Why The Helmet Debate won't die: It's an authoritarian's wet dream.

The issue of cycling helmets speaks to the authoritarian streak in people. You know the sort of thing. "Wear a helmet every time. Shut up. Simples. End of." One passionate but misguided individual is currently using the Twitter hashtag #GetUsedToIt to promote helmet compulsion. Yeah. #GetUsedToIt. No, you can't play on the XBox before bed. #GetUsedToIt. You're not going out in that skirt. #GetUsedToIt. We know better than you. Because we are the parents. We are the Proper People. And you silly little cyclists, wobbling around the roads on your toys, with baguettes in your baskets and kittens in your heads, are the children. You have no choice. Wear a helmet. #GetUsedToIt.

Another current pro-compulsion hashtag is the odious #dontbevainprotectyourbrain. That's right, kids. If you pop to the shops on your clunker for a Curly Wurly and a Cycling Weekly, and you've left your helmet on the shelf in the garage, it can't possibly be that you've made an informed and rational personal risk assessment; it must be because you CARE MORE ABOUT YOUR HAIR THAN YOUR BRAIN YOU IDIOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The fact (yes, evidential fact) is that, per mile travelled, you are at a lower risk of head injury when riding a bicycle than you are when you're in a car. Universal wearing of car helmets would prevent more deaths and injuries than universal wearing of bicycle helmets.

But no-one berates car occupants for not wearing helmets. No-one calls for a "car helmet law" to save these "irresponsible idiots in cars" from themselves.

Why is that? Because, when judging risk, people go with what they "feel" is right, rather than what the facts tell them. They "feel" that cycling is a strange, unusual, dangerous activity. Cyclists belong at the side of the road, as at the side of transport culture and the side of society. Better for the rest of us to point and say "look at that idiot" from the safety of our diesel chariots. They belong in ridiculous Personal Protection Equipment. You can't just cycle in jeans and a beanie. They're normal clothes. And cycling isn't normal.

Driving, on the other hand, is felt by most to be the natural way that normal people travel. It seems stupid to put on a helmet for such a normal activity as driving. So we don't do it. But we insist on it for the safer, but weirder, activity of cycling.

In order to support their "feeling" that cycling is more dangerous than other modes of transport, the authoritarians cherrypick emotive anecdotes: "I fell off my bike and a helmet saved my life", while never considering that billions of more mundane stories are simply never told in public: "I fell off my bike without a helmet and I didn't die", "I wore a helmet but didn't fall off my bike", "this guy wore a helmet but was still crushed to death by a truck" etc.

So why do so many people, cyclist or non-cyclist, care about whether individual cyclists wear helmets or not? Why is such a polarizing issue, that can provoke fierce debate that frequently boils over into anger and abuse?

Because it's an issue on which authoritarians feel an instinctive urge to take a stand. People perceive, some mildly, some strongly, that cyclists are law-breaking anarchists, foolhardy dreamers, individualist cranks, lycra-wearing weirdos, whatever. They are outliers, out at the extreme, thin end of the "transport modes" bell curve.

And humans are hard-wired to group together into societies who think and feel the same, and regard outliers with suspicion. And when we are suspicious, we regulate.

When an authoritarian thinks about cyclists, he feels a tug. A little yank in his gut. That's his primate limbic system, pumping cortisone around his system, getting him ready to fight or flee a stranger from another tribe who might be hostile. But these aren't the prehistoric plains of Africa; he can't just bare his incisors and throw a rock. This is Surbiton, and he's not a hunter-gatherer, encountering an unknown enemy who may steal his berries and his wife; he's an estate agent called Nigel, and he's in the spare bedroom on the laptop, reading yet another inflammatory article in the mainstream press about an irresponsible cyclist. There isn't a rock to throw. There's no-one to bare his teeth to; no-one to see him beat his chest in a display of tribal pride. Instead, he cracks his knuckles and licks his lips. "Somebody ought to do something about these idiots", he thinks. Then he types it into Twitter.

Yes. "Somebody ought to do something about these idiots." The authoritarian's instinct is always to regulate. Regulate and enforce. Votes for women? They ought to be locked up, silly bitches. Stop the War? Send the police in to crack some heads, bloody hippies. Muslims? Round 'em up and put 'em on a plane. Cyclists? They should be made to:

1. Get a licence
2. Get insurance
3. Pay a fictional tax
4. Display number plates
5. Go faster.
6. Go slower.
7. Get off the road
8. Get off the pavement
9. Get off footpaths
10. Get off towpaths
11. Get off bridleways
12. Get into the cycle lanes
13. (bloody cycling lanes, paid for with my taxes?)
14. Wear a yellow vest like they work in an airport
15. Wear a helmet.

#GetUsedToIt.

The authoritarian has a fantasy. It's the fantasy that one day, everyone will look like him. And think like him. And do what people like him tell them to do. And those who dissent will be swept away; crushed; vapourized by a sweep of irresistible executive power. And then the world will be nice again. Safe. Predictable. But since he doesn't have a private army of stormtroopers to enact his fantasies (although he spends a lot of time thinking about what he'd do if he did) the authoritarian will try to realise his vision through social means, by making non-helmeted cycling seem "irresponsible", #dontbevainprotectyourbrain, or through legislation, by calling for helmets to be enforced by law.

If those calling for helmet compulsion really cared about road safety, they would read the data on what *really* makes cyclists safer, and campaign for that, instead of wasting their energy on the enormous red herring that is cycling helmets.

But these people don't really care about keeping cyclists safe. If they did, they would push for better cycling infrastructure, rather than complaining that cyclists "don't pay road tax". They would walk or cycle their short journeys, rather than clog up the roads with another car. They would turn off their phones while driving. They would respect speed limits. They would overtake cyclists leaving plenty of room, and only when safe. They would use their nearside wing mirrors when turning left.
The problem is, all of these solutions require effort. Patience. A modicum of temporary inconvenience on occasion. They require acknowledging that the road is there for all, and not for the privileged use of motorists.

But nah. That's all a bit too difficult. Helmets. They should just all wear bloody helmets.