Freedomgli, you said your cousin had and accident without helmet , and mentioned the state had no helmet law. BUT he chose Not to wear it, the sTtate did not choose, he turned the throttle, not anyone else.
Yes, just like famous NFL star athlete Ben Roethlisberger, my idiotic cousin did not wear a helmet because it was not required by law. Unlike Roethlisberger, my cousin didn't get another chance to make the right decision.
For every stupid reason someone posits why they shouldn't have to wear a helmet, I have 20 better reasons why all motorcyclists should. Bikers who ride without a helmet often dismiss the risks fatalistically - "when your number's up," etc. The same motorcyclists talk about riding uncovered as a personal matter. Well, it's not. This choice to be stupid negatively affects all of us, not just other motorcyclists.
FREEDOM to act does not mean the LIBERTY to act:
In principle, a man is FREE to drink to delirium, but a habitual drunk who lets his children starve will be put in jail, whereas organizations such as MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) have thousands of tales to tell about people who have been innocent victims of someone else’s exercise of what they wrongly viewed to be “their liberty”. Freedom is not identical with Liberty.
In the instant case, whether Ben Roethlisberger wears a helmet or not while driving a motorcycle affects not only him personally, but also millions of other persons around the world and in the USA. He is of course a “free” man, to be sure, to do what he wants, but “liberty” puts constraints upon him, as it does upon all of us in a civilized world governed by the rule of law and by societal rules and conventions which go far beyond the simplistic ideas of well-meaning libertarians.
