If you're riding outside Holland . . please wear a helmet!

[Shut Up Legs]

You can't control all the outcomes!

By that logic, all pedestrians and motorists should be wearing helmets, as they can't control all possible outcomes either . Living in a country in which bicycle helmets are mandatory for cycling, I can tell you that the disadvantages far outweigh the (supposed) advantages, and Australia is the laughing stock of the world because of it.

 

[theclaud]

You have to admit it, prima facie you'd likely believe helmets were useful.

Another one of my observations of these threads is the response to the above statement is going to be met with a request for a peer reviewed journal backing it up and an ensuing mutual back slapping by way of liberal "likes"…

Which would miss the point of the statement but nevertheless be an irresistible cue to a binge of rehearsed reheated arguments smelling of putrid vomit.

I don't believe in compelling people to wear helmets - in practice I tend to wear them if I clip in and don't if I don't clip in. But it seems to me something as a matter of faith on both sides as to the wisdom of either position. Which is all right, it just means that the sneering self-righteousness that does get exhibited is rather tedious and repulsive.

Ok, I'm off !

I take your point - and as evidenced in the recent interminable lid-off between Linf and Cunobelin, having logic, evidence and stamina on your side is not necessarily significantly more endearing than being a tendentious, evasive wind-up merchant who is a stranger to both reason and good humour. And you are right about the prima facie case for helmets, but then that's a product of the status and meaning of cycling in a particular culture, and if you imagine something is so self-evident that you think it brooks no discussion, why attempt to start a discussion about it? I don't think it's too much to ask that someone starting a thread might consider their audience, and if it's a thread with prescriptive intent then perhaps it is a good idea to have a look around and get a feel for how people might react when you start giving them unwanted and unsolicited advice. I don't claim to be a better person than any helmet-wearer, but at least I can leave the buggers alone.

 

[theclaud]

Are you sure its not a Lidl?

Every Lid'll Help?

 

[theclaud]

You are mixing your Tescomores

So I am. I blame Unkers.

 

[steve52]

wear a helmet, dont wear a helmet!its your choice, but why argue over it? and such silly points being used on both sides, from the outside the two side seem to have all the reason of the different sides in the Syrian,conflict

 

[Wobblers]

Gosh, I'm sorry . . I forgot that not everyone looks good in a helmet . .

On my goodness . . what's that she says . . reduces head injuries by 88%. Nah . . can't be . .

You know, it's funny, but it seems that all too often the pro-helmet types end up claiming that anyone who doesn't must be vain... or just an idiot. It's as if they don't actually have any other argument...

And perhaps you'd care to back up your 88% reduction claim with evidence. Oddly enough, my search of the scientific literature failed to turn up anything close to it, not even from Rivara and Thompson. But, hey, what would I know, I'm only a physicist, eh?

 

[Wobblers]

How do you know your head would have been seriously hurt without the helmet? I've run into a truck at 25mph and walked away with stitches.

Pointless thread,

But I bet the truck came off rather worse...

 

[slowmotion]

How do you know your head would have been seriously hurt without the helmet? I've run into a truck at 25mph and walked away with stitches.

Pointless thread,

You wear a helmet running?

 

[Fab Foodie]

By that logic, all pedestrians and motorists should be wearing helmets, as they can't control all possible outcomes either . Living in a country in which bicycle helmets are mandatory for cycling, I can tell you that the disadvantages far outweigh the (supposed) advantages, and Australia is the laughing stock of the world because of it.

 

[Venod]

Because, for reasons best known to themselves, some people on the wear a helmet side of the debate seem to want to tell others what they should do.

Of all the twaddle for and against helmets this is one that really gets my goat, I am not anti helmet but I don't always wear one, when I don't the times I get told I should ( often by younger less experienced cyclist's) is unbelievable, I don't think any of my non helmet wearing friends have ever told anyone they shouldn't be wearing a helmet.

 

[Brandane]

Wearing a helmet didn't help this poor cyclist, they can't even protect you from a swipe from a Ford Transit wing mirror . http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25816281

As above post, I have no problem with people who choose to wear a helmet, but I really wish the preachers would lay off us who make the choice not to wear one.
I no longer cycle with one particular friend who was such a preacher. I got tired listening to his first comment every time we met up, it was "What, no helmet?". He came off his bike about 8 months ago, having ridden into a car when he wandered over to the wrong side of a narrow street while checking his Garmin. He landed on his shoulder and had a nasty break to the collar bone, which is still at the physio stage in the recovery process. Of course, he claims his helmet saved his life.
Perhaps he would have been paying more attention to the road if his helmet hadn't made him feel invincible? Something like the prat drivers who drive like nobbers because they know that all those nice airbags and crumple zones will save them when they hit a 44 tonne truck.

 

[David Parry]

http://www.gicentre.net/blog/2013/11/24/risk-cycling-and-denominator-neglect

Finally some science. Thanks Fab. Yes, here is how we can make 700 seriously injured, maimed, or dead Londoners, . . sorry, I mean "KSIs" . . vanish in a blob of visual math!)

My favorite argument? Here it is: "What would your sweet mother say?"

I must stay clear of the individual-rights rhetoric (only some of which was truly moving). "Mandatory" was not in my thread-starter, and my sympathies are truly with the individual, languishing in the shadow of Max Weber's bureaucratic rationalization.

Nevertheless, my thread was initially conceived only in the interests of new commuter warriors, out there running their bicycles inches from fast-moving traffic . . here, outcomes cannot always be predicted. If you tumble hard, you can't stop a head-slammer. Simple and true. I'm sure riders with a lot more experience cycling than me have contributed above, but I nevertheless estimate I've accumulated some 37000 miles of urban cycle commuting in my last 5 years.

Surprisingly, nobody mentioned the Dutch cycling infrastructure. Too bad, cause it's facilitating and inspirational, as many of us know. How did the Dutch bring about their comparative safe cycling infrastructure? Now this is truly worthy of respect!

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/01/09/how-the-dutch-got-their-bike-paths/

 

[glasgowcyclist]

My favorite argument? Here it is: "What would your sweet mother say?"

She'd say "You're a grown man, make your own choice."

Nevertheless, my thread was initially conceived only in the interests of new commuter warriors, out there running their bicycles inches from fast-moving traffic . . here, outcomes cannot always be predicted. If you tumble hard, you can't stop a head-slammer.

I'm a cyclist, not a "warrior" who needs a helmet as part of his armour.

Surprisingly, nobody mentioned the Dutch cycling infrastructure. Too bad, cause it's facilitating and inspirational, as many of us know. How did the Dutch bring about their comparative safe cycling infrastructure? Now this is truly worthy of respect!

They didn't achieve their cycling paths by exhorting everyone to wear a helmet.

GC

 

[Dan B]

My favorite argument? Here it is: "What would your sweet mother say?"

My response: none of your business. Except that there's a word beginning with "f" between "your" and "business' that the forum software won't let me write

 

[Dan B]

US keyboard layout?