helmet laws was : 4th of July Hypocricy (was: OT Celebration)

From: Don Maslin <donm_at_cts.com>
Date: Tue Jul 10 22:41:44 2001

On Tue, 10 Jul 2001, joe wrote:

> At 08:47 PM 7/9/01 -0700, Eric wrote:
> > > > IMHO it's crazy to be on a motorcycle without a helmet, so why not just
> > > > abandon the helmet requirement and let Darwin have the last word . . .
> > >
> > > Because our society and government are built around protecting the
> > > stupid.
> >
> >More to the point, my tax dollars go to pay the unpaid medical bills
> >of the stupid, and when too many stupid people get head injuries my car
> >and health insurance rates go up.
>
> Hell, that applies to anything you can name; car crash victums, skate
> boarding accidents, people tripping on the side walks, etc etc etc. The
> list is endless. Should you let the "hospital costs" rational be used to
> govern everything we do? I don't think so. What if the next law is that
> no one will be allowed to work on their own computers since they could be
> injured and the public would have to pay the cost of their
> hospitalization? Rediculous? Not really. That's the exact rational that
> was used to pass the helmets laws to begin with and from what Tony says the
> UK isn't far from enacting such non-sensical regulations.

And if you stop to think about it, that was the basis for the various
states class action against the tobacco companies.

                                                 - don

> >If there's an outcry against helmet laws, here's a simple solution.
> >Require riders who don't wear helmets to either get additional "no helmet
> >inurance,"
>
> That appears to be exactly what the state of Florida has done. So
> far it seems to be working. The motorcycle riders are now happy since they
> don't have to wear hwelmets, the insurance companies are very happy $$$$$$
> and the state isn't caught in the middle any more. FWIW it's rare to see a
> rider wearing a helmet around here now and I haven't heard of any cases of
> peole being busted for not having insurance.
>
>
> >or post a $50k bond to cover their additional health costs in
> >the case of an accident. Fines for riders not carrying proof of either
> >should be set at a sufficient level to cover the cost of care for the
> >riders who don't have either.
> >
> >The other option, and a fine one IMHO, is to deny health care to
> >riders who are injured while not wearing a helmet.
>
> It all sounds fine except for the last part. There's no way that
> they're going to deny emergency health care to anyone. Besides I wouldn't
> want them to. Can you imagine the precedence that it would set? The next
> thing you know they'd be dening emergency care for any rediculous reason.
>
> Joe
>
> >Eric
>
>
Received on Tue Jul 10 2001 - 22:41:44 BST