If It Saves Even One Life…

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We hear that cloying bleat from the advocates of “safety” (at gunpoint) befehls all the time. If it saves even one life, it’s worth it! They use it to justify helmet laws for motorcyclists and seatbelt laws for drivers. Air bags, etc. air bag recall pic

But how come their logic is never applied to the source of all Safety itself?

I mean, of course, the government.

Defective Takata air bags have injured and killed at least 130 people so far that we know about – and the potential mayhem could involve literally millions of people. Because millions of “defective” air bags (34 million, to be precise) have been installed – per befehl – in cars made by a number of major car brands since the 2004 model year. These cars are in circulation – and probably many more people will be injured and killed before 34 million of these steering wheel Claymores can be defused.

Many thousands of them probably never will be – their owners blissfully unaware of the ticking time bombs positioned just inches away from their faces and the faces of their loved ones. Not everyone gets their mail. Or watches the evening news. People move, records get lost. Thirty four million cars – built over a period of more than ten years.

That’s one hell of a mop-up operation.air bag pic two

But what about the not-defective air bags?

The ones that worked as designed? These have also killed and maimed. No one knows the precise number, but it is not zero.

Since the dawn of the Air Bag Age in the mid-1990s, air bags have broken bones, ripped out eyes, burned skin and ended lives.

It is a fact.

Every car made since the late ’90s has these devices installed, per befehl. That’s not 34 million cars. It’s on the order of 200 or 300 million of them. And every single one of them could maim or kill someone.

This, too, is a fact.

But where is the outrage? Why do those lives not matter?

Oh, there is gabbling about the “greater good.”

Whose good, though?air bag pic 3

And who gets to decide?

That’s what’s not being talked about, Takata-wise or otherwise.

It ought to be.

If I wreck my motorcycle and am badly injured as a result of not wearing a helmet – which I chose not to wear that day (assuming I had the free choice) then I can at least take comfort in the fact that I made the choice and now bear the consequences for that choice. But when I am forced to wear a helmet – and wake up in a wheelchair, paralyzed but my face unscathed – I am a victim of someone else’s choices.

If I choose not to keep myself fit and instead feed on bacon and Coke and potato chips, when the day comes that my chest feels tight and my last thought – as I slip into darkness – is that maybe I should have taken better care of myself – I will at least go into that good night knowing it was my choice.

But what if I am trapped in a burning car by a seatbelt – which I was forced to wear, by befehl – and am burned to death as a result? Such not only could happen, it has happened.

Why does that life not matter? cartoon

Air bags – like seatbelts – are not infallible. Even when they work as designed, they can be – and sometimes actually are – deadly. No matter how conscientiously something is designed and manufactured, sometimes things go wrong. There are unintended consequences. Things happen. Until humankind ascends to Google-ized transhuman perfection, this will always be the case.

Life is risk. And risk cannot be eliminated.

Which is why the moral right to weigh risk – and to choose – lies with each of us. But only for ourselves. To chose for someone else – to force someone else to accept your choice – is perhaps the ultimate effrontery; arguably, it is the fountainhead of all tyranny.

The issue isn’t whether Takata air bags or air bags in general are “safe.” It’s whether one human being has the moral right to impose a decision on another that could result in harm, however slight. And regardless of the touted benefit.child forever

Here we come to an interesting thing. What I refer to as Cloverism (i.e., coercive collectivism) can be turned around and used (rhetorically) as a weapon against coercive collectivists. Their arguments in favor of a priori punishment – their idea that if it is conceivable that a postulated “something” (or “someone”) might cause harm, actual harm must be presumed – and punished – can be and ought to be redirected their way.

Air bags – defective or not – not only might cause harm, they actually have caused harm. Therefore, air bags – all of them, Takata and otherwise – are dangerous and must be outlawed.

If it saves even one life

Which, of course, it would.

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46 COMMENTS

  1. The only “Fuhrer-Befehl” worth heeding is re: the ‘degenerate’ known as the “Bear Jew”…NEVER again shall anyone German in the Wehrmacht refer to him as the “Bear Jew” again! As to whether this being is a “Golem”…well, that’s just so much gossip among “Den Soldaten en der Heer”.

