It’s fact that an unrestrained infant is at a higher risk of death or injury in an automobile accident than a baby in a carseat. If you can provide verifiable cites that shows this to be untrue, I will recant my opinion that parents who knowingly do this are irresponsible.
I’m takin’ that as a compliment! 
Diane says:
The fact that you chose convenience and laziness over the risk - NO MATTER HOW SMALL - of serious injury or death of your child makes you an irresponsible parent.
If you really believe this, you would NEVER LEAVE THE HOUSE with your kid! You would not have pets. You would not feed him ANYTHING that has not been lab tested. You would CERTAINLY NOT EVER ALLOW him/her to play with other kids or participate in organized sports.
Sound stupid? No, not really! This is what you are argueing! That RISK- NO MATTER HOW SMALL- must be avoided if possible!
I will guarentee you that your kid is at a higher risk playing little league than my kid is riding to the mailbox on my lap. I would say that both are safer than the possibility of the kid being hit by a meteorite!
[Adam Schiff]Put this to bed![/Adam Schiff]
gatopescado
Do the words “taking precautions to prevent serious injury when possible” have any meaning in your world?
As I said before Sherlock (raise your hand if you haven’t been paying attention), is that YES, there are dangers in riding in a car. YES, there are dangers playing sports. YES, there are dangers walking out your front door.
BUT. . . . now pay attention here, this is where you are falling behind the short bus. . . BUT. . .
There are certain things you can do that reduces (notice the word r-e-d-u-c-e-s isn’t spelled the same as p-r-e-v-e-n-t-s), that reduces the risk of a more serious injury or death. Things like helmet and carseats and being a responsible parent.
Fuck, is it getting through to you yet or do we need to adjust your antenna?
Here is the part you are missing: No one is arguing the value of carseats and seatbelts, but the situations previously mentioned in this trainwreck of a thread CARRY SUCH LITTLE RISK as to be comparable to EVERYDAY situations, like playing little league, eating, bathing, whatever!
You wanna stop on the side of the road? You wanna attempt to drive distracted with a howling banshee in the back seat? You go right ahead, if it makes you feel safer. I maintain you are a hypocrit if you feel that someone who goes 3-4 blocks or rocks the kid to sleep on an interstate is irresponsible, yet you see it perfectly acceptable to allow your kid to participate in sports or you keep a dog in the house. All these examples carry very low risk, and all are avoidable, it just a matter of where you draw your line.
I could easliy insinuate in snotty tones how stupid you are for not seeing this obvious point, but I won’t! (I just did! You Bastard!)
She said she loved me like a brother. That’s great, cause she’s from Arkansas!
I was following your argument to a logical conclusion. If you’re not really advocating that parents quit dressing their babies in pj’s then why bother making the argument at all? And why are you so worked up that so far you’re only posting to this one thread?
…or never concieve and are just as protective of the adopted rugrats we’ve got eating up our food, breathing all the good oxygen around the house and generally making life worth living. ( I love ya j, I just had to tweak ya there a bit).
Now then. I stand by everything I’ve said, and I support those who generally agree with the point of view that says, " As parents we can control certain things in the lives of our children, and can NOT control other things in their lives. We make value and safetly judgements day to day, and hour to hour based on our ability to protect them, and balanced with the understanding that we do NOT keep our kids swaddled in cotton batting 24/7."
iamsocool, I’ll respectfully suggest that you take your Public Servant-hating attitude and get the FUCK off the Straight Dope Boards for good. How’s that for Pit-worthy? Not only do you besmirch the tireless work done by EMT’s Paramedics, and the like ( Badged,huh? ), but by extension you besmirch the protective instincts of every parent here who values their child’s life more than they value abstract higher math.
The next time you are badly injured, or a family member is having a heart attack, whip out yer motherfucking Actuarial Tables. Apparently they are MUCH more important to you than relying on those people in every community in this country who are in a position to help you.
