Cyclists are a Perverted Pestulance [Times Article 18/02]

"Vincent Wilcox" wrote in message
...

In a thread with nameism, "vincent" reminds me of a hammer horror moovie

Not in my experience. Dark clothes/hooded tops and double boingers are a
different matter.

Do they pay attention to the large scythe?

"Robert Bruce" wrote in
message ...
mae wedi ysgrifennu:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFr...005150,00.html

Yawn. Nothing new here, though I did like

"A couple of weeks ago I received in the post a photograph of my car and a
£60 fine, because I had strayed unwittingly into a bus lane at 7pm. That
was
nothing to the £320 I accrued in fines after mistakenly parking just
outside
the residents' parking bay in my own street, then going on holiday for a
week."

To me this translates as "I drive without due care and attention and park
like a f**kwit." which is quite an admission for such an otherwise
indignant
piece.

The writer is clearly stupid. Only a stupid person would be paying such a
high rate of Stupidity Tax :~)

T

"Thomas" tom [at] greysheep [dot] co [dot] uk wrote in message ...
Who the hell does he think he is ? The fashion police ? He is an
idiot. The Times are idiots for publishing this crap.

As I wrote in my reply to Helen, it's a sad truth - the majority of
****e cyclists in london have all the gear.

But it is still wrong and offensive to label all cyclists who wear pro
gear
in cities as louts.

But he's not doing that, because he clearly states his article is aimed at
just those that abuse the roads. With the majority of people abusing the
roads wearing lycra, it's a fair assumption to make IMHO.

he starts with a minor side swipe at the CC and KL. He then has a
moan about getting fined for driving in a bus lane and parking
illegally. OK straying over the boundary of a parking bay may or may
not always constitute a hazard but it isn't too hard to not do and can
you imagine a system of parking control that was based on variable
penalties based on a subjective assessment of the impact of each
violation. He now complains about numerous near misses with cyclists
(numerous turning out to mean three). One suspects from injury stats
that his assessment that had he not taken avoiding action then each of
these potential collisions *would* have resulted in permanent total
disablement for both parties could be just a *little* exaggeration.
Let us give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he is being
fair when he places the blame for these near misses entirely on the
other parties. I wouldn't try to defend their behaviour but there are
a minority of people who behave anti-socially and some of them are
cyclists but it is a bit of a leap to "a common pestilence as so many
people behave so badly so often that nobody bothers to do anything
about them. I refer, of course, to cyclists.". He does now say that
this article isn't aimed at cyclists who "behave" but he continues by
calling all London cyclists as "mad" and those who cycle with children
as needing to "be locked up". He goes on to suggest that a majority
of cyclists endanger car drivers (!?) and pedestrians. I think he may
have "endanger" confused with "cause annoyance to". There are
undoubtedly cyclists who cause significant annoyance to pedestrians
and I am not suggesting this is anything but deplorable but we have
waded through a lot of rubbish already. Next via a couple of obscure
points about the silliness of wearing replica team kits (I agree, but
each to their own) and poor personal hygene (as if this is a uniquely
cyclist problem) he condemns cyclists for cycling too fast. Now even
if you assume for a moment that a siginificant proportion of commuting
cyclists routinely travel at 20mph and that motorised traffic never
exceeds this I still know which vehicle I would choose to have collide
with me. He finishes up with a rant about cyclists abusing pedestrian
light phases. This behaviour I would say is pretty much inexcusable.
About as excusable as a straw man that says that most cyclists indulge
in it and that almost all pedestrians are affected by it every time
they try to cross the road. He finishes up with a waek joke
suggesting that "things I do not like" should be penalised in the same
way as he was for a "thing that broke a well understood and bot hard
to comply with law". Ironically when he turns his ire on to dog ****
he starts to realise that cycling might actually be part of the
solution to problems of congestion that he started off by moaning
about.

OTOH he might have just written it to wind up his cycling colleagues
such as the Times' transport correspondent.

In other news, 69% of people on the Telegraph motoring site said that
cyclists did not drive them mad (bottom of right sidebar
http://tinyurl.com/2uskc)

best wishes
james

W K wrote:
"Vincent Wilcox" wrote in message
...

In a thread with nameism, "vincent" reminds me of a hammer horror moovie


Not in my experience. Dark clothes/hooded tops and double boingers are a
different matter.


Do they pay attention to the large scythe?

I'm not sure, I only notice them when the moon is full. They are
invisible otherwise.

On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 13:37:34 +0000, Vincent Wilcox wrote:

Does'nt work really. Best to isolate single groups. I blame illegal
immigrants.

Why limit yourself to illegal ones?

--
Join the Army, travel the world,
meet exotic people and kill them!

Eugenio Mastroviti wrote:
On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 13:37:34 +0000, Vincent Wilcox wrote:


Does'nt work really. Best to isolate single groups. I blame illegal
immigrants.


Why limit yourself to illegal ones?


It's all the rage you know.

David Off wrote:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFr...005150,00.html

I thought it was a rather neat troll.

Eugenio Mastroviti wrote:
On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 09:58:34 +0000, dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers
wrote:



Indeed. In my letter to the Times in response (which I doubt will be
published)...


Nor will be mine, I'm afraid...

Good response.

These kind of articles may be very amusing for editors to commission...
like Kilroy's piece about Arabs and they all have a grain of truth in
them but they don't do anything for good relations between road users.
Instead drivers will think its alright to abuse cyclists even more than
they do already.

"Zog The Undeniable" wrote in message
...
David Off wrote:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFr...005150,00.html

I thought it was a rather neat troll.

Perhaps, but its supposed to be a serious newspaper, not a tabloid.

Its also stirring up and legitimising londoner's antipathy to each other.

David Off wrote:

These kind of articles may be very amusing for editors to
commission... like Kilroy's piece about Arabs and they all have a
grain of truth in them but they don't do anything for good relations
between road users. Instead drivers will think its alright to abuse
cyclists even more than they do already.


the article, in case the red mist that came before your eyes obscured your
view of it, was primarily about the actions of a secetion of the cycling
community who DO put PEDESTRIANS at risk by their unreasonable behaviour.

Vent your spleen by all means, but 'tis best directed at the tw*ts on bikes
who I regularly come across as either pedestrian or cyclist.

pk