Motorcyclist killed in helmet law protest

Reply to post by ABWarrior58

It shouldn't be.

There's already several laws pertaining to reckless endangerment.

Not to mention the simple fact that should speed limits and intoxication limits be revoked today there would not be a bunch of drunk speeders tomorrow.

Those who would drive drunk or 125mph are doing so regardless of legality and those who do not behave in such a way today would not suddenly start tomorrow.


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reply to post by thisguyrighthere


and its the same with helmet laws, i know plenty who disregard those laws

The laws are not there to screw with you.. to prove what a "slave' you are (which is laughable when people suggest this.. they have no idea what lack of freedoms and slavery really is), but to protect especially the younger and less experienced riders, who feel they are indestructible. They are not, and the laws are in place to enforce people's lack of better judgement.

The cases of "died because he wore a helmet" are laughably few - helmets save lives a LOT more than they cause problems. That's as funny as people trying to convince you that not wearing seat belts in a car is "safer."

The biker just proved the point of the government - wearing helmets is for your safety. Some people just can't stand thinking they are being told what to do, and like an irritable toddler who holds his breath to make a point, they go out of their way to prove they can do whatever they please.

Reply to post by ABWarrior58

Right.

Which reduces these "safety" laws into simple revenue generation.

Laws don't change behavior. Education and experience does.

Hence the ultimate futility of all law.

Unless of course the only goal is revenue generation.

With the added bonus of creating a criminal class. Government has no power over the law abiding. It is much easier to regulate and rule the law breaking. So they make more and more laws. Both redundant and contradictory. None of which perform the task they were sold to perform.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Personally I believe helmet and seat belt laws should be mandatory till you're 21. After you turn 21 it should be a personal choice whether or not to use safety equipment. I rode for many years and wore a helmet on most occasions, but on some of the real hot days it sucks having to wear a D.O.T. approved helmet. On many occasions I'd just wear the old school shell helmets. Even though they were illegal to wear, due to not meeting D.O.T. standards, but most LEO wouldn't pull you over just to see if your helmet had a D.O.T. stamp on it. I've had friends die from wearing their helmet before and friends die from not wearing one. Just like I've had friends who died from wearing their seat belt and had one friend who had to go through 12 different surgeries because of the damage the seat belt did to him. Even the EMT's told him he would have been safer without his seat belt on. It all comes down to freedom of choice, no government entity should be allowed to force you to live a certain way if it doesn't harm others. If I choose not to wear a helmet, that doesn't affect anyone in a negative way. It affects me only. Yes if you wipe out your family is affected if you die, but it doesn't physically harm them. Me not wearing a helmet won't cause the person that I hit or whom hit me to incur any extra physical harm or damage to their vehicle. The reason we protest helmet laws is because the government has no right to tell us whether or not to wear safety equipment.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


i would expect more from a gold level, first it doesnt create criminals, its just traffic offenses. Its there to save lives plain and simple

Right.

Which reduces these "safety" laws into simple revenue generation.

Laws don't change behavior. Education and experience does.

Hence the ultimate futility of all law.

Unless of course the only goal is revenue generation.

With the added bonus of creating a criminal class. Government has no power over the law abiding. It is much easier to regulate and rule the law breaking. So they make more and more laws. Both redundant and contradictory. None of which perform the task they were sold to perform.

Are you suggesting that helmets don't protect people? If I recall correctly, helmets are 45% more effective at preventing death, and 70% more effective preventing head injuries, than while not wearing helmets. They actually DO work. A friend of my brothers after going into the mountains to gamble (with my brother), had too much to drink. My brother was riding as well, went a different way though. He saw ambulances and cop cars going the opposite way.. realized what happened. Sure enough, he got into a nasty accident on those tight turns on the mountain highway roads. They said it was a miracle he lived at all, the speed he was going.. but the helmet saved him. Now, you may say it was his "right" to die.. but he was not in a sober state of mind. He had 5 kids and a wife, and other family. He was a sole provider. He certainly didn't want to die. Wearing a helmet saved him. You may call it "evil government control," but I call it the government trying to make up for human's inherent stupidity.

But to suggest that laws created to force people to wear helmets is a money-making venture is laughable in the extreme. They are made to save lives.. and it works.

