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Do mandatory seat-belt laws violate my individual rights?

Don't know. Don't care.

But here's what I DO know: I'm old enough and wise enough to decide whether or not I should wear a seat belt. I neither need nor want arbitrary legislation that rams seat belts down my throat. I scoff at statistics telling me how many lives are saved each year because people wear seat belts.

Here are the only statistics that matter to me:

How many times have I been injured in a car accident because I wasn't wearing a seat belt? Uh, that would be zero. How many times have I been killed in a car accident because I wasn't wearing a seat belt? Uh, once again, zero.

You know why?

Because I know how to drive, because I'm attentive when I drive, and because I'm always on the lookout for drivers who might cause me peril.

Could an accident happen to me anyway? Of course. Could I be injured? Of course. Killed? Of course. But you know what? I'm willing to take that chance. I've been driving for nearly 50 years. I drive between 50 and 70 miles per day, six days per week. On the seventh day, I drive up to 100 miles. And I never wear a seat belt.

Have I ever been in an accident?

Of course. In 50 years of driving I've been in a few. A couple of fender benders. One when I wasn't even in the car. I had a rental that day and parked it, motor running, while I ran inside an office building. When I came back outside, I found the rental smashed into the rear of a car parked a few feet away. Seems the shifter had a mind of its own and shifted into gear. Yeah, yeah, I know, I shouldn't have left the motor running. But I did. Yeah, yeah, I know, somebody could've been hurt. But they weren't. What we had was a minor fender bender with minimal damage to both vehicles. That's why we have insurance. And, oh yeah, I was also involved in one major accident.

That happened more than 40 years ago. Driving a Corvette. Colliding with a pickup. Doing a couple of 360's and wrapping myself around an old oak tree. No seat belt. Car totaled. Walked away without a scratch. Rode in an ambulance to get precautionary X-rays at the hospital, then went to work. About an hour late.

You know what?

I could've been killed. But I wasn't. Even so, I was willing to take the chance. Your whole life's a gamble, for crying out loud.

If you don't want to take such chances, don't. But that's for you to say. It's your decision. Not the decision of a bunch of legislators. And that's all I ask: Let me make the same decision for myself.

Does that mean I'd never change the way I think?

Of course not.

I'm intelligent. If I thought that wearing a seat belt would make my life one iota safer, I'd click it in a heartbeat. But I don't think that's the case.

So when it comes to the seat belt, I don't say, "Click it."

I say, "Stick it."

Learn more about this author, Barry Bowe.
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