Risk Tolerance - What is stupid? (motorcycles)

[PhillyKev 0]

I wear an open face DOT approved helmet and usually wear a leather jacket with CE armor padding. To me, wearing a full face would be like riding in a car. Part of what I enjoy about riding is the wind in my face and the sound of it rushing by in harmony with the sound of the engine.

I know people who don't wear helmets because to them, it diminishes the experience enough for them not to be worth it.

I know others who wear a full face and full leathers always.

I don't think any group is stupid, or a squid, or whatever you want to call them. I just think they have different balances between what the riding experience is to them and the amount of risk that they're willing to accept.

[TheAnvil 0]

I had a bad wreck when I was 16 and almost killed myself on a motorcycle. Don't ride now, but don't preclude doing so in the future. I think wearing a helmet and what type is a choice for the individual and nobody else - definitely not the government.

Vinny the Anvil
Post Traumatic Didn't Make The Lakers Syndrome is REAL
JACKASS POWER!!!!!!

[funks 1]

I have always worn full faced helmets. I have been hit in the face by rocks, rubber from tires blowing out on cars and by bugs that left more splattered guts on my visor than you could imagine. I always thought to myself how this stuff would have felt with an open faced helmet. Couldnt imagine it would feel to good....

edited to say i did not vote for riding without a full face is stupid...

[D22369 0]

I always wear a full face and leathers, but it is by my choice to do so. I dont think anyone should have been able to mandate helmet / seatbelt laws.....

Roy

They say I suffer from insanity.... But I actually enjoy it.

[BartsDaddy 4]

Before the helmet law here in Ca I use to ride my goldwing with a baseball cap no helmet. Allways with leathers though. My sport bikes allways fullface helmet and leathers. And after 14 wrecks and going down on 5 of thoose I have never put a scratch on a helmet. So I don't think they have made all that much of a difference in my case.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Handguns are only used to fight your way to a good rifle

[Deuce 1]

I wear a full face all the time, but that's because the law requires a helmet in CA. My helmet is wired up to my CD player cause I like to to listen to music on longer rides.

My one serious crash was 11 years ago, and I was cut off while lane splitting (splitting is legal and common in CA), locked up the front end and highsided right under the front of an 18 passenger van which then ran over my head. The van came to rest with the helmet (including my head) partially under the front passenger tire. My faceplate was right up against the pavement. I'll never forget laying there, trapped under the stupid van with my ass out in traffic, waiting for my legs to get run over. The van rolled back off my head and I was OK.

If it had been an open face helmet, I would have suffered really serious face and jaw injuries.

-Funniest part of that story was when another motorcyclist came up to me and said "Here's your gun" and handed me my AMT. My pistol had been thrown clear of me when I tumbled. The poor van driver thought he was arming me so I could murder her.

Anyhow, if I'm going to bother, I'll wear the full face. I also have a pair of the neato new Shoei Syncrotec's with the faceplates/chinguards that open. Those are nice to open up when traffic is moving slow.

[funks 1]

I agree that no one should mandate whether or not you have to wear a helmet or not, but i always told myself that if there was no helmet law i would still wear a helmet.

No offense to people who choose not to, but i do think it is pretty stupid not to wear one. Such a simple piece of equipment that can save your life or even better, prevent you from becoming a vegetable. Fuck all the zen shit, I'm wearing a helmet.

[PhillyKev 0]

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I agree that no one should mandate whether or not you have to wear a helmet or not, but i always told myself that if there was no helmet law i would still wear a helmet.

I agree, there's no law here, but I wear one.

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No offense to people who choose not to, but i do think it is pretty stupid not to wear one. Such a simple piece of equipment that can save your life or even better, prevent you from becoming a vegetable.

See, that's the attitude I just don't get. There's a much easier way to not get hurt riding a motorcycle. Don't ride one. I don't think it's any more stupid to ride without a helmet than it is to ride period. I wouldn't do it, because the benefits don't outweigh the risk for me. But for others they do. Why call them stupid?

Do you jump with a 7 cell loaded 1:1? Why not? Should people think you're stupid if you don't?

[JJohnson 0]

I ride with no helmet for a few reasons. I don't wear full leathers either. Sometimes just boots, jeans and a t-shirt. Depends on the weather.

