anti-cyclist screed - anyone care to reply?

"Optonline news server" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

http://www.usrbingeek.com/a/000711.php

And make him feel even more self-important? I don't think so. The best
antidote for such idiots is to let them hear themselves echo in an empty
room.

RichC

In article <[email hidden]>,

Optonline news server said:

http://www.usrbingeek.com/a/000711.php

I think the writer doesn't know how to drive ("Meanwhile
motorists are nervously passing them and crossing the double
lines in the process"😉 and typically of so many who make
these complaints, would much rather have bicycles just go
away[1], than to learn how to drive. Oddly, they seem to not
have nearly as much trouble passing a /wider/ slower vehicle.
Maybe they think bicycles are imbued with magical properties,
or invisible force fields.

Bicycles make some drivers nervous because they're unfamiliar,
and those drivers then resent their own fear of the unknown.
Their solution is not to learn and become acquainted with the
source of their fear, but to eradicate it, very similarly to
impulsively stepping on a big, hairy, scary-looking bug:
"Cyclists are elitist [censored] and deserve to be run off
the road". Destructiveness is easier than learning, and
$DEITY forbid driving should be anything but easy, with
as flat a learning curve as possible.

Anyhow, that's just one of the attitudes out there that
we have to deal with. It's been there since automobiles
were invented. That's largely why we have to do so much
drivers' thinking for them.

[1] As far as they're concerned that's what bike lanes
are for -- dumbing-down driving.

cheers, & don't kill bugs,
Tom

--
-- Nothing is safe from me.
Above address is just a spam midden.
I'm really at: tkeats [curlicue] vcn [point] bc [point] ca

Rich Clark said:

And make him feel even more self-important? I don't think so. The best
antidote for such idiots is to let them hear themselves echo in an empty
room.

This guy has a Google PageRank 6 website with several hundred links
from other websites to it. His room isn't all that empty.

RFM

On Fri, 1 Jul 2005 11:12:43 -0700, [email hidden] (Tom Keats)

Quoted message said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Optonline news server said:

http://www.usrbingeek.com/a/000711.php

I think the writer doesn't know how to drive ("Meanwhile
motorists are nervously passing them and crossing the double
lines in the process"😉 and typically of so many who make
these complaints, would much rather have bicycles just go
away[1], than to learn how to drive. Oddly, they seem to not
have nearly as much trouble passing a /wider/ slower vehicle.
Maybe they think bicycles are imbued with magical properties,
or invisible force fields.

Bicycles make some drivers nervous because they're unfamiliar,
and those drivers then resent their own fear of the unknown.
Their solution is not to learn and become acquainted with the
source of their fear, but to eradicate it, very similarly to
impulsively stepping on a big, hairy, scary-looking bug:
"Cyclists are elitist [censored] and deserve to be run off
the road". Destructiveness is easier than learning, and
$DEITY forbid driving should be anything but easy, with
as flat a learning curve as possible.

Anyhow, that's just one of the attitudes out there that
we have to deal with. It's been there since automobiles
were invented. That's largely why we have to do so much
drivers' thinking for them.

[1] As far as they're concerned that's what bike lanes
are for -- dumbing-down driving.

cheers, & don't kill bugs,
Tom

Now that you mention it, maybe new drivers and octogenarians have a little
trouble judging relative speed and this frustrates them, causing feelings
of anger, then with no one to blame, the get irate at the source - the
cyclist?

"jj" wrote: Now that you mention it, maybe new drivers and octogenarians
have a little trouble judging relative speed (clip)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Please, jj. I will be an octogenarian in a couple of years, and, I hope,
still riding my bike with adequate depth perception and speed judgement.
Let's not judge entire groups. The diatribe by usrbingeek is so offensive
it is hard to know where to begin. Please don't begin on us old folks.

Leo Lichtman said:

"jj" wrote: Now that you mention it, maybe new drivers and octogenarians
have a little trouble judging relative speed (clip)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Please, jj. I will be an octogenarian in a couple of years, and, I hope,
still riding my bike with adequate depth perception and speed judgement.
Let's not judge entire groups. The diatribe by usrbingeek is so offensive
it is hard to know where to begin. Please don't begin on us old folks.

Guilty of too subtle sarcasm, I'm afraid, and not a dig on us old folks.
Will fire writer. ;-)

jj

Leo Lichtman said:

"jj" wrote: Now that you mention it, maybe new drivers and octogenarians
have a little trouble judging relative speed (clip)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Please, jj. I will be an octogenarian in a couple of years, and, I hope,
still riding my bike with adequate depth perception and speed judgement.
Let's not judge entire groups. The diatribe by usrbingeek is so offensive
it is hard to know where to begin. Please don't begin on us old folks.

As a friend who was a bit older than me once admonished " the only
thing you can do at your age that I can't do at my age-is die young!"

In article <[email hidden]>,

jj said:

Now that you mention it, maybe new drivers and octogenarians have a little
trouble judging relative speed and this frustrates them, causing feelings
of anger, then with no one to blame, the get irate at the source - the
cyclist?