As a poster in today’s offerings said, factor in the guilt. The life-blasting, mind-numbing, sickening insanity-provoking guilt. It’s a CAR SEAT.
** U S E I T **
:mad:
Fuck you.
Diane hands out Utah State DOT cards. I talk to drivers at stop lights. Others find ways to try to impress the direness of the situation, but you’ve decided that we are being hypocrites. Cite? Proof? We’re not passing, we are indeed exactly- ** EXACTLY**- what we appear to be : Concerned adults trying to perhaps shed enough light to a stranger, that they reconsider their choices vis a vis their own child.
I’m so very sorry that you find that kind of humane response to be that of a " do-gooder". I happen to be proud of the fact that my 12 year old son and 10+ year old daughter BOTH notice kids loose in another car sometimes, and point it out to me. I don’t find that repulsive in any way.
I think it kind of makes them caring little people. I don’t know who to pity more- you, or any children you have. Oh, was that too personal an attack for you? Re-read your own words at the top of this posting befeore you DARE get uppity about personal attacks.
My goodness, can we inject a little common sense here? Yes, I can think of at least one situation where taking a tyke out of a carseat while said car is still moving (perhaps down an interstate) is entirely sensible and justifiable. If junior starts seriously choking on a foreign object the risk of death-from-choking in the next few minutes most likely far outweighs the possibility of a car accident at any randomly occuring time. Yes, grab junior and administer aid, that’s a no-brainer.
But, barring such catastrophes, keep the kid buckled up. Really. While there are long stretches of interstate in this country where safe stops are few and far between, 99% of the time the kid won’t die from sitting in the poopy diaper or having puke on him long enough to safely pull over and deal with problem. Hell, when my oldest sister was discovering motion sickness I think she threw up in every parking lot in St. Louis as well as the back of the car. Threw up in a lot of places in West Virgina, too, as I recall. Nobody was allowed to unbuckle in the moving car, though.
Life is about managing risks. Problem is, human beings are pretty shitty at really understanding odds and risks. One comparison is the person who is afraid to fly in a commercial airplane yet thinks nothing of driving 20 mph over the speed limit while talking on a cellphone. Whether you believe it or not, the kid is safer in the car seat (barring choking episodes and flaming vehicles, both much more rare than potentially fatal collisions)
So, we gonna continue the pissing match?
You know, Cartooniverse, there are decaffeinated brands which taste just as good as the real thing.
Of course, I don’t take my own advice; I’ve been drinking hi-test Pepsi all day.
Amen, jarbabyj
Pot Kettle Black.
I reacted vehemently out of outrage. You went and wrote the above quote and in doing so, TOTALLY misrepresented everything a LOT of Dopers were saying. Apparently, that flies in your book.
Sure as heck doesn’t fly in mine.
I don’t drink caffeine after 12:00 noon. 
I am back for one more post for those who still don’t get it. Please read it carefully if you are interested.
For those of you who say using formulas, probability theory, statistics, math, etc. to make decisions about protecting a child is outrageous, what you are advocating is ignorance. Math is a language useful in expressing the situation. By ignoring it, you only perpetuate you own ignorance.
To others like Wring, who at least realize benefit must be weighted against risk, your position is that the benefit is so small that is does not outweigh even the small risk. I accept that for you own choice but it does not give you any ammunition to criticize me. Here is why:
A married family with a child has a choice to make about grocery shopping. The child can ride along to Wal-Mart or stay home at home with the spouse. The shopping could be done at 9PM while child sleeps and spouse reads a book or watches TV in which case there is zero benefit to the child going to Wal-Mart. Nevertheless, I see many married people with their children at Wal-Mart, forcing their child to risk a car trip. I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM WITH THEM.
Now, the ADDITIONAL risk created by deciding the bring the child to Wal-Mart vs. staying home is more than the ADDITIONAL risk created by deciding to take a child out of car seat for 2% of a long trip vs. taking him out for 0% of trip. This is so obviously true that I’ll leave it up to any objectors to show otherwise.