Car accidents often occur in a matter of seconds. During that fleeting moment the human body can be subjected to extreme forces and exposure to many sources of harm. Drivers and passengers in moving vehicles continue moving until some external force stops the individual's inertia. A collision will often cause the body to abruptly change direction.

Traumatic brain injury affects roughly 1.7 million Americans each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Brain injuries result in 52,000 deaths each year. The CDC says that 17.3 percent of traumatic brain injuries are the result of a motor vehicle accident.

A rear-end collision, for instance, causes the body to abruptly move toward the rear of the vehicle; toward the point of impact. In a head-on collision, the body is propelled with great force toward the front of the vehicle. Occupants in a vehicle can hit their head on objects in the vehicle as their body is jolted around in the car. The head trauma from the external impact can result in a brain injury.

Head trauma in a California car accident can lead to brain injuries

We could drastically reduce the number of fatalities if all motor vehicle drivers were required to wear helmets, but not only drivers but passengers as well. Think of the reduced trauma to first responders, witnesses, family members of those needlessly killed because they didn't take the simple precaution to wear their helmet in their car. In fact it should be mandatory in all forms of transportation, both public and private. Airplanes, trains, buses, cabs, carts, rickshaws, radio flyers...the list is endless. Why can't we see the obvious?! Are we so blind?!?

reply to post by ExCommando


This story reminds me of that Nascar guy who fought against the implementation of safety harnesses for helmets to prevent basal skull fractures.... who eventually died of a basal skull fracture.

IRM

Originally posted by isitjustme
I ride a Harley and want to be able to decide when I should wear a helmet and when I don't. They can interfere with vision and your abilitry to hear, They can also be very hot in the summer,

"Interfere with vision? I wear sunglasses and can see everywhere out of my full face helmet. I call B.S.

Interfere with ability to hear? You should be wearing earplugs anyways to protect your hearing. You can hear everything you need to and shouldn't be depending on auditory cues for safety. You need visual confirmation always.

They can also be hot during summer? If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. You're probably one of those guys who ride around in a T-shirt and shorts too, eh?

It's easier to replace sweat than it is to replace skin (or a skull).

You've been pushing your luck, and you know it. All the gear, all the time.

Originally posted by Juanxlink
Protesting a law that gives you safety, and for a change, real safety, you must be real idiots... Riding without helmet is a will to die, if you are too retarded to grasp that...
So the guy got what he deserved?

Helmets will not save you when you take a dive off your bike going 70 miles an hour after some prius driving moron who is talking on his phone almost side swipes you.

All a helmet does is keep the yolk in so maybe you will survive as a vegetable for the rest of your life. Why do you think they call them brain buckets?

But I'm wasting my time, you don't ride and probably own a prius. Now you get to tell me you own 4 motorcycles and go to sturgis and myrtel beach every year.

Originally posted by Cryptonomicon

Originally posted by isitjustme
I ride a Harley and want to be able to decide when I should wear a helmet and when I don't. They can interfere with vision and your abilitry to hear, They can also be very hot in the summer,

"Interfere with vision? I wear sunglasses and can see everywhere out of my full face helmet. I call B.S.

Interfere with ability to hear? You should be wearing earplugs anyways to protect your hearing. You can hear everything you need to and shouldn't be depending on auditory cues for safety. You need visual confirmation always.

They can also be hot during summer? If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. You're probably one of those guys who ride around in a T-shirt and shorts too, eh?

It's easier to replace sweat than it is to replace skin (or a skull).



You've been pushing your luck, and you know it. All the gear, all the time.

edit on 4-7-2011 by Cryptonomicon because: (no reason given)

I call bs on you.

Full face helmets cut periphial visian drastically.

I have never heard of a person wearing ear plugs while riding. What rider does that? If your bike is two load then get a bicycle.

No sir, you don't ride. Those two things right there tell me that you have never had the pleasure of being on two wheels.

reply to post by Becoming

You really need to learn something about the facts of motorcycle crashes, G-Forces, and brain damage.

The best article you'll ever read about motorcycle helmets.

First, about half of all serious motorcycle accidents happen when a car pulls in front of a bike in traffic. These accidents typically happen at very low speeds, with a typical impact velocity, after all the braking and skidding, below 25 mph. This was first revealed in the Hurt Report but has been recently backed up by two other studies, a similar one in Thailand and especially the COST 327 study done in the European Union, where people have fast bikes and like to ride very quickly on some roads with no speed limits at all.

