North Carolina is deciding on a law which will make the wearing of helmets for motorcyclists optional rather than mandatory as they are now.
In my state, Delaware, helmets have been optional for a while now. At first, a large majority of riders opted to not wear the helmet, but most of them went back to wearing one. Many cited the fact that injuries in accidents were much more serious. Others cited that it was inconvenient to stop to put on the helmet when they crossed state lines into Maryland or Pennsylvania, so they might as well wear them in Delaware. Most of the people who wanted this law only wanted it because they wanted helmets to be an choice rather than mandated.
It’s my opinion that it’s a mistake to make laws allowing helmet wearing as an option, or to change existing laws to make it an option. In this area, a majority of car drivers seem to ignore motorcyclists for some reason when on the roadways, which is dangerous. Add in a lack of helmet, and you have a recipe for death or serious medical problems. Who will foot the bill for all the injuries, deaths, and damage caused by an unprotected motorcyclist? In most cases, that’s you and me in the form of increased medical and auto insurance premiums.
If states with existing optional helmet laws aren’t willing to return to mandatory laws, then perhaps the insurance companies (medical and auto) could encourage practical safety by refusing to cover injuries and damage if the helmet isn’t worn, or giving a discount for helmet wear.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that if a motorcycle and a car or tree or other solid obstacle meets when the motorcycle is going at a high speed, that the motorcyclist isn’t going to come out on top.
Does your state have mandatory or optional helmet laws? Do you agree with your state’s current laws?
Football players have to wear helmets and they go at far less speed. Shouldn’t motorcyclists?
I don’t know what the Missouri law is, as I don’t ride a bike right now, but I remember when in CA it went mandatory. I am against mandatory helmet laws. I rode motorcycles a lot, and raced snowmobiles for a while, and I never rode without a helmet. A helmet has saved me more than a few times, and I think anyone who does not wear a helmet is a fucking idiot. But that is their choice. About the medical costs, that’s part of why insurance is required on vehicles and bikes. Where should the line be drawn, or in other words, why stop at helmets? Should the law require a fully padded kevlar suit as well to prevent body trauma in a bike wreck? While in the service, I was required to wear long sleeves, long pants, boots with heels, gloves, helmet and orange reflective vest to ride my bikes. I had no problem with the helmet, long pants and gloves, which I wore anyways, but there is a limit to the level of protection people must be required to wear by law. I look at it as natural selection. If someone feels that their image is more important than not splitting their head open on the highway, hey… god speed.
Around here, we used to have mandatory helmet laws, but once the Fed caved into motorcycle lobbyists and over turned the national law, I’ve spotted a lot of people not wearing them.
I think it’s ridiculous to not wear one, but most cycle riders insist on the right to have the breeze blow through their hair, bugs squash on their teeth and their brains spread over the pavement if they wreck. With the helmet laws in effect, the incidents of head injuries dropped among cycle riders, which probably was a mistake, because that left too many of them with too few brains still able to complain about helmets.
Smart bike riders wear one. The usually ride more sensibly and have “Start Seeing Motorcycles” bumper stickers on their other vehicles.
Less intelligent bike riders don’t.
I’m willing to chip in the increased cost in my medical/auto insurance if it means folks who don’t belong in the gene pool have full opportunity to remove themselves from it.
This is not an issue of lives and money as so many people think. I live in Maryland and an all rider helmet law was passed here in 1992. The law was passed as a result of Federal preasure caused by pro-helmet law lobbyist who could not win in over half of the states so they went to the federal government. The insurance industry also claimed that the helmet law would reduce their expenditures and save money. The medical community claimed that motorcycle deaths would decrease with the law. Well, in the last 9 years the Federal “black mail” was repealed making this the state issue it should have been all along; insurance rates have never gone down (when questioned the insurance companies said the law never effected expenditures so it would not effect rates); and DEATHS PER ACCIDENT INCREASED. Still the helmet law remains because anyone who would ride a motorcycle without one must be crazy, and the government must protect us from ourselves. If you chose to wear a helmet, that is fine. But, it is your choice. With this law I have no choice.
If I want to wear a helmet, I will. If I don’t want to wear a helmet, I will not. If you really want to save my life, use your turn signals and actually look out your side window before you change lanes. How about hanging up your cellphone while driving, after all you are driving a car not a phonebooth. In other words, stop worrying about me! If I want to kill myself, it’s my God given right to do so!
That sounds reasonable. If you want to split your head open on the road like a scrambled egg why should the government stop you?
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I’d wear a helmet regardless of the law. Just like I would a seatbelt.
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That’s their problem. If they wish to risk spilling their brains on the highway who are we to stop them?
