Yesterday, after I made the 40 minute commute to the Clearwater area I was looking for a place to surf. In a shrinking surfing environment I had to find somewhere to surf. We are losing our freedom to surf in much of northern Pinellas County. For the sunny day yesterday with somewhat light winds we had limited beach access. This loss of freedom isn’t a party issue; it’s not just democrats or just republicans that are taking away our freedom. People within both of these so called separate parties are limiting our freedom. The state park (republican managed), Honeymoon Island State Park, was closed yesterday for the bright sunny windy day with surf. When I arrived in Clearwater and went to check Sand Key, the county park (democrat managed) the park was closed.

What this post is really about is the fact that the City of Clearwater was there for surfers. Well, sort of. They took away our parking on north beach, so we can’t really surf there anymore without getting a ticket or towed. It’s really a thank you for letting us surf on the south Clearwater Beach Jetty. There has been a trend to let us surf on that jetty during storms. It would seem absurd not to let us have anywhere to surf, especially since the community has been centered around surf marketing for decades. At least for the moment we have somewhere to surf in hurricanes in north Pinellas county. Sometimes they don’t let us surf. It’s a thank you for letting us surf, not a very good thank you, but a thank you. Thanks for letting us surf.

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Where do you draw the line between a safety feature and something that is going to restrict someones freedom. There are things that piss people off in this world, and I would wager that the majority of people are against being controlled by others. Yet, it’s going on on an ongoing basis. If you’re driving a car you’re more than likely driving one that will set off an alarm designed to keep you following the laws. Sure, safety is a major factor in why they installed this feature in a car. However, the reality is that not everyone needs it, and more importantly you should have the choice as to whether or not to do it. Can you guess what I’m talking about?

More than likely you’ve figured it out. It’s activated by a trigger build into your seat and your passenger’s seat. When your sitting in a car, and you drive without you belt plugged in a really annoying alarm starts to sound. You might have forgotten to plug it in every once and a while, and then heard that annoying alarm. Beep, beep, beep. Then 10 seconds later: beep, beep, beep. It goes on continuously until you plug in your seat-belt.

We have have to ask ourselves as a society, where do you draw the line? Do we have a choice? Obviously, it’s a law. It’s something your required to do, or else you get fined, and eventually imprisoned if your not on private property. If you’re driving around in your gated private community, should you have to listen to that annoying beeping sound every 10 seconds, or whatever it is? Who really wants to hear that annoying sound. When you’re driving in a golf cart on roads that permit golf carts you don’t have to wear a seat belt. Why should you have to if you’re under a certain speed limit in a car. Who were the people that thought this alarm is a good idea? Can’t we choose whether or not to buy a car without an alarm? Why are manufacturing companies products so meshed into one coherent scheme that manufacturers aren’t designing drastically different things? Don’t they have free will? Is it all just one big company producing the same annoying products, just with a different name, and under a different network of people? It sure looks that way.

Thinking about this leads to some very serious questions about manufacturing, production, and how supplies are being integrated into society. We have to ask ourselves if we’re really getting a choice here. A good analogy would be like the thought I had recently about taxation without representation. So you’ve got Donald Trump, and you’ve got Joe Biden running for office. You can vote for either of them. They claim to be representing different ideas, but do they really? Are they really different? Are you really just voting for two democrats, or two republicans? When the younger generation are discriminated against in society based purely on the fact that they are “not old enough” to hold office, are we really being represented? Do we really have a choice?

Seat belt alarms should be a choice. That is all.