this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2026
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People shouldn’t wear seat belts unless they need to. Constantly being hypervigilant, prepared for the worst case scenario, thinking you have zero control over whether you get in a deadly accident is bad for the psychological health of our society.
Before seat belt laws there wasn’t even a word for road rage. It didn’t exist because when someone accidentally swerved into your lane or cut you off it didn’t feel like attempted murder.
In 1971, it was hold me close tiny dancer and count the lights on the highway. Today it’s stay over there tiny dancer and stay strapped into your bucket seat just on the off chance we get into a horrible accident. We’re driving ourselves batty with this kind of paranoia.
In 1971 there were 1.4x the road deaths as in 2025 despite having the country only having 60% of the 2025 population. I wouldn’t say you have zero control over whether or not you get into an accident but very surprising things can happen suddenly and give you very little time to react. In that situation I’d want to focus on safely maneuvering the car and not be distracted with panic buckling with my life on the line.
You’re proving my point. You’re worried about something that’s just not going to happen to you. I can safely make a $500 bet with 4,000 people in the US that if they don’t wear their seat belt that they will be alive a year from now and be $1,999,500 richer. It’s not psychologically healthy to constantly worry about this, strapped into a bucket seat by a 3 point safety harness, like you’re an astronaut riding an SLS rocket to the Moon when you’re only driving down the road to buy a gallon of milk.
And what I mean by saying that people shouldn’t wear seat belts unless they need to, does not mean go fumbling for your seat belt in the middle of an emergency situation. It means when you know you are about to be in a dangerous situation that requires one, like riding with someone who you know is a horrible driver. Or that famous scene in Bullitt where Bullitt and the villains buckle up before their big car chase, jumping the hills of San Francisco. Today we buckle up like we’re about to get into a wild car chase when we’re just going around the corner to McDonald’s. That’s making everyone neurotic.
I’m not stroking out in fear wearing a seatbelt? It’s a regular thing I do every time with zero downside.
On the days I got hit I can definitely say I didn’t wake up planning to be hit, I drive like a grandma but just because you’re stopped at a light doesn’t mean the person behind you will care.
Driving is always a dangerous situation - and treating it like it's not just makes it more dangerous. Even the safest driver in the world is not immune to somebody else being an idiot. This is especially important in today's world of mega-SUVs and giant RAM trucks. Wear your dang seatbelt.