Bradley Wiggins calls for safer cycling laws and compulsory helmets

[Red Light]

No because I'm intelligent enough to know that most cyclists already wear helmets vs the 100% of pedestrians who don't, thus the accident statistics are inherantly skewed.

So we stand to gain a lot more if pedestrian helmets are made compulsory than if cycle helmets are. I look forward to you starting the campaign for it.

 

[Red Light]

Probably, the stats show its more dangerous after all. But frankly thats their problem isnt it really?

Can you persuade all the non-cyclists who seem to want to force helmets on us that its not their problem and to stop?

 

[benb]

We should be proud that statistically (probably due to helmets) cycling is less dangerous than walking down the street.

That is laughable.

 

[benb]

You really are hung up about what other people are up to. Who cares? This is about cyclists. Not pedestrians or motorists or stunt pilots or bungee jumpers or anything else you might dream of.

Not really - I think people should be free to make their own choice. An informed choice though, and by pointing out wildly inconsistent positions, it helps to show where arguments in favour of helmets are somewhat flawed.

 

[Red Light]

Do you know how daft this argument sounds, its like saying why bother making Formula 1 any safer as its not had a death since 1994, yet year on year on year.....

It was you who suggested what happened to other groups was not our problem so why should what happens to us be their problem?

We should be proud that statistically (probably due to helmets) cycling is less dangerous than walking down the street.

Except walking down the street is more dangerous than cycling - even if you look just at those killed or injured by vehicles. If you add in the numbers of people that are killed or injured tripping over or falling while walking then its considerably more dangerous. And the evidence is that wearing a helmet when cycling has not made cycling less dangerous. If anything its made it more dangerous. See for example Rodgers study of 8 million cycle accidents which found no reduction in the serious injury rate and an increase in the death rate amongst helmet wearers. And also Hewson's study of cyclists in the UK that found that although females were twice as likely to wear a helmet as males they were just as likely to suffer a head injury.

 

[Standoff]

Not really - I think people should be free to make their own choice. An informed choice though, and by pointing out wildly inconsistent positions, it helps to show where arguments in favour of helmets are somewhat flawed.

Yeh but where's the jobs in that!

 

[Linford]

1. 
   
   Better still. If I swing a baseball bat one inch above the top of your head the worst you will feel is the draught on your head. If I swing a baseball bat one inch above the top of your head and you are wearing a cycle helmet it will hurt a lot. Over millenia of evolution we have got pretty good at not hitting out heads when we fall but put a helmet on and suddenly your head is a lot larger and the evolutionary protection mechanisms and the instincts learnt since birth no longer work. I know. I am quite tall and back in the days when I wore a helmet I was continually banging it on things, particularly door frames, something I never did without the helmet. And sometimes it was very painful, especially when it wrenched your neck.

Falls from height and speed don't happen like this though. when you fall, you have no control over the way you land or tumble - such is the un predictable nature of an accident.

The Baseball bat argument is irrelevant in this debate.

 

[Red Light]

Who's that then? I've not noticed anyone who is fervently anti-helmet. There are quite a few who are anti-compulsion, particularly anti-compulsion based on ignorance and bad science... but that's not the same as anti-helmet.

I am anti-compulsion and anti-promotion because its been shown that promotion, like mandatory wearing, puts people off cycling. I am totally for individual personal choice on the issue although I would prefer it were an informed choice so that people aren't being duped into buying snake oils by misleading information such as that put out by BHIT.

 

[Linford]

Who's that then? I've not noticed anyone who is fervently anti-helmet. There are quite a few who are anti-compulsion, particularly anti-compulsion based on ignorance and bad science... but that's not the same as anti-helmet.

Are you :-
1) Anti helmet because they don't make you look cool ?
2) Anti compulsion because you are not convinced of their effectiveness ?
3) Anti compulsion because you don't like being told what is best for you ?

 

[Linford]

I am anti-compulsion and anti-promotion because its been shown that promotion, like mandatory wearing, puts people off cycling. I am totally for individual personal choice on the issue although I would prefer it were an informed choice so that people aren't being duped into buying snake oils by misleading information such as that put out by BHIT.

If people said the same about motorcycle crash helmets, do you think that giving people the choice would make the rider safer ?

 

[dellzeqq]

No because I'm intelligent enough to know that most cyclists already wear helmets vs the 100% of pedestrians who don't, thus the accident statistics are inherantly skewed.

I don't think that's true. I've not got any numbers to back that up, but given that on any day I might see over a thousand cyclists on the move, I think that only a minority wear helmets.

Perhaps it's a London thing. We're well hard.

 

[Boris Bajic]

Many years ago there was a TV show in which an audience member admitted that his hobby was hooting like an owl at dusk and communicating with a local owl. It got funnier when another audience member admitted the same thing.

It got even funnier when it turned out that their houses backed onto the same small wood. There were no owls.

I love these helmet threads and I drop the odd piece of banal trollery in to tickle my own curiosity... I am childish and naughty like that.

But more and more I am reminded of those two poor chaps hooting at one another in the belief that there was an owl out there taking them seriously.

Oh bugger! I seem to have dropped in more banal trollery.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

Falls from height and speed don't happen like this though. when you fall, you have no control over the way you land or tumble - such is the un predictable nature of an accident.

The Baseball bat argument is irrelevant in this debate.

Replace it with a paving slab then.

EDIT: or a kerb stone

 

[GrumpyGregry]

Yes until you give in or the second coming.

For fecks sake don't bring religion into it!

 

[benb]

[QUOTE 1972441, member: 45"]Nothing is risk-free.

What I'm saying is that all carry different levels of risk, and that the examples are shared between the cyclist and pedestrian groups. So saying that peds are more at risk than cyclists, or vice versa, is too simplistic and paints an inaccurate picture.[/quote]

So you do agree that some activities are so low risk that a helmet is not necessary, even if it would offer some protection?