Poll of the Day > Should seatbelts be mandatory?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I figured with everyone arguing over covid mask requirements, it would be interesting to consider seatbelt laws. You can be fined for not wearing a seatbelt yet you don't hear a lot of people talking about how it infringes on their freedom. Unlike masks, your seatbelt doesn't really protect anyone other than yourself. Do you think people that don't want to wear seatbelts should have to wear them? How does your view about seatbelt laws align (or not align) with your view about masks during a pandemic?

It used to be a much bigger deal. I knew people who were very anti-seatbelt (some that still are).

I think the compromise is that if you don't wear a seatbelt, anything that happens to you is 100% your responsibility to pay for. So if you crash and break your leg, no healthcare coverage. You are out of pocket 100% for whatever it costs. Yeah, the injury could be unrelated to wearing a seatbelt, but that's a good deterrent to not wearing one.

And in a couple decades all these anti-vax people are gonna seem just as stupid as those anti-seatbelt dumbasses

I dont even care about their rights anymore. The government should beat them up

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Mead posted...

And in a couple decades all these anti-vax people are gonna seem just as stupid as those anti-seatbelt dumbasses

I dont even care about their rights anymore. The government should beat them up

Bro. I think I love you.

Should only be mandatory for people with dependants.
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Raddest_Chad posted...

I think the compromise is that if you don't wear a seatbelt, anything that happens to you is 100% your responsibility to pay for. So if you crash and break your leg, no healthcare coverage. You are out of pocket 100% for whatever it costs. Yeah, the injury could be unrelated to wearing a seatbelt, but that's a good deterrent to not wearing one.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

Should only be mandatory for people with dependants.

I think these are both very good points. Seatbelts are also of importance when considering how it could affect insurance company policies and dependants in the case of an accident.

For minors, seatbelts should be mandatory. If an adult wants to make themselves less safe while driving, idgaf, they should have that option. Same with helmets. Masks affect everyone, wear your damn mask.

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Insurance rates would skyrocket for everybody if they didnt have seatbelt and helmet laws

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Mead posted...

Insurance rates would skyrocket for everybody if they didnt have seatbelt and helmet laws

To be fair, insurance is kind of a shit show. Wonder how much inflated health costs, due to our "wonderful" health insurance industry affects the price of car insurance.

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seatbelts actually do help protect others. if you get flung from your car, that can cause more accidents
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I mainly wear a seatbelt in cars because it was embedded into my mind a lot like potty training was. Also, a lot of cars dont shut up unless you have your seatbelt on. (My 17 year old pickup just blinks at me, but I usually wear a seatbelt anyway.)

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Frankly, anyone too stupid to wear a seatbelt is too stupid to belong on the road. I'm fine with legislating the matter accordingly.

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Any person that can predict the future can be exempt from having to wearing one. After all they would know which trip might kill them, and would wear one at that time.

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No

That's literally Communism

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Seatbelts are more of a safety guarantee than vaccines and even seatbelts shouldn't be mandatory, so I guess it's an even stronger argument against mandatory vaccines, masks, and everything else.

Seatbelt laws in general are kinda stupid, considering that it's supposedly for safety yet alcohol isn't banned despite being involved 30% of car crashes, 25% of serious crimes, 50% of domestic abuse cases, etc. The number of people who die every year as a direct or secondary result of alcohol is far more than COVID, even before getting into the tertiary impacts. Honestly, focusing on seatbelts is like bailing water while ignoring a hole at the bottom of the boat. Sure, seatbelts aren't unimportant, but you're completely ignoring the larger issues.

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I don't really care if some idiot wants to endanger themselves needlessly by not wearing a seat belt. I'm 100% pro-Darwin Award.

HOWEVER, the seat belt laws are necessary because I wouldn't want some idiot's corpse* to come flying through their windshield and become a projectile hazard for other motorists, causing them to get into accidents in response.

* Perhaps it's still just a "body" at that exact moment, but by the end of its hurtling, bouncing, pavement-scraping journey, I think I chose the correct term to use

Can anybody tell me how many people have killed people with their body after it has flown out of a vehicle?

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zebatov posted...

Can anybody tell me how many people have killed people with their body after it has flown out of a vehicle?

Via direct impact? Orfor the swerves and such resulting from the sudden human missile?
Don't have figures in either case, just curious how literal you were being.
And it's not just about deaths. I don't care what happens to the moron that thinks seat belts aren't necessary, but I wouldn't want a single dollar of property damage let alone personal injuries to be incurred by the innocent motorists that happen to be in the vicinity of his exit from the mortal coil.

streamofthesky posted...

Via direct impact? Orfor the swerves and such resulting from the sudden human missile?
Don't have figures in either case, just curious how literal you were being.
And it's not just about deaths. I don't care what happens to the moron that thinks seat belts aren't necessary, but I wouldn't want a single dollar of property damage let alone personal injuries to be incurred by the innocent motorists that happen to be in the vicinity of his exit from the mortal coil.