  2. Maybe what’s really best for “us” is to rip a large gaping hole in this world’s largest social safety net we’ve all become ensnared within.

    And paradoxically, doesn’t the act of ripping a hole in a net, leave you with less holes than you had before?

    Or maybe my semantics are off yet again.

    But what about the sacred piece of paper, the constitution?

    What if we were to cut a corner off of it? Wouldn’t that result in us GAINING another corner?

    What if Reaganomics has really been right all along??

    I used to be able to think of such things at my old hangout: Schrodinger’s corner.

    I LOVED the beer selection and burgers at that place, but then, sadly, some clover complained, and they closed it down.

    Rumors are that the problem involved something about a dead cat in a box in the kitchen. But literally no one has ever been able to simply tell me if it’s true that the cat was actually dead.

  3. This just in and I just now saw this article.

    Boy, three, run over and killed by his own grandfather as he tries to retrieve skateboard
    Tyrone Taylor cries ‘oh my God, I’ve killed my grandson’ after he accidentally reverses Volkswagen people carrier over little boy, Poole inquest hears
    By Agency
    2:58PM GMT 19 Nov 2015
    A three-year-old boy was run over and killed on his driveway by his own grandfather when he crawled under a car to retrieve his skateboard, an inquest heard.
    Tyrone Taylor was heard to cry “Oh my God, I’ve killed my grandson” after he had fought to keep Charlie Taylor alive following the accident.
    The youngster had been playing in the front drive of his parent’s £2m home in Poole, Dorset, when Mr Taylor moved his son’s Volkswagen Sharan people carrier he had just cleaned.
    As he did, he heard a loud bang and found Charlie lying motionless under the car with his blue skateboard next to him, a coroner was told.
    Mr Taylor was heard to “howl” in despair and shouted for his wife Eileen, who dialled 999 while he desperately tried to revive his grandson by sucking blood from his mouth.
    “Since that day I have gone over the events thousands of times in my head trying to work out why I did not know Charlie was there”
    Tyrone Taylor

    Neighbour Robin Struthers jumped over the fence separating the two houses to help before three ambulance crews arrived. Charlie was rushed to nearby Poole hospital, but doctors were unable to save him.
    The inquest in Bournemouth heard that Mr and Mrs Taylor had been looking after Charlie while their daughter-in-law Claire went to pick up her other two children Lily, seven, and five-year-old Thomas from school. Their father, Paul Taylor, was away working in London at the time.
    In a statement, Mr Taylor said he had thought Charlie had been inside the house at the time he reversed the car and the parking sensors and reversing camera did not identify the yougster.
    He said: “I had reversed about three feet when I heard a bang like I’d hit a cycle – it was a plastic or metal bang. Thinking I had hit a bike, I put the car into park and got out. I saw one of Charlie’s shoes under the car.
    “I looked down and could see Charlie’s feet under the vehicle, then saw him lying there. I reached down and grabbed Charlie’s lower legs and pulled him out. He wasn’t moving or making any sound.
    “I shouted for Eileen and she dialled 999. A neighbour appeared on the driveway and offered his help and we put Charlie in the recovery position.
    “The ambulance then arrived and took Charlie to hospital. Since that day I have gone over the events thousands of times in my head trying to work out why I did not know Charlie was there.”
    Relatives arrive at the inquest at Bournemouth Coroners Court  Photo: BNPS
    Neighbour Mr Struthers told the inquest that after the ambulance left, Mr Taylor sat on a step with his head in his hands and said: “Oh my God I’ve killed my grandson”.
    Mr Struthers said: “He was in a state of total emotional distress and despair.”
    The inquest heard that Charlie often rolled his skateboard down the sloping driveway of the property in the Branksome Park suburb of Poole.
    A statement by Eileen Taylor said she had been inside the house when she heard her husband “howling like a wolf”.
    She said she had slumped onto the bonnet of another ambulance in exhaustion after Charlie had been taken to hospital.
    Paul Taylor, 41, and 40-year-old Claire Taylor attended the inquest on Thursday, but did not give evidence.
    Inspector Matt Butler told the hearing that he could not be sure exactly how Charlie died, but said it was most likely he had become trapped between the underside of the car and the ground after crawling underneath to get his skateboard.
    He said Charlie had not been hit by the car’s rear bumper, nor had he gone under the wheels of the car.
    “Although the car was fitted with parking sensors and cameras, he was not seen”
    Coroner Sheriff Payne

