Harley-Davidson announced Impact-resistant Tough turban prototype for Sikh riders | GTAMotorcycle.com

Harley-Davidson announced Impact-resistant Tough turban prototype for Sikh riders

Very interesting product and one I hope does well on the market.
 
Is that site legit? It set off alarm bells on the corporate VPN
 
Gotta be fake.A sikh is not going to take his turban off to swap for something else.
 
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Wingboy said:
Gotta be fake.A sikh is not going to take his turban off to swap for something else.
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The way it was explained to me was that a turban is not a religious article, a turban is to cover your hair, in the spirit of modesty, sort of like the niqab or how the amish all have that same dumb bowl haircut. The modesty is the religious article.
A guy I used to ride with would just leave his helmet on if it was a short stop, if we were gonna hang around he would deke and put on his turban. His biggest problem was getting a helmet to fit over all his hair. He had a LOT of hair.
Another guy I know would just always wear a du-rag.

I thought it was legal to wear a turban instead of a helmet

... as an aside: I was in Vancouver in the leadup to Expo 86.
The site was crowded with workers when in rolls the Chinese workers with their wicker hard hats and bamboo scaffolding.
OH NO YOU DON'T. Stop work orders all round.
Poor Chinese guys don't know what's wrong... but the Cdn workers can't work like this!
Unions complain... provincial government gets involved.... tests are done...
Uhhmmmm It seems a wicker hard hat out performs plastic in most ways and bamboo is MUCH safer than steel as low rise scaffolding.

OH
Everyone goes back to work.

In rolls the Indian crew, mostly Sikhs... never seen a plastic hard hat... we have TURBANS.
STOP WORK (These stop work orders are idling THOUSANDS of workers on a tight schedule)
Tests are done... turbans are at least as good as a plastic hard hat EXCEPT for puncture, out performs plastic in getting WACKED up side the head.

OH
Everyone goes back to work.

The Japanese crew rolls in... YEAH, you're over there and we don't care WHAT you do.
 
I know it's easy to interpret the wrong way (and I hope nobody does, because it's not meant that way whatsoever, and I hope we can have a discussion accordingly), but safety exceptions for ANY faith or religion should not a thing. I personally don't care what your religion, faith, political views, skin colour, or anything else - we are all supposed to be equal. And I believe we are.

But. This is a slippery slope thing that I'm surprised nobody else has taken advantage of. Exactly where is the line on where ones religion or beliefs trumps safety? I'm a non practicing catholic (hell, I could be called an Agnostic now for all intents and purposes) but if all catholics decided tomorrow that, say, seatbelts were against our religion....is that OK?

I wouldn't be cool with that, even though I could suddenly claim to be a Catholic again and it would apply to me if I felt so inclined.

Where is the line?

Concerns about safety are commonly cited in discussions over helmet exemptions, but 22 years of riding with turbans have yielded precisely zero fatalities among Canadian Sikh motorcyclists.
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Quoting the article.

With all due respect to Sikh motorcyclists, this is a false argument.

I've been riding motorcycles all my life. To start, 22 years ago it wasn't even legal AFAIK for Sikh's for ride without a helmet - that only happened a few years ago here in Ontario. 2017 in BC. 2016 in Alberta. I don't believe it legal in ANY other provinces.

So where did 22 years come from to start?

And secondly, in the last 20 years I've actually *seen* a Sikh on a motorcycle a grand total of maybe two or three times.

And a few weeks ago was the first time I've ever seen one riding helmetless.

I've travelled across Canada and the USA on 2 wheels and never once seen one there despite it actually being legal in many places.

So again, such a claim seems wholly disingenuous based on the fact it seems like it's a number pulled out of a hat to begin with, and the reality that I don't think motorcycling has even been a particularly popular thing in the Sikh community up until maybe the last 10 years based on a lifetime of observation. I'm open to being proven wrong.

Sure, any community or religious group you could pick that doesn't actually have but maybe 0.5% of that group as a whole actually riding could boast similar stats. I'm open to being proven wrong.

