Euan wrote:
"Bleve" == Bleve writes:
Absolutely. It's a hot and smelly inconvenience which is
off-putting to the fashion conscious.
Bleve Stackhats went out in, oh, 1980? Modern helmets are light,
Bleve well ventilated and comfortable.
On a hot summer's day they most certainly aren't as comfortable as a
decent sun hat.
Agreed.
It's a bit of baggage that you need to lug around and there is no
proof that helmets provide any benefit whereas there is
substantial proof that helmets are detrimental.
Bleve "any" benefit? If I wasn't wearing mine a few months ago
Bleve when I crashed into an oncoming bike on a bikepath, I'd
Bleve probably be a vegetable (more than I am now!). I'd certanily
Bleve have done significan injury. As it is, I had to buy a new
Bleve helmet and was a bit dizzy for a couple of days.
At age five I rode head face in to a concrete lamp post (I sneezed,
opened my eyes, saw lamp post and grabbed the front brake with
predictable results.) I required two stitches but other than that,
fine.
At at age 12 I went sailing over the bonnet of my geography teacher's
car. Many bruises and abrasions but guess what? My skin and bone
healed up.
At fourteen my tennis racket holder (a clamp which fitted on the front
forks which could hold a tennis racket) worked loose and jammed in the
spokes with rather spectacular results. Again, battered and bruised but
I recovered.
I wasn't wearing a helmet. I hit my head. I'm here and not a
vegetable.
My crash had me land on the back of my head, from 2m, head first.
That's the sort of concussion that can lead to brain damage and
neck injury.
As a kid, I had loads of "offs", without a helmet. Yeah, I
got away with them. My head's a mess of scars from all sorts of
minor bingles. None of them were crashes where I landed head-first. I
think I was pretty lucky, as most kids are (or rather, not unlucky,
we get away with all sorts of stuff that if the dice rolled the
wrong numbers, would make us vegetables, as kids)
There is no proof that helmets are beneficial.
Bleve Heh, I refute this thus; I can still read.
I refute your refute, I can still read to after several cycling
accidents which resulted in a bump on the head. I fully suspect that if
you had not been wearing a helmet in your accident you'd still be able
to read as well.
Not given the nature of the crash and how I landed.
This is the thing about helmets, you have an accident and see the damage
done to the helmet. ``Oh thank goodness I was wearing a helmet, that
impact would have left me with brain damage.'' That's a very unlikely
scenario. People have been falling on their bonce since the beginning
of time and it is the minority of those cases which result in brain
injury.
It's not actually, it's only recently that humans have been
traveling at an elevated height along concrete surfaces. A fall onto
a natural surface (grass, dirt etc) is usually fine. A fall onto
an unyielding surface is not to kind to our relatively fragile
heads.
If you're convinced of the properties of cycling helmets then I hope you
wear one when walking and driving a car (I know you wear a motorcycle
helmet ;-) ).
As with all things of this nature, it's a "where do you draw the line"
game. I'm constanly aware of the head-injury disaster area that is the
inside of motor vehicles, and when I raced them, you bet I wore a
helmet.
and when we rolled, and the helmet got trashed from hitting the
rollcage,
I was mighty glad I was wearing it! The inside of cars (especially
older
ones) is trecherous.
But, as a pedestrian, the likelyhood of a fall where I land head-first
is pretty low.
Now, "convinced of the properties of cycling helmets", duh. They
reduce impact forces. That's *all* they do (cycling helmets don't
have to pass any intrusion test, unlike Snell etc, AFAIK?). But,
that's what they do. There's no convincing or otherwise. It's a fact.
Hearts pump blood. That's all they do too. I still want mine
Do helmets make riding safer? No, as they don't reduce the
likleyhood of an accident. Do they make some classes of
accident less likely to cause serious injury? Yes.
Bleve It is a fact that in
every country that has helmet compulsion cycling has decreased
significantly which has a far greater impact on cyclist safety.
Bleve It may have temporarily reduced numbers, but is there any
Bleve evidence to suggest that the change lasted a generation?
If the numbers hadn't reduced it's quite possible we'd have a lot more
cyclists today.
Maybe. That happened a generation ago though. Kids still ride
bikes, they want independant transport. I think more
people drive these days because they live further from work and
cars are too affordable, but with the rising cost of petrol,
that is changing. When I was a kid, people rode bikes because
cars were expensive - most families I knew had one car, not two (or
more!). Nowdays, Joe Average lives 20km+ from work and wants to
get home in time to watch the dodgey tradesman getting busted on
Ch 7. He'd rather sit in a comfortable, air conditioned car with
a stereo (in a traffic jam!) than ride a bike into a headwind or
catch a train to a station that's miles from home and is crowded,
full of drunks and loonies (or at least, perceived to be) and doesn't
let him stop at the stupormarket to go shopping on the way home.
And then, I have to ask, are there actually less cyclists today than
there was 20 years ago? In terms of percentages or base numbers?
The bike shop industry is thriving.
Helmets may work in very limited scenarios, they do not make a
significant contribution to cyclist safety that warrants compulsion.
That's your opinion. It's what counts as a significant contribution
that is where the argument lies here. For me, wearing a helmet
made a significant contribution to *my* safety.
Compulsion is a barrier to cycling, a barrier to cycling reduces cycling
numbers and increases the risk per cyclists. It's not a good trade off.
Maybe, but I doubt it makes a significant difference these days.
Wear a helmet or don't, I just don't agree with compulsion.
Noted. I don't like compulsion either. But, here we are in
that real-world thing where we all have to make compromises.