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"War gear" - can we campaign for "cycling as a normal thing to do" or not?

(19 posts)
  • Started 13 years ago by Dave
  • Latest reply from Kim
  • This topic is closed

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  1. Dave
    Member

    Leading on from the somewhat off-topic discussion in "the problem with forums", here is a question which I think is quite serious:

    Why do we not accept the need for balance in the debate on "war-gear" (in which I would include helmets, high-viz, body armour, horns, and all sorts of specialist equipment that are sold as basic safety "essentials").

    Strictly speaking I am pro-choice, in that I do not think we should have a law banning helmets, or a law making them compulsory.

    However, within that constraint there are alternative positions - you can be completely agnostic, you can think war-gear is a good thing (but shouldn't be compulsory) or you can think it is a bad thing (but shouldn't be banned).

    Now, I occupy the latter camp - while I don't have a problem with helmets being on sale, I do have a problem with them being passed off as "common sense", as an "essential", and particularly with the hypocrisy of trying to claim that cycling to the corner shop on a summer afternoon is safe, yet requires body armour and bin-man suit to stand an even chance of survival.

    What troubles me about cyclists as a group (and I think one great thing about this forum is it has a wide cross-section of people on it) is the lack of tolerance for campaigning *against* fearmongering, and resisting it when it does appear.

    Increasing the numbers of people cycling is the single biggest thing we can do - it directly increases everyone's safety. It makes it much easier to get proper infrastructure installed and the existing stuff corrected. It virtually guarantees proper cycle parking / shower facilities (in the fullness of time).

    It makes you and your kids less likely to be the 1 in 3 who suffer from a heart attack, at the relatively mild risk that if you do it bareheaded for 20,000 years, you'll get a nasty injury.

    The actual mechanics of whether various sorts of "war-gear" work or otherwise, and the stories someone always has about "if I didn't have a helmet on my skull would have exploded like a grenade" are (even if literally true) quite irrelevant to the wider question of whether we campaign for "cycling being a normal thing to do" or not.

    But, part of making this happen requires that people kick up a fuss when a publicly funded body campaigns that "cycling is safe, only provided you buy and wear all this survival gear".

    Why is this so controversial? I'm sure it's not just because it embarasses people who do wear it, "showing them up" or whatever, because anybody who already cycles obviously doesn't care about how other people percieve them that much (especially me, I own a recumbent for heavens sake!).

    What's going on?

    Posted 13 years ago #

  2. spytfyre
    Member

    "What's going on?"

    Posted 13 years ago #

  3. Stepdoh
    Member

    "War Gear" is a little bit of a loaded start but here we go.

    <onlymyopinion>
    I'm in the lycra camp, m'fraid.

    I like putting on cycle gear in the morning before going to work, then having a shower and putting on the suit before starting work. It marks out a seperation between the commute and the work.

    I like not having to care about oil, mud or the really pretty random detritus you get hooning up and down Embra's cycle paths on my clothes. I like the unobtrusiveness, the lack of flappyness, I like the fact it keeps my muscles warm even when wet.

    My 'war gear' usually consists of tights/shorts, a base layer, my beloved, indestructable eleven year old GAP trackie top, gloves and a helmet. Short of a few bits of scotchlite (and bike lights in autumn/winter) it's Black/Grey/Blue. My outfit fits the bits of my ride when I'm outside of the city.

    I'm not high vis, I'm not Chic either, but I like being marked out as cyclist while not attached to two wheels and some alloy.

    There aren't many of us at the moment and it's something to be proud of.
    </opinion>

    Posted 13 years ago #

  4. recombodna
    Member

    I can't believe the fuss on this subject. Surely in this day and age you just do whatever turns you on. Why would you be bothered if some one wants or doesn't want to wear "war gear". Falling off a bike at 20+mph hurts why not protect the extremities? or why bother? whatever you want it's up to you you and only you have the power to decide what you want to do....

    Posted 13 years ago #

  5. chdot
    Admin

    Trailer for programme in half an hour.

    "Are toasters really ten times more dangerous than sharks?!

    I think I'll take my chances with the toaster."

    "SYNOPSIS Which would win in a fight - a shark or a toaster? Tim Harford finds out in this week's More or Less. The team also investigate whether Hospital Standardised Mortality Ratios (or HSMRs) - expected deaths to observed deaths - can be unhelpful, ask who stands to lose from the scrapping of Child Trust Funds and remember the great mathematician, Martin Gardner."  

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sgbr5

    Posted 13 years ago #

  6. Smudge
    Member

    Nips off to switch on the radio :)
    Radio 4, one of the best things ever to come out of London. Fabulous :)

    Posted 13 years ago #

  7. spytfyre
    Member

    ... thanks chdot that was really random
    @Dave - I would suggest the answer is (not saying that it definitely is) Yes we can promote cycling as normal but in the same way that the BBC had to give all the "3 main parties" the same coverage on "Have I Got News For You" we would have to have each page show one picture with a helmet and one without....

