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news
Wetherby wire on path (via West Yorkshire Police).PNG‘Tempting’ – Sunday Times columnist Rod Liddle on stretching piano wire across road to target cyclists
Sunday Times columnist Rod Liddle has said in today’s edition of the newspaper that he finds it “tempting” to stretch piano wire across the road to target cyclists – something that, as we reported last month, resulted in a man being injured when he was riding on a trail near Leeds with his son.
The column was published under the title, ‘The BBC is doing its job again. All it took was thousands of deaths and a useless cabinet’ – but it opened with Liddle’s anti-cyclist rant:
Every day it’s the same. Walk out of my front door with the dog to be swept aside, into a hedge, by a middle-class family from the city who think they’re all Bradley bloody Wiggins. Daddy and Piers, 11, in the peloton. Mummy bringing up the rear with little Poppy, 6, and Oliver, 4. All in Lycra, all with their energy drinks and fatuous expressions on their faces, expressions of self-righteousness and irreproachable virtue. This is a local lane for local people — go back to your tenements, I shout at them. My wife has persuaded me that, strictly speaking, it is against the law to tie piano wire at neck height across the road. Oh, but it’s tempting.
A reference to Halfords’ recent sales boom and “An entire nation that wants nothing more than … a bike with which to cause havoc in every country lane” in the second paragraph excepted, Liddle then moved on to the main point of his column, the “rebirth” of the BBC, where he was editor of the Today programme from 1998 to 2002, making the anti-cyclist rant look particularly gratuitous and out of context.
Moreover, it comes at a time when there have been a number of incidents since lockdown began of cyclists being targeted with drawing pins and tacks, pieces of wood studded with nails and, yes, wire stretched across paths – with police in West Yorkshire releasing pictures (see main image above, and the one below) and appealing for witnesses after one such trap resulted in a cyclist being injured when he rode into it.
> Cyclist injured by wire stretched across West Yorkshire trail
It’s not the first time that Liddle, who also pens a column for The Spectator, where he is associate editor, has taken a swipe at cyclists in The Sunday Times.
In 2016, Cycling UK demanded an apology from the newspaper and the retraction of what it termed an “inflammatory and dangerous” article in which Liddle appeared to applaud Chris Grayling after the then transport secretary doored a cyclist while getting out of his ministerial car outside the Palace of Westminster.
> Sunday Times: Rod Liddle wasn’t condoning ‘dooring’ cyclists – he was just using “heavy irony”
In its response, the newspaper claimed that the column had been written with “heavy irony” – a reaction that dismayed not only the national cycling charity, but also the widow of a cyclist who was was killed in Southport in January 2014 after a motorist opened her car door into his path without looking.
The column brings to mind one written in sister paper The Times back in 2007 by former MP Matthew Parris, who wrote: “A festive custom we could do worse than foster would be stringing piano wire across country lanes to decapitate cyclists.”
The complaints received in response to that article, published under the headline, ‘What’s smug and deserves to be decapitated?’, elicited what might be best described as a grudging apology from Parris, who claimed that the remark “was meant humorously but so many cyclists have taken it seriously that I plainly misjudged. I am sorry.”
No doubt Liddle’s remarks were also meant “humorously,” but we wouldn’t advise you to hold your breath while waiting for Liddle to issue any apology, grudging or otherwise, for his latest piece.
We have contacted Cycling UK for a comment.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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66 comments
On the offchance anyone's interested, here's the link to the Independent Press Standards Organisation in order that you can lodge a complaint about Liddle's article.
I did, simply because if the reference to cyclists had been swapped for gays, blacks, gingers etc then it would have been truly offensive and the public at large would have complained. In the same way that I don't think it's acceptable to publicly hate on gays, blacks, gingers or any other group, I don't think it should be acceptable to publicly hate on cyclists.
Here's the link:
https://www.ipso.co.uk/complain/complaints-form/#
Well I had a reply from the Sunday Times today saying:
"Rod Liddle's remark was not intended to be taken seriously. We're sorry he's caused offence. We believe that cyclists should have their say in our pages. To that end, we intend to publish a letter from Cycling UK putting their view of the column this coming Sunday"
The damage has still been done, though
I have also complained to the Sunday Times, as I assume hundreds have. This is what I said.
I would hope that I do not need to repeat what so many people have said about the foolishness of your publishing remarks that incite to hate crime, but the feebleness of your response so far -- that the remarks were not intended to be taken seriously, at a time when at least two such incidents have taken place and an innocent cyclist hospitalised as a result, compels me to do so.
