Beware Anti-helmet ninnies

[Amalitza]

@jrenaut 31027 wrote:

Perhaps not. Photo taken after my nose stopped gushing blood.

Nose + elbow = no fun by thetejon, on Flickr

That was from an organized coed flag football game last Saturday.

walked right into that one, didn’t I?

[krazygl00]

@acl 31022 wrote:

Since football got mentioned, I think there’s an apt comparison there. I think it’s a really good idea for football players in organized, competitive leagues to wear helmets and pads, but a group of guys playing a casual pick-up game in the park can do so relatively safely without.

To drag this further into contact-sports territory, I would disagree with the above. Rugby is still played from the club level to the highest professional and world cup levels without pads or helmets, and the injury rate is still much less than in College or Pro football. The reason for this is that helmets and pads enable football players to make much harder and more spectacular hits – it actually makes for a better spectator experience – but the downside is that it tends to drive the injuries deeper into the areas hit, shoulders, spines, etc. Rugby injuries tend to be less serious injuries closer to the surface. Having played at the casual/club level I can tell you that when you tackle somebody you are always aware that neither you nor the guy you’re hitting are wearing protective gear.

Of course all of this gets pretty far away from cycling – concrete doesn’t soften its blow, helmet or not. I just think the football/cycling analogy doesn’t really hold up.

[JorgeGortex]

@Mark Blacknell 30967 wrote:

Hopefully you see the possible contradictions here . . .

Yeah, I see the irony. I think my point was rather that CaBi survive or fail is irrelevant to my interest in people keeping their brains in one piece and not gooped on our shiny pavement.

[mstone]

@JorgeGortex 31080 wrote:

Yeah, I see the irony. I think my point was rather that CaBi survive or fail is irrelevant to my interest in people keeping their brains in one piece and not gooped on our shiny pavement.

Thank god people don’t engage in too much hyperbole over this issue.

[JorgeGortex]

@mstone 31093 wrote:

Thank god people don’t engage in too much hyperbole over this issue.

Hyperbole? Uhm, no. Witty penmanship, maybe. Taking the issue seriously? Always.

[mstone]

I tend to wear a helmet out of habit, but as people get more aggressive about the “need” for them, I find myself more sympathetic to the point of view that the pro-helmet hysteria is unhelpful. Cyclists are more likely to die from massive trauma in an accident with a car than from anything a helmet is going to prevent. The solution its to slow the cars down, make people drive less aggressively, and make the roads safer for everyone. Helmet hysteria does nothing to further that goal, and I increasingly think it’s just a distraction that prevents people from focusing on the real (hard) problems.

[lordofthemark]

@JorgeGortex 31080 wrote:

Yeah, I see the irony. I think my point was rather that CaBi survive or fail is irrelevant to my interest in people keeping their brains in one piece and not gooped on our shiny pavement.

Copenhagen.

[Rod Smith]

I sometimes take mine off when I’m indoors. I sometimes open the chinstrap when I’m outdoors. If you take yours off you may die.

[RayDC]

Having just survived a direct hit by a car Thursday morning that failed to yield while making a left at an light controlled intersection, I can attest after seeing the windshield of the car, I would not be posting this now had I not had a helmet on. So, I’ll continue to take my chances biking with a helmet. [ATTACH=CONFIG]1711[/ATTACH]

[mstone]

@RayDC 31121 wrote:

Having just survived a direct hit by a car Thursday morning that failed to yield while making a left at an light controlled intersection, I can attest after seeing the windshield of the car, I would not be posting this now had I not had a helmet on.

Or, you may have. We’ll never know. But wouldn’t it be cool if better enforcement pushed a culture change that made this sort of thing less common?

[RayDC]

Sure I may have, but I’d rather not try again sans helmet to find out. Hopefully I never have to find out again either way… had I not had my commuter back pack on, I’d probably be in bad shape now, but it cushioned my fall when I landed on my back. I’m not stating case for or against, but unless you’ve been hit by no fault of your own, it’s difficult to say what helps or what doesn’t. Since I have, I know the only explanations are due to the gear I had on and not the gear I didn’t.

[Amalitza]

I’m not arguing against anyone choosing to wear a helmet. I wear mine 99% of the time. I’m arguing against 1) ridiculing those who don’t, 2) refusing to recognize that there are, in fact, different levels of risk depending on how and where you’re riding, and, mostly 3) focusing on helmet use as a primary point of cycling safety.