    Posted 13 years ago #

  8. chdot
    Admin

    "... thanks chdot that was really random"

    Depends how you define "random"

    Some people assume things because they are 'obvious'.

    Some people do things because, whatever the evidence/probability, they feel it's right for them.

    That's choice/'human nature' etc.

    The point on this forum is that arguing from a fixed position with people who have strongly different views is not entirely productive ESPECIALLY when it keeps happening.

    Not least because there is no universally right (or wrong) answer.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  9. Dave
    Member

    I'm in the lycra camp, m'fraid.

    Don't apologise! This is actually a really good example, precisely because it has gone the other way. There is a massive backlash against "proper" cycle clothes, despite the fact that it's hard to argue cotton boxers are as comfortable as a plush pair of bib-tights when you're lathering up Leith Walk.

    Everybody seems to understand that not only do you not *need* to wear lycra (which is not to say that it isn't better), if we did promote it at every opportunity it would be rather damaging to efforts to sell the idea that if you need to get across town to pick something up from the florists, you can do it on your bike.

    Of course, it doesn't hurt that manufacturers and shops can sell you "not lycra" clothes - which is a big part of it. I spent almost as much on my latest MTB/casual shorts as on my bib-shorts. Nobody makes a killing not selling protective gear!

    I can't believe the fuss on this subject. Surely in this day and age you just do whatever turns you on. Why would you be bothered if some one wants or doesn't want to wear "war gear". Falling off a bike at 20+mph hurts why not protect the extremities? or why bother? whatever you want it's up to you you and only you have the power to decide what you want to do....

    This is exactly what I'm talking about - sadly missing the basic point that what people do does affect other people, very dramatically.

    There's a good post on the "forums" discussion (which I might have hoped to attract here), but as your starter for 10:

    The Department for Transport has long held the position that helmets will be made compulsory in the UK as soon as voluntary use reaches a certain percentage - sadly unspecified. Wearing a helmet is, literally (if not intentionally) a vote for compulsion.

    Really you should read Copenhagenize for a very lucid and ongoing analysis of the problem "war gear" causes to our efforts to make cycling more popular, if it is not screamingly obvious.

    (That's not to say that I think you personally should be riding bareheaded. But it certainly amazes me that people are so actively against standing up to fearmongering).

    Posted 13 years ago #

  10. steveo
    Member

    As has been said is there any point in "debating" this, since the debate revolves around one group who wears what they feel comfortable in and the other who say this is wrong and try to beat the first group over the head with flaky statistics and ill formed scientific principle.

    NO ONE IS GOING TO CHANGE THEIR OPINION.

    There it is! It really doesn't matter.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  11. Smudge
    Member

    "NO ONE IS GOING TO CHANGE THEIR OPINION.

    There it is! It really doesn't matter. "

    <Applauds> yup, so no point discussing it further here unless some interesting new info comes out I'd say, only seems to lead to otherwise nice people becoming upset.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  12. wee folding bike
    Member

    If I was going far enough I'd wear lycra, yes, even on a Brompton, I have no shame. The last time I did that every day was four years ago when I was working nearly 20 miles away on the NW side of Glasgow.

    I'm only doing 10 miles each way now so I don't bother with lycra. I usually just use normal shorts and a t shirt.

    This week I have mostly been wearing Craghopper Kiwi zip off trousers. As well as a quick get away in the afternoon this allows me to have the same pockets all day so I don't forget to move something and leave my Swiss Army knife, keys or credit cards at work.

    Actually I've still got the Craghoppers on today and might get away with wearing them this evening on a wedding anniversary trip for a pizza supper and then theatre. I'll zip the bottom bits on if pressed by the memsahib.

    Craghoppers make pants impregnated with insect repellent.. I'm tempted but they are more spendy. Those ones also have a water proof pocket.

    http://tiny.cc/38wzd

    In the winter I sometimes wear long pants in the morning, very rarely in the afternoon. I carry water proofs when the Met Office says it's going to rain.

    Shorts are my normal kind of kit. Even when I'm not cycling I'll wear shorts out doors for half of the year and, since I usually have them on coming home, I tend to wear them in the house most of the year.

    A skipped cap keeps rain out of my eyes and a balaclava or hat keeps my ears warm.

    I wear gloves in the winter but I've never been troubled by vibration from the bars so I don't use them other times. I know about Sheldon's idea of gloves protecting you i a fall but I don't fall off much and when I do I've not had hand injuries... apart from the car hitting me in '96 but that wasn't a scrape, I couldn't pick up pencils for a few days.

    One thing I found about lycra was that even if I wore the same jersey as Sean Kelly I didn't go as fast as him.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  13. Dave
    Member

    As has been said is there any point in "debating" this, since the debate revolves around one group who wears what they feel comfortable in and the other who say this is wrong and try to beat the first group over the head with flaky statistics and ill formed scientific principle.