JJ

"Call me Darth Balls"

[CanuckInUSA 0]

There are two types of motorcylists in this world. Those who have crashed and those who have yet to crash. I fall into the crashed category. And because of this (I was lucky enough to survive without permanent injuries) I always wear a full face helmet and most of the times you will see me wearing leather jacket, back protector (mandatory for racers) and protective pants. If someone wants to ride their bike not wearing a helmet and wearing a t-shirt and shorts. Then power to them. I just hope they don't crash, because if they do, it's not going to be pretty. One can argue that proper protective attire should be mandatory since hospitalization/rehab costs can be extremely high. But riding a motorcycle isn't the only dangerous game in town and where does the government legislation stop?

To address your open versus full face helmet question. If you have a visor shield on your bike, then you are some what protected from flying debris (a bug can do just as much damage as a rock when travelling 30+ mph). So your only real danger there is what happens to your face if/when you crash and you do a face plant. So I sure as hell won't tell you that you need to wear a full face. But you will never see me on my bike without one. As long as you are aware of the risks, then it's your bacon, not mine that is on the line. I have my own issues to deal with.

Try not to worry about the things you have no control over

[Luv2Fall 0]

I'll wear a 1/2 helmet and a 3/4's open face helmet at times............picking out bugs from the grill afterwards. Other times, I'll wear a 3/4 helmet with a pull down full-face shield. Love the wind in face for the most part.

[peacefuljeffrey 0]

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I agree that no one should mandate whether or not you have to wear a helmet or not, but i always told myself that if there was no helmet law i would still wear a helmet.

No offense to people who choose not to, but i do think it is pretty stupid not to wear one. Such a simple piece of equipment that can save your life or even better, prevent you from becoming a vegetable. Fuck all the zen shit, I'm wearing a helmet.

A flight instructor at the flight school where I took lessons here was bashed by a moron in a car who changed lanes into him. He wiped out pretty hard and suffered cuts, scrapes and a broken knee. He was wearing a full face helmet, and said that he would have suffered severe head injuries had he not had it. He's kind of a macho, muscular, tattooed tuff-guy, and it always seemed to me to be a bit out of "character" for a guy like him to wear a helmet, but I'm really glad I was wrong on that count.

-

-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"

[CornishChris 5]

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I agree that no one should mandate whether or not you have to wear a helmet or not

In the UK and in Australia, where I now live, it is law to wear a helmet. I assume you would also have been in the group arguing against the mandate of seat belts in cars, or against reserves in parachutes.

I believe that (1) you do what the law requires and (2) you do what common sense requires and wear a helmet. I choose a full face. After having taken a dune bug to the knee doing 100 miles an hour I decline the option of taking one to the face too - don't think i would stay on.

But hey, if you want to kill yourself or suffer head injury - it is your choice.

CJP

Gods don't kill people. People with Gods kill people

[kelpdiver 2]

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There are two types of motorcylists in this world. Those who have crashed and those who have yet to crash.

You have to alter that to those who MAY crash. I don't plan to go down easy. (Why is it that nearly everone parroting this line is in the first group?)

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One can argue that proper protective attire should be mandatory since hospitalization/rehab costs can be extremely high. But riding a motorcycle isn't the only dangerous game in town and where does the government legislation stop?

This was the line used to get the lid law passed in CA. Massive savings were promised. Didn't happen. Why? Because dead motorcyclists cost little in medical care - those with helmets in accidents ended up being slightly more expensive than those without. There was also a transfer of deaths due to head trauma to deaths due to chest trauma. Just as we know in skydiving, the accidental profiles that helmets protect against is not all encompassing, or even close.

If CA lost the lid law, I'd occasionally take advantage of it. I already have a springtime shorts ritual. I'm surprised I haven't gotten a 3/4 helmet yet. At slower speeds, I'd prefer the openness. But at freeway speeds, it's back to the RF900. Noise, bug, and head protection become more important.

[peacefuljeffrey 0]

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I agree that no one should mandate whether or not you have to wear a helmet or not

In the UK and in Australia, where I now live, it is law to wear a helmet. I assume you would also have been in the group arguing against the mandate of seat belts in cars, or against reserves in parachutes.

I believe that (1) you do what the law requires and (2) you do what common sense requires and wear a helmet. I choose a full face. After having taken a dune bug to the knee doing 100 miles an hour I decline the option of taking one to the face too - don't think i would stay on.

