Bunch of Wrong Headed Fools on Both Sides
 

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/loca...472536893.html

For the sake of sanity, to anyone clicking the link, don't scroll down to the comments. Good heavens.

Very misleading story. But it's the usual inflammatory stuff that sells tabloids and provokes clickbait flame wars.

It's a bunch of (insert politically correct euphemism for clots of misbehaving young people here) doing what (clots of misbehaving young people) have always done, in every generation in every city. These just happened to be riding bicycles. In other instances it was skateboards or plain ol' shoes.

I suppose it didn't occur to the drivers to just wait it out for a few moments rather than honking, cussing and actually trying to chase down everyone who offends or inconveniences them slightly.

True it was thugs on bicycles, but it certainly was also more than just a case of "inconveniences them slightly".

Which brings up a thought. Sitting in your self driving car waiting at a light. A thug walks up and stands in front of your car, disabling it. While others start smashing widows to get inside to you. Your self driving car will be useless as a tool for escape and that will be known far and wide. With no manual controls, you're done.

They could also break into your house, rob you while you're walking down the street, etc.

Which has nothing to do with cycling, or using a bicycle to block traffic. Back on topic please.

Yeah, but you are the jerk who just them thugs!

The headline implies a moral equivalence comparable to when the Idiot in Chief saying there was blame on both sides in Charlottesville.

There's NO excuse for the conduct of the bicyclists, and whatever the drivers did or said in reaction doesn't mitigate that.

No t everyone who rides a bike is a cyclist.

Is a home invader in a tutu a ballerina?

I can see this thread has legs ... and will use them to run through every cesspool imaginable.

Much will be learned, no doubt .... many lives will be improved, many minds will be opened.

Sounds like a crime that has little or nothing to do with bicycle safety or advocacy. Why post it here?

I suspect it's here as an example of "anti-advocacy", and that's a valid issue.

While bicyclists aren't part of some kind of movement, there's a tendency in the minds of others, (especially those who already don't like bicyclists) to see us as all the same, ie "those damn bicyclists" and use nonsense like this to reinforce their negative notions.

I run into the negative characterization from time to time, and make it a point to say, I'm not one of "them" I'm just a guy on a bike.

In the movie "Them," ... "They" were giant ants and none of them rode bikes. Do you really need to tell people you are not a giant ant? And if you look so much like a giant ant that you need to tell people ... how can you ride a bike?

These are serious issues.

Heh. A poster promoting Them could serve for A&S (and LCF for that matter):

Just to be clear, I've never seen myself as a member of a sub class, and don't see other people that way. In the case of bicyclists, we are most definitely not a "class" as proven by the broad diversity on what and how we ride.

The only thing that links is that we happen to ride 2 wheeled human powered vehicles from time to time, some more than others. Some in addition to driving other vehicles, some not. Some for sport, some for transport, some for health, some out of social consciousness, some for more than one of the preceding, and some for other reasons altogether.

So, I don't let people see what some cyclists may do as being associated with me, and by the same token, don't claim that I'm representative of others.

So, as I said, I'm not a member of any group, I'm just someone who happens to ride a bicycle.

BTW- when the issue arises in conversation, I sometimes ask why they and their friends drive drunk while using the cell phone. When they disown that, I say same thing here.

Are you drunk? Your post makes no sense.

I just said that, Again. Clockwork Orange. Kubrick was a genius.

you don't have to be impaired to not make sense, CB, be nice about it.

... deleted political hate BS Are you sure? I consider the lose of any rights a very serious matter.

Of course there is NO excuse for a gang of thugs running through the streets breaking laws and damaging property.

If we responded by demanding the government limit peoples rights every time a bunch of thugs act like this, then we would eventually end up with no rights.

This time, some just want to ban cyclist rights. Next they may want to ban walkers rights. Then maybe kids should never be allowed out on their own (some now say age 26 is when someone becomes an adult, so no one out under the age of 26). Maybe many religious rights should be banned.

Asking if he was drunk seemed to be the nice option of the many possibilities.