I was being pretty literal. Because if one of the only reasons seatbelts are mandatory is because you become a weapon, then Id like to see the statistics showing why. If they cant provide these statistics, then I dont see the justification. I mean, I dont want to die, so I wear one. Im just thinking from the other side.

Speaking of costs incurred by other people due to stupidity...

Fun fact: In my province, they made it so a certain people dont have to wear helmets on motorbikes because of their religion. So foreign religion trumps domestic safety rules and insurance policies.

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zebatov posted...

Fun fact: In my province, they made it so a certain people dont have to wear helmets on motorbikes because of their religion. So foreign religion trumps domestic safety rules and insurance policies.

Well yeah, that's fucking stupid. I completely agree w/ you, that shouldn't be in the law.

Same for exemptions from vaccines for "religious reasons".

streamofthesky posted...

HOWEVER, the seat belt laws are necessary because I wouldn't want some idiot's corpse* to come flying through their windshield and become a projectile hazard for other motorists, causing them to get into accidents in response.

so whats the justification for motorcycle helmets then or is that also made up

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I thought they have been mandatory since last century.

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Smarkil posted...

so whats the justification for motorcycle helmets then or is that also made up

What?
I don't even know what "point" you're trying to make.
Perhaps you somehow think the same speeds / force of impact / etc... are required for someone to be thrown from a motorcycle as it requires for someone to fly out of a car (especially through a windshield) are are just embarrassing yourself publicly in that fashion?
Or you're an advocate for removing helmet laws for motorcyclists?
Or some other angle?
You tell me.

Let's remember guys, a death is cheaper to insurers than a life-changing injuries, so if anything the insurance rate would go down.
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No. I'm a big boy and I don't need big brother watching over my back telling me what I need or don't need to do. Same with helmets, Michigan finally is a helmet free state and I take the Harley out helmetless BECAUSE I CHOOSE TO. Its funny how people actually like gov't deciding what we can and can't do. Sheep.

RampageHowl posted...

No. I'm a big boy and I don't need big brother watching over my back telling me what I need or don't need to do. Same with helmets, Michigan finally is a helmet free state and I take the Harley out helmetless BECAUSE I CHOOSE TO. Its funny how people actually like gov't deciding what we can and can't do. Sheep.

I find it hilarious that people will unironically call others sheep for following rules that are meant to protect them and legitimately believe they're being intelligent and somehow less naive by risking their safety. You're not cool or rebellious for thinking helmet and seatbelt regulations are some "big brother" scenario. That's just dumb.

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In China everybody has fake seatbelts in their car that can be plugged into the socket to prevent them from triggering the seatbelt alarm.

Which is insane given their high rate of traffic accidents

It's not really relevant to this discussion except it kind of highlights how powerful force of habit can be

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Blightzkrieg posted...

In China everybody has fake seatbelts in their car that can be plugged into the socket to prevent them from triggering the seatbelt alarm.

Which is insane given their high rate of traffic accidents

It's not really relevant to this discussion except it kind of highlights how powerful force of habit can be

Why don't they just wear the seatbelt?

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In Spain they call them bleatblets

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When people say they would rather not have the government tell them what to do, would they rather there be no laws at all? What about jaywalking, age restrictions on driving, age restrictions on drinking, laws against murder, laws against thievery etc. Is there a line that should be drawn? How does one even choose where it gets drawn?

streamofthesky posted...

What?
I don't even know what "point" you're trying to make.
Perhaps you somehow think the same speeds / force of impact / etc... are required for someone to be thrown from a motorcycle as it requires for someone to fly out of a car (especially through a windshield) are are just embarrassing yourself publicly in that fashion?
Or you're an advocate for removing helmet laws for motorcyclists?
Or some other angle?
You tell me.

The point is that this narrative of "YOU GET THROWN THROUGH WINDSHIELD AND HURT OTHER PEOPLE" is completely unfounded. There's no statistical data other than 'well it could happen maybe'. And yes, I'm absolutely an advocate for removing motorcycle helmet laws because they're stupid. I've had a motorcycle for about 14 years now and I nearly always wear my helmet. Why? Because I want to. The government doesn't need a law to keep me from killing myself. That's fucking stupid.

Seat belt laws are another chicken shit way cops get to pull people over for no fucking reason and it's what results in people going to jail or getting shot far more often than it should be. Cop sees a black dude not wearing his seat belt and pulls him over, 'Oh I pulled you over cause you weren't wearing your seat belt smells like you have weed in there better pull you out and cuff you'.

Let people do what they want. If they wanna die, that's on them. If your goal as a lawmaker is to try and get people to stop killing themselves then outlaw motorcycles all together. Outlaw skydiving. Outlaw rock climbing. We don't want those people to die right?

