There is inherent danger in riding, and an accident can get you at any time. If I hadn't been wearing leather pants and a leather jacket, I might have needed skin grafts as well as a shoulder reset.

My nurse friend said she saw some terrible injuries sustained by riders wearing half-helmets that could have been avoided. I can't avoid all the risk riding, but at least I can avoid that one.

 

What is the definition of a real Harley owner? Wear what you want, don't pay mind to those who cant handle you being yourself or doing or wearing what makes you comfortable. As for the safety factor FF has its arguments, but they are not the ultimate in safe. In my line of work I have cleaned up bikes and saw guys hauled off from accidents where the FF didn't make a difference in life or death and in a couple of cases where it caused death. Remember regardless of what helmet you wear, never ever remove someone's after an accident with out professional medical assistance, Paralyses or death can happen with in seconds of an unseen head or neck injury that the helmet is securing.

 

The BEST protection is protecting the head(brain) from injury. What protection do you 'realize' that they don't offer? You haven't had the 'experience' needed, and apparently haven't even been personally exposed to people that have said experience, to really understand the issue.

And that is a GOOD thing, for you. The pain, agony, misery, inconvenience or whatever justification someone has for not wanting to wear a helmet only has any meaning while they are wearing, or not wearing, a helmet. A head(brain) injury, for people that don't die immediately, becomes the(a) major point of their 'lives'. Every second for the rest of their lives. And, depending on the severity of the injury, the lives of the families or caregivers are also affected.

It all depends on a person's priorities and what they feel are they odds for/against them bouncing their head on solid hard.

 

It's amusing that we're having this debate. Health and Safety determined back in the 70s that we should be protected from injury and deafness, amongst other hazards, while we are at work. Anyone working in an environment where they may suffer injury wears a helmet, eyewear and ear defenders and has been for around 40 years - since before some of those arguing against bike helmets were even a twinkle in their parents eye.......

 

'In your line of work' do you follow, or do you even have any immediate knowledge, of the lives of people that receive a head(brain) injury that might have been prevented by wearing a helmet?

If not, you can't really understand the issue. Since it means there is no more pain or suffering, because life ends and the rider never knows, death is unimportant. But your focus on death, is understandable. That is what people generally, and erroneously, think is the important part of this issue.

In a bad accident blunt force trauma, or a unusual occurrence such as a helmet causing an injury, can cause death or injury. The real sad thing is when a minor, insignificant in that the rider can usually get up and walk or even sometimes ride away, incident occurs and the rider 'lives' with the results every second for the rest of their 'life'.

 

When compulsory seat belts for cars were introduced here in the UK, in the 60s, someone I knew argued against them because on the one occasion he rolled his car the windshield popped out and he followed through the hole it left, thereby avoiding being crushed inside. Close shave?!

Since then mortality and serious injury on the roads have greatly reduced, but medicine has improved to such a degree that we are running out of organs for transplants, previously 'donated' by dead road victims. The World's a mixed up place.......

 

yes i do first hand.

 

You, or the person with the injury, have my empathy. Don't you agree that sometimes death is the easy way out?

Of course if your "first hand" knowledge is only through observation of accident scenes, you, fortunately, can't really understand the issue.

But don't you agree "The real sad thing is when a minor, insignificant in that the rider can usually get up and walk or even sometimes ride away, incident occurs and the rider 'lives' with the results every second for the rest of their 'life'?

 

How many did it cause death in? And how many did you come across where it prevented or lessened injury?

 

I'm surprised motsknab77 hasn't answered our questions yet? He does make 21 posts per day. Most, almost all actually, of his posts are in game threads or of a social nature having NOTHING to do with motorcycles.

And that is OK, but it makes one wonder about his concern/interest/knowledge with motorcycle related questions/problems?

Ironically, your last question is difficult, actually impossible, to answer since incidents in which a helmet prevented or lessened injury aren't usually public knowledge because the rider gets up and rides, or at least walks, away.