Asking them to clarify, for the apparent loss of one word, was polite. An apology would be cool and since you started the topic, what exactly is your point? That to me is not fully clear.


All in all it sounds like the Super Bowl was involved. Let's start over, please.


Is this an A&S thread or a spectator story?

Who do you think he was calling a jerk in his post? Maybe your asking the wrong person to be nice and start over.

I am puzzled by why you would suspect the super bowl would have anything to do with this thread or any post. I was done with the NFL when they began kneeling for the Anthem, especially when the veterans commercial asking them to stand was refused by the NFL. I did hear that financial considerations finally got to them and both teams did stand today. Heard that second hand since I was lifting weights at the time.

Can we get back to the topics of thugs on bikes and people demanding our rights be removed?

That just goes back to what I asked. Is this about an issue that can be changed by education, or a crime scene? 18, 19 thugs on bikes terrorizing the neighborhood isn't much of an issue we as A&S can affect, it's a local matter for citizens and the police.


We can't do a lot about acts of terror. We can do something to promote safety through changing the culture of the society we live in. We can point out unsafe conditions, which are generally unsafe for ALL vehicles, not just bikes, for we have to co-exist.


Writing about sensationalism isn't necessarily advocacy. If it leads to us vs. them discussions then it has done little good perhaps.


If you witnessed the incident or know who might have committed the crimes, by all means do contribute to their apprehension and prosecution. But I don't agree that this is a topic we can help, and I have the examples of other threads that were close to guide me. My opinion of course, and also not an argument with you in the general sense.

That may be true. But i've seen endless post about self driving cars saving civilization. How smug some people are. Without a thought of failure.

It seems to me that the vast majority of advocacy occurs at the local level.

Knowing about problems in other local areas, as well as solutions that worked is always helpful in my advocacy.

We now know one local area has thugs on bicycles causing both property damage and potential damage to cyclist rights. The knock out game started in one local area, but spread across the country. Who knows if this thug bicycle riding will spread in a similar manner.

As critical mass events spread across the country, I was able to look at both the good and bad issues of critical mass well in advance of some college kid at the University of Hawaii organizing one in Honolulu. The kid was the type that felt he missed out on the Vietnam protest and needed to find something to fulfill his anarchist desires. With what I saw and learned of other cities, I was able to jump in at the ground level and keep the Honolulu rides lawful. I also learned about parade permit claims by cops in other cities. So after a few months of rides, a young cop pulled over about 50 riders with a mass of other cops to help, the kid got scared talking to the cop and was ready to concede to the demand that a parade permit was required. At that point, I took over talking to the cop. My first question was "Does HPD pull over the corvette club when they go out for a Sunday group ride and demand they get a parade permit?" That ended the parade permit demand. Cops next argument was that the last couple of riders went through the intersection several blocks back as the light had just turned red. So I asked him "Then why did you pull over all these cyclist if only 2 cyclist ran the light; how many motorist did you see go through a fresh red today and did you pull over all 50 motorist on the road at the time, like you just did with these cyclist? Did you even pull over the few motorist that did go through the fresh red?" Cops next argument was that the cyclist were in all five lanes of traffic and not just the right most lane. I advised the cop that traffic was only moving 8 - 10 miles an hour and that as long as any cyclist was able to maintain speed with the flow of traffic it was legal for any such cyclist to use any of the lanes. The cops final attempt to get a concession from me was to note that 2 roller bladders and a skate border who had joined our ride were illegally in the roadway. I agreed with the cop that the roller bladders and skate border acted illegally and asked him why he pulled over the cyclist who were riding legally and let the illegal roller bladders and skate border get away (also noting that we had not asked them to join us and thus we were not responsible for their actions). The cop finally admitted we cyclist broke no laws (other than the 2 fresh red runners who he could not identify) and that ended the discussion. Several cops followed the group for a couple of miles after that, but got the disappointment that no one broke the traffic law.

Had I not known about critical mass issues in other cities ahead of this event, I would not have been as prepared to defend cyclist rights with these cops and been able to educate this group of cops.

Knowing about these thug riders in the story may help me defend legal cyclist in the future.