This woman should not be in jail. It is ridiculous.
Jail, no. This is borne of ignorance and, most likely, lack of options (though it would’ve been marginally safer to carry the child in the front seat on her lap).
My parents held us on their laps as infants in the car. When I was older, I got to hold my baby brother. We put the seats down in the back of the station wagon and used couch cushions for long trips … crawled around back there with the dog at 70 plus mph.
This is only stupid because we have become so overly protective. Everything must be totally safe and virtually risk free or you are stupid. It is beyond anything I ever thought I would see.
This is stupid because we know better now, not because of the year on the calendar or some out-of-control PC climate. Driving around like your parents used to was every bit as dangerous then as it is now, and more reckless and irresponsible because safer options are readily available and people are now aware of the risks.
This is terribly condescending. We were shooting people into outerspace when my parents had us riding around in the back of trucks and station wagons. They were fully aware of the risks. The point is not that people were unaware of risks or that we now have safer options. The point is that those who are more risk-averse have taken control of the public discourse and are making the rules for the less risk-averse. It is not a matter of knowledge, smarts or options. It is a matter of a society that has and continues to succumb to the wishes of its most risk-averse members.
Brick. We’re talking about protecting helpless children from known dangers by taking basic, proven steps to decrease known threats to life and health. It’s really that simple.
Pull a dead child or two from a survivable crash, then get back to me on what’s stupid and overprotective. I didn’t need the experience to know it’s stupid, but it sure as shit reinforced the point.
Its got nothing to do with knowing better. It has to do with ever increasing expectations of safety that go along with ever increasing material wealth.
This is stupid because we know better now, not because of the year on the calendar or some out-of-control PC climate. Driving around like your parents used to was every bit as dangerous then as it is now, and more reckless and irresponsible because safer options are readily available and people are now aware of the risks.
Why don’t you let the children’s family/caretakers decide for themselves how much risk to assume?
There is no benefit to society for us getting involved in each other’s safety choices.
None of us assume 0 risk, ever. We all die. Its really not worth getting upset about.
Brick. We’re talking about protecting helpless children from known dangers by taking basic, proven steps to decrease known threats to life and health. It’s really that simple.
Pull a dead child or two from a survivable crash, then get back to me on what’s stupid and overprotective. I didn’t need the experience to know it’s stupid, but it sure as shit reinforced the point.
There is absolutely a point where we take things too far (banning dodge ball, mandatory helmet laws for motorcycle riders), but requiring that people secure their children safely in their vehicles is in no way past that point. I don’t care how we used to do it. We used to do a lot of stupid shit because we didn’t know better, or didn’t have better options.
The point is not that people were unaware of risks or that we now have safer options. The point is that those who are more risk-averse have taken control of the public discourse and are making the rules for the less risk-averse. It is not a matter of knowledge, smarts or options. It is a matter of a society that has and continues to succumb to the wishes of its most risk-averse members.
You are wrong on several counts.
Most people are NOT aware of the risks. They think that they are immune to accidents or that bad things won’t happen to them. It is not like they are actually weighing their options here and make a sound decision based on the true risks.
It is also not a matter of society is being run by the “most risk-averse members.” While that may or may not be true, the reality is that these laws and/or restrictions are reactionary to events that have actually happened. What often follows are law suits that are born out of these people’s tragedies that have occurred because of their ignorance.
Brick. We’re talking about protecting helpless children from known dangers by taking basic, proven steps to decrease known threats to life and health. It’s really that simple.
No it is not that simple. We are imposing someone else’s risk-reward calculation on society. When we do that via the force of law, we are limiting our freedom.
For you, the limitation on freedom is worth the reduced risk. For me it is not.
I too have experienced “preventable loss” but it has not for one moment made me wish that yet another law was in effect to require someone to behave in a less risky fashion.
I see parents riding bicycles on the road with kids in bike seats and on trail-a-bikes. In fact, I used to be one of them. That is far more dangerous than putting a kid in the back of a pick up truck. One distracted driver and my kid would have been crushed on the trial-a-bike or on the bike seat. I suppose I was stupid. I suppose we need another law preventing parents from riding on the roads with their kids. Maybe you can tell me what the appropriate age is for a kid to ride a bike on the road with their parent is?
I disagree. It is far more dangerous for you to ride your bike on a road than it is for any person of any age to ride in the back of a pickup truck.
How on earth can you state that most people are not aware of risks?
People are perfectly aware of risks. They also appreciate those risks fully. They, quite simply, are prepared to accept those risks.
The problem lies with folks who take your position that, “we know better.” You all think that it is your duty to legislate so as to protect the poor simpletons who are either too dumb, too young, too immature, etc. to recognize and avoid risk on their own. In your analysis it is an impossibility that smart and responsible people can assess a risk and make a different decision than you as to whether or not to accept that risk.
