Kansas Seat Belt Law

      I concur with what Dr. Walter E. Williams said in his Click It Or Ticket column. Wearing seat belts in a motor vehicle should be optional. The state should not be requiring an adult to wear his seat belt. Is the state going to require a person look both ways before crossing the street? The driver or passenger does not interfere or harm other drivers when he is not wearing his seat belt. He just harms himself. It's a different situation when a driver does not signal for instance when turning. Signaling informs other drivers of your intentions and could potentially cause an accident when the driver in back of you is surprised when you turn a corner.
       If you noticed I italicized the word "adult." Requiring babies and kids to be restrained in a car is a different matter. They really do not understand the consequences of not wearing a seat belt. So, requiring kids to wear seat belts is fine.  
        It appears that this statue was enacted because Kansas could lose a safety grant of $11 million from the gov't according to a Topeka Capital Journal article. Evidently, Kansas was ranked 43rd in the country in 2004.
         I should mention that I wear a seat belt when I drive and even when I am a passenger. I've been doing it even before the seat belt statue was enacted. I don't feel comfortable without it on. I understand fully well the physics when you don't wear a seat belt when you are in a collision. Basically the car stops moving but you don't until you collide with an object. It's called Newton's First Law of Motion or the Law of Inertia.  Here is something you might not know, your brain also has inertia when the car is moving. When the head hits let's say the windshield, the brain is still moving until it hits the inside of the skull. Hence, possible brain damage. This is what is known as the third collision. The first collision is when the car strikes an object. The second collision is when the body strikes an object. You can't argue with laws of physics.
         I think more education on seat belts would be helpful especially during drivers education. Teachers can explain the three collisions to students and give examples of people who survived car crashes with their seat belts and those who did not survive without them on. A good example of this is the Princess Diana accident. Everyone in that car crash died except for the guy who put on a seat belt. Yes, he was in the hospital for a while, but he did live. That would be a very good example to use in a drivers ed class. This is not exploiting an incident, this is just teaching by example. Every action has a consequence. Not wearing a seat belt (action) leads to possible death or being seriously hurt during an accident (consequence). It's that simple. The state gov't should not have to require you to be responsible--you should be responsible on your own. It's your life after all. One other thing, parents can also set good example for their children by wearing seat belts. Movies and TV shows also could show actors putting on seat belts when getting into cars. The main character in the preview of the "Transporter 2" movie asks his son "What's the first rule when entering a man's car?." Then the son buckles up. I thought that was a nice seen. In summary, education instead of regulation.