    Insp Butler said: “I believe Charlie tried to retrieve his skateboard from under the car. When the car moved Charlie was caught between the underside of the car and the driveway.
    “A three-year-old would not realise the potential dangers of a parked car with its engine running. Mr Taylor would have had no idea Charlie had crawled under the car and no blame should be apportioned to him.”
    A post mortem examination carried out at Great Ormond Street Hospital, in London, found Charlie died from “severe traumatic head injuries”.
    Recording a verdict of accidental death, Dorset coroner Sheriff Payne said: “Charlie was a young three-year-old lad who was clearly quite mischievous. It seems clear he has put himself under the car in some way.
    “Although the car was fitted with parking sensors and cameras, he was not seen. Tyrone Taylor stopped the moment he heard a sound.
    “It would appear Charlie had gone under the car to get his skateboard. Clearly this was a tragic accident.”
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/12005774/Poole-Dorset-boy-three-run-over-and-killed-by-own-grandfather.html

    And another incident:
    A six-year-old girl has died after being hit by a car driven by her own mother.

    Bolutito Shodipe was struck outside Hounslow West tube station in south-west London just before 9:40am on Wednesday.

    Police said her the pair had arrived together at the station car park and that her mother had been trying to park the car when she was hit.

    Paramedics and police officers tried to resuscitate her, but she was pronounced dead at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington.

    In a statement released through the police, her family said: “Bolutito was our eldest daughter and no-one could have asked for a better daughter.
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    “She was a beautiful, well behaved, girl who loved ballet and who will be sorely missed by all of us.

    “This is an extremely upsetting time for us and we ask that we be given the respect and space to grieve and to come to terms with this terrible accident.”

    Detective chief inspector Iain Miller of the British Transport Police said his officers were trying to understand how the incident had happened.

    He said: “Our officers attended, alongside colleagues from the Metropolitan Police Service and London Ambulance Service, and discovered a child – a six-year-old girl – had sustained fatal injuries having been struck by a car being driven by her mother.

    “It is clear that both mother and child arrived together in the car park and the accident occurred during a parking manoeuvre.

    “Specialist officers are now providing full support to the girl’s family whilst detectives are working to determine exactly how the incident occurred.”

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/11032784/Young-girl-fatally-run-over-by-own-mother.html

    Yes sir man these newfangled safety devices worked really well. 2 deaths and counting. Links at end of articles..

    • Can’t find a video link, but here’s the script from, “Soldier”: http://www.script-o-rama.com/movie_scripts/s/soldier-script-transcript-kurt-russell.html

      After the experienced soldier, who was selected and trained from birth, has decimated a squad of his genetically engineered replacements, some 20 years his junior…

      “Maybe you should’ve made them smart instead of fast.”

      Maybe we need to teach children to NOT be stupid little shits? How many times have you seen a child do EXACTLY what they’ve been told not to do? Tell the child to go inside, you have to move the car – and they refuse to. Can’t slap or spank them, it’s “child abuse.” Can’t make them go inside, dragging them by the arm is “child abuse.” In fact, taking away their iPhone/tablet/TV./computer privileges are – you guessed it – “child abuse.” Timeouts? “child abuse.”

      Coupled with the idiot machines we’re making – meaning, you can’t see, so you’re forced to rely on sensors and video with limited range of view; but that limited range of view is “all you’ll need.” Because Clover said so. And as a result, the art of looking around is a lost art…. Lost skill. The machine said it’s fine – must be OK.

      My dad made a (very good) living from those events where “the machine said….” and, well, there’s a REASON your processing plant is now scattered across three counties, and 15 people are missing, dead or mutilated…

      “But the computer said…”

      Computers can be WRONG. It’s only as good as the people who wrote it. Remember two things about ALL that crap:
      1. Computer programmers are like the fighter jocks of the IT world. Cocky, arrogant, a-holes, who are SOMETIMES half as smart as they think they are.
      2. The company awarded the contract? Usually lowest bidder. Think what that means, given #1.

