Well, did it? I have a friend who was riding his motorcycle and went over the hood of the car, through the windshield and into the back seat of the car with almost no injuries. He had cuts on the calf of one leg.

And another who was riding his bicycle, was hit by a car, went through the windshield, hit and killed the passenger in the car and was in intensive caer for 6 months with head injuries despite his helmet. Did the helmet make a difference? As noted above people have gone through windshields headfirst without so much as a cut.

So individual cases might be different so we need to look at the statistical relevance of helmets and the statistics show no discernable changes in head injuries. What's more, the statistics from Australia, Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand and the USA all show the same sort of patterns - pushing helmet use, even with no legal mandates, causes substantial drops in cycling, reducing bicycling road presence and this in turn makes the remaining individuals more endangered from the traffic.

Those who wish to wear helmets are free to do so. The problem is that they feel the need to misrepresent why they are doing so by using false claims of increased safety.

What I wish to happen is for these people to feel absolutely free to wear helmets without screaming "Where's your helmet" at anyone that isn't wearing one. I know this is about as reasonable a dream as expecting rap singers to act like normal people.