Because I would like to see the source of your numbers. Someone just posted a cite that suggests the numbers you talked about may be a bit off.
Asking for a cite is in no way considered bad form, or rude even.
My husband’s family had a friend who was in a car wreck in another country. This would have been in the 1960s or 1970s, and he was thrown clear, and was the only survivor. As a result, he refused to ever wear a seatbelt. Not entirely irrational in his case, but the statistics are not in favor of that being a good long-term approach. I don’t know if anyone ever argued it with him - and he died long before COVID was an issue, so no clue what his take would have been there.
Isn’t it funny how these anecdotes are all second- and third-hand? People will latch onto any story to support what they want to do (or not do) anyway.
Meanwhile, a real high school classmate of mine was really killed when he was thrown from a vehicle – a crash he almost certainly would have survived with minor injuries had he been wearing his belt.
Opinion from today’s Los Angeles Times:
Full headline is:
Column: We can’t blame the unmasked and unvaccinated for being irresponsible? Really?
(In a font where the question marks look like Hebrew letters.)
He differentiates among several groups who are unvaxxed for various reasons, and heaps proportionate quantities of scorn on them accordingly.
Well, in the case I cited, it was firsthand from the friend who survived the accident, so…
Having personally survived one car wreck where the results would NOT have been quite so survivable - and my husband survived two (that one, plus another one a few years later in that same car), we’d have had quite the argument had the topic ever come up during a social event.
Not always. I do know someone whose daughter died in a wreck while belted, while my friend was thrown clear and lived. Nothing could convince her to wear a seat belt after that. Didn’t matter that even without a belt, her daughter likely wouldn’t have survived.
And quite frankly, the numbers in that cite might be high (or low) as well. Like many other studies, it assumes that people who have blood drawn in a lab is representative of the general population. While that is possibly true outside of an ongoing pandemic, I think there are flaws assuming that it holds true during one.
It’s extremely illogical. To the point of stupidity.
And if someone is really worried about being in that situation (as unlikely as it is, compared to your garden-variety crash), this might ease their troubled minds:
But sometimes it’s a valid concern. As the great poet Chuck Berry said:
The night was young and the moon was bold
So we both decided to take a stroll
Can you imagine the way I felt?
I couldn’t unfasten her safety beltRidin’ along in my calaboose
Still tryin’ to get her belt aloose
All the way home I held a grudge
But the safety belt it wouldn’t budge
I hope this seatbelt tangent doesn’t leave the thread with no particular place to go …
Did the poor girl ever manage to get out of the car?
Sadly, no. 
In the 18th and 19th centuries, there was a panic about being mistaken for dead and buried alive. This apparently was a real thing during the cholera epidemics. This led to the invention of Safety Coffins, having an air vent and a bell that the un-deceased could ring upon finding himself buried alive.
ETA: Okay, getting back on-topic: Yes, shame on them as refuse the vaccines.
I see these two things as very different. I greatly resent being forced to wear a seatbelt, but I was delighted to get my Covid vaccination. But I would not support government mandated vaccinations for everyone. I know seatbelts save lives, it’s the government mandate I object to. If i don’t wear a seatbelt, it is my life, and only my life, at risk and I do not believe government should be involved in my decision. I’ve heard the argument that if i don’t wear a seatbelt & get injured it raises insurance rates for everyone so it isn’t just my lilfe being affected. That’s a scary argument that has no limits – the same argument applies if I eat too much junk or go hiking alone or swim in the ocean or … And I think it’s dangerous to allow the government to get a toehold in this area because ‘government’ also has no limits unless we put them in place. Covid vaccination, or lack thereof, does affect other people, but that has to be balanced against the risk of giving government this kind of power over our personal health decisions.
No, that argument has “limits” wherever we as a society decide to set them. It’s perfectly rational to decide that we’re willing to allow individuals to choose to run the risks of swimming in the ocean (unless there’s a pollution alert or something), or hiking or rock climbing, but not willing to allow individuals to run the risk of driving a car unbelted.
The reasonableness of that distinction is illustrated by the fact that, oh hey, we still do permit individuals to go hiking and ocean swimming etc. even while we insist that they buckle their ass up when they’re in a car.
IMHO it’s a far better idea to assign that power over your COVID health situation to the government than to Andy Antivax Maskhole who’s breathing down your neck at the grocery store.
When it comes to easily transmittable, especially asymptomatically transmittable, infectious diseases, those are really the only two options. Either we accept giving the government some emergency powers to protect the public health, or we rely instead on our communities to do so voluntarily. And I think the current pandemic has shown all too starkly just how fatally unreliable too many people in our communities are.
That said, I don’t think it’s necessary or desirable for the government to require that everybody absolutely MUST get a COVID vaccination. But I think it’s totally fine for the government to require everybody to make a choice between getting vaccinated and being legally obliged to follow proper health protocols for the unvaccinated.
If you (generic “you”) are willing to mask and distance and stay home until such time as the pandemic is declared effectively over, as some of my vaccine-hesitant acquaintances have undertaken to do, I’m fairly okay with that. It’s not the optimal choice but at least it’s reasonably socially responsible.
But if you want to have your COVID cake and eat it too, by avoiding the vaccine but demanding all the freedoms of the vaccinated, then I don’t care one whit that the government is impacting your pwecious fweedums by telling your spoiled-toddler ass that no, you can’t have that.
My understanding is there is no record of anyone ever having rang the bell from inside, but yes, they were a real thing for a while. There is an Urban Legend that holds this is the origin of the phrase, “Saved by the bell,” when in reality the phrase came from boxing in the late 19th century. A fighter on his last legs was “saved by the bell” when it rang ending the round.
Nope. In an accident, your body becomes a projectile and can hit and kill or seriously injure another passenger or the driver.
People also have preferences as to how they would wish to die. Many people would understand that they are more likely to die in a car crash if they are not wearing seatbelts, but would prefer that possibility rather than having any chance of getting trapped in a burning car and burning to death.
This is one of the best commercials I’ve ever seen that illustrates that. here
Let’s hope @Ziberian watches this.
? For people who do get trapped in crashed cars, is it typically the seatbelt that traps them?
AIUI, you’re actually less likely to be trapped in a crashed car if you’re properly belted in, because you’re kept in position in the car’s most protected space instead of ending up with one broken leg jammed through the roof or something.
ISTM that the less injured you are in a car crash, the better your chances of being able to get out of the crashed car. And wearing your seatbelt indubitably reduces your chances and severity of injury.
Of course, that’s not to say that it’s a bad idea to have an emergency car-escape tool affixed to the side of your seat so you could cut the seatbelt if necessary, that’s probably smart.