CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!

Sorry ... helmet related

(38 posts)
  • Started 11 years ago by amir
  • Latest reply from Greenroofer

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  1. skotl
    Member

    Interesting debate. On the topic of how children view the safety / danger aspect of cycling, my eight year old son and I watched an episode of Top Gear (which we both love) a few weeks ago, where there were several spoof adverts which paraphrased "I earn money, I bought a car. Don't cycle, cos you'll die".

    I just thought it was a bit of humour until last week when my son suggested to me that I should drive to work, because I could afford to. If I cycled "I would probably be killed". Thanks, Clarkson...

    Back to the helmet (and the helmet wars debate), I am pro-choice in pretty much all of its forms. My choice, however is that me and my family will wear a helmet because I would prefer to have 2" of polystyrene between my, my wife's or my son's head and the concrete or a car, should contact occur.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  2. Instography
    Member

    "How does one put the opposing point of view? How does one challenge the school when this kind of thing happens without coming across as a complete nutcase?"

    You don't. Your responsibilities extend no further than you and yours. When my son came home from cubs with the idea that a helmet would save him if he got hit by a lorry I offered to drive over his helmeted head, if he was that convinced. I'd rather have driven over the cub leader. Turned out he wasn't so sure.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  3. gembo
    Member

    @insto- offering to drive over the helmet (and head) is logical but if you will forgive me at the Jeremy Clarkson level of non advanced logic. So combined with skotl's point it does seem that Clarkson logic works with younger children......

    Posted 11 years ago #

  4. ARobComp
    Member

    From an objective point of view I'm not sure, having read the cherry picking nature of the statistics from Headway, that they could not be considered a "pressure group", and therefore should not be allowed a stage in a school. Effectively they are politicising the issue, I think that some basic coaching on common sense while playing, and perhaps some fun games led by an instructor around drop and roll style falling, with perhaps a wee leaflet would be appropriate and in line with other messages that children (and parents receive).

    An assembly telling children they'll die/be maimed if they ride a bike without a helmet is probably not to be considered beneficial.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  5. slowcoach
    Member

    Insto re "Some of them had arrived on bicycles and taken their helmets off to climb." There have been several children killed by cycle helmet straps strangling them after getting caught on climbimg frames etc. (according to a pro-helmet website)

    Posted 11 years ago #

  6. twinspark
    Member

    Full Disclosure - I wear a Helmet 99% of the time. The kids wear a helmet 100% of the time.

    As a Parent Bikeability volunteer, I asked about the compulsion aspect as children / their parents may have other entirely acceptable choices. I was told it was policy that the kids have to have helmets for the training and accept that as I want kids to cycle, for this to be a norm and for this good habit to continue throughout their lives.

    That said I don't think there *SHOULD* be any form of Compulsion.

    I always tell the kids doing the training that the helmet isn't going to save them if a lorry drives over them, nor will it make them invincible and immune to injury. I always tell them that regardless of the fact that they may be in the "right", if there is an action that they can take which will prevent an accident to either themselves or somebody else then they should take it and that this applies to whether they are cycling, walking or when they are older driving, flying or sailing. Being in the "right" and having, for example "right of way" and not braking whilst possibly being a moral victory is meaningless if they end up injured or dead.

    I'd be worried about helmet wearing being presented as a panacea that will protect them. With airbags in cars, nobody dies at the wheel now do they?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  7. gembo
    Member

    @arobcomp, Your stance is same as mine when I heard about creationists giving inputs to school assemblies. But still they do......

    Posted 11 years ago #

  8. Greenroofer
    Member

    @ARobComp: the thing I found interesting when looking at the Headway stats was that I couldn't find anything that said 'number of people each year who sustain life-changing brain injury by accident and causes of those accidents'.

    It's clear that a large part of their work is on non-accidental brain injury (strokes and the like). It's also clear that their stats talk about admissions to hospital for brain injuries (concussion and the like, I suppose) without saying how many of those are permanently affected.

    I think it's right they campaign to make boxing safer: the point of boxing, after all, is to inflict brain injury on your opponent. I would guess that their next target should be brain injury caused by car collisons, because I'll bet that that is the most common cause of accidental brain injury (although I've got no evidence for that!).

    Cycling should be way down their list of priorities.

    Posted 11 years ago #

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