Actual crash speeds are slow, but the damage isn't. These are serious, often fatal crashes. Most of these crashes happen very close to home. Because no matter where you go, you always leave your own neighborhood and come back to it. And making it through traffic-filled intersections—the ones near your home—is the most dangerous thing you do on a street motorcycle.

The next-biggest group of typical accidents happens at night, often on a weekend, at higher speeds. They are much more likely to involve alcohol, and often take place when a rider goes off the road alone. These two groups of accidents account for almost 75 percent of all serious crashes. So the accident we are most afraid of, and the one we tend to buy our helmets for—crashing at high speeds, out sport riding—is relatively rare.

Even though many motorcycles were capable of running the quarter-mile in 11 seconds (or less) and topping 140 mph back in '81, not one of the 900-odd accidents investigated in the Hurt study involved a speed over 100 mph. The "one in a thousand" speed seen in the Hurt Report was 86 mph, meaning only one of the accidents seen in the 900-crash study occurred at or above that speed. And the COST 327 study, done recently in the land of the autobahn, contained very few crashes over 120 kph, or 75 mph. The big lesson here is this: It's a mistake to assume that going really fast causes a significant number of accidents just because a motorcycle can go really fast.

reply to post by Cryptonomicon


I'm sorry non rider says what?

Jump in your prius and let the big boys on two wheels decide what safety equipment needs to be implemented.

I suggest the best thing to do for motorcycle safety is to take the phones out of car drivers, like yourself, who run us over.

Thank you and goodnight.

reply to post by Becoming

I own a Shoei Hornet DS helmet, and my peripheral vision is 100%. There is no excuse. Just because there are cheap helmets out there doesn't give you an excuse to write off all helmets all together. You've been using this B.S. excuse of "peripheral" vision for too long, and it's based on urban legends.

Secondly, even so, if you are depending on your extreme"peripheral" vision while riding, you aren't doing it right. You need to be aware of your surroundings at ALL TIMES.

As far as "ear plugs", God you are so uneducated about motorcycle safety. EAR PLUGS are recommended by every motorcycle safety school in the NATION!!!! When you go above speeds of 50 mph for any extended period of time your ears experience extreme stress from the decibels created by wind buffeting. This can not only damage your hearing, but it also will tire you out faster (not good for those iron butt rides).

wow, this truly is ironic, didnt the same sort of thing happen to Gary Busey?

reply to post by Becoming

Man, you are foolish. I am a rider. Kawasaki KLR 650 for 6 years. I wear full helmet, full gear IN SUMMER. I sweat my ass of when I'm stopped, but guess what? I drink water/gatorade and I'm fine. When I'm moving the venting keeps me comfortable and cool.

As far as the helmet goes - it's got venting too - and when I'm stopped it's a little warm, but...

Let me put it to you this way:

If you don't enjoy the discomfort of FULL GEAR, then you'll HATE the discomfort of lost skin, muscle, and a cracked skull.

You should go talk to a rider who crashed without full gear and ask them how their skin graft operations are going. And as for the riders who crashed without a helmet - you can't ask them anything because they are most likely either brain damaged or dead.

Don't take my word for it. Go ask a Fireman about his experiences of responding to a motorcycle crash and ask them to compare what happened to the guy wearing the T-Shirt & shorts Vs. The guy in FULL GEAR.

I guess we should also have laws that restrict our sun exposure to 20 minutes per day because there's a possibility of developing skin cancer in the future. And being outdoors when there's lightning activity within a ten mile radius should also be illegal.
/sarcasm

Its not like wearing a helmet is going to reduce your chance of getting into an accident, though it might slightly lower your risk of death. Be a good driver and you shouldn't worry about helmets

Originally posted by BirdOfillOmen
Be a good driver and you shouldn't worry about helmets

The only problem with that is EVERY rider thinks they are a good rider. That, and even the "good" riders can get hit by an idiot in a meat cage. Sometimes it's simply unavoidable.

reply to post by Cryptonomicon

True, but practically any decision you make carries the risk of fatal consequences somewhere down the road. I really don't think its necessary to have a law requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets. Meh.