Is Gear Really All or Nothing?

I once heard an ex-Navy SEAL give advice regarding carrying a firearm for self-defense. It was something along the lines of: “If you’re going to carry a weapon, you have to carry it each and every time you leave the house, and you have to be ready to use it. The one time you don’t/aren’t will be the one time you’ll need it.”

That logic makes sense, from a certain perspective, with any safety precaution. One of the most common things you hear in riding communities with regards to safety is the phrase “all the gear all the time” (given the rather banal acronym “ATGATT”). I watch tons of motorcycle safety videos on the internet, crash analytics, helmet cams, etc, and ATGATT is parrotted quite often when someone not wearing full protective gear gets into a wreck and is injured or killed. 

I’m a huge proponent of safe riding. I rarely go over the speed limit for any reason. I never drink and drive. I operate my bike defensively, scan my surroundings, leave considerable gaps between myself and cars in front, and so on. That said, I’ve never quite understood the ATGATT gang. They’re like the helmet police in rock climbing, but worse (I generally agree with the climbing helmet police, as trollish and irritating as they often are).

The logic is that if you want to be safe, do whatever you can to be safe at all times. I get it. Wearing full leathers and a full-face helmet 99.9% of the time won’t protect you if you crash during the 0.01% of the time that you aren’t suited up. Statistically speaking, though, someone is still a hell of a lot safer if they’re wearing gear 99.9% of the time than if they’re only wearing it 50% of the time, and wearing gear 99.9% of the time is almost as likely to prevent injury as wearing it 100% of the time. So I don’t really understand the “all or nothing” mentality of safety enthusiasts.

However you want to ride is your decision. No helmet, no jacket, no gloves, whatever. Going around acting like not wearing ATGATT is somehow “wrong” or “incorrect riding” is just plain arrogant. I always wear a full-face ECE helmet, boots, and gloves, at least, because the consequences of crashing without a helmet are just too dire and easily preventable. I usually wear a leather jacket, but I don’t all the time. Sometimes I wear riding pants, sometimes I don’t.

How you operate your motorcycle, of course, is both responsible for your own safety and that of others, so it is morally reprehensible to ride like a maniac. Killing someone other than yourself (or a passenger on your bike) in a moto accident is unlikely, but still very possible. The repercussions of improper gear, on the other hand, fall entirely on you. 

So how is it anyone else’s place to tell you what to wear when you ride?

If safety is a primary concern of yours, don’t ride in the first place. If you want to ride and be as safe as possible, wear your gear. If it’s blazing hot outside and I want to cruise around the block without leathers, I probably will.