The safety car has ruined many many races, and the amount of dangerous accidents hasn't in any way lessened because of it, so I can't see the point.
As for bunching up the cars to allow time to clear the track thats the smaller reason, its actually pretty safe to be out on the track with cars going past, if they are going pretty slowly and safely, when they burn around a corner at 180mph, the cars on the limit and a tiny tiny mistake and that car could go anywhere and anyone on the track or near it is in major danger. IF that same car is doing 40mph, the tyres aren't on the limit, the car, the driver, the engine, nothing is, the chance of someone making a massive mistake at 40mph that will cause them to slide around the track dangerously is almost non existant. A lock of everyone to a certain speed limit would maintain the time differences between cars, and ruin a heck of a lot less races, with 99% of the same safety as with a car that ruins entire races.
Not that I'm a fan of Alonso, but he was absolutely screwed, his own fault, I said instantly that if he conceded the space, something seemed very wrong with Kubica's car, he'd get back past within a few corners and he could go on. But the penalty without a safety car would have been far far less harsh, for a very minor infraction. Its really incredibly stupid though a pretty rare case, had they known there was going to be a safety car, wouldn't giving up one space have been pretty fair, yet they couldn't know it would happen.
Safety cars have largely ruined F1, as any given race could be completely pointless, not a fan of a lot of other little rules, have to use specific tyres, the further up the grid you qualify the more ridiculous rules screw the top drivers, etc, etc.
What F1 desparately needs is either very little regulation on the back wing/diffuser, or incredibly specific regulation, not this half arsed attempt every year to stunt downforce, with 2-3 teams finding a workaround/loophole that actually causes more downforce and even more air flow disruption making overtaking a joke.
Unless a Vettel gets a puncture, theres normally very little overtaking going on these days.
Safety cars is my biggest pet peeve though, completely changed the outcome of far too many races. It should be drivers, and racing that effect the outcome, strategy aswell, not someone elses mistake being bad enough to bring a safety car out.
