I noticed that only about half of all motorbike/scooter riders wore a helmet - despite EU law. Yes, so many Sicilian civilians who just ignore it! After all, its only a traffic law! I know its not much in the grand macro theory of self determination/regulation but our diminishing civilian freedoms leave me feeling like I have a maternally pestering nanny who insists on telling me what is good for me.
But we are men Madam! we need risk or we cannot be truly happy. I need to be adventurous and carefree like my Neanderthal hunter-gatherer ancestors. Nanny, it seems, really doesn't understand me.
People in every society, advanced or not, still behave with basic tribal instinct - we divide, and fight, and separate ourselves from those we think are different - not good for us, but we do it anyway because it's fundamental to what we are - you can't rule against it.
I make decisions all the time about which of our civilian laws I'll bend or break and which ones I have to follow to the letter - It feels good that I can use my own common sense to protect myself (to some extent) and it seems that in the UK I am still allowed to take a few risks with my person.
Most of the time it feels like the 'freedom/control' balance is about right here in the UK, and it is a difficult balance to get right, especially when you have men and women (who are so fundamentally opposite) mixed together in society. But we do need to be careful of going to far, of forgetting what we are - what men are!
So far this year I've visited Austria, Italy, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia, and Sicily. All of these European countries have laws to control and protect society from itself, of course, but one of the things that makes each of these places feel different is the extent to which laws are abided by and which are robustly enforced by the state. The biggest contrast [I noticed] being between Austria and Italy(Sicily).
Sicily, slightly chaotic, slightly unsafe, feels like a place where laws are routinely ignored, a place where societies' natural order has joint control. Austria felt safer with a sort of controlled subservience - a very nice societly.
I think our government [although we are subject to EU laws too] is borderline overprotective in the UK, specifically with regard to personal safety on the road. I wouldn't be surprised if, in the not too distant future, it becomes compulsory for cyclists to wear helmets too, like motorcyclists already have to. Flippin busy bodies coming up with health and safety statistics for this and that in order to eliminate human casualties. Someone should muzzle em! Being human, by definition, is an accident waiting to happen.Status Quo, rock and roll..... mmm, not sure those 2 things are synonymous. :-p
EU Motorcycle helmet Law has for many years insisted that motorcyclists wear helmets. I ride a motorbike, and in the UK I don't want to wear a helmet all the time. Do we, as pedestrians have to wear protective headgear when we cross the road or walk along the side of busy roads, just in case a car or lorry accidentally crashes into us?
I cycle a lot too, but I only wear my cycling helmet when I think I should. ie: in busy traffic or while mountain biking downhill. I don't wear it if I'm just tottering down to the local shop or if I'm cycling along back roads with little traffic - or if I am cycling UP a mountain at 3mph. There is NO NEED NANNY!
Is it only a matter of time before our nanny makes me wear a cycling helmet ALL the time?!
No Nanny!!
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