But hey, if you want to kill yourself or suffer head injury - it is your choice.

I'm not much in favor of government mandating the saving of ourselves from ourselves.

I can't tell you how many times I read of rollover accidents (and others) in Florida that kill vehicle occupants -- particularly by making them EX-vehicle occupants. Getting thrown from a vehicle is, according to the instructor of a traffic school course I took, the number one way of dying in a vehicle crash.

When I read stories in the newspaper that tell of people "ejected from the vehicle and killed," I chuckle and am sort of glad they're gone. That kind of death is indicative that he was a stupid person with shitty judgment, and I think the world needs a decrease in the number of such people using up air, water and space. I don't sympathize with a schmuck who takes himself away from his wife and kids because he's too fuckin' dumb to know that seatbelts save lives. The government can make all the laws it wants: it is never going to outlaw stupidity. A seat belt law can mandate their use, and punish people for not using them, but it cannot make them buckle the belt. That remains, despite the law, the responsibility of the user.

One of the arguments I have heard used in favor of seat belt / helmet laws is the cost of medical care for accident victims. Costly injuries can be reduced through safety device usage and therefore a person who gets injured by the choice of not using a seat belt or helmet imposes his choice on others through the cost of accident insurance, or if he is unable to pay his medical bills he imposes the cost through the government, which may pay his bills.

I think someone told me that some health insurance (hospitalization insurance) will be void if the injuries are the result of a motorcycle accident involving a helmetless rider. So think of what a $235,000 hospital stay including brain surgery to relieve swelling might do to a family! That's a mite selfish of the rider, yes? Same deal for the woman who "just isn't comfortable" with the seatbelt on, or who is worried it'll wrinkle her outfit, or whose cousin's friend's aunt's brother-in-law was (allegedly) decapitated by his seatbelt in an accident. (There are always people who think it's smart to treat the anomalous .0002% chance occurrence as the most likely thing, and base decisions of that coming to pass. Shit, if even 49 out of 100 uses of a seatbelt resulted in a fatality, the 51% save rate of seatbelts would make them the better bet. And we can be thankful that the margin is not even nearly that close!)

-

-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"

[lurch 0]

I love it when people use that argument. Seems to be a symptom of incipient police state or something. Ever consider the non-pc unmentionable category of people who know how to fucking drive, have confidence in their ability to evade being t-boned,refuse to wear seat belts, and make it through their entire lives without being ejected from the fucking vehicle? You know which group, its that group that, even before seat belts were mandatory, comprised 99.99999% of the population?
Are they still stupid, Jeff?
How bout all those "stupid person with shitty judgment" who think they can chuck themselves out of an aircraft thousands of times and think they'll get away with it without getting killed? No seatbelts in freefall, man. And reserve or no reserve the risk of becoming a crater due to skydiving is much, much higher than that of being killed in a car wreck. There are (rough estimate) what, about 30,000 active jumpers? 3 of us die due to cratering, or some impact-oriented variation thereof, per month, on average. I always feel better when I read the mag and see this month we got lucky and only had two or one or none fatalities. Means we're losing roughly one out of a thousand of our number, per month, on average. If we lost one out of a thousand citizens every month due to driving fatalities it would be regarded as absolute intolerable highway carnage.
Your own words, here.... (There are always people who think it's smart to treat the anomalous .0002% chance occurrence as the most likely thing, and base decisions of that coming to pass.)
Um, given the fact that I've been driving for over a decade without ever once even coming close to being ejected from the vehicle, I'd say being killed due to being thrown out of the car IS the .0002% chance occurrence you think would be stupid to base decisions on the possibility of! If I wore a seat belt for fear of that event I'd be doing exactly what you claim is stupid. You also claim failing to plan for that event and wear a seat belt to counter it is stupid.
So which is it, man? You're so busy being venomous you failed to notice you contradicted yourself. I guess I can expect the usual statistical nitpicking, people arguing that my 1/1000 is wrong, or coming up with some way to prove me wrong about the 3 fatalities a month on average statement but attacking my possibly inaccurate statistics doesn't undo the validity of my point. I do not wear a seat belt because I see the risk of being ejected due to its lack as almost astronomically small...I hear about people dying for that reason a -LOT- less often than I hear about people cratering, or dying of freak cases of rare cancers, for that matter. Does that make me stupid because I don't get cat scanned MRI'ed and full bio-checked every week to avoid THAT possibility? I can't tell you how many times I read of someone who died for that reason.
On a long enough time frame the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. Life is fatal. Deal with it.
One more thing....what about obesity? Society has been focusing on this one a lot lately since due to excessive prosperity and too much free time and not enough activity we're up to, what, something like 1/3 of all americans are now disgustingly, waddlingly grotesquely obese? Go to the nearest mall, man it gives me the creeps, looks like a sci-fi conspiracy theory plot to turn the population into a herd of semi-immobile lipid refineries. And about 60% of americans are at least overweight? Its a huge, rising risk of early death, man. Isn't it about time insurance companies started refusing to pay for any injuries or health issues possibly caused by the individual's failure to control their caloric intake? Isn't it about time we started making laws mandating certain maximum food intakes and mandating fat-testing before employment? How about having the police do roadblock obesity checks? You get bagged, you are required to go to defensive-eating school, your eating habits subjected to state-operated supervision and control and you get checked weekly to ensure compliance? Isn't it about time somebody started chuckling and gloating every time someone dies due to obesity? Oh, wait.....
-exit rant mode, resume lurk mode....next post in 6 months.....