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Smarkil posted...
The government doesn't need a law to keep me from killing myself. That's fucking stupid.

If you fly off your motorcycle and end up in a coma rather than having a few scrapes and bruises, you're draining resources from society. Even if you have health insurance preventing you from being accountable for the cost of your hospital stay that doesn't mean the taxpayers aren't covering it. I would rather my tax dollars go towards something productive and not medical expenses for people who chose to not follow common sense safety measures. Not to mention the hospital staff who need to attend to you when they could be trying to save the life of someone who is dying through no fault of their own.

If you're willing to sign a waiver that says you incur 100% of the cost of any injury sustained when not following safety rules and that you volunteer to forfeit your hospital bed the moment another patient comes in, then by all means, ride without a helmet. But you don't live in a vacuum and the consequences of your poor choices don't only affect your health. Wear a god damn helmet because you're not cool or edgy or badass for being reckless.

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GunslingerGunsl posted...

When people say they would rather not have the government tell them what to do, would they rather there be no laws at all? What about jaywalking, age restrictions on driving, age restrictions on drinking, laws against murder, laws against thievery etc. Is there a line that should be drawn? How does one even choose where it gets drawn?

Libertarians fantasize about a world with no laws where they live in their own fortresses and shoot anyone who comes near, don't try and apply logic to them.

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https://youtu.be/ZITP93pqtdQ

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At the end of the day, each one of us is ultimate responsible for our safety and whether or not we choose to wear seatbelts etc.

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Zareth posted...

Libertarians fantasize about a world with no laws where they live in their own fortresses and shoot anyone who comes near, don't try and apply logic to them.

They also like to ignore the fact that no country has ever had a successful libertarian government, the fact that the countries in the world with the highest standard of living by pretty much any metric are all countries with very large governments, the fact that the countries with "small" governments are more or less all third world countries run by warlords, and the fact that pretty much all of human history has demonstrated that if you take away structure and put more autonomy and responsibility in the hands of individuals, they will fuck each other over for short term gains 100% of the time.

IMO hardcore libertarians are all just people with no understanding of history or significant superiority complexes and I've never met one who didn't clearly fit into one of those two categories.

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man101 posted...

If you fly off your motorcycle and end up in a coma rather than having a few scrapes and bruises, you're draining resources from society. Even if you have health insurance preventing you from being accountable for the cost of your hospital stay that doesn't mean the taxpayers aren't covering it. I would rather my tax dollars go towards something productive and not medical expenses for people who chose to not follow common sense safety measures. Not to mention the hospital staff who need to attend to you when they could be trying to save the life of someone who is dying through no fault of their own.

If you're willing to sign a waiver that says you incur 100% of the cost of any injury sustained when not following safety rules and that you volunteer to forfeit your hospital bed the moment another patient comes in, then by all means, ride without a helmet. But you don't live in a vacuum and the consequences of your poor choices don't only affect your health. Wear a god damn helmet because you're not cool or edgy or badass for being reckless.

Okay, now make every person that visits McDonalds sign the waiver. Because if you're going to argue that my willingly riding a motorcycle makes me a risk for 'draining resources' then you sure as fuck better extend that same courtesy to every fat person in the world. Or smokers. Or drinkers. Or anyone that makes poor decisions. Because legislating people on the spurious notion that they MIGHT become a drain on resources is insane and not a world I'm thrilled about living in.

Oh and I wanna be clear about something given the topic at hand. I'm more okay with mask mandates than I am with seatbelt or helmet laws. I don't like the idea that masks should be required by law and I may disagree with the idea of a law based upon my personal ethics, but at least masks make an appreciable and measurable difference and that not wearing a mask has measured effect on others.

I wear masks and I wear helmets and whatever else because I'm a normal human being who cares about my own well being and others well being in so far as I have the chance to affect change. But willing adding more weapons in the governments arsenal of bullshit tools to fine and harm its own citizens is dumb as shit.

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Smarkil posted...

so whats the justification for motorcycle helmets then or is that also made up

They get a pass because motorcycles make up X insurance profits and are X part of the cost of payouts.

As for what the other guy said, your body weight is your body weight. If youre moving at X speed, the vehicle youre on doesnt affect that, outside of the fact that flying through a windshield might slow you down first.

Good point, sir.

man101 posted...

I find it hilarious that people will unironically call others sheep for following rules that are meant to protect them and legitimately believe they're being intelligent and somehow less naive by risking their safety. You're not cool or rebellious for thinking helmet and seatbelt regulations are some "big brother" scenario. That's just dumb.

So when they say certain demographics are allowed to not wear them but others have to, within the same society, thatsssssssssss...............?

@#38, smokers are regularly affected by insurance policies in a negative way. Even if it isnt in the policy, if a smoker dies, and an insurance claim is made, you can guarantee that the insurance company is going to find a way to attribute the death to their own choice, ergo fail to be insured.

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