Spears' Antics Spark New Legislation

Love it!!

Pop star BRITNEY SPEARS has prompted California lawmakers to introduce a bill requiring parents to face their infants' car seats towards the back of the vehicle if they are under one year old. Spears started another car seat controversy earlier this week (15MAY06), when she was photographed with her eight-month-old son, SEAN PRESTON, slumped over in a forward-facing car seat. According to California motor-vehicle code, babies who weigh 20 pounds (9 kilograms) or who are less than one year old should have their car seats facing backward. Spears' representatives insist that she did nothing wrong, since her son weighs over 20 pounds. Lawmakers hope the new legislation will clear up any confusion over the code by having any child under one year old facing backwards, regardless of weight. If passed, the new legislation would be called Britney's Law, in honor of the pop star.

Credit: http://www.contactmusic.com/new/xmlfeed.nsf/mndwebpages/spears sparks new legislation_18_05_2006

Also, check out this site as well! It would be pretty funny if it weren't such a damn shame: http://www.saveseanpreston.org/

Colleen

Britney's Law--that's a riot!

Actually, new CRS legislation has been in the works in CA for a few months now, and the 1 year and 20lbs clause is part of it.

Awesome! Of all the things she's famous for, that one will probably last the longest, that she was an idiot about her son's safety.

Wendy

Amazing how one celebrity can make a gaffe and give child passenger safety more publicity in a few months than it has had in a few decades...

too bad it's being used to continue to push 12 & 20 rather than something actually relevant to today's standards.

Considering the number of people who aren't aware of the 12 & 20 thing, this is a good start. However, I think it should be named...whatever the baby is called... law.

(Sean? What is the name of her spawn?)

Of course we'll have new disclaimers on our carseats. "In the state of california it is known that it is best to keep a child rearfacing until this limit" (much like the "x substance is known to cause cancer...in the state of california..." [because, apparently, they are keeping it a secret from the other 49....lol])

Someone in anotherr thread (I think it was here or maybe it was somewhere else?) mentioned that they thought she should do commercials for child passenger safety.

I can see that working, not necessarily for younger mothers, but any mother who just didn't know*. She could say something like "you know, you'd expect that with all the help I have that I'd have the most up to date information regarding the safety of my son in his carseat, but as you all know, I didn't...

Unfortunately I'm not the only one who doesn't know....blah blah blah statistics, blah blah more statistics...the minimum requirement for forward facing is 20 lbs and 12 months, while they shouldn't be turned before that time, it doesn't mean they can't remain rearfacing after that time. Now that we have the facts we can keep our babies safe..."

or how ever the heck she'd phrase it. Also, they should get a celebrity mother that we don't think is an idiot to do on. (And perhaps in the commercial show some of the crash test footage of ff'ing infant vs rf'ing infant)

(*because you all know the number of well educated parents who don't know any better is astounding. Why are carseats so un-intuitive?)

I have some reservations about the idea of using Britney as "spokesparent" for a new child restraint law because some people won't take her seriously and it will dilute the effectiveness of such a CPS campaign. However, a more vindictive side of me thinks she should have to do so as "community service" for her repeat carseat offenses.

My problem with anyone pushing 12 and 20 os that WE KNOW BETTER. that 12/20 standard is from a time in which seats only RF to 20 lbs. That, at the time, was the maximum for ANY seat. Now the MINIMUJM for any convertibe seat is 30 lbs, and all NEW infant seats go to at least 22 lbs.

I don't think we'll see the HWL Rf seats as long as 12 & 20 is still being pushed.

if Brit does a car seat commercial I don't want her pushing 12 & 20 - I want her telling her teeny bopper followers that 18 mos & 30 lbs is the goal.