Who should make the decision about helmets?

Korda: Decisions that people, not government, should make

By George Korda (Contact)
Originally published 09:38 a.m., June 8, 2009
Updated 09:38 a.m., June 8, 2009

For years, State Sen. Tim Burchett has tried to repeal the law that takes from adult Tennessee motorcycle riders the right to decide for themselves if they want to wear a helmet.

Unfortunately, though Burchett’s bill has passed the senate, it has never gotten out of the state House of Representatives.

“It has to pass in the House, but it doesn’t ever go anywhere,” Burchett said. “If it got to the House floor it would pass.”

Burchett’s effort isn’t about making the roads less safe. It’s about grown-up Tennessee citizens having the ability – and the right – to make such decisions for themselves.

I worked hard to help pass the state’s first mandatory safety belt law in the mid-1980s. The company I worked for at the time was hired to help bring about its passage. It was my job. With the research I did on the subject I went from never wearing a safety belt to almost always buckling up.

However, with the passage of time I have come to believe that it is not the government’s role to protect people in cars or on motorcycles from themselves.

I know the arguments. I used to use them. Helmets and safety belts save lives and reduce injuries. People who don’t use safety belts or helmets run up our health care costs if they are injured.

But we as adults should use these safety measures because we decide to do so, not because our government has threatened to punish us if we don’t protect ourselves according to government demands.

A man called my radio show some months ago when the subject of motorcycle helmets came up. My position was that Tennessee should follow the lead of Florida and repeal the helmet law for people over 21.

The caller was irate. He said that his health care costs were affected by people who made the foolish decision not to wear helmets. Head injuries in motorcycle crashes were expensive, he said, so it is a good law.

From there, the conversation proceeded along these lines: Me: “So you are saying that someone else’s behavior that could affect your healthcare costs means the government should punish that behavior?” Him: yes.

“I don’t know you,” I said. “You could be a heavy smoker, be 100 pounds overweight, or engage in other behavior that is a risk to your health and therefore can drive up my health care costs. Using your logic, shouldn’t I be able to get a law passed restricting what you eat or habits you have in the interest of keeping everyone’s health care costs lower?”

As I recall, that slowed him down. He was all for clamping down on someone else’s rights. But when the conversation bled over into what might be his personal practices, well, that was a different story.

The sticky wicket is that health care costs can be used to justify almost any infringement on people’s rights.

Here’s a way to cut down on health care costs. Eliminate football at the high school and college levels. Think of the thousands of ligaments and cartilage that won’t be torn, the bones and joints that won’t be shattered and the concussions that won’t do damage to brains.

How much do you imagine all those doctor visits, MRIs, CT scans, surgeries and rehabilitation cost the health care system – meaning us - every year?

For someone who doesn’t like football, it’s a perfect argument. Health care costs are a cogent reason why football should be eliminated from the national sports inventory.

I don’t agree with that. But I bet I could find people who do.

The movement to restrict individual rights usually starts with a media campaign. A think tank or university study group puts out research that says X is happening, and it’s because of Y. If it’s something that will curb personal freedom you can be virtually certain that there will be a reference to health care costs.

The media picks up the story. Special interest groups seize the opportunity and produce their own research that, not surprisingly, comes to the same conclusion. Thus, more stories appear in the news.

In interviews, press conferences or other venues, politicians begin to be asked about X and its effect on Y. One or more of them vow to “do something for the public good.” Bills are introduced. Laws are passed. Freedom is restricted.

Even in the rare instance where such laws are repealed, the effort to re-enact can continue.

Florida had a mandatory motorcycle rider helmet law it repealed in 2000. Riders argued for their individual rights, and the government acted. In Florida today people make individual choices about helmets.

Predictably, safety organizations were aghast. Consumeraffairs.com put out a story in 2005 titled “Florida Motorcycle Deaths Soar After Helmet Law Repeal.” The story referenced information from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

You had to get all the way down to the last paragraph before reading this: “The study does not fully blame the increase on deaths on riders without helmets, noting that alcohol use and speed also likely played a role.”

As with most government intrusions, the requirement that we protect ourselves, or else, starts small and has grown more intrusive over time.

When the safety belt law first passed in Tennessee it was made clear by the legislature that no driver could be pulled over and ticketed solely for not being buckled up.

Today police officers are permitted to pull us over if they notice our safety belts unbuckled and we see aggressive public service announcements with near-snarling narrators warning us that we’d better click it or we’ll wind up with a ticket.

The push to regulate individuals is never ending. I read a June 3 story on the MSNBC Web site about a Harvard University study of obese trucker drivers being prone to sleep apnea, which makes them more tired on the road.

The story said, in part, “It’s a major public health issue and it’s becoming more common with the obesity epidemic,’ said Dr. Stefanos N. Kales, medical director of employee and industrial medicine at the Cambridge Health Alliance in Cambridge, Mass.”

The story cited the costs of truck crashes, and contained suggestions that federally mandated screenings may be needed to identify obese, sleep apnea-beset truck drivers.

Anyone who thinks such government control would stop with truck drivers doesn’t understand the nature of government, which is to survive and grow.

Helmets and safety belts are decision in which government should leave people to their own choices. It’s a radical concept called freedom.

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George Korda is political analyst for WATE-TV. He hosts “State Your Case” Sunday afternoons from noon to 3 p.m. on FM 100, WNOX and appears on the “Hallerin Hilton Hill” show regularly on WNOX. He is president of Korda Communications, a public relations and communications consulting firm.

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