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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

cycle helmets

141 replies

Orangejuicemarathoner · 04/10/2021 21:28

I can't bear to see my nephew set off for school by bike in busy traffic, and poor visibility without a cycle helmet. I can't understand his parents allowing this. I know it's none of my business and there is nothing I can do, but I really wish this wasn't allowed

OP posts:
PlanDeRaccordement · 05/10/2021 21:54

@SnackSizeRaisin
The point here is that firstly it's extremely unlikely that your nephew riding to school is going to have a cycling accident, secondly if he does he probably won't bang his head. Helmets are no use against cars.

How dare you call science “hysteria” because you are in denial about the decades of studies done on cycling and helmets. Cyclists are the most likely of all road users to get into an accident, and if he does, he is actually very likely to bang his head and helmets do in fact reduce both head injury severity and fatalities both in falling off your bicycle and in collisions with cars.

Tell me are you also an anti-vaxxer? Because you are a science denier in this so I would not be at all shocked if you had refused vaccines too.

PlanDeRaccordement · 05/10/2021 21:56

@DecadentlyDecisive

I’ve come off my bike, hit my head and was knocked out. Was wearing a helmet and was ok. My best friend has also been knocked out after a cycling accident and again was wearing a helmet and apart from a broken shoulder was ok. Could have been a different story without the helmets.

Other people have suffered worse injuries because of helmets though, where it's altered the angle their head hits at and damages the neck, or the lip or strap catches and jerks the head back/left/right.

It's honestly the luck of the draw....

Source saying that helmet wearing causes worse injuries than not wearing one?

I posted several studies which affirmed that helmet wearing is not linked to neck injuries/cervical spine injuries at all.

Macncheeseballs · 05/10/2021 22:17

Planderacordment, why does it make you so angry though? surely it's individual choice to make one's own risk assessment. Do you get as angry with smokers?

Macncheeseballs · 05/10/2021 22:18

Separate cycle lanes are by far the greatest life saving thing you can give a cyclist

Nottheduchess · 05/10/2021 22:37

@PlanDeRaccordement give up if I was you, you can’t educate pork.

Nottheduchess · 05/10/2021 22:41

@Macncheeseballs I think the anger is because all the stats and science is there to show how important helmets are in regards to saving lives and preventing serious head injuries yet some people are still arguing against them and coming up with a load of shite to back up their opinions.

LadyGAgain · 05/10/2021 22:45

@Macncheeseballs

Ladyg, but the chances of that happening are fairly low to be honest
This is true. Thankfully.
IDontThinkSoNo · 05/10/2021 22:50

@Macncheeseballs

I don't understsnd why people get so upset about what other people wear on their heads. It's their head.
He’s her nephew. She loves him and doesn’t want him to get hurt. That difficult for you to understand?
MinesAPintOfTea · 05/10/2021 22:52

Check with his parents first, then have a chat with him about the benefits of helmet wearing? Sometimes messages go in better from a non-parent chat.

But he’s probably healthier cycling without a helmet than getting a lift because he refuses to cycle with one

DdraigGoch · 06/10/2021 01:05

@SnackSizeRaisin

Yabu. Cycle helmets are no use against being hit by a car. They are a thin bit of polystyrene tested with a 12 kg weight, cars weigh hundreds of kilos. Why do people think cycle helmets are some kind of magic forcefield to stop all accidents Anyway cycling is an inherently safe activity. He's much better off cycling than sitting in a car , both mentally and physically.
I know someone who wouldn't be alive today if he hadn't worn a helmet. He's not alone by any stretch.
DdraigGoch · 06/10/2021 01:22

@Macncheeseballs

Despite safety measures such as seat belts, and its protective metal structure, the most common injury to car occupants in an accident is to the head, this is in a vehicle that can travel up to 100 miles an hour, so where is the outcry, why aren't we all urged to wear helmets in cars, and yet you are getting upset about the safety aspects of a vehicle travelling at 10/15 miles an hour
Have you not heard about the new invention they call "the air bag"?

You don't have to be going fast at all to have serious consequences from hitting the tarmac.

Macncheeseballs · 06/10/2021 07:13

Ddraig, that was taking the airbag into account, no you don't have to be going fast, as a bike to have a serious accident, which is why serious accidents also happen to pedestrians

liveforsummer · 06/10/2021 07:16

If his mum made him wear it he'd only take it off round the corner anyway. You don't see any dc wearing them here past primary school.

Macncheeseballs · 06/10/2021 07:18

Nottheduchess, all the stats also show that smoking or drinking or over eating is bad for you, I don't see it as my job to tell people not to do any of those things, I would never be so arrogant. Let people make their own risk assessments about their own bodies. I'm not a great fan of skiing, every time I have been one of our party has been injured yet thousands continue to hurl their bodies down mountains every year, their body, their risk. We are all different, and it is incredibly rude to call someone pork because they do not agree with you.

bonbonours · 06/10/2021 07:27

I believe they should be compulsory for all cyclists which would maybe help with the embarrassment factor.

