Driving down to Kentucky recently, I found myself in-between a concrete wall and a mobile-home. The result was a game of ping pong in which we played the ball for a good 30 seconds. My head smashed through the side window, my right pant leg was soaked with blood (which I later discovered came from my knee). As soon as the chaos stopped I looked around to see my mom with blood coming out of her nose profusely, complaining that her back was in pain. My 2 year old niece was in the back, laughing (if only I could be that blissfully unaware) and without a scratch.

What followed was people stopping to help, an ambulance arriving, and a really cramped ride to southern Kentucky. In it all I noticed two interesting occurences. One: The airbags didn\'t go off (hello lawsuit!) Two: Niether of us were wearing a seatbelt. And yet, with only a few minor injuries, we we\'re all alive and OK. After a few weeks we would all heal completely up and be back about our normal lives. The car, of course, was a total wreck. But our bodies were no more banged up than they would have been during a casual fall in the house.

It struck me as odd that the two sacred things espoused by the government and the media as being "lifesavers" played no role whatsoever. Of course we will now pay higher rates and most of our insurance will not be covered due to the lack of seatbelts... but what if we we\'re wearing them? Would our injuries have been less severe? More severe? Or about the same? I don\'t know, and nobody really knows due to the myriad of variables and possible outcomes.
It is impossible to know a perfect solution.

Obviously if we had not entered into the accident, we would have been fine. But the wreck itself, though seemingly serious, did not produce all-too serious results. Would this have been hindered or magnified by the presence of these safety features?

I think the question ulimately lies, not in whether it is safer or not to wear a seatbelt, but who exactly that choice should be left up to. The fact of the matter is that seatbelts are not the cure-all for automobile accidents, and in many cases they make matters worse than they would have been otherwise. It is this fact that makes the choice all too important to be left up to politicians.

It is our lives at risk, our bodies being put on the line when we enter a car and drive that car onto the road where other vehicles are traveling at high speeds. The likelihood of an accident is not miniscule, but it is the probablity of this happening that makes the choice of the individual even more prescient. Only the individual has all the information regarding his vehicle, his destination, the roads he is taking, the vehicles and drivers around him, the weather conditions, their own ability to drive, and the costs of an accident (both physical and financial). The beauracrat does not have any stake in the matter, nor can he survey each individual situation and the conditions surrounding them.

To make a blanket law absorbing all the citizens and forcing them (at the point of a gun, as all government actions entail) to act in a way either contrary, or in line with, their personal choices, is incompetent and immoral. In some cases lives are saved, in others lives are lost, due to the law. Yet the real purpose of the State is far more sinister than the seemingly benevolent politicians would have you believe.

The State, as in all situations, is only interested in it\'s own security. It is a monopoly on the use of force and violence, and issuing of arbitrary law in contention with natural reactionary law. And so the corruption is not only probable, but inevitable. The seat belt law is only in place, against popular opinion, in order to fill the federal and state government\'s pockets. The State has to fund it\'s endless wars, inflation, and oppression somehow. This is just another string in the spider\'s web our elected officials lay down to catch us and take what they need.

Why, you may ask, did I choose to not wear a seatbelt on that particular day? Well, because I didn\'t feel the need to. Do I regret it? Absolutely not. With our without the seatbelt, I would have smashed by head through the side window. It simply would not have restrained my head from doing so. My knee might have been saved some trouble, but it is untelling the damage that might have been done to my insides in the aftermath. Sure, it\'s possible that I would have ended up in better condition. But it\'s just as possible that I would have ended up in worse or the exact same condition.

The point is that the choice was mine, I assessed the risk and the uncomfortablity of having two tight strands constraining me for a 9 hour road-trip, so I decided accordingly... and, now this is very important, I experienced the consequences. Nobody else did. My mom was in the exact same situation and made the exact same choices.

What baffles me completely, is the audacity of armed men telling us that if we don\'t comply (are forced to make a choice regarding our own safety) we have to pay them money. And if we don\'t pay them that money, they will put us in a cage... and if we refuse to go in the cage, they will shoot us and possibly kill us. The same can be said of the foolish laws on helmets and the costly war on drugs.

Then there\'s the matter of the airbags, which were placed by the car companies (at the behest of the government), which were supposed to deploy. Ours did not. Does this mean we ended up in worse, better, or the exact same condition than what would have been? Who knows? Airbags have caused suffacation, burns, and other injuries without preventing any further damage in a car wreck. The fact that they didn\'t deploy could have been a blessing or a curse. [either way I have no qualms about suing GM over it, seeing as 60% of it is now owned by the government]

In conclusion, the car accident I expererienced (which I am sure is the first of many, but hope is the first and last), has only reassured my position of free choice in the matter of personal safety... including in the services and products offered by business and demanded by consumers. The State is only interested in it\'s own security, and stealing our money for making decisions that may or may not be a good idea (when it is our responsibility anyways), is only another way for it to expand it\'s size, scope, and power.

The next time you get in a car, decide for yourself whether you want to wear your seatbelt or not... what the government says should be of no account.