"Cyclists need good manners"

"Zebee Johnstone" wrote:

YOu know for sure she was not on a zebra crossing? Or not legally
crossing more than 20m (or 50m depending on jurisdiction) from a
crossing place?

Why the presumption of guilt?

I make no such presumptions as I was not present. I don't even know the
locale as I live in Melbourne.

But IF I did want to cros a (perhaps) busy road near a popular beach, and IF
I was walking my elderly dog (which I do not have) I would think it wise to
take the slow moving dog to cross at a signalled crossing, for its own sake.

I also would not be too surprised if traffic, be it cyclists or motorists,
yelled at me if I stepped out in front of traffic and slowly crossed the
road.

Yeah, maybe I am presuming too much!!

--
Cheers
Peter

~~~ ~ _@
~~ ~ _- \,
~~ (*)/ (*)

"Zebee Johnstone" wrote:

I dunno. You assume the woman was not crossing legitimately, and that
the "yelled at us to hurry up" was a call of warning, not an angry
yell.

Try as I might I can't seem to get much anger into a yell of "hurry up!" Now
if it was "hurry up, you m----- f-----" that would count as an angry call.
But Ms East didn't complain of this.

I have no idea if it was a legitimate crossing, nor if the rider was
riding at a suitable pace for the conditions, nor if the rider was
being aggro.

I just note that to assume that the writer of the letter needed anger
management but the cyclist didn't is making many assumptions not
supported by the evidence.

And I think I clarified that I make no such assumptions, and in fact don't
regard either as in need of anger management.

Life's too short for this frustration over such a tiny mistake.
--
Cheers
Peter

~~~ ~ _@
~~ ~ _- \,
~~ (*)/ (*)

Peter Signorini wrote:

Now if it was "hurry up, you m----- f-----" that would count as an angry call.

I find nothing offensive about minced fabrics?


Russ.

In aus.bicycle on Thu, 1 Mar 2007 22:55:38 +1100
cfsmtb wrote:

Duracell Bunny Wrote:


Whatever makes you think I'm angry about it?

Ah, come on, don't you know that simply expressing an opinion is
commonly misconstrued, by those with less advanced social skills, as
being extremely biased or even gives the illusion of being angry?


Well yes. As was evinced by DB's reaction to the original letter.

Zebee
- listening to the conversation of kitchen equipment.

In aus.bicycle on Thu, 1 Mar 2007 23:44:23 +1100
Peter Signorini wrote:

"Zebee Johnstone" wrote:

YOu know for sure she was not on a zebra crossing? Or not legally
crossing more than 20m (or 50m depending on jurisdiction) from a
crossing place?

Why the presumption of guilt?

I make no such presumptions as I was not present. I don't even know the
locale as I live in Melbourne.

Well you are... because yo uasked Theo the same sort of questions.

I don't know either. But I didn't base a comment on the idea that
*wasn't* it.


But IF I did want to cros a (perhaps) busy road near a popular beach, and IF
I was walking my elderly dog (which I do not have) I would think it wise to
take the slow moving dog to cross at a signalled crossing, for its own sake.

Maybe there wasn't one. Maybe it was a Zebra crossing. Maybe the
crossing was in a slow for peds area. I don't know. Neither do you.
The difference is that I didn't assume either way.


I also would not be too surprised if traffic, be it cyclists or motorists,
yelled at me if I stepped out in front of traffic and slowly crossed the
road.

IT isn't clear what happened. For example, where was the cyclist, how
fast, why "hurry up" when getting past a ped is easy?

I don't know what happned, so I'm not willing to paint either as a
villain given the evidence presented.

Zebee

In aus.bicycle on Fri, 2 Mar 2007 00:00:08 +1100
Peter Signorini wrote:

"Zebee Johnstone" wrote:

I dunno. You assume the woman was not crossing legitimately, and that
the "yelled at us to hurry up" was a call of warning, not an angry
yell.

Try as I might I can't seem to get much anger into a yell of "hurry up!" Now
if it was "hurry up, you m----- f-----" that would count as an angry call.
But Ms East didn't complain of this.

Whereas I can. TOne of voice, location, all.

There's no *need* to call that is the point. The only reason is if
you are annoyed. There is a gap between annoyed and angry, but I can
as easily hear that as I can hear it being polite in tone.

I don't think that it is likely to be polite, because such words
seldom are. Exasperated rather than angry or polite is most likely
but that's easily heard as anger.

(About as easily as the original letter can be read as angry rather
than exasperated and at least one person has so read it.)

I just note that to assume that the writer of the letter needed anger
management but the cyclist didn't is making many assumptions not
supported by the evidence.

And I think I clarified that I make no such assumptions, and in fact don't
regard either as in need of anger management.

TO me it looks very much like you have, and you have said so in the
other post. If you say that you make no assumption about her being
legit or not, then I'll believe you.

Life's too short for this frustration over such a tiny mistake.

I'm just interested in the way that subcultures work. It happens on
aus.moto too, but to a lesser extent. The people there are a lot more
inclined to suspect that a rider is in the wrong than people here are.

Zebee

Donga Wrote:


DB, it gives me great pleasure to confer on you honorary membership of
the BikeQld list GOMOB (Grumpy Old Men on Bikes).

Donga
Please accept my resignation. I would not join any club that would have
someone like me for a member.
(with apologies to the great Groucho)

DB


--
Duracell Bunny

Duracell Bunny wrote:
Theo Bekkers Wrote:

Are you saying she was jaywalking? What makes you assume that?

Thank you for answering my earlier question - clearly you did NOT read
my letter to the paper.

I did actually
You said "She does not say whether or not she was
crossing the road on a pedestrian crossing, nor whether she checked
that the road was clear before she slowly meandered across the road
with her lame dog."
For all you and I know, she could have been on a crosswalk, at a set of
traffic lights, at an intersection. There are many possible situations in
which she would have been in a position where the onus was on the cyclist to
give way. Even if she wasn't, it's bad manners to yell "Hurry up" at someone
crossing the road, even if you have right of way, because they may be
delaying your very important journey by two or three seconds.
Then you said "so yes we DO pay for roads." I inferred from that that the
pedestrian, who may also own a car, pay taxes, etc., somehow has less right
to the roadway, and should ensure that they do not delay any wheeled vehicle
by a few seconds.
Then you said "Acting aggressively is never the answer to problems." My take
is that the initial agression was shown by the cyclist.

Pay attention, there's a good chap.

**Plonk**

Oops, there's that anger management again.

Theo

Peter Signorini wrote:
"Theo Bekkers" wrote:

Are you saying she was jaywalking? What makes you assume that?

So Theo, you can confirm that she was crossing legally, and more to
the point, with her elderly dog was crossing at a pedestrian crossing
with the green man?

No I can't. Can you confirm that she wasn't? Pedestrians can legally cross
the road anywhere they want, except within 20 metres of a crosswalk or
intersection.

Theo

Zebee Johnstone wrote:
Peter Signorini wrote:

So Theo, you can confirm that she was crossing legally, and more to
the point, with her elderly dog was crossing at a pedestrian
crossing with the green man?

YOu know for sure she was not on a zebra crossing? Or not legally
crossing more than 20m (or 50m depending on jurisdiction) from a
crossing place?

Why the presumption of guilt?

Apparently the cyclist is always in the right. If the vehicle had been a
taxi, he would have been an inconsiderate ******* requiring urgent anger
management treatment.

Theo