    Although I applaud this legendary post (either side of the helmet debate can apply it to the other - brilliant), you're not answering the topic we're discussing.

    I specifically didn't bring up any claims or counter-claims to do with war-gear (in fact I even allowed that riding bareheaded may cause your head to explode). The question I'm asking is whether as cyclists we support or oppose efforts to fearmonger and talk down cycling, literally or figuratively.

    NO ONE IS GOING TO CHANGE THEIR OPINION.

    This is blatantly untrue. How do you think people come to form an opinion one way or the other? You're hardly born a helmet believer or an anti-fearmongering campaigner...

    People do change their minds. I'm an example of that, because a few years ago I couldn't imagine any way in which not wearing a helmet (or campaigning for helmet use) wasn't a good idea. Eventually discussions like these prompted me to reconsider.

    Plus the people who post are perhaps 1% (or less) of the number who will read it in the fullness of time. Understanding that the universal promotion of "war gear" is not accepted by people who do cycle could help a prospective rider make up their mind to get on a bike.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  14. steveo
    Member

    urrgghh... I give up, these debates really are a waste of time. Do as you please don't tell me about it.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  15. wee folding bike
    Member

    More or Less is available as a podcast. Material World is pretty good too.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  16. spytfyre
    Member

    wee folding bike nearly had me converted and cycling home with the wind in my... hairless noggin

    Posted 13 years ago #

  17. wee folding bike
    Member

    Ahhh... I don't have one of those. Fairly hirsute here.

    I did go for the Spock's beard look a year ago after more than a decade of sporting the full works.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  18. Dave
    Member

    wee folding bike nearly had me converted and cycling home with the wind in my... hairless noggin

    The whole point of this topic was specifically not to try and persuade people who wear helmets to take them off! That's why I made the title "can we campaign for cycling as a normal thing to do" not "take off thine lid".

    The two are completely different things. One is telling people they don't have a choice - the other is trying to reshape the grass-roots of cycling (and the way it is promoted) such that it doesn't prey on people's fear and end up doing more harm than good.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  19. Kim
    Member

    "while I don't have a problem with helmets being on sale, I do have a problem with them being passed off as "common sense", as an "essential", and particularly with the hypocrisy of trying to claim that cycling to the corner shop on a summer afternoon is safe, yet requires body armour and bin-man suit to stand an even chance of survival."

    I agree. I don't have a problem with people wearing Lycra, with wearing Hi-Viz or Helmets if they want to.

    Where I do find it a problem is the promotion of them as being "essential" to cycle safely, or that wearing them gives a positive image of cycling. It doesn't!

    I am by nature a sceptic and have worked in science for most of the last 15 year (before that I did a lot of completely different things, and recently I have started to change career direction again). So when someone tells me X is a certainty and must be, i.e. the MMR jag causes autism or the Global Climate is warming due to anthropogenic CO2 emissions, I want to see evidence. I know how to read and evaluate the scientific literature, I understand the use of statistics. So I read the literature and try to form an informed opinion from there. Therefore I am not convinced that MMR causes autism, but I know that the global climate in warming and it most probably linked to anthropogenic activity.

    When people started to constantly reiterate that helmets reused your risk of head injury by 85% and that is was "essential" wear one while cycling or you were going to die, I wanted to see that evidence. This figure of 85% which frequently trotted out, comes from only one paper (Thompson, Rivera & Thompson 1989), one other study has ever come anywhere near that figure, including Thompson, Rivera & Thompson 1996 and Thompson, Rivera & Thompson 2000. So why is it still constantly in use? Well it is very convent if you are trying to sell helmets, which have a very high profit margin, unlike say bicycles.

    The other thing you quickly learn if you spend time reading the literature is the promotion of cycling helmets has a negative on the frequency of cycling. Put simply, you either promote helmets and Hi-Viz, or you can promote cycling for the masses, but you can do both, it just doesn't work.

    One of the major problems here is the way in which helmets have been promoted in the past (and sometimes still are), just think of the smashed egg ads. Fear was deliberately used to encourage the use of helmets, and in the process make people feel that cycling was actually a highly dangerous activity. After all, if it wasn't dangerous why would you need all this "safety" equipment to do it? The simple truth is cycling isn't particularly dangerous and you don't need a lot gear to do it.

    If you are riding long distances and/or at higher speeds, then wearing cycle specific clothing (i.e. Lycra) can be more comfortable, but it is not absolutely essential. If you are going round to the shops or a couple of miles to work, it really isn't necessary, but it harms no one and if it makes you happy, why not?

    The whole cycle chic is about showing that cycling can be a normal fun activity, it is about selling a positive idea. It is about cycling being something anyone can do! That you don't have to be a super fit sporty type to do it. It is about make cycling a normal everyday activity, the way it used to be. There was a time (only about 20 years ago) when going to the shops didn't involve grabbing the car keys. When it was normal for children used to walk or cycling to school, even on their own!

    Posted 13 years ago #

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