Make Helmets Great Again: Is It Just Me Or Have Kids Told Helmets To Pound Sand?

I had the news on this morning while I poured my coffee, and there was something one of the anchors said that caught my attention.

"Kids in the area will soon be returning to school…"

Now, as a guy with no kids, that doesn't mean much to me other than the fact that the community pool is about to become my own personal resort with all of those youngsters stuck inside learning math skills they'll never use while I backstroke like I'm in a Busby Berkeley film.

But then something else dawned on me, and that was that I'm about to get thrown into my typical diatribe on helmet wearing, or, more specifically, lack thereof.

There's a high school and middle school not too far from where I live, and tons of the kids who go there ride to school on electric scooters. It's kind of nuts. I don't think one kid's Nike has touched the sidewalk between their house and school in years at this point.

But what also strikes me when I see them whizzing around is how none of them wear helmets. 

Zero. Nada. Zip.

This always blew my mind because we live in an age of people being very safety-conscious about a lot of things. I'd assume that they'd want to be conscious about not whacking their unhelmeted noggins off the pavement, too, but nope.

I'm pretty sure there are even laws on the books requiring kids under 16 to wear them, but I've yet to see one kid obey the word of Johnny Law and wear one.

Nope, they're willing to risk having to trade their fun two-wheel scooter for one that they have to sit in and control with a straw.

A kid wearing a helmet while riding an electric scooter; a rare sight these days. He probably got a swirly from the cool kids once he got to school, but at least he was safe on the way there. (Getty Images)

We Should All Wear Helmets All The Time

Now, helmets carry a bit of a stigma. I remember when I was a kid, I wanted to look cool and cruise around my neighborhood on my Mongoose mountain bike with my hair flowing in the wind.

But you know what else I wanted? To continue living without having to be fed through a tube.

Now, maybe I'm just a little pro-helmet in the other direction because there have been times when I've wondered why we all don't just wear helmets all the time.

You never know when you're going to stand up while loading groceries without realizing your trunk lid has come down, or if a coconut will clunk you on the head a la Gilligan's Island. These happen too fast for you to put on your helmet. You need your helmet on at all times because the moment you realize you need it means you're already too late and are about to get bonked on the head by something.

I may have solved this dilemma about helmets not being cool and making you look, well… a little goofy if worn in public.

Hard hats like the one worn by this contruction worker (Left) could help us fight helmet stigmatization and thereby save the nation's youth from scooter-related head injuries. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

We Need To De-Stigmatize Helmets, And I Think I Figured Out The Way

I was at the hardware store to buy wood for barbecuing and to go back and forth about buying one of those plastic salt shotguns you use to blast insects to pieces. I did a lap around the store pretending to be more handy around the house than I really am, when I came across an aisle that had all kinds of odds and ends, including something that made a lightbulb go off above my head, despite lightbulbs being several aisles over.

"Whoa! Hard hats!" I said to myself. "I didn't know you could just buy these."

It's true. For some reason, I thought construction workers had access to some kind of special catalogue that sold hard hats. I didn't realize anyone — even a very handsome writer like myslef — could just grab one of the shelves.

"This may be the answer," I said as I held one up to the heavens.

The problem with most helmets is that you look ridiculous and out of place in them, despite their safety benefits. 

If I walked around my neighborhood wearing a football helmet, I'd look like a psycho. 

If I rolled into the doctor's office with a crash helmet on, I'd be committed.

But, if I walk in anywhere with a hard hat on, I'm just a construction worker… or possibly in a Village People tribute band.

This way, I could wear a hat most places and people wouldn't even think twice, and if I bonked my head getting out of the car (cars are really dangerous for head-bonking), it wouldn't be a big deal, and I'd just be like, "Good thing I had my helmet on!"

Also, I'd probably put some sweet, bad-ass stickers and hot rod flames on my helmet, but that's another story…

But, anyway, what I'm getting at is for the good of our electric-scootering youth, we need to destigmatize helmets so that kids don't get picked on for wearing them, and instead, kids who don't wear them are the ones who get shelled with spitballs and wedgied in middle school hallways.

If that means we all go to the hardware store and buy hard hats to wear around 24/7, I say act now for the good of the children… and also because I kind of want to do it, but don't want to be the only one going to restaurants on a Thursday night wearing a hard hat.