I have a feeling he was some sort of welder in the past, so I guess he had a helmet that just flipped onto his face whenever he needed.

 

That's quite interesting, actually. It would be pretty cool if that were the case  

 

I remember hearing that at one stage Optimus and Bumblebee were dock workers on Cybertron and Optimus eventually moved on to be taught as Megatron's apprentice while Bumblebee was hired to work on the Arc.

 

I always thought it looked like a ball-gag.

Dock Boss: "Dammit, Bumblebee! I told you to weld that join, not rip someone's spine out! There's never going to be any point in your life that ripping out someone's spine is going to be a useful skill, so stop trying to perfect it!"

Bumblebee's Spineless Workmate: "Medic..."

 

All those Decepticons must've forgot the safety word was "banana".

 

It allows Hasbro to make another dozen Bumblebee toys.

 

WINNER

/thread

 

Protects his beautiful face

 

Now I have this mental image of Bumblebee working on the docks, and every time he's told to weld something everyone else on the dock gets their spine ripped out.  

 

Ok, so he's a welder, and has a habit of using a pacifier, hehe.  

 

Well think of it if you had armor and some one just busted up on you and attacked you, wouldn't you be caught off guard until you knew your body wouldn't be injured.

I'm sure a firefighter feels more comfortable in a fire with his gear on than he would if a fire just broke out and he had to go into it without it.

He also already had his voice box messed up beyond repair I think he would be touchy about his eyes and the parts he has left that function.

 

That seems like an unfair parallel, though.

Holding the gun sideways just looks stupid and does literally nothing in the shooter's favor, whereas Bumblebee's mask looks really effing awesome and serves some kind of purpose.

I'm sorry I just can't stand the sideways-gun cliche.