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Anti Cycling Groups On Facebook
Over the past year, I have noticed an increasing trend on Facebook and other social media…lashing out at cyclists on the road. Now that everyone has a voice through fan pages on everything from sleep to your favorite website, there have been some antagonistic fan pages towards cyclists and road bikers setup on Facebook. These fan pages advocate and encourage hateful dialogue towards those of us that like to share the blacktop with cars and other motor vehicles. In some cases, they are actually promoting retaliation with their cars and projectiles out the window to discourage riders from hitting the road. In the road biking and general cycling industry, what can we do to combat this attitude and make it better for everyone involved?
Anti-Cyclists Fan Pages On Facebook
Before we get into that, let’s take a look at some of them and what they are saying.
There’s a perfectly good path right next to the road you stupid cyclist!
Fans: 38,406
Whenever I see a cyclist. It just pisses me off. especially road cyclists! I am glad their are more people with the same values as ME!
even worse there is a whole bloody path there why ride on the 2 inches closest to the road!!!!!!!!!!
Damn cyclists.
Not all. Just 90%.
- Feel they need to use the walking path when there is a bike lane 10 feet away.
- Think it’s OK to block traffic and cause a hazard making cars slow down because they feel entitled to do so.
- Are too stupid and ignorant of the law to ride WITH traffic.
And thanks to the a-hole that was s…o important he could not wait for traffic to move and flew by my stopped car hitting the side view mirror. That’s hit and run boy.I’ll think about sharing the road when you follow traffic rules.
Ur not Lance Armstrong, stop biking on the road
Fans: 116
A+ to whoever made this.
this is too perfect
What Can We Do As Cyclists On The Road?
First, forget about posting on these pages. You just getting into an online argument that no one wins. You can no combat keyboard courage. I think it is as distasteful as you do, but you are not going to change people or change the page by getting your blood pressure through the roof by arguing with idiots.
These pages – and the comments on them – do bring up an interesting point that I have been thinking about for quite sometime. I see a lot of road bikers run red lights, run stop signs, stop traffic and do other “I own the road” maneuvers that really do not help our cause. If we are going to expect motorists to respect us on the road, we really need to respect the same laws of the road as everyone else using that piece of blacktop that day.
I am as guilty as the next rider of running stop signs…I’ll admit it. But that does not mean it is right. Just like with anything, there is a shed of truth in some of the comments left on these types of hatred pages. If we are really going to expect people to change their attitudes about road bikers, we need to set the tone by obeying the same laws of the road and lead by example.
There are always going to be those drivers that think it is funny to run riders off the road or throw things out of their car. We have all been there (the cyclist not the asshole driver) and it sucks. But…we just need to be more aware of our surroundings and try to limit our exposure to the idiots in this world. There will never be enough laws, enforcement or awareness to fix stupid.
As you get out on your next ride…think about what you can do to improve the image cyclists have on the road. You never know…you could be converting one driver at a time over to our side.
Image by biblicone
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11:58 am
A good thing to remember is that if you over-react, the motorist may over-react to the next cyclist they see. Now, I think of the next cyclist up the road and I don’t do anything more to infuriate the motorist. I just smile, wave and don’t let them under my skin.
1:39 pm
There are lots of grass roots efforts to get laws changed, and most importantly, people educated on the current laws regarding ‘sharing of the road’. In Georgia, for instance, new legislation is being considered to give cyclist 3 foot from cars when being passed.
Police, cyclist, and motorist alike are generally confused about their rights. As cyclist, it is important to learn your rights and the local laws, and try to ride within those laws. Some states, by the way, allow cyclist to yield at stop signs, and stop and proceed at red lights.