Seatbelts

[Nataly 38]

Quote

Problems is (or one of the) is the people do not see it as being selfish..... they only 'think' that it's their so called freedom being invaded.... no accounting for stupid, I guess.

Taking unnecessary risk is often "selfish" but we all do it for one reason or another (I mean, we skydive 'cause it's fun, right?). However, if something as simple and easy as buckling your seatbelt (or wearing a helmet) can so greatly reduce the risks, it seems like a no-brainer to me.

My parents drilled it into me that I should always wear one - I'm glad that it's so automatic I don't even have to think about it

"There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse."
- Chris Hadfield
« Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. »
- my boss

[millertimeunc 0]

Quote

...bio-missile potentially impacting others?

Quote

Pretty much describes my RW skills...

Bio Missile! I want to change my DZ.com screen name now! That's awesome!

The best things in life are dangerous.

[kallend 2,147]

Quote

Quote

I only wear a seat belt because I do not want to pay for the ticket. Working in the Fire Department for several years I saw a few people that were killed because they were wearing a seat belt, unfortunately that doesn't fly in court.

Yeah, everybody knows someone who knows someone who was either killed because of the seatbelt, or would have been killed if they were wearing one. (I realize that isn't what you said)

They all seem to ignore the people they know who wouldn't have been killed if they had been wearing one. The car stops, the person doesn't. Either out through the windshield and headfirst into a tree, building, other car (and on and on). Or the car rolls, the person goes out the window and the car lands on them. One friend went straight up when the car rolled. They estimated that he went up about 20 feet and landed on the pavement. On his head.

I've lost too many friends who would still be here if they had been belted in to believe the bullshit about "Being killed because of the seatbelt." Yes, it happens, but not nearly as much as a lot of people think.

That being said, I fully believe that seatbelts and motorcycle helmets should be a choice (for adults anyway).
I never drive or ride without a seatbelt or helmet, but I believe it should be my choice.
If nothing else, it ups the Darwin effect.

Drive on taxpayer funded roads, obey the rules. Your choice is to refrain from driving on public roads.

Traffic lights have been proven inefficient for traffic management and do not promote safety. I still stop for red lights, though.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[riddler 0]

Driving in snow, Colorado, F-150 pickup, slow lane of three-lane highway. Man in small car behind me decides that 45 MPH in the slow lane during a snow storm isn't fast enough, accelerates to middle lane, hits ice, yaws several times, then hits my left rear tire. He skids off to the right shoulder with only minor damage.

I am pushed to the left, through all three lanes of traffic, and end up sideways in the fast lane. Bad news is, there is a semi tractor/trailer Semi crushes the front of my pickup, pushing me right, back through the same three lanes I just came from. Now I hit a streetlight with a large concrete base. This crushes the remainder of my pickup truck. Now, it's just a box with some back wheels. No airbags.

I am wearing a seatbelt, and get out of the car, run back 150 yards to make sure that the guy that hit me is all right. He is, and is able to drive away after we exchange insurance info.

No seatbelt, I would have been dead at 19. Pretty easy decision for me.

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[riddler 0]

My mother, who passed away in February, was a mail carrier for 30 years. She didn't wear her seatbelt for the first 10 years. Remember that older mail jeeps had the driver's side on the right side, so that lazy mail carriers could put your mail in the box without getting out of the vehicle.

My mom was merging into traffic, failed to yield right of way, and was hit by a garbage truck on the left (passenger side). This destroyed her entire mail jeep, and she was thrown from the vehicle, which broke her hip, and she stayed for five weeks in the hospital. She was not wearing her seatbelt. If she was wearing her seatbelt, there is a chance she would have been killed, because she would have remained in the vehicle while it was being crushed.

So I would say, if you are in the position of driving a 30-year old mail jeep, with the driver's side on the right, and you frequently fail to yield right of way, while merging left, then it's probably OK to not wear your seatbelt.

