I saw Critical Mass

(Tom Keats) writes:

In article ,
Ozark Bicycle writes:
On Jul 27, 3:38 am, (Tom Keats) wrote:

sniped for clarity

Snipped for what?

- on Critical Mass -

CM isn't a showcase about the good things about bicycles.


BINGO!!!

remainder snipped

Critical Mass is a showcase of the bad things about POV cars.

You wish. CM is mostly a showcase of the arrrogance, stupidity and
aggression of its participants.

I ride my bike 5,000-7,000 miles a year and have been riding bike over
40 years. As a percentage of riding time my bad experiences with car
drivers have been extremely few and far between. I know people who
have frequent problems with drivers and- watching them ride- I know
why. They ride their bikes like assholes. They don't pay attention
to what's going on around them, so they have to react instead of
anticipating. They expect to have the right of way when the right of
way actually belongs to someone else. They don't think traffic laws
apply to them. Etc. Most of the time, cyclists create their own
problems on the road.

VELORUTION!http://webspawner.com/users/donquijote91

Cross-Posting Spammer.

Here's the face of CM for the general public.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/....showdown.king

Productive, huh? Once again, cyclists as hooligans and drivers as
law-abiding citizens. Critical Mass assholes setting cycling back one
last Friday at a time. Morons.

In article ,
Tim McNamara writes:
(Tom Keats) writes:

In article ,
Ozark Bicycle writes:
On Jul 27, 3:38 am, (Tom Keats) wrote:

sniped for clarity

Snipped for what?

- on Critical Mass -

CM isn't a showcase about the good things about bicycles.


BINGO!!!

remainder snipped

Critical Mass is a showcase of the bad things about POV cars.

You wish. CM is mostly a showcase of the arrrogance, stupidity and
aggression of its participants.

I ride my bike 5,000-7,000 miles a year and have been riding bike over
40 years. As a percentage of riding time my bad experiences with car
drivers have been extremely few and far between. I know people who
have frequent problems with drivers and- watching them ride- I know
why. They ride their bikes like assholes. They don't pay attention
to what's going on around them, so they have to react instead of
anticipating. They expect to have the right of way when the right of
way actually belongs to someone else. They don't think traffic laws
apply to them. Etc. Most of the time, cyclists create their own
problems on the road.

Your experience differs so greatly from my own.

Here in Vancouver BC, Critical Mass is quite benign.
In fact, on the rare occasions where things go a little
awry and contentions arise between riders & drivers,
there is much introspection, consideration and discussion
among CM participants as to how to better handle things
in future.

Nevertheless, there are always some social write-offs
who ride their bikes as poorly, discourteously and
inconsiderately as they drive their cars.


cheers,
Tom

--
Nothing is safe from me.
I'm really at:
tkeats curlicue vcn dot bc dot ca

"Tim McNamara" wrote in message


I ride my bike 5,000-7,000 miles a year and have been riding bike over
40 years. As a percentage of riding time my bad experiences with car
drivers have been extremely few and far between. I know people who
have frequent problems with drivers and- watching them ride- I know
why. They ride their bikes like assholes. They don't pay attention
to what's going on around them, so they have to react instead of
anticipating. They expect to have the right of way when the right of
way actually belongs to someone else. They don't think traffic laws
apply to them. Etc. Most of the time, cyclists create their own
problems on the road.

I agree.

It is frustrating to see cyclists do silly things to **** off drivers. I
live close to where a bike route crosses a road. There is a stop sign that
a lot of cyclists ignore and I frequently watch the confrontations between
the riders and the drivers. Sometimes I see drivers playing chicken with
the cyclists who blow through the stop sign. Not good all around.

(Tom Keats) writes:

Here in Vancouver BC, Critical Mass is quite benign. In fact, on
the rare occasions where things go a little awry and contentions
arise between riders & drivers, there is much introspection,
consideration and discussion among CM participants as to how to
better handle things in future.

Americans and Canadians tend to be different, in my experience.

I have friends who moved to Gabriola a not too long ago. Maybe I'll
get to see a Vancouver CM when I go visit them sometime.

"Frank Drackman" writes:

"Tim McNamara" wrote in message


I ride my bike 5,000-7,000 miles a year and have been riding bike
over 40 years. As a percentage of riding time my bad experiences
with car drivers have been extremely few and far between. I know
people who have frequent problems with drivers and- watching them
ride- I know why. They ride their bikes like assholes. They don't
pay attention to what's going on around them, so they have to react
instead of anticipating. They expect to have the right of way when
the right of way actually belongs to someone else. They don't
think traffic laws apply to them. Etc. Most of the time, cyclists
create their own problems on the road.

I agree.

It is frustrating to see cyclists do silly things to **** off
drivers. I live close to where a bike route crosses a road. There
is a stop sign that a lot of cyclists ignore and I frequently watch
the confrontations between the riders and the drivers. Sometimes I
see drivers playing chicken with the cyclists who blow through the
stop sign. Not good all around.