I think part of the fault lies with adults who don't wear them (sometimes while cycling with kids who are wearing them). This implies the kids need to wear them due to not being as proficient at cycling. Therefore teenagers, who think (probably correctly) they are just as good at it as an adult, are offended at the idea of wearing one. In fact anyone, no matter how proficient can be knocked off by bad car driving or a person opening a car door into them.

You don't decide whether to wear a seatbelt based on how good a driver you think you are. A helmet won't prevent all injury but it could save your life or make the difference between severe and slight injury.

Macncheeseballs · 06/10/2021 07:31

Bonbon, the more people cycling, the safer it is for cyclists. Compulsory helmet use lessens the amount of people cycling, so perhaps it cancels out.

bonbonours · 06/10/2021 07:32

@LadyGAgain.
I wish I'd saved a photo I saw of a teen with severe permanent brain injury following a bike accident with no helmet, who now has special needs and has to be tube fed. It had a caption something to do with "embarrassed to wear a helmet, wouldn't you be more embarrassed to look like me?"

Crabapple04 · 06/10/2021 07:34

How about a skater style one, my term wears one - might that be a bit "cooler"?

Nomoreusernames1244 · 06/10/2021 07:35

Bonbon, the more people cycling, the safer it is for cyclists. Compulsory helmet use lessens the amount of people cycling, so perhaps it cancels out

Someone has posted stats upthread that shows this hasn’t happened in countries where compulsory helmets have been introduced. Injuries are reduced, but don’t correlate with reduced numbers of cyclists.

So why do you still think compulsory helmets will reduce cycling?

Swimmingwiththefishes · 06/10/2021 08:29

Oh god, there are some proper twats on this thread and things like this make me so angry

My sister was in a low speed collision with a car on her bike early last year

18 months later she has had to learn to walk and talk again. Her short term memory is terrible and each time I bring my son to see her I have to reintroduce them as he was born after her accident so she doesn't remember him.

The car had a minor bump and my sister suffered a broken arm too. But she wasn't wearing a helmet and hit her head on the kerb. I have absolutely no doubt that if she was wearing a helmet she would have had concussion and a short hospital stay.

OP YANBU and I wish it was something more people did

HuhWhatNow · 06/10/2021 08:32

I watched my son come of his bike going down our road. Every millisecond of it has been burned into my memory like I watched it in slow motion. He hit the road and his body bounced, slamming his head. As he rolled, his head slammed into the road two more times. He was wearing a helmet and the only damage to his head was lost skin on his chin.
He lost so much skin (on his covered body) that we had to put him in a bath to clean the wounds rather than tackling each one. Thankfully none were too deep and it wasn't an A&E trip. Not one part of his body escaped some damage.

I absolutely know that the now smashed helmet saved his life.

OP, YANBU but this is an argument most won't win. My kids have never been allowed on bikes without a helmet so it's a given that they will continue. However, a kid who hasn't been made to will probably not change their mind and start to do so.

PlanDeRaccordement · 06/10/2021 12:03

@Macncheeseballs

Planderacordment, why does it make you so angry though? surely it's individual choice to make one's own risk assessment. Do you get as angry with smokers?
It makes me angry that you are saying patently untrue false things to give the impression that a child is safer not wearing a helmet. You admit that smoking, drinking is unsafe, but you’re literally saying falsehoods about bicycle helmets to score points on an Internet forum- you are forgetting a living breathing 12yr olds safety is at the heart of this.
NewLifePending · 06/10/2021 12:07

My sons helmet saved his face a few weeks back. He went over the handlebars and landed straight down on his face. The front of his helmet hit the ground and cracked and his only injuries were a grazed his chin and a bit of a fat lip. It would have been a lot worse without his helmet

PlanDeRaccordement · 06/10/2021 12:08

@bonbonours

I believe they should be compulsory for all cyclists which would maybe help with the embarrassment factor.

I think part of the fault lies with adults who don't wear them (sometimes while cycling with kids who are wearing them). This implies the kids need to wear them due to not being as proficient at cycling. Therefore teenagers, who think (probably correctly) they are just as good at it as an adult, are offended at the idea of wearing one. In fact anyone, no matter how proficient can be knocked off by bad car driving or a person opening a car door into them.

You don't decide whether to wear a seatbelt based on how good a driver you think you are. A helmet won't prevent all injury but it could save your life or make the difference between severe and slight injury.

Agree completely. We always wore helmets when cycling with our children. On road or on cycle paths. No helmet, no cycling. My youngest is 17 and eldest is 24....and yes they have never stopped wearing helmets. I truly believe it is because we modelled helmet wearing as adults that it was normalised for them.
HarrietsChariot · 06/10/2021 12:11

Helmets help in minor incidents but don't do much for higher speed accidents. The test is do they protect the user from serious injury if they fall off a stationary bike and hit their head on the ground.

If a truck clips the back of your head with its wing mirror you're fucked, helmet or no helmet. Arguably you're better off being killed outright than having to live in a PVS.

If you want proper protection you need a motorcyle helmet, open face is ok as long as your chin is covered.