Anyhow, that's my rant.

Interesting article on the topic here:

canadamotoguide.com

Opinion: Fighting the helmet fight | Canada Moto Guide

If Sikhs don’t have to wear helmets on motorcycles, what should that mean for everyone else?
canadamotoguide.com canadamotoguide.com


Because of this, Sikhs who like to ride motorcycles do not want to wear motorcycle helmets. They’ve been exempt from the law in British Columbia and Manitoba since 2017, and in Alberta for the past year. In the UK, where most riders use All The Gear, All The Time, they’ve been exempt since 1976 without any incident. There’s no increase in health care or insurance premiums because if a rider crashes and strikes his head wearing a turban, he’s more likely to die than be severely injured, and it’s generally far cheaper to pay out for a death than for medical rehabilitation.
Click to expand...
 
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PrivatePilot said:
I know it's easy to interpret the wrong way (and I hope nobody does, because it's not meant that way whatsoever, and I hope we can have a discussion accordingly), but safety exceptions for ANY faith or religion should not a thing. I personally don't care what your religion, faith, political views, skin colour, or anything else - we are all supposed to be equal. And I believe we are.

But. This is a slippery slope thing that I'm surprised nobody else has taken advantage of. Exactly where is the line on where ones religion or beliefs trumps safety? I'm a non practicing catholic (hell, I could be called an Agnostic now for all intents and purposes) but if all catholics decided tomorrow that, say, seatbelts were against our religion....is that OK?

I wouldn't be cool with that, even though I could suddenly claim to be a Catholic again and it would apply to me if I felt so inclined.

Where is the line?



Quoting the article.

With all due respect to Sikh motorcyclists, this is a false argument.

I've been riding motorcycles all my life. To start, 22 years ago it wasn't even legal AFAIK for Sikh's for ride without a helmet - that only happened a few years ago here in Ontario. 2017 in BC. 2016 in Alberta. I don't believe it legal in ANY other provinces.

So where did 22 years come from to start?

And secondly, in the last 20 years I've actually *seen* a Sikh on a motorcycle a grand total of maybe two or three times.

And a few weeks ago was the first time I've ever seen one riding helmetless.

I've travelled across Canada and the USA on 2 wheels and never once seen one there despite it actually being legal in many places.

So again, such a claim seems wholly disingenuous based on the fact it seems like it's a number pulled out of a hat to begin with, and the reality that I don't think motorcycling has even been a particularly popular thing in the Sikh community up until maybe the last 10 years based on a lifetime of observation. I'm open to being proven wrong.

Sure, any community or religious group you could pick that doesn't actually have but maybe 0.5% of that group as a whole actually riding could boast similar stats. I'm open to being proven wrong.

Anyhow, that's my rant.

Interesting article on the topic here:

canadamotoguide.com

Opinion: Fighting the helmet fight | Canada Moto Guide

If Sikhs don’t have to wear helmets on motorcycles, what should that mean for everyone else?
canadamotoguide.com canadamotoguide.com
Click to expand...

My own religion grants me freedom from speed traps and my saviour, all hail the pastaman, allows me to use any part of the road he sees fit…including the sidewalk or using the shoulder of highways. In my religion we only reach nirvana by travelling at speeds in excess of 140kmh or by wheelying excessively. Also…nothing you can do about it as my charter of rights and freedoms says so. Also…on Fridays we are allowed access to kg quantities of cocaine for religious purposes and several weeks before our death we are to be allowed to party with the Dallas Cowboys cheerleading squad by law.

Did I miss anything?
 
Anyone notice at about 1:18 of of the video where she's whacking the hammer on the egg that she's not really whacking the hammer on the egg. Can't believe that made it in the video. She totally pulled back.
 
Had a Sikh customer who mostly wore a toque. When I saw him in the turban I asked "why not always". He said it was mostly just for special occasions. Maybe he's a sikh the way PP is a catholic.
 
