There are many things that start bizarre Hatfield and McCoy like feuds in the cycling community like tubulars versus clinchers, presta versus schrader valves, and Campy versus Shimano. Even BikeSnob NYC tried to settle many of these issues a few years ago, but the battle wages on.
There are still no takers on marketing our Don King Invisihelmet to put this bitter civil war to rest.
AustinBikeBlog Don King Yakkay HelmetHelmet versus non-helmet is one of these arguments, and we are not immune from the skirmishes on this issue locally. So it is with more than a little amusement I recently read New York Magazine’s “154 Minutes With Matthew Modine” interview. Modine bikes for transportation in New York City and runs the website and pro-cycling organization Bicycle for a Day. The article points out that while he is a very public cycling advocate he’s gotten in trouble lately with other cycling advocates for not wearing a helmet. It goes on to report that the League of American Bicyclists refused to promote a pro-cycling video Modine had produced because he is helmetless in it. Really? Are we that omnipresent and omnipotent, LAB, that we refuse to work with someone else who shares our goals and has considerable resources because of his head gear choices? What’s next, turning our backs on the woefully brakeless fixie community?
Unfortunately, the wackiness is not limited to the LAB. Modine goes on to riff on why he doesn’t wear a helmet with these non-sequitur rationalizations:
So why doesn’t he wear one? “Because I don’t assume that I’m going to get hurt.” Then he seems defensive: “Should we wear helmets when we walk down the sidewalk?” Then his logic gets really shaky: “I think that people that wear helmets, cars are a little more aggressive with them.” He mentions the late Natasha Richardson, who died in March after a skiing accident: “She was a great friend of mine. She barely banged her head and it cost her her life.” Yes, and she wasn’t wearing a helmet. Doesn’t that give him pause? “I think it gave us all pause. Think how many times you’ve banged your head in your lifetime.”
So wasn’t that enough to make him wear a helmet? He admits that his wife, Cari—they live in a West Chelsea condo—just bought him a helmet. Will he wear it? “I think I’ll go back and see what other models they have.” Hmmm. “I think that biking is the closest we come to flying,” he says. “And to have that thing on my head—”
OK buddy, just admit you don’t like the look or how it will hurt your blow dry hair and get over it. Wearing a helmet or not is everyone’s individual decision. We make decisions everyday based calculated risks. In everything, sometime you’re the windshield and sometimes you’re the bug, and you gotta decide how much you are willing to do to handle the worst. He’s decided not to wear one and more than likely his life will never be affected by that decision. Modine should just own up to the fact that it is a risk he’s decided live with.
No matter which side of this debate you fall on, pick a side; we are at war! Do not, I repeat, do not attempt to be in the middle on this or you’ll end up looking silly.
If you are one of the helmeted clan, you might want to think about how often you replace your brain lid. Bicycle Sport Shop Blog had a humorous look at this subject recently and made the recommendation of replacing your helmet any time it’s been in a crash, is cracked, or is over five years old.
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on Jun 17th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
I have been involved with bmx for 25 years. If I am riding ramps and going vertical, I’ll wear a helmet, other than that, forget it. Not even the models on the helmet box can make it look good. I have never seen a bicycle helmet that didn’t look a lil “special needs”.
When I was a kid I took a good head blow. After that I learned, don’t land head first. You learn to fall after awhile.
If you can’t learn to fall, there is a such thing as “thinning out the herd”.
Sorry if that sounds harsh, but if someone dies in an auto accident, lives may have been saved if they were wearing a helmet like in Nascar. If you drive responsibly and only take calculated risk, likely you will not be in an accident. I know there are exceptions to every thing, but this is my $0.02.
on Jun 17th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
He’s not that wacky. His statements basically hit the following, which are arguably true:
1. They don’t appear to be strong enough to have done any good in the general population (injury rates didn’t change after massive increase in use). (“I think it gave us all pause. Think how many times you’ve banged your head in your lifetime.”)
2. They address a low-risk but low-power population instead of a higher-risk population (“Should we wear helmets when we walk down the sidewalk?”). Argument works even better if you use drivers instead of pedestrians, of course.
3. Recent study (yes, really) did, in fact, show that “people that wear helmets, cars are a little more aggressive with them.”
on Jun 17th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
Is there a link to the source of the Modine interview quote? I couldn’t find one in the blog entry here.
Thanks for the post.
on Jun 17th, 2009 at 4:40 pm
Before you get all righteous about the actor not owning up to why he doesn’t wear a helmet please notice that he did not bring the subject up. If his answer is a little weak it might be because he doesn’t consider biking dangerous and hasn’t spent hours worrying about crashes. A better answer to the question would simply be : Why should I? I never gave it much thought.
After all, he is promoting cycling as a positive activity. It may actually be true that he does not consider it dangerous.
on Jun 17th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
Tom Wald,
The article is linked now through its title. I had that code in there originally, but it disappeared for some reason.
Other Tom,
Those are good answers but not what he said. He did an interview where he talked about the virtues of bike riding, he is a public advocate for riding, and he knew this had been an issue. I’m cutting him no slack. We as a group need by better message disciple from our mouthpieces.
on Jun 26th, 2009 at 9:31 am
[...] week, I wrote an opinion piece in response to an interview in New York Magazine with actor and cycling advocate Matthew Modine [...]