Safety vs Freedom: Should Adults be Forced to Wear Seatbelts?

[a completely inoffensive name]

Ok, I am going to ignore your completely offensive posting style and personal attacks, and cut right to the chase. You seem to be completely ignoring what I said about things that danger or damage and individual committing them, and things that danger or damage others. Things such as littering, burning down your house, speeding, drunk driving, etc endanger or steal from others. THAT is the difference. Maybe next time you can actually read my post before responding to it.
And how is my advocating the death penalty a hypocrisy of 'my entire ideology' (which I have never laid out to you BTW, and you have no way of knowing)? My ideology is that people should be completely free to do whatever they want, as long as it does not hurt OTHERS! When people deliberately do things that endanger or steal from others, I think that they should receive the harshest punishment appropriate for their crime. (and if what you do endangers the lives of others, I think that you should forfeit your own) You cannot commit a crime against yourself - that is just stupidity, not a crime. A crime can only be committed against others, and deserved harsh punishment. Are we going to start fining people for spending too much time on the computer because it is not good for their health now?
You obviously have no idea what my ideology is.

Almost everything you do that harms yourself, ends up harming another. Unless you are recluse who is forever alone in this world, harm upon yourself drains other people. By not buckling your seat belt and dying because of it, you have created a destructive ripple in the lives of other people. The other people in the accident will think they may have killed a person depending on how the accident goes down. Everyone has parents, parents have children, friends, they all suffer negatively from your actions of not protecting yourself from imminent danger. Your outlook that as long as what you do does not physically harm another person is completely moronic in my opinion. If we applied that same train of thought to all aspects then we need to strike down laws against mental abuse of any form. Hurt is such a subjective word and it is filled with numerous interpretations that the ideology of "as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else" is quite meaningless. On top of that, as has been stated elsewhere, injuries resulting in death or serious conditions because of not wearing a seat blt put a financial burden on the health care system, which means more taxpayer money has to go to healthcare to support the costs and less is given somewhere else which directly impacts someone elses life negatively. No man is an island and to treat everyone as such is completely unrealistic.

"Are we going to start fining for blah blah blah?" This is a slippery slope and has already been talked about.

I guess you are right regarding the death penalty, I would need to hear what your exact reasoning for supporting it would be.

As for what your ideology is, I have a pretty good approximation of it: it's an ideology of ideas not thoughts. Hey, why don't I abandon my children and wife. I'm not physically harming them in anyway, why is the government forcing me to spend my life supporting other people? Such socialism.

[Vuk]

Almost everything you do that harms yourself, ends up harming another. Unless you are recluse who is forever alone in this world, harm upon yourself drains other people. By not buckling your seat belt and dying because of it, you have created a destructive ripple in the lives of other people. The other people in the accident will think they may have killed a person depending on how the accident goes down. Everyone has parents, parents have children, friends, they all suffer negatively from your actions of not protecting yourself from imminent danger. Your outlook that as long as what you do does not physically harm another person is completely moronic in my opinion. If we applied that same train of thought to all aspects then we need to strike down laws against mental abuse of any form. Hurt is such a subjective word and it is filled with numerous interpretations that the ideology of "as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else" is quite meaningless. On top of that, as has been stated elsewhere, injuries resulting in death or serious conditions because of not wearing a seat blt put a financial burden on the health care system, which means more taxpayer money has to go to healthcare to support the costs and less is given somewhere else which directly impacts someone elses life negatively. No man is an island and to treat everyone as such is completely unrealistic.

"Are we going to start fining for blah blah blah?" This is a slippery slope and has already been talked about.

I guess you are right regarding the death penalty, I would need to hear what your exact reasoning for supporting it would be.

As for what your ideology is, I have a pretty good approximation of it: it's an ideology of ideas not thoughts. Hey, why don't I abandon my children and wife. I'm not physically harming them in anyway, why is the government forcing me to spend my life supporting other people? Such socialism.

I said harm others, I never specified physical harm.

[Captain Blackadder]

Simple for those of whom wish for the precious freedom to be a complete idiot and kill yourself come to Australia where the laws regarding seat belts only apply if the car has seatbelts buy a car from the 1950s and enjoy your precious freedom.

[a completely inoffensive name]

I said harm others, I never specified physical harm.