There’s no increase in health care or insurance premiums because if a rider crashes and strikes his head wearing a turban, he’s more likely to die than be severely injured, and it’s generally far cheaper to pay out for a death than for medical rehabilitation.
Click to expand...

Follow the money...

Maybe the ON government can assess the cost/benefit of changing helmet laws to optional for all versus mandatory and see if death is cheaper than rehab (i err on the side of "yes" like the UK). They can include lane filtering as well while they are at it.
 
PrivatePilot said:
So again, such a claim seems wholly disingenuous based on the fact it seems like it's a number pulled out of a hat to begin with, and the reality that I don't think motorcycling has even been a particularly popular thing in the Sikh community up until maybe the last 10 years based on a lifetime of observation. I'm open to being proven wrong.
Click to expand...

The reality is, a turban is probably as effective as a "DOT" half helmet people ride on cruisers. Somewhere close to 0%.

One of the big arguments has always been they were allowed to wear them in the World Wars, as a replacement for the issued helmet. Which is true. And there too, the issued helmets did little to stop anything but low velocity shrapnel.

If you are going to deny them turbans, then let's move to adopt the EUs ECE standards on safety gear, and not this unregulated wild west of loose regulations used by American "certified" gear that's more for show.

Otherwise, the argument becomes we allow unsafe gear, but have an issue with someone else's unsafe gear that happens to be religious.
 
Dimitri said:
The reality is, a turban is probably as effective as a "DOT" half helmet people ride on cruisers. Somewhere close to 0%.

One of the big arguments has always been they were allowed to wear them in the World Wars, as a replacement for the issued helmet. Which is true. And there too, the issued helmets did little to stop anything but low velocity shrapnel.

If you are going to deny them turbans, then let's move to adopt the EUs ECE standards on safety gear, and not this unregulated wild west of loose regulations used by American "certified" gear that's more for show.

Otherwise, the argument becomes we allow unsafe gear, but have an issue with someone else's unsafe gear that happens to be religious.
Click to expand...

Ocam's Razor. Mandatory helmet protector protectors for everyone.

 
PrivatePilot said:
I know it's easy to interpret the wrong way (and I hope nobody does, because it's not meant that way whatsoever, and I hope we can have a discussion accordingly), but safety exceptions for ANY faith or religion should not a thing. I personally don't care what your religion, faith, political views, skin colour, or anything else - we are all supposed to be equal. And I believe we are.

But. This is a slippery slope thing that I'm surprised nobody else has taken advantage of. Exactly where is the line on where ones religion or beliefs trumps safety? I'm a non practicing catholic (hell, I could be called an Agnostic now for all intents and purposes) but if all catholics decided tomorrow that, say, seatbelts were against our religion....is that OK?

I wouldn't be cool with that, even though I could suddenly claim to be a Catholic again and it would apply to me if I felt so inclined.

Where is the line?
Click to expand...
One rule for all. You cant wear a helmet, you cant ride, simple as that. Riding a motorcycle isnt a right.
Freedom from discrimination against religion shouldnt override the highway traffic act.
Many people here want special priviledges in Canada. The ability to be completely covered in a government photo etc.
I used to work at a place were some people had to remove all jewelry but others could wear it on religious grounds.

Religion is a choice and there should be ZERO special priviledges for ANY religion.

Imagine if Canadians went to live in the middle east and demanded governments change the law to better suit Canadian values and traditions.
 
FullMotoJacket said:
Ocam's Razor. Mandatory helmet protector protectors for everyone.
Click to expand...

That's funny, but outside of these forums most of the guys I've hear complain about the turban rule are likely to be found on their cruisers with a ****** half helmet and a tee shirt today.

So I tend to shrug.
 
Dimitri said:
That's funny, but outside of these forums most of the guys I've hear complain about the turban rule are likely to be found on their cruisers with a ****** half helmet and a tee shirt today.

So I tend to shrug.
Click to expand...

Then just get rid of the helmet laws. Personally I’d still wear one 99% of the time but, if you’re going to not make it mandatory across the board the law shouldn’t be there.




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