Cyclists need to accept the risk that a car, truck or bus can easily kill them or at least cause serious injuries
Yikes. Victim blaming much? “Women need to accept the risk that a man can easily rape them or at least commit serious sexual assault.” That’s what you sound like right now.
Cyclists need to recognise that often people are using the road to get somewhere reasonably quickly and by travelling at a speed significantly lower than the speed limit they are a hindrance to this convenience
Oh cry me a fucking river. Cyclists have every right to be on the road. In fact, by being on the road, cyclists are reducing congestion and thereby helping car drivers get where they’re going faster. Not to mention the fact that they’re saving drivers money by reducing maintenance costs on roads and reducing healthcare expenses. But even were that not true, a cyclist is allowed to use the road. Whether they’re using it for training or because they themselves need to get somewhere, there is no reason to expect that they “recognise that other people are using the road to get somewhere reasonably quickly” and actually alter their behaviour based on this.
I think the video shows this, since the cyclist did not stop to allow traffic through
Seriously, wtf are you talking about. That’s just not a thing. Anyone expecting that needs to seriously re-evaluate their priorities, because that is so badly fucked up it’s not even worth the effort to rationally explain the problems with it. If they continue to think this after evaluating things, then they need to just hand in their licence. Because clearly they lack the mental capacity to be driving.
or use the footpath
While this is legal in Queensland, and rightly so because there are times when it’s just the best option available, there are many, many reasons that it may not be a good idea to do it in practice. In this case, you can clearly see many of the problems. If he were on the footpath, he’d be forced to stop at the lights to cross the side street, likely for multiple complete cycles since the slip lane has lights on it (and these are rarely, in Brisbane, designed intelligently to sync up properly). He’d also be a danger to pedestrians, especially as he approaches the bus shelter. And then there’s the increased risk of cycling across an unsignalised side-street from a footpath, which is often more dangerous than being on the road.
I’m sorry for being so angry here, but your comment is showing an incredible level of ignorance and victim blaming all throughout. This is precisely the mindset that leads to cyclists’ deaths.
Car-brain (sometimes called motornormativity) has deeply infested our society, and people can not be fully blamed for it on a personal level when it’s been so deeply ingrained in them since birth by our society. It causes people to instinctively think of driving as the normal behaviour and anything else as abnormal, and therefore think of things that inconvenience a driver as really bad, while things that inconvenience non-drivers are not viewed the same way.
But I don’t think that is necessarily a full excuse, and it certainly doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be called out and corrected where it arises. my earlier rage notwithstanding, I sincerely hope you can take some time to reflect on the power dynamics at play on the road, the environmental impacts, and which person is most likely to actually cause harm, and use this information to re-evaluate who you think should be taking responsibility.
I think a more apt comparison would be assuming that the cars are all convicted rapists.
I don’t agree at all. In fact, it’s a pretty spot-on comparison. It’s certainly highly emotionally-charged, and I obviously used it because of that fact, but it doesn’t lose accuracy for that fact. Indeed, I think it’s a near-perfect analogy.
You are saying that the responsibility lies on the victim of a crime to go out of their way and not live their life the way they want to in order to avoid being victimised, rather than recognising the responsibility lies entirely on the person operating an incredibly dangerous piece of machinery which requires a licence (and the knowledge of laws and responsibilities that come with that licence) to operate.
Like, yes, a potential victim should certainly take reasonable precautions. If I were a women I probably wouldn’t go walking alone in secluded spots at night. Likewise, as a cyclist I always ensure visibility by using lights and I tend toward reasonably bright and/or reflective clothing. The uploader of the video demonstrates the reasoning behind another thing that knowledgeable cyclists do to keep the risk down—taking the lane. But taking the lane is mentally rather difficult. Many, many cyclists, even experienced ones, don’t even know it’s something they should be doing, and even those who do know they should be doing it can find themselves inadvertently drifting over to the left, especially at places where the road temporarily widens like at intersections. But to suggest cyclists should simply get off the road is more like insisting women stay inside entirely, and that’s just not on.
The “convicted rapists” angle doesn’t make any sense. That’s more like if women could avoid rape by avoiding going to places with known rapists. Which doesn’t even begin to make sense.
Perhaps another way to look at this is to consider a person walking out in front of a train and being hit, who is at fault?
The problem with this analogy is that trains go somewhere that pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers simply don’t. The only time you can get hit is at a level crossing—and barriers come down with flashing lights and a warning to say “hey, just for the moment, don’t go here”—or illegally crossing the rail at a platform rather than using the provided crossings. It’s not something that can happen without you doing anything wrong. It’s not something that happens when you’re just going about your business.
It certainly is possible, but I really need to stress that in this case, the seemingly-extreme stance is very much warranted. Cyclists die from this. Just a couple of weeks ago a cyclist died on a road that cycling advocates had repeatedly called for safety upgrades to. Multiple cyclists have died in ways directly tied to poor visibility on trucks, including after a report came out recommending all trucks must be fitted with devices to eliminate their blindspots (a recommendation that went ignored). In recent memory, a cyclist died whilst being tracked by people from around the world on a circumnavigation of the country—hit squarely from behind by a vehicle that was likely speeding and unroadworthy; the driver faced no repercussions. Neither did the police who utterly botched the investigation into the matter and gave provably-false testimony to the inquest.