In both cases the potential consequence is death in a car accident, so you cannot distinguish between them by saying the consequence of death is too great. It is the same consequence in both examples.
On the benefit side of the issue, the benefit of rocking a child to sleep in a car far outweighs any “benefit” of the other spouse being home alone as opposed to playing with child or being home as the child sleeps.
So next time you see a married friend a Wal-Mart with their child tell them how irresponsible the were to drive the child there when it would have been safer and no less convenient to shop at a time when the child could been left home with the spouse. Tell him or her, “You should not breed.” See what response you get from you friend. That is my response to you.
sail, I don’t even understand the point you’re trying to make.
My point was that it’s stupid and irresponsible to take a child out of the carseat for any reason, during any type of car trip. You don’t know what’s around the next curve.
Even if you’re a careful driver, how do you know someone who is completely smashed isn’t barreling towards you on the wrong side of the road just around that bend?
There is NO WAY you can hold onto a child when you’ve been hit head-on.
What the hell does that have to do with going grocery shopping at Wal-Mart?!? Of course I take my kids out shopping. But they’re ALWAYS, always buckled in.
And what the fuck was that bit about the Killer Jammies?
That was my point as well. Apparently, it’s become about Killer Jammies, Lethal Wal-Marts and Actuarial Tables, instead of parental common sense.
sail - I’ve told you all along, that the mathmatical formula does not include the factor of guilt should something go wrong, nor does it allow for the weighing of the risks.
Taking the child w/you places is part of living your life, having a family life etc. Making them as safe as possible while you’re doing it is also part of responsible parenthood.
FOr example - I’m sure that you have knives in your house, sharp ones. And, I’m equally as certain that for a period of time w/your youngster, you took ‘extra care’ about where you left the knife. Was there really a huge risk that your child would grab the knife and do great bodily harm to themselves? probably not a great deal. However, the potential consequences were significant enough to you so that you were consciously careful w/knives around your child, right? (thinking that when they’re not mobile, you wouldn’t think twice about leaving one on the stove, nor would you be concerned when the kid was a teen, however, most likely while they were toddlers you were most likely **very ** careful where you put them, right?).
same w/ the safety belt. The immediate, foreseeable risk at that exact moment, given those conditions might be near zero, but for many of us in this thread, that ever so slight risk, when combined with the absolute horrific potential consequences makes it an unfathomable risk to take (especially for something as minor as mere comfort ).
We re-evaluate risks all the time. When I was young, seat belts weren’t available. We bounced around all over the place. My mom didn’t know that having a baby when she was 40, smoking 2 packs of cigs a day and drinking like a fish was risky (we think it explains a lot about my brother), but, now we do know.
and, just as I’d do my damndest to convince a pregnant woman that drinking, drugging, smoking while pregnant are risks, or leaving your baby at home, alone & asleep while you run to the store is risky, I’ll still also try and convince folks that unbuckling your child while the car is moving is a risk better left unrisked.
Well, my son doesn’t sleep in Killer Jammies.
Not because I’m protecting him from the Evil Killer Jammies or anything like that, but because he wants to be ‘Like Daddy’ and sleep in just his undies. (except Daddy doesn’t wear Rocket Power underwear 
)
There. I’ve said it. My five-year-old sleeps in just his underpants. How long before someone comes in and flames me for not wrapping him up in warm pajamas?
To the three stooges responding to my last post. My point was clear. If you are not capable of understanding it, or refuse to addressing it head on, then I cannot help you any further. Go ahead and bask in your self-righteous ignorance. Good night.
Can I be Moe?
oh, well, calling me a stooge, that certainly puts your argument in best light. Oh, how could I have been so blind?
Again - your mathmatical equation did not assess a ‘guilt’ factor should the worst happen. And, while it may be educational to assess a risk factor using mathmatical terms, it also can backfire quite substantially when applied to human lives. (see: Ford Pinto)
Now we all know how Daddy and Son bond around YOUR HOUSE !!! With a little shared Hero Worship