Comments on Cycling Community Meets With the City to Talk About the Future of Critical Mass
OMG!
FIRST!
Future of Critical Mass: LOL!
They probably want to carry guns and light artilery during their next ride.
Is it me or is Tim the only councilmember who knows what the hell they are doing up there?
The only thing that will change this is if cyclists arm themselves with hunting rifles and shotguns on bike racks.
The "cycling community" is represented by the city council, not the Cascade Bicycling Club or Critical Mass. The vast majority of cyclists do not belong to any club, organization, or "scene". No one has elected the CBC or CM to anything.
Except the bikers were the criminals first, by illegally surrounding and blocking his car.
Critical Mass is unproductive.
Critical Mass endangers regular bikers who don't act like terrorists.
The rest of us need to endure animosity generated by bikers behaving like the selfish arrogant short-sited assholes they are.
Critical Mass makes me more afraid than ever to ride my bike. So I've been driving again. Nice work, guys.
I agree that Critical Mass has outlived its novelty. I think most of the riders have a vague idea that they want to promote awareness of cyclists sharing the road with bikes, but that's made pointless by their taking over of the road and their mob mentality.
"criminals"? "terrorists"? counterproductive's rather hysterical and insane rantings are can only come from someone who's never seen a critical mass, or has some personal grudge against it (perhaps a friend of the man who attempted vehicular manslaughter). Such false statements should be seen for what they are: idiotic and counterproductive.
@6 spewed:
Except the bikers were the criminals first, by illegally surrounding and blocking his car.
RCW 46.61.300 states:
Starting parked vehicle.
No person shall start a vehicle which is stopped, standing or parked unless and until such movement can be made with reasonable safety.
Critical Mass rioted. After they started to riot, the people they were attacking defended themselves with the only means they had. Once their victim was defenseless, one of the rioters tried to murder him with a blow to the back of the head with a heavy steel weapon.
After Critical Mass riots again, maybe people will start to see this clearly. The Stranger's shitty, agenda-driven reporting will be partly to blame when more people get hurt, by the way.
elonchos, are you the driver by any chance or some other asshole who shouldn't be on the roads?
And another useless, uninformed posting by elenchos.....
call tim b at 684-8806 and tell him that CM should be allowed to parade like anyone else with a permit.
productive - i've seen them and they have plenty of thugs among them -
Uh oh. We're about to see more proof that riding a bike makes you stressed-out, angry and, a little out of touch. So much for a healthy way of life. Nobody has a shorter fuse than an avid bike rider, I tell you what.
And yes, I am a huge asshole who probably shouldn't be allowed near a car, or any other machinery. Yet what will you say when I'm proven right about ths? Will you come back and admit you were wrong?
hey "brilliant". there's plenty of thugs in cars who are much more dangerous. anyone who actually has seen a critical mass (and is not lying about it) has to admit that thugs are in the minority at the event. The overwhelming majority of participants are peaceful.
The Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board, which "advises the City of Seattle on all matters related to bicycling" wasn't present?
Shocking.
productive the thug,
nice guys that got in the fight with the disabled people in SF or the nice people that fought with the undercover detectives here or the one that bashed the guy from behind with a U lock
right just a bunch of nice folks out breaking the law for fixie rights
Nice that the city is more that willing to let a bunch of hooligans inconvenience and assault people going about their day.
brilliant (@18), CM isn't about "fixie rights" - maybe stick to the facts instead of making (more) false claims.
giffy (@19): every day I notice that the city is willing to let of bunch of motorist inconvenience people. why?
Sounds like the end result of the Grand Wizard's long winded testimony is, "We don't want to do anything. We're hoping this blows over and is forgotten." That's a lot of verbage to defend laziness.
@16: That may be, but you're judged by loudest voices. Two (non-Seattle) CM problems I've witnessed:
- Right outside my house when a neighbor was leaving to pick up his kids, a CM rider blocked him in his parking space and was screaming at him to get the fuck out of his fucking car and walk. This lasted for over ten minutes.
- I was crossing the street en route to an after work function and had to pass *through* a CM swarm. One of the riders smacked me on the back of my head and when I shared my, um, feelings in a loud way involving gestures and riders pedalling by me booed *me*.
Great people. Should I judge these CM rallies by the assholes or just the people who look the other way when the assholes misbehave?
yeesh, sorry for the grammar in 22.