It is far more dangerous for you to ride your bike on a road than it is for any person of any age to ride in the back of a pickup truck.
Maybe, maybe not. Road conditions, speed, the truck driver, traffic, and many other things could easily make riding in the back of the pickup truck more dangerous. I do agree that ridin your bike on a road is extremely hazardous. Exactly why I don’t road ride very often and when I do it is on closed roads.
**How on earth can you state that most people are not aware of risks? **
People are perfectly aware of risks. They also appreciate those risks fully. They, quite simply, are prepared to accept those risks.
If you have to ask that question, then you must not deal with too many people. I deal with people every day who have absolutely no clue what is dangerous and what isn’t. Then, when something bad happens they are simply amazed. So my answer is based on my experience.
The problem lies with folks who take your position that, “we know better.” You all think that it is your duty to legislate so as to protect the poor simpletons who are either too dumb, too young, too immature, etc. to recognize and avoid risk on their own. In your analysis it is an impossibility that smart and responsible people can assess a risk and make a different decision than you as to whether or not to accept that risk.
In my analysis it is not impossible for smart and responsible people to assess risk. I think you overestimate the amount of smart and responsible people out there.
Realistically, it was probably lawyers that spurred the changes. Remember the Subaru Brat pickup truck. It had seats in the back that insurance companies eventually forced owners to remove in order to be eligible for coverage. It's the litigious society that often causes over-reaction from the nanny-state. Still dumb though.
When we do that via the force of law, we are limiting our freedom. For you, the limitation on freedom is worth the reduced risk. For me it is not.
For fuck’s sake, we’re talking about seat belts. Proven life saving devices that come standard in every vehicle made in every automobile factory in the world. If requiring that children be buckled in while engaging in the single most dangerous activity parents subject their children to is too great an infringement on your personal freedoms, perhaps that libertarian utopia in the Pacific would provide more reasonable accommodations, where you’re free to unnecessarily risk children’s lives in whatever way you see fit. Until then, my condolences for the tragic loss of that dear freedom in your vehicle. I can only imagine how painful it must be.
I see parents riding bicycles on the road with kids in bike seats and on trail-a-bikes. In fact, I used to be one of them. That is far more dangerous than putting a kid in the back of a pick up truck. One distracted driver and my kid would have been crushed on the trial-a-bike or on the bike seat. I suppose I was stupid. I suppose we need another law preventing parents from riding on the roads with their kids. Maybe you can tell me what the appropriate age is for a kid to ride a bike on the road with their parent is?
That’s a difficult problem for a number of reasons. I would hope people would exercise common sense and take whatever precautions are available (road selection, safety gear, speed, conditions, etc) when travel with child by bicycle is absolutely necessary. But that’s an entirely different problem than than that of safety belts and car seats in automobiles, which is a fairly simple problem with clear data and proven solutions that do not impose an unreasonable burden (as would a prohibition on bicycle travel with child). The existence of a complex problem that cannot be effectively addressed in regulation and law does not and should not imply that we should not address others.
We’re not talking about a passive endeavor. We are actively placing children in harm’s way, into a realm that is currently regulated by the state, when we put them in a motor vehicle. If the state has any responsibility whatsoever to ensure that parents cannot needlessly endanger children, then the state should have the power to require them to be secured properly in the vehicle to prevent needless endangerment. Nostalgia for the old days and the fact that we somehow survived is not sufficient grounds to continue a needlessly dangerous practice.
This is terribly condescending. We were shooting people into outerspace when my parents had us riding around in the back of trucks and station wagons. They were fully aware of the risks. The point is not that people were unaware of risks or that we now have safer options. The point is that those who are more risk-averse have taken control of the public discourse and are making the rules for the less risk-averse. It is not a matter of knowledge, smarts or options. It is a matter of a society that has and continues to succumb to the wishes of its most risk-averse members.
The real issue isn’t what happened in the stone ages, it’s about what we know and do now. We all id stupid things as kids and most of us lived, but their are those that did not. O, we lived, we learned.
How many times do you let the firecracker blow up in your hand before you put it down before you light it? With you thoughts, after the hand is deformed enough that it cannot hold the firecracker.
Her being in the back of the pick up. Not an issue
The child in the back of the pick up. Bad, but not totally stupid.
Leaving the child in a stroller to roll around in the back of a pick up. Darwin award.
"I also hate when I see parents pushing their kids across the middle of the road because they are too damn lazy to use the crosswalk. "
I am going to defend the parents on this one. My only form of transport is bike or foot and I am here to tell you crosswalks are death traps. You are putting yourself in an area with cars coming from all four ways and there is a lot of drivers taking a right turn without looking for someone on bicycles. I have been bumped by a car and seen 3 people hit by cars making a left. If you cross in the middle of the road you have cars coming from fewer directions and their speed is more constant. The middle of the road is safe, the crosswalks will kill you.