Any other time, you need to wear a seatbelt.

Trapped on the surface of a sphere. XKCD

[LongWayToFall 0]

That is pretty funny. I was wondering where you were going with that, after saying she uses her seat belt now.

The FACT of the matter, is that if you are not wearing your seat belt, and you collide with something, you will probably loose your ability to control the vehicle, by not being able to reach the wheel or pedals. After loosing control, you could very well crash and kill ME or someone else.
Because of this, I have pretty much no tolerance of people who don't belt up.

I am almost always in favor of less laws, but this one makes sense. The motorcycle helmet law on the other hand, can only really affect yourself (aside from insurance, as noted earlier) and because of this I think it should be optional.

[kbordson 8]

Quote

The FACT of the matter, is that if you are not wearing your seat belt, and you collide with something, you will probably loose your ability to control the vehicle, by not being able to reach the wheel or pedals. After loosing control, you could very well crash and kill ME or someone else.
Because of this, I have pretty much no tolerance of people who don't belt up.

I am almost always in favor of less laws, but this one makes sense. The motorcycle helmet law on the other hand, can only really affect yourself (aside from insurance, as noted earlier) and because of this I think it should be optional.

Wow! You should check your premises. You are good at rationalizing. Can you even see the contradiction in your statement?

Paragraph 2: "FACT of the matter"? "probably loose your ability to control"? "could very well crash and kill ME"? "no tolerance for people who don't belt up"?

Paragraph 3: "motorcycle helmet law on the other hand, can only really affect yourself"?

So in paragraph 2 - you have ONE potential "missile" (the person inside the vehicle) and you vehemently slander those potential "murders"; in paragraph 3 - there are TWO potential "missiles" (the motorcycle and the rider) But you can accept one because "I think it should be optional."

If you accept the law for one, you should be willing to accept the law for the other. (and ftr, the reason that I wear my helmet all the time is not to "save" me once I go down; rather it's to keep the bugs off of my face at highway speeds) You are in favor of laws that YOU like... not ones that "make sense."

I'm not a moron. I just don't agree with you on all of your points. (just like you obviously don't agree with my thoughts)

[LongWayToFall 0]

I never made any mention of "meat missiles", and that is not my point.
As you can tell, I am shitty at making arguments. One of my main rules in life, is that if something could possibly cause harm to me or my family, I probably won't be cool with it. If however, you want to do something, and it has nothing to do with me, I'm probably ok with it.

The point I am trying to make, is that when you are not wearing a seatbelt it is entirely possible for you to loose control of the vehicle, solely because you aren't belted. IE you bounce out of the seat, and can't grab the wheel anymore. That same scenario could have been prevented, because you stayed in the seat via the belt, and regained control of the car before crashing into something/one.
This is a point that nobody has made in the thread yet, and for me personally, changes the ball game.
A motorcycle helmet does not carry the same possible scenario, hence why I make the distinction.
So as you can see, my argument has nothing to do with missiles. On that same point though, what do you propose to prohibit the motorcycle/rider from being a missile, if that really is a problem in your eyes?
I'm pretty sure upthread you mentioned not wearing a belt, in which case you can excuse the last sentence.

[CanuckInUSA 0]

I am willing to take the risk that I will be in a situation where wearing a seat belt will kill me. In other words, the seat belt will save my ass 99% of the time. If my 1% comes up, well it was not my day and I wasn't supposed to live forever. I always wear my seat belt. Seat belts save lives.

Try not to worry about the things you have no control over

[guppykf 0]

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?


Funny,but true story: when I was a newly licensed teen driver in the heat of summer, one day i was sitting in traffic with my foot out the window (car didnt have A/C), seatbelt on when a police officer on a horse approached my car and asked what I was doing and I told him aging and getting fat (I was eating some ho hos at the time) He said you really should get your foot out the window or I'll have to give you a ticket. I said, make you a deal, let me keep my foot out the door and I will give you the rest of my ho hos.......he agreed and rode off with the rest of my melting box of ho hos.