I’m probably a bit biased (but also tangentially knowledgable) on that last one because of my job, which is (roughly) managing the building and commissioning of new production facilities/processes, and designing in safety is a big part of that. Requiring that employees wear personal protective equipment in appropriate situations is part of that, but it is considered the last-ditch solution (because ppe can’t prevent accidents, it can only decrease the severity of the resulting injuries– prevention is considered the much preferred option) when other approaches fail to decrease risk to an acceptable level (note: acceptable level = zero). So while I think that individuals wearing helmets is a good idea, when I see anyone pushing universal helmet use (and sometimes mandatory by law requirements for universal helmet use) as an important bicycle safety initiative, I see people distracting and taking time and energy away from things that could better improve safety and *prevent* accidents in the first place like infrastructure, driver/cyclist education, etc. Helmets have a purpose, but they can only do so much to protect you– from some but not by any means all head injuries, and not at all from other injuries– so I think the attention paid to helmet use is pretty outsized considering their actual safety benefits.

If you told me I had to go riding on public streets at dusk in gray clothes, no lights, and a helmet; or let me have lights and reflective gear but no helmet, I’ll do the second in a heartbeat, because it has a much better chance of preventing an accident in the first place. Give me some cycling-appropriate infrastructure and cyclist-aware drivers? Take it any day over a helmet. Sure, I’ll wear a helmet, too, but I think that’s a very bad place to put primary focus on safety issues. But listen to most public conversation about bicycle safety and hear lots and lots about how to get people to wear helmets. Almost nothing about driver awareness and education, and only a small amount about cyclist awareness and education.

[JorgeGortex]

@lordofthemark 31119 wrote:

Copenhagen.

Sorry, not into snuff.

[JorgeGortex]

@mstone 31106 wrote:

I tend to wear a helmet out of habit, but as people get more aggressive about the “need” for them, I find myself more sympathetic to the point of view that the pro-helmet hysteria is unhelpful. Cyclists are more likely to die from massive trauma in an accident with a car than from anything a helmet is going to prevent. The solution its to slow the cars down, make people drive less aggressively, and make the roads safer for everyone. Helmet hysteria does nothing to further that goal, and I increasingly think it’s just a distraction that prevents people from focusing on the real (hard) problems.

That sorta strikes me as the sort of stance a teenager takes… the more you tell them to do something wise, the more they go the other way. Hmmm. I don’t think there is any “hysteria.” Again, its up to each adult. I think you are unwise if you don’t wear a helmet out on a ride. I’d also suggest that accidents on bikes aren’t all about a collision with a motor vehicle. As an example:

Not long back I was in my car headed down King Street where it turns downhill after Janey’s lane towards the Masonic Temple. This is a good hill if you don’t know it. Anyway, two teens on BMX bikes were riding down the sidewalk at a good clip… and their bike handling gave me the impression that they had their bikes under control. So I was watching traffic while half admiring their riding as I start to pass them when, boom, the lead kid goes down and his bike spins half way into the street in front of my car. Luckily I was able to stop before I ran over the rear end of his bike. The second kid skidded to a stop and was helping his friend. I asked if he was OK, and the kids said yes. Although the kid that wiped looked a bit wide eyes and shaken up. Neither kid had a helmet on. This kid got really lucky. The point of this is that this kid biffed out of nowhere. His tire caught something, he shifted his weight wrong, who knows… and down he went. No car involved.

Stupid $@^! happens. Its not always as simple as a collision with a car.

[mstone]

These days anyone who falls off a bike and doesn’t end up with a TBI credits the helmet, and anyone in the same state without a helmet is just “lucky”. The hysteria is way out ahead of the science. Why is it that people in other countries can manage to toodle around town bare headed? The anecdotes from this country suggest that the Dutch should pretty much all be dead by now. There are circumstances where wearing a helmet makes a lot of sense, and other cases where it’s unnecessary. I don’t understand why the discussion is no longer rational, and people instead compete to see who can be most doctrinaire about pushing helmets all the time (while implying that everybody else is just too stupid to understand the issue.) So am I acting like a rebellious teen (thanks for the analogy)? No; I’m simply going to make a conscious decision about whether a helmet makes sense for a given ride.

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