      Additionally, Development has an “us vs them” mindset about Quality control (forget Quality assurance or Engineering.) We are merely an impediment to their deadlines. We beat on their “baby.” THEY are the Doctor, we are the Lowly Nurse Chapel, and should know our place and bow before their greatness.

      then, there’s the profit margin – again, lowest cost bidder. So, you get one developer who really IS that good – usually at an inflated, but “worth it” rate – and lots of mediocre, might’ve been, could’ve been, never rans, especially from overseas. The Outsourced crowd. Mr. Crack Developer plans it out, sends assignments overseas, and assembles some REALLY GOOD code to bind it all together. IF QA gets ahold of the code on time, they MIGHT be able to do proper testing. Usually, it arrives to QA three weeks into their 4-week testing cycle, with about half the promised functionality, sometimes with the wrong core components. (think a 57 Chevy body with a modern turbo-charged TDI slapped in the engine compartment. And sometimes that’s a better fit than what we get. When you take it for a test drive, you find out: the TDI has been fueled with kerosene. The body is taped together with duct tape. And someone forgot to put the wheels on. But that’s all because QA looked too closely at the “final product.” Shit, we’ve had code delivered for Production use that called for the wrong components, to be installed the wrong way. And WE are the enemy, because we called it out. But if it had gone to PROD? We’d be down a few million dollars. PLUS damage to future reputation and sales.)

      Sorry, I’ll stop ranting.

      The plain simple truth is, most of us – even the immensely intelligent – will never amount to a hill of beans. We’re animals who will come and go, and no one will even know. And as the population increases, it’s impossible to find someone who has a great skill or personality, and boost them to high social levels. E.G., how many more Gateses will there be? How many more Dells? How many more Fords, or Carnegies? How any discovered actors, like Marion Robert Morrison (John Wayne), or Paul Newman?
      No, we get pigeonholed into roles early on (might be better said, “cornholed.”) Stripped of all value and meaning, a cog in the machine. (Note, in the Badlands series, just started on .. AMC, I think? Same channel as Walking Dead – anyway, the slaves are referred to as “cogs.” These are the enslaved workers of the Barons, the Elite. There are 6 Barons. There are field hands, or workers; Clippers, or Police/Enforcers; and Barons. Not sure if it’s a caste society or there’s a Merchant class, yet, but there are “private” skilled workers. They may be fully owned as well, not sure. Of note, it’s a Liberal paradise, where guns were outlawed and destroyed, so everyone is a “skilled martial artist” if they are a fighter. Oddly enough, there’s still crime… So much for the antigun morons. Anyway…)

      I think the problem we have is, we don’t have ENOUGH violence. Males especially are taught to be feminine, sensitive creatures. Women, whose aggressions are usually social and not blatant violent acts, are given a pass. So, shunning, exclusion, social jockeying – that’s OK, but actually punching someone in the face when they deserve it? THAT is evil and gets you arrested, and marked for life, as if you were Cain himself. Note the cartoons my generation grew up on reinforce that – Bluto vs. Popeye, early Disney cartoons (Might Casey), Woody Woodpecker’s gang, and Looney Tunes. Especially Porky Pig, Bugs, and Droopy.
      We’ve forgotten that ALL of those characters had a “breaking point,” where they DID actually respond to their attackers. But anyway:
      Imagine a world where male anger wasn’t verbotten. Where, when someone started a fight, you could actually respond? Where the Police would actually learn what’s going on, before going apeshit and shooting everything/one in sight? And where, if you’d been attacked, or someone came up to you and started a fight verbally, you could respond? E.G., “You’re a coward!” or “You’re mom’s a whore!” got you a knuckle sandwich? Somehow the concept of fighting words, or picking a fight, has been lost.
      In those cases, the police and courts basically said, “You were asking for it, case dismissed.”
      We can’t do that any more, we’re “Blaming (attacking) the victim” now – which I’d link to the idiocy of rape cases, where a “rape victim’s” sexual past can’t be brought up or used against her; where the facts that she was drunk, dressed provocatively, in a bad area, alone, etc, cannot be counted against her. And where she can decide after the fact, in the light of a sober/hungover morning, that the sex she wanted last night was a bad idea (can’t be a slut!)…
      I think that’s been abused, and is now misapplied to all cases because of the softening of Western minds.
      These days, someone comes after you with a gun, you’re supposed to wait until the police show up – can’t even defend yourself. Similar to a trucker involved in an accident (I think 8SM posted that) – car hits truck, trucker is arrested, checked for any and every possible drug, and MAYBE released afterwards, to recover his impounded vehicle and load…? At great personal cost, too. the car driver is somehow a “victim”, even if only of their own bad driving. But others are held accountable.