Live and learn... or die, and teach by example.

[unformed 0]

amen brother. you said everything i wanted to say and so much more.

This ad space for sale.

[funks 1]

maybe I am stupid but I cant tell what the hell you are supporting or not supporting by reading that post of yours. Do you happen to have the cliff notes available for that particular post?

[PhillyKev 0]

Are you voting for Nader? You realize he's the guy who made seat belts in cars mandatory, right? Using the same reasoning you're using, right?

[CanuckInUSA 0]

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I cant tell what the hell you are supporting or not supporting by reading that post of yours

LOL ... I felt the same way. It was just one big rant.

Try not to worry about the things you have no control over

[OnYourBack 0]

Judging a persons intelligence based on their risk tolerance is the ignorant thing.

I love the whole argument about how it much it costs to take care of people who are "stupid." Lurch hit the nail on the head talking about obesity. Far more people die or cost the country money because they are overweight than skydiving, riding motorcycles without helmets or not wearing seat belts. If you want to save lives and save the country money with legislation (which in my opinion is wrong), then you should pass a law that requires exercise and a healthy diet.

[sabr190 0]

Maybe the government will ban motorcycles in public places, like they did smoking. Both can be terrible for your personal health and the health of those around you

"The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the few, or the one" - rehmwa

[Darius11 12]

I used to think people who didn’t ware helmets were stupid. Until I moved to RI and got a chance to try it (it was illegal in NY). I love it.
I don’t have a Bike now but if I did it would depend on what kind of riding I would like to do.
If I am going for a cruz no helmet. If I were going out for some speeding I would ware every thing I can.

I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." - Kurt Cobain

[peacefuljeffrey 0]

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Are you voting for Nader? You realize he's the guy who made seat belts in cars mandatory, right? Using the same reasoning you're using, right?

When did I ever say I was a Nader supporter??

I'll tell you right now, my plan is to vote for Bush because, and only because, of the threat that Kerry is to my right to own firearms.

Yes, I'm a single-issue voter, and have been since I became aware of the struggle to protect our Second Amendment rights in 1993.

I suppose I will be voting based on this issue until we get a definitive United States Supreme Court decision that adequately protects the right to keep and bear arms for American citizens.

Blue skies,
-

-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"

[peacefuljeffrey 0]

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I cant tell what the hell you are supporting or not supporting by reading that post of yours

LOL ... I felt the same way. It was just one big rant.

Same here.

I can't figure out why someone argues so vehemently against wearing a seatbelt -- I'm not talking about mandatory use, I'm talking about just deciding for oneself that it's a worthwhile thing to do.

If you never have a crash that would have killed you without the seatbelt, great! You save on repair bills and insurance premiums. If you DO have a nasty crash, there is a tremendous likelihood that your seatbelt, only if worn, will save you from serious injury or death. I'd like to know if Lurch disputes that fact.

-

-Jeffrey
"With tha thoughts of a militant mind... Hard line, hard line after hard line!"