And the point is not only whether the remarks were in bad taste or dangerous, but that they contribute to a corrosive culture of treating people who are doing nothing worse than cycling to the shops or work, or enjoying a great form of outdoor recreation, as pariahs and people deserving of harassment, insult and a disregard for their safety, vulnerable as they are, rather than the courtesy of concern for their welfare as legitimate users of the road -- all things which are far too common, even if they stop short of actually garrotting an innocent family out for a ride. Nor is the point that Liddle has given offence. The point is that he is disseminating opinions that make our society less tolerant and more dangerous and which actively discourage ordinary people from following the lead of countries like the Netherlands and Denmark where cycling is normal for the majority of the population, to the detriment of our clean air, our use of carbon, our health and the congestion of our roads.
In 2012 The Times campaigned for cycling safety after the death of one of its journalists, Mary Bowers. Today, with so many people finding out how enjoyable and convenient cycling can be if conditions are made safe, as the huge reduction in traffic during lockdown helped to do, you would do well to emulate The Times's Cycle Safe campaign with one that meets the need of our time to have safe infrastructure throughout the UK to enable us to meet the challenge of global warming and the demand that lockdown has revealed, rather than giving publicity to Liddle's vile outpourings, insulting the memory of Bowers.
This Liddle guy is NUTS, the Sunday Times needs to fire him and send him to the insane asylium. I can assume that with the Sunday Times being non reactive to the insanity of Liddle that they support this sort of behavior. I would suggest that people stop reading the Sunday Times. It's just a matter of time before Liddle snaps and he does something really really bad, and when this happens they should hold the Sunday Times partially responsible for failure to take action to stop this mad man.
Well I've complained to the Times and to IPSO. Weight of numbers is all these organisations care about. And vote with your wallet - don't buy the Times - there are plenty of other 'news outlets' available.
I am glad this article has been picked up on. I think I was one of the first to leave a negative comment about it on The Times. I was then accused of needing a sense of humour implant by another reader - a comment that got 36 likes compared to the 5 mine got. This really shook my faith in humanity and left me questioning whether it was my judgement at fault!
Good for you for having a go. The first response of bullies is usually "we were just having a laugh..."
I'd be more inclined to think that it was a joke if there weren't cases were people do actually set booby-traps for cyclists. It'd be more obviously a joke if it was something implausible, but as it does happen, that takes it out of the realm of humour and into the realm of nastiness.
And yeah, anti-cycling comments on websites usually overwhelm the pro-cycling ones. It's not you.
His Wikipedia page makes interesting reading... nice guy.
We must all write to the police because this is hate speech exactly the same as if it were directed at a religious belief!
Every day it’s the same. Pick up my newspaper and there is some gammon faced, girlfriend beating, racist, islamaphobic, slightly overweigh, probably hypertensive and diabetic middle aged man with a chip on their well padded shoulder. A plethora of Farrages, Clarksons and Liddles. All in tweed jackets with their 20 Bensons, pints of poor quality ale and fatuous expressions on their ruddy faces, expressions of self-righteousness and irreproachable indignation. This is a just a nice way of getting exercise — don’t be such NIMBY dickheads, I shout at them. My wife has persuaded me that, strictly speaking, it is against the law to cough Corona Virus in their faces. Oh, but it’s tempting.
Ive written to the Sunday Times complaining about the article and have asked for a retraction and public apology...I wont be holding my breath!
Complaint made to ipso. Quite easy to complete online.
Looking at the Editors' Code it's unclear which provision this would breach. (Not condoning, just don't get your hopes up - I stopped reading anything the appalling Liddle wrote years ago.)
I've also submitted a complaint to IPSO as this is a clear incitement to violence
I've also submitted a complaint to IPSO as this is a clear incitement to violence
I've also submitted a complaint to IPSO as this is a clear incitement to violence
3 complaints?
Is this not incitement to murder?
I beg your pardon?
Nope - probably 'incitement to manslaughter' (no intent to kill) or something like that.
Didn't the Times used to campaign for safer cycling (in London particularly) after one of their journalists was killed? Or did I imagine that?
(duplicate - got an Ajax error, sorry)
yes they did campaign for safer cycling in London after the death of one of their journalists. The campaign didn't last long.
Is this not incitement to murder?
Is this not incitement to murder?
Is this not incitement to murder?
Could someone with a Times account enquire his preferred option for this family? Is his intention with the Piano wire to potentially create three new orphans for the state to care for? Or is he proposing piano wire at 6/4 year old height to teach the evil parents a lesson? Presumably as they live "in a tenement" the children can't be considered actually human and deserving of fresh air or exercise which they should be getting up chimneys?
As if he'd ever have the balls to actually do it.
I'd assume not too, but the issue is that writing this crap and having it distributed via a mainstream publication normalises hatred of a particular identifiable group and feeds the prejudices of an extremist minority who will feel perfectly justified in setting and have actually in the past set piano wire and other booby traps capable of causing serious injury.
Anyway, at least no-one here is suggesting that a breeze block be dropped on his car from a motorway bridge, albeit in an attempted humurous way, which would be a fair analogy.
Or doing anything else, however violent and reprehensible, with extreme irony of course.
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