      We MUST get rid of these idiots. I can’t feel too bad about these events. Too many people, too little death, too long a life, mostly unexamined and unlived, or at least, under-lived.

      We keep building better machines, and making people into tax cattle / organic machines. It sucks, it’s counter-productive (promotes only the status quo) – not growth or progress, and results in more death and destruction than if we’d allowed actual growth (chaos) – but that’s not as PROFITABLE…

      Examples of the clusterfuck: Video surveillance everywhere, yet WE Cannot use them – it’s only for the police, for use AFTER a crime – because that makes more victims, and if people could avoid the crime? No need for police! (David Brin, “The Transparent Society”, wrote this example.)
      Fiat currency and fractional reserve banking.
      Unlimited reproduction (which results in the less-capable reproducing more than the responsible and gifted.)
      “Just in time” inventory – which includes grocery stores, partially by necessity – but also by design. Hence, the shelves are empty before a flood or snowstorm or whatever. There’s no surplus, and people want to hoard more than they need (and if YOU don’t, someone else will. Dumb animals. No reserves purchased over time; hell, THAT is illegal, for fuck’s sake! MUST be a slave….)

      A plague is necessary, reduce the population like Agenda 21 plans, it will remove the populace, including the Elites. Only option. Genocide.
      And the elites ARE PLANNING to accomplish this. Anything less would be stupid. They can’t kick the can down the road forever, but they’ll need to get off the merry-go-round eventually.
      Do you want them to devise a plague, and elevate themselves as “saviors of humanity”? Because if they make the plague, and have the cure, guess who’s dying. Hint: NOT THEM. Everyone else. All the “cattle,” especially the intelligent and future-oriented. Because the dumb and short-sighted make good workers, reproduce faster, and can be trained to be good Cogs…. And aren’t a threat (too cowardly, because of time sense.)

      And we don’t have the resources to make nanotech or viral/biological/chemical agents, in rate or quantity, to be useful. We need to operate on cheap and effective, I.E., Gasoline and Matches. Crossbow and Longbow. Knife.

      I’d prefer we could go another direction, but they’re psychotic, so we must adapt. They see us as animals; we’re being cornered. We really cannot continue to back away; we’re being “painted into a corner” in a sense.

      As long as we’re playing THEIR game, they win.
      And they’re working to change the “loopholes” (Read: Techniques they’ve used to escape the Matrix and get power, wealth, and prestige themselves. E.G., multiple passports, multiple identities, banking havens, insider trading, smuggling, drugs, etc. And none of the Elites are allowed to escape THAT matrix, either – facial recognition software, forcing banks to reveal who holds accounts (EG, Switzerland.)

      Can’t support a parasite forever. Wealth (especially gotten through immoral means, which includes people like Gates – hostile business practices, locking down machines so they only run with “OS “X” “, putting out microcode that breaks competitor’s OS’s, etc.) cannot be locked down, and intelligence isn’t actually handed down through the blood. Inherited, sure, but it’s not a guaranteed thing. Brilliant scientists produce idiots, and idiots produce intelligent people. There is NO divine right of kings…

      But they’re trying to make us a caste-driven society, where all of us are in the “untouchable” range, and they are all Brahmins…. And there is NO upward mobility.
      Is it not self-defense to lash out when cornered? Is it not unreasonable to expect us to go quietly into the night…?

      • “Computer programmers are like the fighter jocks of the IT world. Cocky, arrogant, a-holes, who are SOMETIMES half as smart as they think they are.”… I resemble that remark! Otherwise, great rant.

  4. Islamic State (in) Iraq (and) Syria…

    is a Wahhabi/Salafi jihadist extremist militant group, self-proclaimed to be a caliphate and Islamic state.