Especially for the cyclist, who is going to lose that confrontation.
I see a lot of cyclists every day who seem intent on thinning the gene
pool.

Not that I see a lot of law-abiding drivers, either. People in cars
seem every bit as likely to violate the law as people on bikes.

In article ,
Tim McNamara writes:
(Tom Keats) writes:

Here in Vancouver BC, Critical Mass is quite benign. In fact, on
the rare occasions where things go a little awry and contentions
arise between riders & drivers, there is much introspection,
consideration and discussion among CM participants as to how to
better handle things in future.

Americans and Canadians tend to be different, in my experience.

I have friends who moved to Gabriola a not too long ago. Maybe I'll
get to see a Vancouver CM when I go visit them sometime.

I hope you do get to come here to Vancouver, to just plain
enjoy riding here, not necessarily in our Critical Mass.

We have a beautiful riding environment here, and I thoroughly
appreciate it. It's a blessing to be here. We're not Utopia,
but we /are/ known as LotusLand. We have a thriving bicycling
populace, so many local car drivers (although not all) understand
what it's like to participate as traffic on a bicycle. It's not
perfect, but y'know what? We're getting there.

We did have a fairly recent Critical Mass where things /did/
go a little awry. Basically, a large influx of newbies who
didn't quite "get it" surprisingly showed up. Under normal
circumstances, the more experienced CM riders rise to the
need to take care of their fellow riders; to judiciously
cork when necessary, to take care of stragglers and keep the
ride together, and to diplomatically (in a range of degrees)
keep certain people with chips on their shoulders, from
turning the event into something negative and contentious.

But this time, the size of the ride caught people unawares,
and as a result it got segmented by traffic lights, and
not as self-governed as it should have been.

The matter was intensely discussed on our local VeloLove
Listserv, and subsequent but civil and polite measures
will be taken.

The next ride will be a beauty. So will September's
Equinox ride. And the Lantern Ride in October.

I like to think that people around the world aren't
so different. Living in Vancouver, I've gotten to
meet people from PRC, Hong Kong, Taiwan, The Punjab,
Iraq, Iran, UAE, Kenya, Mozambique, Viet Nam, Singapore,
Australia, New Zealand, Papua/New Guinea, Fiji, Uraguay,
Peru, Colombia, Romania, Hungary, Poland, The Ukraine,
Israel, Lebanon, South Africa, Samoa, Denmark, Germany,
Russia, Greece, South Carolina, Mongolia, Japan, Texas,
Italy, Sri Lanka, France, Borneo, Portugal, Norway,
The British Isles (including The Channel Islands,)
Finland, Chile, Afghanistan, Cyprus, Turkey, Newfoundland
(which has a more distinct & venerable culture than Quebec)
and a bunch of native, "aboriginal" (home-grown) people.

And y'know what? I've learned that people all around the
world are basically good. They care about you, and we care
about them. None of us wants to step on anybody's toes.

Humanity as whole is a big, loveable thing.
Nice people abound.

But nobody's big enough to hug us all at once
except You-Know-Who. And he refrains from doing so,
because he'd probably squeeze our heads off in
so doing. And then there'd be much blood-squirting
and fainting. Not a good thing.

It's good that we have a somewhat stand-off-ish
Sagalie Tyee.

It's also good that humanity is not /too/ loveably
huggable. That could be our demise. The Almighty
gave us flaws for our own self-preservation.
From Him, Herself.

I've gotta listen to Alice Cooper's Flush The Fashion,
now. + "Hey Stupid" + "Lost In America."

This is gonna be good!

And then I've gotta go back to work tomorrow morning.

Oh, well.


cheers,
Tom

--
Nothing is safe from me.
I'm really at:
tkeats curlicue vcn dot bc dot ca

Tom Keats wrote:
...
But nobody's big enough to hug us all at once
except You-Know-Who....

Eddy Merckx!

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
“Mary had a little lamb / And when she saw it sicken /
She shipped it off to Packingtown / And now it’s labeled chicken.”

In article ,
KingOfTheApes writes:
On Jul 26, 4:18*pm, (Tom Keats) wrote:

First of all, nobody knew what they were up to. Some T-shirts, for
example, would have announced their cause.

Ersatz uniforms, eh? ***** that noise.
And you can shove that concept up your ass,
with vigour. *I'm hereby suspecting you of
being a Nazi with ulterior motives, and
trying to establish a bundt.

Phf**** you.

No, I'm not a Nazi, I'm not a Marxist or Maoist. I'm for organizing
the monkeys, so they have a better chance of success.

That's what they all say.

You have shown your colours, and you can't retract them.

Maybe you should invest in an ant farm or an aquarium.

Organize those.

Maybe pace around them with a swagger-stick and a Mauser
machine pistol and a dour demeanour.

--
Nothing is safe from me.
I'm really at:
tkeats curlicue vcn dot bc dot ca