How do you feel about the "safety police" governing our society today?
I don't have a problem with common sense laws that protect us from each other, like no texting while driving, but it does irritate me that we have so many laws governing personal behavior, such as seat belt or helmet laws. Do you agree with these kinds of legislation, or are we being treated like 5 year olds?
I think it is easy to mock and resent these laws. Individual freedom and all that. But personally to follow your examples - I believe that seat belts and helmets save lives and injuries.
The fact they save lives is true enough, but it still begs the question, if under most common sense scenarios... it's only the adult individual's safety at risk, why do we feel like we need to play "mommy" and dictate their behavior to them?
I personally despise pot, and I'm not even 100% sure why as I have no "bad experiences" or anything to base my feelings off of, I just do. That being said, I do think it should be legal and regulated/taxed just like alcohol, as I admit, unlike crack or meth, pretty safe to say a "pot head" isn't generally going to pose much of a hazard to anyone else (driving not withstanding).
Have we really regressed that much, to have completely lost touch with the sense of personal freedom and responsibility that used to make the U.S. great, that we now need to be treated like children and have our personal behaviors legislated to us?
Such laws are the symbolic effort to show those who are still living that the government is taking responsible action to minimize needless death as a result of foolish choices on the part of an individual or group. Spoken in another way, "the government is attempting to protect a fool from himself". Basically, that is an impossible task unless you employ the following guidelines....assign an armed guard to the person with instructions that the guard is to shot him/her if they attempt anything stupid. Government, as a result of political gaming, and to some extent, as a result of an expectant public, has embraced the art of symbolic law to demonstrate their concerns and to wash their hands of the blood of fools. WB
There are idiots out there among us who need to be treated like 5 year olds.
It countries that have a general 'free' health service, injuries and deaths from road accidents put a strain on health and social services, that strain is still there, perhaps in a lesser form, but still there, in countries that don't have, general 'free' health services. By passing legislation that requires the use of car seat belts or helmets when using a motor cycle, the government is helping ease that strain.
I agree though, the health and safety Nazis, along with the food Nazis, and the politically correct Nazis, are acquiring far too much power in society.
The government can inform me of the benefits of wearing a seatbelt if it wants; but the government has no right to protect me from myself. The cops will issue citations for not wearing a seatbelt. Next they give you a ticket for leaving your car door unlocked in a parking lot. If you don't pay the citations, you will go to jail. All of this because you didn't do anything. You did not steal or assault anyone, yet you are in jail. And then there are the airports...The laws everywhere will continue to get worse and the American people will love it.
I can make an argument for seat belt laws. It's a little less clear cut for helmets, but I could stretch it.
Seat belts prevent you from becoming a projectile outside of your car, which could injure a bystander.
Helmets aren't going to save a bystander, and might even cause more harm. I'd be more inclined to require helmets under the age of 18, since there's no problem with treating children like children, but adults should be allowed to not wear one if they don't want to.
That said, I don't have a serious problem with either law. I could take it or leave it. I'd wear my seatbelt without a law. Helmets? They aren't required where I live anyway.
Legislation is important but all laws are not practicles to implement.
I never felt safe around police even though everyone has forgotten that we employ them. The truth is that a seatbelt is being inforced for the insurance companies so that they do not need to pay up when accidents happen.(It is to protect them) Think about it, why should a cop stop you if you are not wearing a seatbelt? there is no injured party so then why ticket? It is not prevent you from getting hurt!(there is no injured party yet!) It is simply for insurance companies. I am not saying you should not wear a seatbelt, but what i am saying is that it is my choice not theirs. But it is like everything else ,you need to ask permision to the governement to be able to make a lawful choice! so yes everyone is a child , thats why your governed? government means looked after. But if we call them by there real job titles (employees) they wont like there jobs . Everyone forgot that your the master and they are the servants, not the other way around. Cops serve you ,they only forgot that! plus you need to understand that wearing a seatbelt is not a law ,it is a statute.Again noone knows anything so they took advatage of you.
I dislike these laws because it goes against Darwin's theory and weakens the genepool as a whole. If an idiot decides to do a hundred on a rice-rocket down a busy highway buck-naked, that's fine with me. I'd post the crash to Youtube in a heartbeat. But I would rather have him not live to pass his genetics along before he ends up dead just because the government decided he needed to be nursemaided.
by Pat Bennett 12 years ago
Do you check your Congressman and Senator's homepages to see how they vote on bills?I check about once a month to see if they feel the same as do about bills they vote on. In the last six months my Senator has been in agreement with me and my Congressman all except two bills. If I don't...
by JessShow 13 years ago
How do you feel about certain vaccinations for your child and why?I am interested in other people's opinions on this subject because we had a discussion in pharmacology class about this.
by Ralph Schwartz 7 years ago
I've been reading and listening to the debate on gun control over the past day. I keep hearing a repeating theme from those who feel guns need to be banned - its for the safety of children. Yet, those same voices are totally against a border wall that would reduce illegal drug...
by Elena Vasiliev 8 years ago
What do you think are the 5 main problems that society today faces, in order of importance, and why?
by Caroline Paulison Andrew 14 years ago
Do you think the government should legislate nutrition?From McDonald's toys and fast food menus to the vending machine industry, local, state and federal government is increasing its legislation in nutrition matters. Should it be doing this?
by PrettyPanther 6 years ago
“Can you think of any laws that give government the power to make decisions about the male body?” Harris asked.After a long pause and a bizarre back-and-forth in which Kavanaugh asked for a more specific question and then claimed he thought Harris was “asking about medical procedures that are...
Copyright © 2025 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2025 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |