[lbo-talk] is law enforcement a way to raise money for localeconomies?

[Alan P. Rudy]

On Monday, May 14, 2012 at 10:08 AM, shag carpet bomb wrote:
> At 08:22 AM 5/10/2012, Alan P. Rudy wrote:
> > Even though I think driver asshattery towards other drivers, cyclists, and  
> > pedestrians isn't sourced primarily in experiences with driving, cyclists  
> > or pedestrians, is it unreasonable to find that youthful, largely male,  
> > often petrochemical-rejecting, physically over-confident risk-celebrating  
> > bike riding doesn't exacerbate the already existing problem?
> >  
>  
>  
> honestly? in all the words, I lost what you were saying. i ride with about,  
> what?, 300 different cyclists over the year. I haven't met one that fits  
> all those characteristics, never mind just two of them.
>  
>  

SNIP

I think we're talking about two different geographies and two different kinds - and often, though by no means always, ages - of riders.

I am writing about mountain bikers riding like they're on the mountain in the streets of Santa Cruz, Berkeley, Palo Alto, Davis, Santa Barbara, San Diego, Portland, Seattle, Boulder, Tuscon, Amherst and Ithaca.  I am not writing about the cyclists riding fixed-wheel or road bikes in those places.  I have rather extensive experience with road biking - though nothing like or as immediate as yours and nothing like Michael's in NYC - and, depending on the specific locale - some-to-a-great deal of experience with the kinds of riders I am talking about in the places I just mentioned.

At no point in any of the posts I have made have I asserted that bike riders are wholly or even predominantly to blame for the asshattery of drivers in general… and not a single thing you just wrote in what I snipped indicates that the asshattery of drivers comes from driving rather than wider cultural phenomena expressed in cars.  The latter was Michael's argument in his - and Woj's and Joanna's - blanket statements about driving and the things driving itself causes drivers to do, it is what I am arguing against.   

I made this pretty clear in the last few posts I made and explicitly agreed with you about what it'll take to change relations between drivers and cyclists.