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Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

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Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#761

Post by iruoy »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #715
krab wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to wear helmet as a passenger as well as a driver on such bike. The helmet doesn't add almost any inconvenience, is reasonably cheap and light. Why not wear it? I use shared bikes one-way quite often and I usually carry my helmet around, strapped to a backpack. In colder weather I would cycle in a business shirt. No issue with a helmet.

> Why not wear it? Car drivers often get head and brain injuries if they are involved in a collision with another car or with a tree/building. Do you wear a helmet when you drive? The helmet doesn't add almost any inconvenience, is reasonably cheap and light, as you say. Unless you're on a racetrack or driving a test vehicle, probably not.

I think most people will disagree with you on how big of an inconvenience a helmet is. At least I will.

In Europe most people didn't even wear helmets when they went skiing (on-piste) until a few years ago. Now pretty much everyone does, but it's one more thing you'll carry with you everywhere you go. And on warm days I sometimes have to take my helmet off in the gondola because it gets very warm.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#762

Post by iruoy »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #195
throwawayhelmet wrote: post #44

Okay, true story. Years ago I struggled with this exact logic regarding skiing with helmet. After serious consideration I decided to start skiing so carefully that I do not need a helmet. As you may guess at this point, The very first day I left my helmet home, I got into an accident and got a skull fracture. I started using my helmet again after that. (But another safety related thing I have started to really doubt.…

I've never skied with a helmet. Ridiculous. The only thing you can do about the risk of hitting or being hit, is stay home.

I've skied in Austria for the past 15 years and never wore a helmet for the first 8 years. I now have my own helmet. And I made sure it even has MIPS.

You can be as cautious as you want and never make a mistake, but if someone else skies into you you could still smash your head very hard. That's why you should wear a helmet. Not because of your own capabilities, but because of the capabilities of the people around you and the risk just being too high.

I wouldn't wear a helmet while cycling though. It's quite safe in The Netherlands.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#763

Post by profile53 »

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #506
profile53 wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think helmets would mitigate that risk. For comparison, should bicyclists be required to wear seatbelts?

Race car drivers wear helmets, so clearly they help.

Race cars are built differently; they have a tube frame to protect against high speed roll overs and have no airbags. You wear a helmet to protect yourself from hitting your head against the metal roll cage or steering wheel (because no airbag).

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#764

Post by jessaustin »

naniwaduni wrote: post #733
jessaustin wrote: post #727

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's really not the point. The thought experiment doesn't consider the safety, and far less the convenience (did you call this "effectiveness"?), of drivers . Rather, it examines the safety of all those who suffer the presence of drivers: pedestrians, cyclists, road workers, wild animals, unleashed dogs, etc.

Of course it's not the point! The problem with the thought experiment is that it misses the point ! Getting from point A to point B faster is more than an incidental convenience to a driver, it is the primary goal of having a car and driving it!

Sure, that is a goal for many drivers. There's no reason for anyone else to care about it. Whatever the hypothetical advantages of automobiles to society in general, police-enforced speed limits exist. Since you seem opposed to limits on speed, one might expect you to value Tullock's spike as another possible solution in the trade-off space that would allow faster travel for those who, like you, really value that, while still somewhat protecting the rest of us on the street.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#765

Post by davisoneee »

RC_ITR wrote: post #540
davisoneee wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that example is quite so obvious. American Football is all about set plays. You line up and then charge at each other, meaning you have two lines effectively charging at each other and can focus all your effort on this one effort. Rugby is much more fluid, so the amount of direct head-on-head collisions is much lower, and the distance someone typically runs before tackling someone is much lower as the '…

I don’t want to be rude, but wide receivers and running backs get CTE as much as other positions and their movement patterns are nearly identical to rugby. I agree linemen are a novel concept, but they’re not the only victims.

I was not suggesting it's only linemen. I think my point still stands about NFL being all about 'set plays'. NFL is all "set up, set up, set up, RUN, TACKLE, STOP", whereas rugby is more "run run tackle run tackle run tackle stop".

Combine that with the fact when a Rugby player makes an extended run, they aren't often tackled directly head or side-on, it's more perhaps an "anchor" tackle from the back to pull them down. In american football, the safeties and deep players have more opportunity to get head-on with a receiver while the ball is in flight, while a rugby full-back having to watch and run horizontally while the player is running means they are less likely to be directly head-on.

Further combine that with the fact that Rugby governing bodies have penalised 'high tackles', and the rate of CTE drops significalty.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#767

Post by soco »

MandieD wrote: post #649
runamok wrote: post #609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention the risk of getting hit by another snowboarder or skier.

Before 2009: very few adult skiers in Austria and Germany wore helmets, pretty much only the racers and children who were legally required to. I felt like a dork wearing mine, but I experienced a scary near-miss my first season on these relatively crowded slopes. After 2009: at least 80% of adult skiers in Austria and Germany wear helmets, from the looks of things. Most frequent non-wearers are very old, permanently…

I cracked two helmets hitting my head on iced slopes. Every time I was able to stand back up (although dizzy and with a headache) and bless my initiative to wear a helmet. As they say, your mileage may vary.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#768

Post by soco »

ryandrake wrote: post #726
mh- wrote: post #721

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's also the year Natasha Richardson died from a head injury she received while skiing. That was all over the news (at least in the US/Canada, and probably England). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natasha_Richardson#Injury_and_...

Interesting. I wonder if these 2009 events were a turning point worldwide. I recently returned to downhill skiing after last skiing in the 90s, and was absolutely shocked by the number of skiers wearing helmets. Like 90-95%. Whereas when I skied as a young man in the 90s, it was something like 0-2% (basically only a handful of children). The skier side of my brain still can’t get used to the idea of wearing one of th…

For some reason you say? I don't think you could make a circle on the (empty, of course) slope with older skis :)

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#769

Post by paulryanrogers »

edmcnulty101 wrote: post #731
paulryanrogers wrote: post #720

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious what sources you have. Because several family members and I have experienced head injuries riding bicycles, none of us have been shot at or attacked with a knife. That said, I'm down for making all private gun possession illegal.

There's like 250,000 shootings and stabbings in the US per year estimated. There's like 27000 bicycle head injuries in the US. I'm surprised you haven't googled it. Here's the head injury source. You can easily Google shooting and stabbings per year and add them together. https://www.nsc.org/safety-first-blog/bicycle-safety-statist... Its pretty clear you should pick up some Kevlar and chain mail for your kids.

There may be some reporting issues with your data. For example how many helmets prevented would've-been-reported head injuries? How many injuries aren't reported? And how many hours on bicycle are there compared to constantly living around so many guns?

A natural experiment may require comparing similar communities with and with helmet laws.

Shootings and stabbings on the other had are difficult to not report. And can happen regardless of proximity to bicycles.

Ultimately let's do both: get helmets for kids and get rid of so many guns.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#770

Post by Brian_K_White »

pessimizer wrote: post #379
Brian_K_White wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Declaring things "reasonable" based on nothing is like declaring things "common sense" based on nothing. The only way to disagree is to be unreasonable and stupid. It's the kind of thing you say when you're demanding people agree with you, not convincing them to.

This. ffs.
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