I am against the notion of government by earthworms. It's not something I need to spend much time worrying about.

Our vicar tuts and gives me a comedy hard stare when he sees my children riding without helmets, but as he is also opposed to yoga being practised in Church property, we may want to make our own minds up about which planet he inhabits.

Well if that doesn't make me a troll and a moron, what does?

Of course it doesn't make you a troll or a moron. It makes you naive and complacent. The compulsion laws overseas are not "pilot schemes", they are country or state wide fully fledged laws. Other laws which make "safety equipment" compulsory began in those same states and were then introduced here. We have a vocal compulsion lobby and far too little public knowledge of the practical failure of the compulsion laws in other countries. Government some years ago said that at that time the proportion of cyclists wearing polystyrene was too low to implement a law, but that they would keep the situation under review and would like to bring in a law when the number of wearers was higher (I paraphrase from memory).
There is no need to insult those who disagree with you on the likelihood of compulsion. That is just silly. Compulsion laws have been enacted in other countries, what on earth makes it impossible to happen here?

 

[StuartG]

Oddly, doctors, police officers and ambulance crew I know tend to be in favour of helmets, but I've never heard one speak in favour of compulsion.

Certainly for doctors. Here is a quote from the BMJ:

More than two thirds (68%) of BMJ readers responding to a poll published today (27 July 2011) voted against mandatory cycle helmets for adults.
The poll asked: "Should it be compulsory for adult cyclists to wear helmets?" A total of 1,427 votes were cast on bmj.com over the last 7 days. Of these, 978 said No, while 462 said Yes.
The full results are now available at http://resources.bmj.com/bmj/interactive/polls

 

[benb]

I think very few people take the idea of compulsory helmet-wearing seriously.

You may be right in that, as it stands, there is little prospect of national helmet compulsion getting through parliament. But if we don't meet these arguments head on, who knows what the position will be in 5 years?

We're already seeing complusion via the back door, with almost every sportive, and several training courses for children mandating the wearing of helmets.

 

[mmoore5553]

I believe helmets are a must now a days. Older times people where not riding / biking on cement or payment. They used trails and they had a little give to them. It is just like anything else i would rather be safe then hurt.

 

[Theseus]

I believe helmets are a must now a days. Older times people where not riding / biking on cement or payment. They used trails and they had a little give to them. It is just like anything else i would rather be safe then hurt.

Poppycock.

I have been riding for many years. The vast majority on roads with only very few rides on trails, less than once per year.

ETA: Thinking about it I have come off the bike more on trails than I have on the road.

 

[Dan_h]

I believe helmets are a must now a days. Older times people where not riding / biking on cement or payment. They used trails and they had a little give to them. It is just like anything else i would rather be safe then hurt.

Sorry, I have to disagree. People have been riding on roads for an awfully long time without helmets!

 

[StuartG]

I believe helmets are a must

I believe I am a rock god. Next?

 

[Cyclopathic]

That kid it going to have a massive scare for the rest of his life now. Just for not waering a helmet.

This video highlights very well just how important it is to work from a properly devised script when tryinig to get across a serious point rather than just pointing the camera at oneself and winging it. It might even be an idea to rehearse a little so that the message comes across as well as possible. It has only strengthened my opinion that a helmet is unnecessary for the type of riding I do. I do not ride around in gardens that are full of holes.

 

[ufkacbln]

Motorcycles generate a lot of wind.

So do helmet debates!

 

[ufkacbln]

Compulsion is an issue because it is being sneaked in.

It is not the back bench MP looking for a national policy, but all the little nibbles that represent the introduction by the back door.

For instance we have children excluded from the proven value of training if they don't wear an (unproven) helmet, you can't go on a sponsored ride, a race, or other events without one.

We have the classic "Education" by misguided medical professionals who expound how luck you wear to survive a knee injury because you were not wearing a elmet

We have insurance companies condoning appalling injuries being inflicted by dangerous driving because not wearing a helmet somehow makes their client somehow innocent of the consequences of their actions

There is a case on another Forum where a Scout group is telling a Scout they cannnot come to meetings on a bike unless he wears a helmet.

There are lots of other cases... but these are where the problem lies.

 

[Bicycle]

Compulsion is an issue because it is being sneaked in.

It is not the back bench MP looking for a national policy, but all the little nibbles that represent the introduction by the back door.

For instance we have children excluded from the proven value of training if they don't wear an (unproven) helmet, you can't go on a sponsored ride, a race, or other events without one.

I see the point here, but I don't see it as a pernicious nibble. I wear helmets to some events because they're required. I used to race a motorcycle and had to put the bike and my clothing through scrutineering that I would never have undergone for road riding. I don't see a link here with the threat of legislation. I understand how one might, but I don't.

We have the classic "Education" by misguided medical professionals who expound how luck you wear to survive a knee injury because you were not wearing a elmet

I've spoken to many healthcare professionals over the years after crashes and have never been 'educated' like that. One or two have asked about helmets, but not in a hectoring way. I've found the NHS (from ambulance crew to A&E and beyond) quite fantastic after road crashes. I may have been lucky, but that's how I've found it.

We have insurance companies condoning appalling injuries being inflicted by dangerous driving because not wearing a helmet somehow makes their client somehow innocent of the consequences of their actions

I'm not sure an insurance company has ever condoned appalling injuries. They may have adjusted payment in the case of some head injuries (I have no data), but that is not condoning. Insurace companies are in the business of not condoning relevant facts, using either meaning of the word. They are not charities.

There is a case on another Forum where a Scout group is telling a Scout they cannnot come to meetings on a bike unless he wears a helmet.

I can't get excited about that. It is not a question for the Scout Group. I marvel at the way Scout Leaders and associated volunteers keep these organisations going the way they do. The notion of asking a scout not to ride to meetings without a helmet seems eccentric and quite alien to the attitude of all the volunteer scout leaders I have known. it's a case for a quiet word with someone who is putting a lot back into society and may have made an eccentric decision on one seemingly minor issue.

There are lots of other cases... but these are where the problem lies.

I quite understand there are lots of other cases... but if these are the four that come most readily to mind, we are not sliding headlong into a rocky crevasse. We may not even be in the foothills.... It is the human right of us all to get excited about whatever it is that floats our boat, but this whole anti-helmet thing reminds me a little of the chap who used to carry a sandwich board on Oxford Street telling me the end was nigh.

I reserve the right in this matter to be wrong, naive, hoodwinked or lacking in curiosity.

 

[DresdenDoom]

This debate is about helmets in the same way the fox-hunting debate was about foxes. A group of 'right-thinking' people wants to impose their will on another group who have differing views. Using the crutch of 'commonsense' they will harangue the unbelievers until a consensus of 'best practice' is made mainstream. Garnering the new majority, laws will be passed, and control imposed. Thus writ, they will move on, oblivious of the feelings of those they have legislated against. The noose grows ever tighter.

 

[StuartG]

This debate is about helmets in the same way the fox-hunting debate was about foxes.

Anologies are usually unsound. This one particulary. That is you didn't understand that you didn't understand the arguement of those you disagree with.

Heck I take it back - its a great analogy