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So charge non helmet wearing drivers more insurance.
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Sort of. Texas requires someone to wear a helmet unless they get a special sticker that says they don’t have to. To get that special sticker one must either have X amount of insurance or take some safety course.
Actually, I read somewhere that smokers save us money in the long run because they die sooner. No social security, no elder benefits etc.
?authority says;
I find this kinda hard to believe. I mean, how could wearing a helmet increase deaths/accident? I could see a slight increase in the number of accidents, if you believe the stories of decreased visibility and hearing, but trauma workers are pretty universal in thier support of helmet laws.
I think helmets should be mandatory for minors because most don’t have the wisdom to decide for themselves. I’m also ambivalent about laws for adults.
Peace,
mangeorge
I live in North Carolina, and I can tell you now that people are not taking the current law very seriously. I think I probably see more motorcycle riders without helemts than with helmets.
I do believe that the law is unnecessary. I think that people should have the right to ride free as the wind, or not quite as free. Helmets can and do save lives on a regular basis, and that is good. If people who ride bikes can’t realize this, then are they actually worth keeping around anyway? There are enough boneheads in this country as it is…
As a former Harley owner from California I guess I should weigh in. People used to ask my opinion a lot.
Helmet law or no, it didn’t change my lifestyle. I wouldn’t get on the bike without a full face helmet, gloves, boots, long pants, and a jacket. Yes, a good ventilated jacket is perfectly comfortable in the desert in July (as long as you don’t have to stop).
I did appreciate what the helmet law did for my insurance rate. $250 a year for full coverage of a primary vehicle in a metropolis is a bargain. It helped my student budget.
Helmet laws and accident statistics can be deceptive. There’s a certain population of riders–known as squids to the rest of us–who break the speed laws while wearing shorts, sandals, tee shirts with their helmets. This is known as natural selection.
we need more information for those stats to be relevant. what was the nature of the accidents? what was the cause of death? how many head injuries were prevented by the use of helmets?
How much more relevent could those stats be. The claim was made that helmet laws save lives, the fact that there was not a decrese in the number of deaths per accident proves the claim false.
The highway administation does not track deaths by cause other than what mode of transportation was used, ie motorcyclist deaths caused by motorcycle accidents.
If more relevent stats exist I would love to see them. But, it seems when the stats support freedom to chose weather or not to use a helmet, the pro helmet law folks call us idiots.
As for gremlins insurance issue, I have been riding street bikes in Maryland since 1985. When the helmet law passed in Maryland, I wrote State Farm (my insurance company) to ask about a reduction in rates. I was told that helmet laws do not effect the insurance companies expenditures so my rates would continue at the current rate. I still have the letter.
But, the true issue here is not deaths or money, it is the fact that the government feels compelled to protect us from ourseves. Every aspect of life contains risk, riding a motorcycle in and of its self is more risky than driving in a car, should we outlaw motorcycles to eliminate the possible cost to society of injuries to people who take more of a risk than the average person? If that is the case we could continue this logic to the absurd…smoking, drinking, fast food, too much TV.
To stand by and allow a freedom to be taken, even if it is not a freedom you exercise, is not what this country was suposed to be all about.
That statement would hold true only if those who were “standing by” agreed with you that a freedom is being unjustly denied, and that helmets don’t save lives.
How many of those cyclists killed were wearing helmets, as the law demands?
Drinking and smoking are both very much regulated where I live.
Peace,
mangeorge
I don’t know if helmet laws have saved lives or not, since I haven’t looked at the data. But the idea that mandatory helmet laws causes more deaths is not necessarily stupid - it’s just an application of the law of unintended consequences.
There have been a number of recent studies that suggest that people have a ‘comfort zone for risk’ that they tend to stay in. Give a driver a safer car, and he’ll drive more recklessly because he feels like it’s less risky to do so.
Helmets can give you a FALSE sense of protection. I’ve ridden bikes both with and without helmets. When riding without a helmet, I feel uncomfortable and unsafe. As a result, I take extra care when riding.
If the helmet makes you feel like you’re wearing armor, then you’re more likely to take extra risks, drive faster, be less attentive, etc.
Bottom line: If the helmet protects you less than you THINK it does, it may make you more likely to be hurt. If it protects you more than you think it does, it’ll probably be effective.
Have you ever been at a fatal motorcycle accident? I have. I’d eaten breakfast with the man less than an hour before. He was French Canadian, early fifties. It was a clear October morning.
We were among the slowest riders on the road. It was a Yamaha against a Cadillac. The Cadillac won.
After half an hour taking turns at CPR the helecopter arrived and took him to the morgue.
