Under-fire police force releases full video of cyclists fined for ignoring red light amid questions over original footage

But that's how all prejudice works: person A sees other people of a certain type doing something so person A assumes all people of that certain type act and think that way. We haved to fight that within ourselves as it is a core evolutionary survival instinct demonstrated by other social animals but not useful in the modern global village

brooksby wrote:

And - I dont believe that their behaviour gives me a bad name, any more than my own bad behaviour (when I finally do it!) will reflect upon them.

YOU might not believe that, but many many drivers do. They see 'some' cyclists doing stuff like this, and we ALL get punished because these drivers stick us all the same box. They put every cyclist they drive past at risk because they think "we're all as bad as each other". No amount of safe and legal riding by you or I will change some of those attitudes.

Dicklexic wrote:

YOU might not believe that, but many many drivers do. They see 'some' cyclists doing stuff like this, and we ALL get punished because these drivers stick us all the same box. They put every cyclist they drive past at risk because they think "we're all as bad as each other". No amount of safe and legal riding by you or I will change some of those attitudes.

Collective punishment is generally forbidden by modern society under treaties such as the Geneva Convention. However, you seem to think it's appropriate that drivers should deal out such forbidden punishments even though the drivers are not in any way associated with law enforcement and often don't even know what the road traffic laws actually are.

It wouldn't matter if every single cyclist on earth obeyed every road sign and traffic law and practised perfect roadcraft - some drivers are still going to get irrationally angry about imagined issues and will ignore their responsibility to take care around vulnerable road users.

hawkinspeter wrote:

It wouldn't matter if every single cyclist on earth obeyed every road sign and traffic law and practised perfect roadcraft - some drivers are still going to get irrationally angry about imagined issues and will ignore their responsibility to take care around vulnerable road users.

Definitely agree with this statement, Peter.

Just read the comments to Blackbelt Barristers review of this footage, I'm sure Ashley Neals will be the same when he does his, nearly everyone seems to have a I saw a cyclist jump a red light once anecdote to share.

We might not agree that it should be like this, I see regularly ten times more motorists jump red lights than cyclists,but its definitely an attitude people take towards cyclists as a group.

Do you think speeding drivers give all drivers (and thus the vast majority of the UK population) a "bad name", or is this just a nonsense you apply to minority transport modes?

I refuse to be an ambassador for all cyclists every time I get on my bike. Group responsibility is a lie, at least for something as broad as a transport mode.

Boopop wrote:

Group responsibility is a lie, at least for something as broad as a transport mode.

Well, certainly none of us here would ever blame things on an amorphous group of drivers/drivists...

Unfortunately lots of people do apply group responsibility, so it doesn't much matter what you or I think: they'll act as if it's real and so it may as well be. It's a discussion I've had through a number of car windows: "I might have cut you up, but you cyclists all ride through red lights/ride on the pavement/kill puppies" / "You've not seen this cyclist do any of those things. I've seen you nearly kill me though."

The correct answer is that everyone is overall better off if everyone understands and obeys the laws, and doesn't act like one "group's" breaking of them means that the other's is acceptable. 

Brauchsel wrote:

Unfortunately lots of people do apply group responsibility,

...and it's wrong. We don't accept it for protected characteristics so I don't see why we should accept it for something as mundane as a transport mode. You can be beholden to the knuckle draggers of this world if you must but I won't. People who think like that will always think the worst of cyclists anyway, no amount of "good behaviour" is going to change their mind.

I didn't say that we should "accept it", but that it makes very little difference whether or not we do. Using protected characteristics as a (flawed) analogy, the unacceptability of racism or sexism or homophobia doesn't mean that the existence of those things is "a lie". 

As I said in the post you replied to, I do challenge those attitudes when I come across them. I'm not beholden to "knuckle-draggers" (are they a group?) in particular, but to an extent I am as I am to everyone else on the road and they are to me. That tangle of shared obligations is much easier to navigate and fulfil if everyone involved follows a common set of rules, such as stopping at each and every red traffic light regardless of whether it's a personal inconvenience or "I'm a good driver/cyclist and can trust my own judgement". 

And they still should have *stopped*.

They could have easily have said to the right turn car that they had screwed up, can they go in front...
Or they could have waited in a single file on the left / right turn divider...

But they didn't.

They *chose* to break the law, and the law caught them.

Stop making excuses for shitty behaviour.

Im not excusing the right turn, they got caught. They also didn't observe the car coming up on the inside, that turned out to be a cop car, so didnt do a lifesaver check before going up the inside of queued traffic. But I often do ride to the front where I know there is an ASL only to find the front car stopped or moving slowly into it to block me off. 

I too try to pass to get to the ASL then I can safely move away, but nine times out of ten there's a car in it. 

I expect they were very familiar with the junction and timings.
They took a chance and lost.

Hirsute wrote:

I expect they were very familiar with the junction and timings. They took a chance and lost.

Certainly if they weren't familiar with the junction they were taking a very stupid risk that the traffic from the right wouldn't be released straight into them. Looks like at least the leader (the guy at the back seems less sure and actually unclips to stop, then realises the rest are going on) knew the light timings and that they could get across on the phasing. No excuse, mind.

Rendel Harris wrote:

the guy at the back seems less sure and actually unclips to stop, then realises the rest are going on

I once got a talking to on a club ride for splitting a large group because I stopped when a light turned red. I was told a group of cyclists should behave like a lorry and trailer - if the front has crossed the line, then the rest follows.

I don't ride with the club anymore.  

quiff wrote:

Rendel Harris wrote:

the guy at the back seems less sure and actually unclips to stop, then realises the rest are going on

I once got a talking to on a club ride for splitting a large group because I stopped when a light turned red. I was told a group of cyclists should behave like a lorry and trailer - if the front has crossed the line, then the rest follows.

I don't ride with the club anymore.  

meanwhile at my club most of us stopped when the rider at the front went through on orange and when we caught them stopped and waiting down the road we rolled past, they had to work hard to get back on. When he complained I told him not to go through lights on orange, the outcome is obvious, and it puts pressure on the rear riders to jump reds.

Can I join?