"All I can say is its really scary looking at the data how little helmets actually protect. I use to look at the person not wearing a helmet and think "what a nut". But not anymore". As a Accident survivor I would have to disagree with you. I am sure that I am not alone on this.

 

darwins law but if you crash without a helmet i dont want my tax dollars going to taking care of your self induced retarded *** just my opinion

 

Well someone flipped out for no apparent reason.

Anyways my choice is MSF. Cant beat good ole education. As far as gear its a personal thing. I tend to like my skin and life so im always wearing atleast jeans, helmet and a good bike jacket. I wear gloves when its chilly out

 

lol :-)

 

Voted for restricting engine size, even though it's hypocritical of me. Would I have been opposed to riding a 250cc for a year or so before a 600cc, not at all. This regulation seems to work in other countries just fine. But I'm for darwinism all the way, which will ultimately occur whether it's legal or not.

MSF- If you're ignorant enough to get on a motorcycle without properly educating yourself on how to effectively operate it, then you've got whats coming to you. That goes with anything that poses any sort of risk to your physical well being and of others (skydiving, scuba, guns, ect...).

Stricter Traffic Laws- They're just fine the way they are, imo. If you injure or kill somebody as result of careless or reckless driving, you're screwed; simple as that. Although I do think we need harsher punishments for habitual drunk drivers.

It does appear that if people are unable to maintain an overall level of safety/order in and by themselves, then the goverment will see fit to interject regulations limiting and/or prohibiting certain activities. Take cellphones for example. If it can be demonstrated that the majority of avoidable accidents are caused by inatentive drivers on cellulars, then wouldn't it make sense to prohibit such behavior?

That is why there are states where it's mandatory to wear helmets. Their legislature said to themselves, if we can avoid 47% of fatalities and/or cranial injuries involving motorcycle accidents and unhelmeted riders, thereby saving X amount of money with the costs incurred by caring for these invalids, then lets do it.

Personally, I wear full gear all the time and made sure that I had taken the MSF (with endorsement) prior to riding. Fortunate enough to have taken an advanced course as well, a year later. I've spent good money making sure to have armored leather from neck to toe, including a lid for the gooey gray matter. At home I have a family who is dependant on me, and a job that I'm dependant on to support them. Riding without taking every available precaution would be very irresponsible in my part, for something that is purely recreational. Aside from that, the confidence inspired in knowing that I'm fully suited up to ride a sportbike, is in itself tranferred to my riding.

The Department of Motor Vehicles as a whole, needs a major overhaul in this country, imo. As does National Security & Immigration Enforcement, but that's another topic... But don't get me wrong, I'm highly against goverment intervening with our freedoms. It's the people out there who are incapable of comporting themselves, that bring about regulations. As to riding without a helmet, there's plenty of folks out there in need of organ donors.

 

When I got my endorsement (after taking the MSF course), I did decide for the first time to become an organ donor.

 

Care to share this data?

 

I'd love to see that too... sounds pretty absurd to suggest that a helmet doesn't keep your face from getting scraped off or soften an impact enough to avoid a skull fracture. Even just intuitively, that sounds like an absurd suggestion to make.

As for the original question... I think all of the measures would be very effective, but my love of freedom will not allow me to support that much government in my life. When it comes down to it, I think there are already too many rules on the road purely from a traffic standpoint... but that goes into another discussion.

I chose mandatory MSF, as I know it gave me a lot of skills that I use day-to-day to keep me safe while I commute in.

Now that said, I still think it would be a great idea to make some kind of condensed motorcycle course be part of the licensing process for automobiles as someone mentioned. I think showing the techniques we use to make ourselves visible to cages would also make a lot of them a lot more aware of how to watch for us and where/how they could expect to see us moving through traffic. Also, ban cell phone/computer/media player use of all kinds at all times while in a running vehicle.

In the last couple of weeks I've had a soccer mom in minivan almost run me over in my lane on the highway while trying to type on a laptop in her passenger seat and another guy try to change into my lane on top of me while distracted by the movie on his kid's movie playing in the car... I swear to god it makes me want to do something violent when people are so careless...

 

I did some Googling and think I can see how the stats could be misinterpretted. This is a quote from the motorcycle fatality facts of 2008 by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety

Quote:

In 2008, 86 percent of fatally injured motorcyclists were helmeted in states with helmet laws that cover all riders, in contrast to only 24 percent in states with no helmet law. In states with helmet laws that cover only some riders, 37 percent of fatally injured motorcyclists were helmeted.

It's logical that helmet equipped fatalities would be higher in a state that requires helmet use than in a state where its not required. A breakdown of head injuries, fatal and non-fatal, would be more pertinent.

 

I voted MSF because knowing is half the battle....

Someone mentioned something about harsher penalties for riding drunk, which I'm all for. However, I don't want there to be harsher penalties just because I want to take my bike around in a somewhat haphazard manner. Anyone who rides big (600-1000cc)and doesn't ride fast every now and then is just doing it for status and shouldn't be on a sport bike anyways.

Also, I don't get how you guys even keep your eyes open when riding w/o a proper visor.