THRIVING IN MY DASH!!

[Abedy 0]

Goodonya. I scanned the thread for airplane seatbelt, so thank you.
I also fasten the seat belt in a plane whenever possible (Caravans, Otters, Skyvans) especially when doing tandems.

The sky is not the limit. The ground is.

The Society of Skydiving Ducks

[Nataly 38]

Quote

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?

Really?? That doesn't even make sense!

Our car was too small (and too full!) for us to lay down in the back... We always had to buckle up, but we never complained about it because that's just the way it was. We didn't back-talk to our parents - we'd have gotten the back-hand!!

"There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse."
- Chris Hadfield
« Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. »
- my boss

[shropshire 0]

Quote

Quote

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?

Really?? That doesn't even make sense!

Our car was too small (and too full!) for us to lay down in the back... We always had to buckle up, but we never complained about it because that's just the way it was. We didn't back-talk to our parents - we'd have gotten the back-hand!!

+1

But you're not allowed to beat respect into kids anymore

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[JohnnyMarko 1]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?

Really?? That doesn't even make sense!

Our car was too small (and too full!) for us to lay down in the back... We always had to buckle up, but we never complained about it because that's just the way it was. We didn't back-talk to our parents - we'd have gotten the back-hand!!

+1

But you're not allowed to beat respect into kids anymore

I was beat as a kid. Not like beat just for the hell of it, like beat when I did something wrong. I feel like my age group (21) was the last to have the sense beat into them.

[Andy9o8 2]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?

Really?? That doesn't even make sense!

Our car was too small (and too full!) for us to lay down in the back... We always had to buckle up, but we never complained about it because that's just the way it was. We didn't back-talk to our parents - we'd have gotten the back-hand!!

+1

But you're not allowed to beat respect into kids anymore

I was beat as a kid. Not like beat just for the hell of it, like beat when I did something wrong. I feel like my age group (21) was the last to have the sense beat into them.

You guys really all wanna take this into SC?
People who use their superior size, strength and authority to physically assault children, even their own children, are fucking morons who deserve to be beaten themselves.

We raised 2 kids quite strictly, but without any corporal punishment, period. They're both decent, respectful people, are attending college, are working work-study to help pay the freight for college, and have jobs lined up for this summer.

I regularly was corporally smacked when I was a kid, and look what an asshole I turned out to be. QED.

[JohnnyMarko 1]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote

Quote

Here's another quip to squabble about. How many parents let their kids lay down in the backseat when driving on a long trip, but as soon as the kid sits up they must have their seatbelt on?

Really?? That doesn't even make sense!

Our car was too small (and too full!) for us to lay down in the back... We always had to buckle up, but we never complained about it because that's just the way it was. We didn't back-talk to our parents - we'd have gotten the back-hand!!

+1

But you're not allowed to beat respect into kids anymore

I was beat as a kid. Not like beat just for the hell of it, like beat when I did something wrong. I feel like my age group (21) was the last to have the sense beat into them.

You guys really all wanna take this into SC?
People who use their superior size, strength and authority to physically assault children, even their own children, are fucking morons who deserve to be beaten themselves.

We raised 2 kids quite strictly, but without any corporal punishment, period. They're both decent, respectful people, are attending college, are working work-study to help pay the freight for college, and have jobs lined up for this summer.

I regularly was corporally smacked when I was a kid, and look what an asshole I turned out to be. QED.

Tomato, potatoe

[mjosparky 4]

Quote

Quote

Some people are just stupid.

What an incredibly asinine thing to say. But thanks for you thoughts on it anyway.

You might think it is asinine but it is true.

Sparky

My idea of a fair fight is clubbing baby seals

[airtwardo 7]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdqbi66oNuI

Tomato Egg sammich...

~ If you choke a Smurf, what color does it turn? ~