Actually, I opine that /all/ of us human beings have
more trouble judging relative speed, especially speeds
of motor vehicles, than we care to admit. If anyone gets
frustrated over it, I doubt age has much to do with it.
I think people who too readily get frustrated and irate
tend to be rather peurile no matter what their age. In
fact, I think they love to be frustrated and irate. But
there's not much we can do about other people's attitudes.
To paraphrase a famous erstwhile public speaker: "The
peurile have ye always with you." This usrbingeek's rant
is artless, unoriginal, and as old as the hills & twice
as dusty. Heard it all before. And probably not for the
last time.

cheers,
Tom

--
-- Nothing is safe from me.
Above address is just a spam midden.
I'm really at: tkeats [curlicue] vcn [point] bc [point] ca

Tom Keats said:

cheers, & don't kill bugs,
Tom

I rescue spiders by removing them from my house, and worms from
precarious places (not my house). Most bugs I like. However, mosquitoes
are not my friends, nor are termites. They must die.

Wayne

"jj" wrote: Guilty of too subtle sarcasm, I'm afraid, and not a dig on us
old folks. Will fire writer. ;-)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
The fact that I do not understand the too subtle sarcasm does not diminish
the effectiveness of your reply. I admire its spirit and hope to borrow it
next time I am in trouble--hope you don't mind.

In article <[email hidden]>,

Wayne Pein said:

Tom Keats said:

cheers, & don't kill bugs,
Tom

I rescue spiders by removing them from my house, and worms from
precarious places (not my house). Most bugs I like. However, mosquitoes
are not my friends, nor are termites. They must die.

Actually I was referring to this:
http://www.mts.net/~marcz/hosers/elron2.htm

which I think is quite applicable with an article beginning
with an opening sentence like: "Cyclists are elitist [censored]
and deserve to be run off the road."

cheers,
Tom

--
-- Nothing is safe from me.
Above address is just a spam midden.
I'm really at: tkeats [curlicue] vcn [point] bc [point] ca

Tom Keats said:

Actually I was referring to this:
http://www.mts.net/~marcz/hosers/elron2.htm

which I think is quite applicable with an article beginning
with an opening sentence like: "Cyclists are elitist [censored]
and deserve to be run off the road."

Yes, I knew. I like that.

Wayne

Tom Keats said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Optonline news server said:

http://www.usrbingeek.com/a/000711.php

I think the writer doesn't know how to drive ("Meanwhile
motorists are nervously passing them and crossing the double
lines in the process"😉 and typically of so many who make
these complaints, would much rather have bicycles just go
away[1], than to learn how to drive. Oddly, they seem to not
have nearly as much trouble passing a /wider/ slower vehicle.
Maybe they think bicycles are imbued with magical properties,
or invisible force fields.

I don't want to give buddy a page hit, so I did not read the article,
however, most anti-cycling people have big SUVs that want to see every
millimetre of land paved over, and if it's not paved over, it's covered
in a concrete, steel and glass structure that is an tired, ugly and
boring as the one next to it.

Quoted message said:

Anyhow, that's just one of the attitudes out there that
we have to deal with. It's been there since automobiles
were invented. That's largely why we have to do so much
drivers' thinking for them.

[1] As far as they're concerned that's what bike lanes
are for -- dumbing-down driving.

I'm not sure with bike lanes, as gasoline gets more and more expensive
they are bound to get much more popular.

W

Just remember-
These people are crazy, but they're out there, and they're driving big heavy
motorized vehicles, and every now and then one of them gets too [censored]
and crushes a cyclist (as if they were a fly). Unfortunately the law of
physics is on their side. So be careful out there!

"Optonline news server" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

http://www.usrbingeek.com/a/000711.php

Gary Smiley said:

Just remember-
These people are crazy, but they're out there, and they're driving big heavy
motorized vehicles, and every now and then one of them gets too [censored]
and crushes a cyclist (as if they were a fly). Unfortunately the law of
physics is on their side. So be careful out there!

And when they say, " I just didn't see him, your honor," they seem to get other
laws working for them too.

Ben

Well, my response to this article will probably generate a little warmth
as well.

While I do not condone his (her?) generalization of all cyclists
carrying on this way, I have seen many, especially, as he points out
"performance" cyclists guilty of just what he complains about. These
seem to be more commonly "club" riders and weekend warriors who have
little road experience outside these arenas, and could probably benefit
from a few months riding through L.A. rush hour traffic. If they
survive, it just may make them more road worthy cyclists. Certainly
safer.

And yes, IMO, many of those who are guilty of his accusations DO deserve
what their careless arrogant riding behaviour gets them.

- -

"May you have the winds at your back,
And a really low gear for the hills!"

Chris Zacho ~ "Your Friendly Neighborhood Wheelman"

Chris'Z Corner
http://www.geocities.com/czcorner

Chris Zacho said:

many of those who are guilty of his accusations DO deserve
what their careless arrogant riding behaviour gets them.

God save us all from what we deserve.

--
"Bicycling is a healthy and manly pursuit with much
to recommend it, and, unlike other foolish crazes,
it has not died out." -- The Daily Telegraph (1877)

LioNiNoiL_a t_Y a h 0 0_d 0 t_c 0 m said:

God save us all from what we deserve.

Screw justice; give me MERCY!

--
Me

If there was a cycle lane, why weren't they using it? That was the
point of the post.