@22, care to cite exactly when and where you saw a biker blocking and "screaming" at your neighbor for over ten minutes?
seeing as it typically takes anywhere from 20 seconds to 3 minutes for the mass to pass by a specific point, it seems pretty strange that a biker would be blocking a point for over 10 minutes.
@ 17— The Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board WAS in fact present at the meeting. Post has been updated.
Yes, Oakley Blvd. in Chicago's Ukrainian Village. It was summer of last year, June or July. The entire Mass took well over 15 minutes to pass my building, though I can't speculate as to why. The stream of bikers was long but thin. That seems typical of the rallies on side streets around here.
@9 for the win.
Just because other people are being a-holes doesn't mean you get to be one too.
And driving, unlike biking, is a privilege.
@24: Further to that, even if it had been three minutes, don't you think that one decent co-rider could have stopped and asked the belligerent biker to move on? If the point is establishing an empowered community, why behave like a bunch of see-nothing, hear-nothing, not-my-problem suburbanites?
And why am I being assaulted as a pedestrian with the right of way a month or two later?
@26: "The stream of bikers was long but thin."
Oh, but I thought you wanted riders to ride two abreast, per the law. If 300+ riders did that, then your buddy is gonna have to wait longer for them to pass than if the mass was bunched together and passed by in two minutes.
Also, I mistakenly thought you were referring to a Seattle ride. That Chicago ride may have been gobs larger, and thus longer to pass by a point.
The Chicago CM may be poorly run or just really popular. As a pedestrian/public transport rider who would love to feel safe enough to bike in my hometown, I completely sympathize. My best friend was a bike messenger a decade ago. I haven't driven in nine years and don't even have a license anymore.
But CM (here, at least, if my experience is any indication) seems to be undermining itself and hopefully Seattle's contingent will be able to avoid the same pitfalls.
@30
eric sic, Seattle's critical mass, like CM everywhere, is not poorly run. It is not run at all. There is no leadership to speak of. It is nothing but a gang of young dudes looking for some action.
If a grownup tried to corral them and make them behave, they'd either fight, or go elsewhere looking for more of their kind of "fun." The only issue is whether or not publications like The Stranger advertise how cool it is and attract more boys and young men out to take part in some violence, or whether it is allowed to peter our and be forgotten.
another fine work of fiction, elenchos. I look forward to reading your entire novel!
@32
stinkbug. Youignorantslut.
First off, where in any of your posts do you provide evidence? References? Links? You, sir, are the one who is bullshitting everyone.
Let's get back to your question "every day I notice that the city is willing to let of bunch of motorist [sic] inconvenience people. why?"
The answer is that we live in a democracy.
This is a democracy. The people elected a government, which passed laws that say how the roads paid for with our taxes, which the people consented to, may be used. The adolescent male and young adult male minority of the bicycle minority disagrees with what the majority has decided. Fine. Wonderful, even. Dissent is good.
But that does not justify violence.
Civil disobedience is justified when you are disobeying an unjust law. It is not unjust to ask that everyone on the roads stop and give others a chance to move through an intersection. It is not unjust to have certain regulations for how bicycles can move on the roads. Parade permits are not unjust.
Stinkbug, you sir, are a twat. A bullshitting, simpering twat. That is all. Good day, sir.
I SAID good day, sir.
elenchos @33 Gene Wilder'ed:
This is a democracy. The people elected a government, which passed laws that say how the roads paid for with our taxes, which the people consented to, may be used.
The adolescent male and young adult male minority of the [motor vehicle majority] disagrees with what the majority has decided. Fine. Wonderful, even. Dissent is good.
But that does not justify violence.
I'm glad we all agree that motorized vehicles running over other vehicles isn't acceptable behavior and is in violation of the law.
I sincerely hope the city decides to move forward with criminal proceedings against a man that literally ran over a human being with his car.
If not, I fear vigilante justice will continue to be the only way to punish road raging drivers in Seattle. My deepest sympathies go out to victims of this form of punishment.
thanks for horking my blockquote even after i previewed it, slog. here:
"This is a democracy. The people elected a government, which passed laws that say how the roads paid for with our taxes, which the people consented to, may be used.
The adolescent male and young adult male minority of the [motor vehicle majority] disagrees with what the majority has decided. Fine. Wonderful, even. Dissent is good.
But that does not justify violence."
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