This isn’t some ridiculous overreach comparing rape to petty theft or something. People actually die because of this. Regularly. And neither our Councils nor our State Governments are doing anything about it, thanks to the extreme levels of motornormativity.
We have, as a society, generally agreed that victim blaming of this sort is inappropriate when it comes to rape cases. We should do the same for deaths on the road.
Yikes. Victim blaming much? “Women need to accept the risk that a man can easily rape them or at least commit serious sexual assault.” That’s what you sound like right now.
Oh cry me a fucking river. Cyclists have every right to be on the road. In fact, by being on the road, cyclists are reducing congestion and thereby helping car drivers get where they’re going faster. Not to mention the fact that they’re saving drivers money by reducing maintenance costs on roads and reducing healthcare expenses. But even were that not true, a cyclist is allowed to use the road. Whether they’re using it for training or because they themselves need to get somewhere, there is no reason to expect that they “recognise that other people are using the road to get somewhere reasonably quickly” and actually alter their behaviour based on this.
Seriously, wtf are you talking about. That’s just not a thing. Anyone expecting that needs to seriously re-evaluate their priorities, because that is so badly fucked up it’s not even worth the effort to rationally explain the problems with it. If they continue to think this after evaluating things, then they need to just hand in their licence. Because clearly they lack the mental capacity to be driving.
While this is legal in Queensland, and rightly so because there are times when it’s just the best option available, there are many, many reasons that it may not be a good idea to do it in practice. In this case, you can clearly see many of the problems. If he were on the footpath, he’d be forced to stop at the lights to cross the side street, likely for multiple complete cycles since the slip lane has lights on it (and these are rarely, in Brisbane, designed intelligently to sync up properly). He’d also be a danger to pedestrians, especially as he approaches the bus shelter. And then there’s the increased risk of cycling across an unsignalised side-street from a footpath, which is often more dangerous than being on the road.
I’m sorry for being so angry here, but your comment is showing an incredible level of ignorance and victim blaming all throughout. This is precisely the mindset that leads to cyclists’ deaths.
Car-brain (sometimes called motornormativity) has deeply infested our society, and people can not be fully blamed for it on a personal level when it’s been so deeply ingrained in them since birth by our society. It causes people to instinctively think of driving as the normal behaviour and anything else as abnormal, and therefore think of things that inconvenience a driver as really bad, while things that inconvenience non-drivers are not viewed the same way.
But I don’t think that is necessarily a full excuse, and it certainly doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be called out and corrected where it arises. my earlier rage notwithstanding, I sincerely hope you can take some time to reflect on the power dynamics at play on the road, the environmental impacts, and which person is most likely to actually cause harm, and use this information to re-evaluate who you think should be taking responsibility.
deleted by creator
I don’t agree at all. In fact, it’s a pretty spot-on comparison. It’s certainly highly emotionally-charged, and I obviously used it because of that fact, but it doesn’t lose accuracy for that fact. Indeed, I think it’s a near-perfect analogy.
You are saying that the responsibility lies on the victim of a crime to go out of their way and not live their life the way they want to in order to avoid being victimised, rather than recognising the responsibility lies entirely on the person operating an incredibly dangerous piece of machinery which requires a licence (and the knowledge of laws and responsibilities that come with that licence) to operate.
Like, yes, a potential victim should certainly take reasonable precautions. If I were a women I probably wouldn’t go walking alone in secluded spots at night. Likewise, as a cyclist I always ensure visibility by using lights and I tend toward reasonably bright and/or reflective clothing. The uploader of the video demonstrates the reasoning behind another thing that knowledgeable cyclists do to keep the risk down—taking the lane. But taking the lane is mentally rather difficult. Many, many cyclists, even experienced ones, don’t even know it’s something they should be doing, and even those who do know they should be doing it can find themselves inadvertently drifting over to the left, especially at places where the road temporarily widens like at intersections. But to suggest cyclists should simply get off the road is more like insisting women stay inside entirely, and that’s just not on.
The “convicted rapists” angle doesn’t make any sense. That’s more like if women could avoid rape by avoiding going to places with known rapists. Which doesn’t even begin to make sense.
The problem with this analogy is that trains go somewhere that pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers simply don’t. The only time you can get hit is at a level crossing—and barriers come down with flashing lights and a warning to say “hey, just for the moment, don’t go here”—or illegally crossing the rail at a platform rather than using the provided crossings. It’s not something that can happen without you doing anything wrong. It’s not something that happens when you’re just going about your business.
deleted by creator
It certainly is possible, but I really need to stress that in this case, the seemingly-extreme stance is very much warranted. Cyclists die from this. Just a couple of weeks ago a cyclist died on a road that cycling advocates had repeatedly called for safety upgrades to. Multiple cyclists have died in ways directly tied to poor visibility on trucks, including after a report came out recommending all trucks must be fitted with devices to eliminate their blindspots (a recommendation that went ignored). In recent memory, a cyclist died whilst being tracked by people from around the world on a circumnavigation of the country—hit squarely from behind by a vehicle that was likely speeding and unroadworthy; the driver faced no repercussions. Neither did the police who utterly botched the investigation into the matter and gave provably-false testimony to the inquest.
This isn’t some ridiculous overreach comparing rape to petty theft or something. People actually die because of this. Regularly. And neither our Councils nor our State Governments are doing anything about it, thanks to the extreme levels of motornormativity.
We have, as a society, generally agreed that victim blaming of this sort is inappropriate when it comes to rape cases. We should do the same for deaths on the road.