    It is led by and mainly composed of Sunni Arabs from Iraq and Syria. As of March 2015, it has control over territory occupied by 10 million people in Iraq and Syria, and through loyal local groups, has control over small areas of Libya, Nigeria and Afghanistan. The group also operates or has affiliates in other parts of the world, including North Africa and South Asia

    United State (in) America (and) Overseas

    is a Secular/Pan-Christian capitalist-socialist fiat currency dictatorship militant group, self-proclaimed to be a federal republic with five major territories and dozens of overseas possessions and claims.

    It is led by and mainly composed of Secular and Christian Zionist-Idealist armies and legions of federalist bankers. As of March 2015, it has control over territory occupied by 320 million people in North America, and through loyal local groups, has control over Guam, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Northern Mariana Islands, the Virgin Islands, and Samoa. The group also operates or has affiliate operate forts all over the world, including Rammstein Germany, Camp Zama, Tokyo,
    Fort Buckner, Okinawa Torii Station Japan, Kunsan & Osan South Korea, Camp Lemmonier Djibouti, Pine Gap Australia, Dimona Israel, and too many more to name within the character limits of a wordpress comment.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_military_bases

    Also with territories scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. At 3.8 million square miles the occupied lands constitute the world’s third or fourth-largest militant occupied territory by total area and the third most populous.

    It is one of the world’s most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration and self-sacrificial bureaucratic enslavements from many countries. The geography and climate of the United Debt and Deficit Jihadist States are also extremely diverse, and the country is home to a wide variety of wildlife.

  5. My 04′ Ranger has a recall notice on it by Ford. I received the notice letter in the mail in July. When I contacted the local dealer, they said that Ford didn’t have a fix yet, and they said they were in the dark as much as me on the whole thing. My folks have an 05′ Honda CRV, and when they contacted the Honda dealer, they said the fix Honda came out with initially didn’t work, and to not bother wasting time bringing the car in until Honda finds a better fix. It sounds to me like Ford and Honda have no idea how to fix it because they know airbags are a joke, and that there is no fix!

  6. When I look at my steering wheel, I don’t see the inflatable airbag, I see the hard plastic disk with the KIA logo. Last week there was a Veteran’s Day celebration at the Harry S Truman library. Among a display of military relics was a deactivated Claymore mine from the Viet Nam war. The resemblance was immediately obvious. Another interesting effect of airbags: in some models, the deployment of the airbag shatters the windshield. I don’t know what other damage is caused by the inflation of the multiple bags in the newer cars, but I would assume that even a minor bump would essentially destroy the car.

  7. Nobody has mentioned baby/child seats. You are not allowed to leave the hospital with your newborn unless you prove that you have a government approved car seat to secure your infant.

    Before these carseats were mandated, how many parents left their children securely strapped into a car?

    Personally, I never heard of a child dying by being left in a locked car before carseats were mandated. Now perhaps I missed some reports and it may have happened but definitely not with the frequency of today’s regular reports.

    It’s horrifying to read these reports when many times the child is old enough to simply get down and unlock the door but he can’t because he is strapped into a straightjacket for his own safety.

  8. I almost hate to say it, because I don’t like that we HAVE to have airbags, but a side airbag saved me from at least a minor to maybe a major head injury, which of course makes me look at airbags a little differently now. I was hit on the driver’s side of the car and thrown violently left. Afterwards I just felt like I had been slapped on the left side of my face, which was from the side-curtain airbag. Later I even noticed that there was a little triangle shaped airbag deployed down by my hip, which may have helped with not being injured there as well.

    • I don’t think anyone wants to win you over to any specific view on airbags.

      But as a man, we would advocate that you insist on living your life as a sentient self-directing adult male, and at least not force us to be dictated to like housepets.

      Most women like having “the man” on their side, and being the shadow husband for them who keeps them “equal” and empowered and all that stuff. And I don’t really know how much I should expect women to really buy into this view.

      Hopefully a lot of them, but it’s hard to see things from their social collective “human family” viewpoint when I’m just not wired or public school indoctrinated into understanding such things.

