Poll: Should Adults Be Legally Forced to Wear Seatbelts?

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

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    Arena Senior Member Crazed Rabbit's Avatar
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    Default Re: Safety vs Freedom: Should Adults be Forced to Wear Seatbelts?

    Quote Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name View Post
    I would assume that there are transportation purposes better suited for a more mobile, two wheeled single person vehicle just as there are transportation purposes better suited for an 18 wheeler. I haven't ridden a motorcycle or am at all knowledgeable so I can't list any such reasons off the top of my head. Ask the Harley-Davidson forums?
    I'm sorry, but asking harley davidson is hilarious (they're overpriced, under performing motorcycles). I've ridden motorcycles for a while, and there's nothing you really need them for. You can use them for certain things, like offroad riding in spots you can't go off road with cars, but you don't need to do those things.

    As for the second statement, I don't know the physics behind motorcycle helmets but that seems completely false to me. What kind of person designs a helmet that transfers the kinetic energy from the impact from the collision from the toughened skull to the extremely fragile neck? The point of any helmet is to dissipate the kinetic energy among the frame of the helmet so that the impact doesn't generate enough energy to crack or fracture the skull. So I call that last statement into question.
    That's what a doctor at the university of washington told me. But I'm sure someone who's never ridden a motorcycle knows best. . Also, a helmet doesn't protect the vast majority of your body. And the really fun thing is how stringent safety standards led to less safe helmets.

    Here is the point I am really trying to make underneath all this CR. There are times when the outcome of one train of thought is better then another and many times (most actually) where it is not an either/or situation. You are setting the argument and reality to be a false dichotomy of either we enact policies to promote freedom or we promote policies to promote safety. The fact is that, yes, the train of thought that you and Fisherkind have been putting out are valid for situations where there truly is a strong consequence stemming from safety policies violating civil liberties. Telling people to please put the strap on before you drive a two ton car 60mph on the freeway is not one of those situations. Life is not black or white and we need to compromise on the little things when it can help to a big extent like having people wear seatbelts. It's not a slippery slope when all participants recognize that adhering to one train of thought for one situation doesn't mean we must use the same train of thought for all situations.
    The thing is, I don't think many participants recognize this. We live in a country where people blindly accept that the TSA is actually making us safer with these nude imaging scanners and even when groped and victimized will passively agree to it if someone tells them they will be safer.

    I would call that also into question. The daily intake of salt if I remember correctly should only be about 6 grams of salt. Now obviously everyone takes in waaaaay more then that. Excessive salt has been shown to be contributing to strokes, high blood pressure and heart disease. According to the Center of Disease Control and Prevention the leading causes of death in the US are:

    So I would actually say the negative effects of salt (or at least unhealthy food in general) are on par or higher then motorcycles.
    I don't think there's evidence for that:
    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/07/science/07tier.html

    Second, even though lower blood pressure correlates with less heart disease, scientists haven’t demonstrated that eating less salt leads to better health and longer life. The results from observational studies have too often been inconclusive and contradictory. After reviewing the literature for the Cochrane Collaboration in 2003, researchers from Copenhagen University concluded that “there is little evidence for long-term benefit from reducing salt intake.”

    A similar conclusion was reached in 2006 by Norman K. Hollenberg of Harvard Medical School. While it might make sense for some individuals to change their diets, he wrote, “the available evidence shows that the influence of salt intake is too inconsistent and generally too small to mandate policy decisions at the community level.”

    In the past year, researchers led by Salvatore Paterna of the University of Palermo have reported one of the most rigorous experiments so far: a randomized clinical trial of heart patients who were put on different diets. Those on a low-sodium diet were more likely to be rehospitalized and to die, results that prompted the researchers to ask, “Is sodium an old enemy or a new friend?”

    Those results, while hardly a reason for you to start eating more salt, are a reminder that salt affects a great deal more than blood pressure. Lowering it can cause problems with blood flow to the kidneys and insulin resistance, which can increase the risk of strokes and heart attacks.


    To be honest, if we were to be arguing about the bans in food due to being unhealthy I would liken it if government banned contractors from making pipes out of lead due to the negative impact that can have on the public. I don't think most people would be unhappy if that measure was taken (as far as I know, that could actually be a real law).
    I would not agree with that. You have a clear and simple choice on what food to buy, which isn't the same as pipes.

    WHY DO YOU THINK THAT IS? jUST A RANDOM TREND? oR SOMETHING INHERENT IN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE TWO?

    AND THAT WAS OFF THE TOP OF MY HEAD
    Easy on the caps lock there, buddy. I understand the differences between motorcycles and seatbelts.

    That's not gonna stop the oppressive march of safety, though. A motorcycle culture won't stop the people who's number one goal is safety.

    CR
    Last edited by Crazed Rabbit; 12-05-2010 at 22:48.
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