Well, dying in a car accident certainly harms other people mentally and fiscally. So why do you support people's right to not wear a seat belt?

[Fisherking]

I think most of you are missing my point.

Seatbelts are good. They should be used. The benefit is obvious.

But Laws of this nature are infringements on personal liberties.

It is government saying you are too dumb to take care of your self so we have to look out for you. Therefore, everything is now within their preview. Government legislating for the benefit of government and not the benefit of the people.

It is not a matter of seatbelts. It is only the example used.

They are telling you what you may or may not do for the benefit of the government...

[a completely inoffensive name]

I think most of you are missing my point.

Seatbelts are good. They should be used. The benefit is obvious.

But Laws of this nature are infringements on personal liberties.

It is government saying you are too dumb to take care of your self so we have to look out for you. Therefore, everything is now within their preview. Government legislating for the benefit of government and not the benefit of the people.

It is not a matter of seatbelts. It is only the example used.

They are telling you what you may or may not do for the benefit of the government...

Your point is misguided. The reason there is seat belt laws was because people asked the government to make them mandatory. The reason drugs are outlawed is because people pushed for them to be outlawed and when some drugs like alcohol no longer wanted to be banned, they pushed and alcohol was no longer banned. This idea that government has constantly been working to undermine us and dictate what we should do for the benefit of government is not true. The reality is that government has always been a tool for, not an entity in itself, striving for more power. Infringements upon our civil liberties are for them ost part perpetrated by government due to outside special interest groups wielding control over the institution. Government is the hit man for totalitarian special interest groups and saviors alike.

In dictatorships the government is always trying to enlarge itself because the dictator is the government, now we live in representative democracies and it doesn't work like that anymore. We have separation of powers and government is no longer a single entity or man any longer. It fights within itself among the branches and its decisions are wielded by the men and women who get most involved in all aspects of it and spend the most money to tame it.

[Fisherking]

Your point is misguided. The reason there is seat belt laws was because people asked the government to make them mandatory. The reason drugs are outlawed is because people pushed for them to be outlawed and when some drugs like alcohol no longer wanted to be banned, they pushed and alcohol was no longer banned. This idea that government has constantly been working to undermine us and dictate what we should do for the benefit of government is not true. The reality is that government has always been a tool for, not an entity in itself, striving for more power. Infringements upon our civil liberties are for them ost part perpetrated by government due to outside special interest groups wielding control over the institution. Government is the hit man for totalitarian special interest groups and saviors alike.

In dictatorships the government is always trying to enlarge itself because the dictator is the government, now we live in representative democracies and it doesn't work like that anymore. We have separation of powers and government is no longer a single entity or man any longer. It fights within itself among the branches and its decisions are wielded by the men and women who get most involved in all aspects of it and spend the most money to tame it.

No!

It was for money and control.

It was not an outcry from the people no the insurance industry.

The seatbelt laws are state laws which provide and excuse to stop individual automobiles after the Supreme Court said that random stops were an infringement on individual liberty. It was a convenient excuse and pushed by law enforcement agencies. Go and check.

[HoreTore]

No!

It was for money and control.

It was not an outcry from the people no the insurance industry.

The seatbelt laws are state laws which provide and excuse to stop individual automobiles after the Supreme Court said that random stops were an infringement on individual liberty. It was a convenient excuse and pushed by law enforcement agencies. Go and check.

Did you know, that in the 70's, the CIA installed radio-transmitters in peoples mouths when they went to the doctor, so they could hear everything people said? Go and check!

When you apply for a driver's licence are you not undertaking to obey the rules of the road.

Don't know what rituals you guys go through, but I did nothing like that when I got my license. The application form was basically name, address and ticking the boxes that said "I don't have any court orders prohibiting getting a license" and "Yes, I'm applying for a license".

[a completely inoffensive name]

No!

It was for money and control.

It was not an outcry from the people no the insurance industry.

The seatbelt laws are state laws which provide and excuse to stop individual automobiles after the Supreme Court said that random stops were an infringement on individual liberty. It was a convenient excuse and pushed by law enforcement agencies. Go and check.

So what you just said was that special interest groups (the police unions and organizations) used government to increase their own power. Hmmmmm, sounds exactly like what I just said.