      Even clover would be somewhat welcome here probably, if he would at least keep an open mind and honestly entertain freedom and self-responsibility as a realistic alternative for some people.

      If you’re making an appeal to consequences, then no I don’t think you have a valid rational argument that any of us should consider.

      Exception: If it is understood by both parties that an argument is not being made, rather it is a warning based on possibilities, and the person issuing the warning acknowledges it is not evidence for the claim, then there is no fallacy. The problem is virtually every such warning has an implied argument, so it is a point of contention what is fallacious or not.

      Tip: Realize that you can deal with reality, no matter what that reality turns out to be. You don’t need to hide from it—face it and embrace it.

      http://www.logicallyfallacious.com/index.php/logical-fallacies/26-appeal-to-consequences

    • Hi Charlie,

      I’ve never denied that air bags can save lives. I merely point out that, sometimes, they also take them.

      My chief objection is to the mandate; the arrogant idea that someone else is going to decide for me – against my will – what’s “safe.”

      That is aggression. An act of violence, whether actual or threatened. Thus, immoral.

      People have every right to offer advice, to suggest. They have no right at all to compel you to follow their advice, to do as they believe prudent.

      You live your life; I’ll live mine. So long as I’m not harming you – and you’re not harming me – neither of us has any right to interfere with the other in any way whatsoever.

      • You would think it would be an easy concept to grok wouldn’t you Eric? I guess that is why “they” go through such trouble to indoctrinate and program us all, starting from a very young age (at least those of us not of the psychopathic nature that is).

        • A new video supposedly depicting an ISIS school teaching kids the ins and outs of ISIS is circulating. It’s amazing how people can see the conditioning in other places, but are blind to it here.

    • Read the article. How does silicon glass be safe? Glass doesn’t form unless there is considerable heat and time involved. So the chemical reaction is wrong. Most likely a poison gas or solid is formed. Like what you would see on a WW1 battlefield.

      People need to start suing regulatory agencies. Not the makers of these devices.

      • Silicate glass or silicon? How would you know the chemical reaction is wrong? I’m asking because I am genuinely curious. So, lease be more specific.

        • I know from experience when lightning strikes a power line or wind causes it to break, the sandier the soil the more glass that’s produced when the still hot line hits the dirt. You smell a great deal of ozone that’s supposed to be a by-product of lightning. You also might smell cooked PCB’s and various other chemicals that were caused when electrical components were exposed to millions of volts, countless joules of electricity. The marbles/puddles of “glass” produced are sometimes bubbly and easily broken, sometimes very hard. So what does this mean? I haven’t a clue.

    • That case was not well established.
      He died weeks later of pneumonia, could have been triggered by any dust.
      The chemicals do not look poisonous.
      Not saying the dangers of having an explosive always sitting in front of you is a good thing, but the chems don’t seem that bad.

      • Thanks Gary. I would assume this would be just as present in the media as the impact of airbags causing serious injury/ death. Always open to more insight. Also I have been in a crash in which the airbag deployed and exploded releasing what looked like baby powder. That was years ago and I never had breathing issues following the accident.

  9. It’s easy to justify doing something based on its intended result, harder to measure the result, and almost impossible to consider the unseen side-effects. Bastiat wrote about this a long time ago in “What is Seen and what is Unseen”.

    The government mandates airbags and shows statistics on how many lives they save, but no stats on how many people were killed by airbags who would have otherwise lived because it’s impossible to say and there’s no incentive to say it.

    The government mandates TPMS sensors, backup cameras, emissions systems, each of which has a noble goal, but also makes cars heavier, more expensive, and less efficient. The dueling mandates of safety and efficiency make cars continually more expensive.

    What we don’t see is that car prices increasing have priced out a lot of people, who are driving much older cars which are significantly less safe than a hypothetical modern car without any of the mandated features. A 2015 car without any of that stuff will be safer, cleaner, than anything from the 1990’s. How many lives were lost due to driving old cars which could have been saved by cheaper new cars? There’s no way to know, but it’s also a number which has been increased by the mandates.

    • glad you brought up tpms sensors. one is dying on my car so it sets off the warning light so now i might have to spend a couple of hundred bucks plus on 4 sensors (cos it doesnt tell you which one is bad) and shop time.

