Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Start Boosting!
In this story, we learn that children up to the age of eleven are going to have to sit on booster seats in cars.
'RAC Foundation spokesman Kevin Delaney said: "There will be people who view this an intrusion by the nanny state, but it is right that as much as possible is done to offer children protection."'
Personally, I don't believe that children should be allowed out of the house. After all, the world is full of dangers, and if they enter it, they will surely be exposed to all of them. What's more, it's obvious that we cannot trust parents to look after their children, because - because - well, I'm not sure why actually, but clearly we can't.
What annoys me about this - and again, I know it's an esoteric thing to be annoyed about, but there you go - isn't really the unspoken implication in all of this that parents haven't a clue how to bring up children. It isn't even the intellectually degenerate underlying philosophy of 'safety first at whatever cost.' What really annoys me is that this is a directive handed down from Europe, and we will inevitably be the only people to pay any attention.
Part of the reason, it seems to me, that Britain is so eurosceptic, is that every other country in Europe either likes these rules or else dislikes them, and then ignores them. Only in Britain do we resent them, but also accept them.
When I was 10, I went to Italy on a week long exchange. The family I stayed with, a more jovial and rotund group you couldn't expect to meet, the Benuzzi's, drove me everywhere around their town. The first time I got in their car, I did my seatbelt up. Not only did they not follow suit, they looked at me in amazement and then burst out laughing. Don't imagaine, though, that this was confidence borne of skill - they were hopeless drivers. The dad had a terrifying habit of physically turning around in the driver's seat while accelerating in order to emphatically gesture a point. I would shrink back in my seat, preparing for the shuddering crash, but the worst that ever happened was him losing a wing mirror as he did this down a particularly narrow one-way street.
It could have been worse. When I returned five years later, to Rome this time, I was hit by cars twice within the space of three hours. However, a directive like this will never trouble the Polizia. Why not? Because in Italy, they haven't swallowed this fundamentally anti-humanist safety-first culture like we have. It always starts with an apparently laudable aim - who can argue against the government's plan to reduce child road deaths by 2000 in principle? Yet it always leads to endless, needless regulation and interfering, so that the government can seriously advise kids not to kiss each other in case of meningitis.
One day, maybe, just maybe, we will rise out this accursed safety culture and decide to enjoy our lives.
'RAC Foundation spokesman Kevin Delaney said: "There will be people who view this an intrusion by the nanny state, but it is right that as much as possible is done to offer children protection."'
Personally, I don't believe that children should be allowed out of the house. After all, the world is full of dangers, and if they enter it, they will surely be exposed to all of them. What's more, it's obvious that we cannot trust parents to look after their children, because - because - well, I'm not sure why actually, but clearly we can't.
What annoys me about this - and again, I know it's an esoteric thing to be annoyed about, but there you go - isn't really the unspoken implication in all of this that parents haven't a clue how to bring up children. It isn't even the intellectually degenerate underlying philosophy of 'safety first at whatever cost.' What really annoys me is that this is a directive handed down from Europe, and we will inevitably be the only people to pay any attention.
Part of the reason, it seems to me, that Britain is so eurosceptic, is that every other country in Europe either likes these rules or else dislikes them, and then ignores them. Only in Britain do we resent them, but also accept them.
When I was 10, I went to Italy on a week long exchange. The family I stayed with, a more jovial and rotund group you couldn't expect to meet, the Benuzzi's, drove me everywhere around their town. The first time I got in their car, I did my seatbelt up. Not only did they not follow suit, they looked at me in amazement and then burst out laughing. Don't imagaine, though, that this was confidence borne of skill - they were hopeless drivers. The dad had a terrifying habit of physically turning around in the driver's seat while accelerating in order to emphatically gesture a point. I would shrink back in my seat, preparing for the shuddering crash, but the worst that ever happened was him losing a wing mirror as he did this down a particularly narrow one-way street.
It could have been worse. When I returned five years later, to Rome this time, I was hit by cars twice within the space of three hours. However, a directive like this will never trouble the Polizia. Why not? Because in Italy, they haven't swallowed this fundamentally anti-humanist safety-first culture like we have. It always starts with an apparently laudable aim - who can argue against the government's plan to reduce child road deaths by 2000 in principle? Yet it always leads to endless, needless regulation and interfering, so that the government can seriously advise kids not to kiss each other in case of meningitis.
One day, maybe, just maybe, we will rise out this accursed safety culture and decide to enjoy our lives.
Comments:
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Seems like theres a decent arguement for the booster seat. I get the impression it's the impending compulsory nature of it that's a problem for you rather than the seat itself. If you can prove that the seats reduce child injuries, they should pretty much sell themselves and will probably come as an optional fitting in all new family cars. The long arm of the law should be nowhere near this.
Have to say though, anyone that gets in a car and doesn't wear a seatbelt has to be mad. Never fancied the thought of becoming dashboard pizza.........
Have to say though, anyone that gets in a car and doesn't wear a seatbelt has to be mad. Never fancied the thought of becoming dashboard pizza.........
ooh I *loathe* that advert. I mean its a point well made but I don't need to be constantly reminded of it. When its not that one its the one set in the pub or the little girl's bones one etc etc.
xxB
xxB
Ill Man - Yes, you're right. That's pretty much exactly what I was trying to say, but you put it considerably better.
Boudica - I generally loathe all government advertising on television. I fail to see why my, or anybody else's, taxes should be spent on lecturing me about things I already know.
Boudica - I generally loathe all government advertising on television. I fail to see why my, or anybody else's, taxes should be spent on lecturing me about things I already know.
I have to stop doing that. Reading a post and then leaving a comment that basically summarises what the author has written. It's rude too.
Well I read somewhere that children are more likely to come to harm in the home than anywhere else. As ever Mr Tony so-called Blair ignores this, when it's obvious to anyone with an once of sense that children should be stored in giant safes and cared for by clouds who unlike so-called parents have never been convicted of the fiddling.
Ill Man - Actually, I'm rather glad you did. That post was hardly one of my best. My argument was somewhat confused to say the least.
Clairwil - The line 'raised by clouds' has put a permanent smirk on my face. How long will it be, indeed?
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Clairwil - The line 'raised by clouds' has put a permanent smirk on my face. How long will it be, indeed?
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