God bless the commonwealth.
I don’t have any sympathy for people who don’t wear helmets/seatbelts. I know that the latter is still a law but it’s not a bad idea and it isn’t going to hurt as much as popping a hole in the windshield with your head (those suckers are hard!) If you don’t want to wear your helmet, your insurance premiums should go up and I shouldn’t have to pay for your stupidity.
This is the only reason I think there should be a helmet law–I don’t want to pay for another’s stupidity.
However, I’d vote for it if they’d attach a rider saying the state will not pay to treat head injuries sustained by helmetless accident victims.
So, what exactly is the increased cost to the rest of us, per capita, to pay for the medical treatment of all the people taking unprotecteed headers off of their motorcycles? .002 cents? I think my pocketbook can stand the additional strain. This is a law the legislature had no business passing in the first place, and I’m glad to see it gone.
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there far more head traumas in car wrecks. IF this were a consideration people should be required to wear helmets in cars. Except that its illegal to wear a helmet in a car because it blocks your hearing.
In so far as there is actually a cost to the state, well, the state shouldn’t be paying for those services anyway. And if a few reckless morons splitting their skulls on the pavement cause private premiums to rise, that’s the way the cookie crumbles. Maybe insurers could start offering helmet-only policies which you have to sign a contract stating you’ll always wear a helmet in order to get.
Exactly. Motorcycle accidents make up miniscule amount of the total medical costs…and head injurys in them are actually pretty rare. Most injurys in a motorcycle accident are to extremities, not the head. And then we can get into the debate about having a helmet on making you morelikely to get into an accident in the first place(due to rider fatigue, blocked vsion and hearing(on some helmets), etc…Well, I’m not getting into that one again…weve debated that to death and if you want just do a search on my name and helmet and you’ll find everything I would post anyway.
And the senator will probably get more votes from this, not get voted out of office. The motorcycle rights activates are pretty good about taking care of people to do the right thing and repeal these stupid laws.
Helmet laws
So why do we have seatbelt laws, then?
Esprix
We have seatbelt laws because seatbelts have demonstrably saved lives, you can wear one in a car, and it doesn’t hurt you to wear it.
Same with a helmet. Yet just as people still choose not to wear seatbelts, some people choose not to wear helmets. And that’s their business so far as I’m concerned.
The jury is still out on helmets.
The funny thing is, this is the same state in which laws recently went into effect which require all children under age 9, I think to be in car seats and for motorists to put their lights on when travelling through construction zones even in broad daylight. While I can sort of see the rationale behind the former, what it means is there was a run on car seats the day before the law went into effect which meant the only ones available were the most expensive ones, if the evening news is to be believed. It also means that while my brother and his family were visiting my folks recently, when his dog decided to chase something other than a tennis ball and took off, my niece couldn’t join me when my brother and I took our respective cars to quarter the neighborhood (We found the dog safe and sound less than 2 blocks away, and it is a quiet neighborhood. She also didn’t get any more tennis balls thrown for her!) I don’t get the lights on in construction zones law either; I’m just grateful my car alerts me when I turn off the engine and forget to turn off the lights since I drive through one on the way to work.
Pennsylvania is going very paternalistic when it comes to automobile drivers, but not to motorcyclists. While I must admit a Harley is cooler than a Hyundai, I’m not happy with the recent turn of events.
CJ
Because the State is improperly acting as a nanny in people’s cars, too.
Well, the implementation of legislation such as this usually has reasonably long lead-times, with adequate warning for those affected. Whether one agrees with the legislation or not, one shouldn’t really blame the legislators if people leave it to the last minute to comply with the law.
My friend here in PA just bought a motorcycle, and a helmet. The dealer how sold him the bike mentioned the law to him, and my friend bought a helmet anyway and wears it all the time.
But even the bike store owner, who makes money from selling helmets, says they are often pretty useless unless you wipe out at bicycle-riding speeds. For this reason, the law is junk and why bother to enforce it?
Seatbelts, on the other hand, have a much better track record. A seatbelt in a wreck will protect you a lot better than a motorcycle helmet will. Look at it this way: what do you usually see in non-seatbelt fatalities: “so and so was ejected from the vehicle”. Wearing a belt would prevent that in a snap. On the other hand, if you wipe out on a motorcycle, you’re getting ejected, helmet or not. And that helmet (and sometimes anything short of a suit of armor) might not do much to protect you from a nasty case of road rash.
Sounds like a great idea to me.
Ending the helmet law, that is. Not electing Gary Busey. After listening to him on Loveline the other night, I don’t think he’s even fit to be governor of Candyland.
Not directed at you Elwood, but this is absolute BULLSHIT!
Ask any motorcycle racer the value of a good helmet, and at what speed his last get-off occured.
Law or not, what amazes me is how anyone can actually argue against the merits of wearing a helmet. Its a little like claiming condoms are no good against STD’s. They work, folks! Not always 100% and not in every situation and you might not like wearing it. Get over it!
I scream, you scream, we all denounce Jesus for ICE CREAM!
Ask any motorcycle racer the value of good leathers so he doesn’t leave everything but his head behind him on the track.
If people are so concerned about other people’s safety, then why don’t they mandate full leathers, full face helmets, boots, and gloves for every rider?
Commonsense certainly doesn’t prevail on its own.
I have seen far too many riders who, while wearing helmets, were wearing t-shirts, shorts, and tennis shoes. These same mental incompetents, took turns at speeds so they could take their bike as tightly to the ground as possible. If there were a mistake or something that got in the way, you’d have easily seen a bloody smear wearing a helmet.
Leathers and a hemlet are commonsense, IMUO. YMMV.
gato: no hard feelings. Actually, that bit of info is just one more reason why helmet or no, you won’t see me driving or riding a motorcycle anytime soon.
No, its not absolute bullshit. Motorcycle racing is a differant enviroment than the street, and I have known several racers who would wear one on the track but absolutely not wear one on the street. I know EMT’s, cops, firefighters, and doctors that dont believe that Helmets are a good idea either.
Helmets protect you in some cases, but they make up for what little protection you get from head injurys in increased neck injurys in what would otherwise be a minor accident.
My not wearing a helmet has nothing to do with my not liking it, but everything to do with the evidence I have read pointing to it being a bad idea.
This is not a black and white issue like condoms. A lot of elements go into motorcycle saftey, and helmets hurt in some and help in others. Just because someone has looked at the evidence and drawn a differant conclusion than you have does not make them ingnornt and stupid.
Get over over it your self.
Without taking sides here, I want to know why people wouldn’t want to wear a helmet? What’s so godawful about it? Honestly.