    • I’d suppose that anyone who survives a wreck in which an airbag is deployed is automatically counted as being saved by the airbag.

      • Sure, of course!

        Meanwhile, I once got T-boned by a dude who ran a red light. My car had no air bags. I walked away from the totaled car.

    • Wiser poorer folk will spend just a bit more and get an even older car that is really solid and well built… far better value than many modern new cars. Mercedes and Volvo come to mind, BMW as well but at a certain “relatively young” age they begin to eat maintenance dollars at an alarming rate. Volvos and Mercedes from the 1980’s are very cheap to own and maintain, comfortable, economical, and last a really long time. Toyota pickups from the same era fall into the same category…. I’ve seen 400K plus on all of these cars. Dont know how the Tojo fares in a prang… but both Merceded and Volvo were decades ahead of the mainstream for crash safety.

  10. And it is more then just cars too. When I was in college, we had a dorm fire in a staircase. Was it careless smoking? Nope, it was a battery in the “emergency” lighting system that blew up. Thankfully no one was in that staircase when it blew, since there was battery acid all over.

    Never the less, the school had to spend thousands of dollars relocating these batteries out of staircases and hallways. Some of the ones removed were close to blowing up too.

    • That’s because the school didn’t check and service them regularly. Usually sealed lead acid won’t do anything like that. At least that’s what the old lights used to have. Maybe some idiot switched to Li-Ion

        • had to be seriously defective to explode lead-acid gel cells to the point of causing a fire. Just plain stupid to use li-ion in that application and someone stupid enough to use it there is stupid enough to make it all wrong.

  11. Not sure the consequences are “unintended” PtB.

    In 19and74 Autoweek Magazine had a article on airbags. Tests done in Sweden using infant piglets placed in a front seat position while the airbag was detonated resulted in 8 of 24 of the little porkers being killed by the concussion alone.

    GovCo knew this. Joan Claybrooke knew this. The car companies fought it…and lost…never to fight again.

    They should all be facing manslaughter charges at a minimum.

    • “Not sure the consequences are ‘unintended’” – well of course they are not all, although some of them may be. I was just using ‘their’ terminology – you know, like ‘collateral damage.’

    • Government knew. Claybrook and/or her ilk (can’t remember now who exactly) claimed the automakers were lying (probably with nicer deniable words that mean the same thing to the 3rd party listener) because they didn’t want to spend the money. I remember it from the debates. Airbags were the last thing the automakers fought hard against publicly. They knew that airbags could kill people. The government knew the unbelted male standard would kill children and small adults. They knew, it was part of the debate. They chose to ignore it. That’s why there are rube goldberg contraptions in cars today to work around it instead of just fixing the standard. If they change the standard they have to admit they were wrong.

      • And, the first rule of GovCo, Never, EVER, under ANY circumstances admit fault. Plead ignorance all day long but, NEVER admit guilt.

  12. Ah, your mistake is assuming the government is interested in your safety because they want to meddle. The reality is that they want to keep you producing tax revenue, or at least keeping you around for collateral in case they need to borrow a few bucks. That is why “lives matter”

  13. It seems every few months there is massive outcries and demands for some low level engineer’s head on a platter for a sub six-sigma failure rate on something. Fantastically twisted stories about standard engineering and corporate practices were designed to kill people. Then the next news story will be about how manufacturing has left the USA or how to encourage kids into “STEM” or the lack of good jobs in the USA or a new round of expensive to comply with regulation or licensing to keep people safe.

    Then there is a government regulation that has failed us and what’s the answer? More government regulation of course.

    As with everything else, it is in their minds different when the government does it. With airbags it isn’t the government standard that’s faulty, it is the people. Short people are defective and putting kids in the front seat is child abuse and should be punished. There was a guy who was prosecuted when his kid was killed by his pick up truck’s airbag. He forgot to turn it off. I forget what happened to him after that. That’s the authoritarian collectivist answer, punish people when the edicts don’t work. The edict isn’t the problem it’s lack of obedience to it ya see. So don’t be a physically small person and everything will be fine. They’ll make human beings fungible yet while celebrating diversity.

  14. Unintended consequences are like side effects. And what are side effects? Unwanted effects in addition to those effects that are desired.

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