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Facebook Cyclists Hate Group
Outcry against the Facebook Fan Page “There’s a perfectly good path right next to the road you stupid cyclist!” (which frighteningly has more than 30,000 fans) is gaining momentum. Just yesterday, efforts to end the group culminated in the response group, “Help Remove this Hate Group Against Cyclists!”. The Australian based anti-cyclists page is filled with violent comments about hitting cyclists, who the page refers to as “road hogging rats.” The profile picture is even of a car dooring a cyclist. The page claims that bicycles only belong on bike paths and should not be allowed on roads. The about me box states, “No matter how far to the left you are, you’re taking up my road. My car is hard, and i am not slowing down!”
The Facebook page is anger-fueled and misinformed. Cyclists have the legal right to be on the road in Australia and are considered vehicles, as are cyclists in all 50 US states. Endorsing violence should not be tolerated, and the ignorance endorsed on this Facebook page simply begets more ignorance towards cyclists. The page’s crass content, “The road belongs to engine driven cars,” and photos are legally incorrect – and offensive.
Read the League’s Trash Talk entry to get more information on the real facts, the issue and how to take action/report the page for being offensive.
Tensions, clearly displayed on the Facebook page, between drivers and cyclists need to be diffused and hate groups only help to add fuel to a fire that is already
out of control. Christopher Thompson the enraged LA doctor who injured two cyclists with his vehicle last summer (picture right – courtesy of VeloNews), is scheduled to be sentenced this morning, Friday, January 8th. Guilty of six felonies, prosecutes are asking for eight years in prison (VeloNews)
Also during the summer of 2009, Charles Alexander, a retired Asheville firefighter shot at a cyclist, narrowly missing his head by less than an inch. He was sentenced to a measly 120 days in prison for attempted murder (Streetsblog)
We must diffuse the mounting tension of “us and them” before another cyclist is injured or killed by an irate driver and ending the Facebook hate group is a good place to start.
Meghan Cahill
League Director of Communications
Cahill joined the League in December 2008 and has a BA in Media Communications with a concentration in Italian Studies from the College of Charleston.
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January 8th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
[...] League of American Bicyclists has also come out against the Facebook page. In a statement on its website it denounces the page, and also links to a few disturbing incidents where motorists [...]
January 8th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Thank goodness you folks are here to censor the thoughts and feelings of my fellow man. Whew, was that ever close. I was nearly exposed to dangerous, and personally harmful, ideas. Fortunately for me, I will never be exposed to those ideas, that way, if I should independently arrive at similar conclusions of my own one day, we can have the conflict all over again.
Ya, censorship. Ineffective, inefficient, invasive, clumsy, subjective, and wholeheartedly sponsored by anger and hate in its own right. What’s not to love?
Well, that whole letting people think and judge for themselves thing was a crock anyway. This certainly calls for an American bicycling institution to demand the summary-censorship of a foreign national. We’re smooth like ‘dat.
This fB group attempts to support a dumb, and irrational position. Dumb, irrational, positions are child’s play to defeat in argument. Why ya gotta be all censor this and censor that? Like all bad ideas, this one will perish under a pile of fallacious logic, consequences of taking wrong action, and any number of things that befall bad ideas.
That’s why we call ‘em bad ideas. ‘Cause they are, and they don’t need censored, they need countered.
January 9th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
The good news is that most of the fan photos are clearly in favor of bicycling. Upon a little investigation (i.e. perusing the fan page) a lot of the activity is done by pro-cyclists.
At first I was really saddened by the group and its astonishingly high number of members, but now I feel like it has organized many from the cycling community.
January 10th, 2010 at 3:39 am
I’m opposed to censorship and don’t actually want to remove this group. Yet, the execrable proclivities of people who create and participate in sites that celebrate violence against bicyclist deserves to be known, and that I why I joined the “help remove…” group and invited others to join. I hope we will begin to figure out that all of the “share the road” signs in the world won’t do jack shit for addressing our totalitarian transportation system and the social-psychology it produces.
January 10th, 2010 at 12:29 pm
Not sure what the law says in Australia regarding free speech. In the United States, free speech is not without limits. Here, speech that incites (or that attempts to incite) violence is illegal. I realize the folks who created the anti-cyclist group are in Australia, but Facebook provides the platform for their rhetoric, and Facebook does business in the United States, so it is subject to the laws of this country.
I’d be interested in what a court would have to say if (God forbid) some lunatic who prescribes to these anti-cyclist (and apparently hate filled) notions was persuaded by this FB group to commit an act of violence against a cyclist(s). Facebook and the administrators of this group could face (hopefully)a world of legal hurt.
January 25th, 2010 at 1:57 pm
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January 25th, 2010 at 8:01 pm
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February 2nd, 2010 at 3:26 pm
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February 6th, 2010 at 11:51 pm
7.5/10
February 12th, 2010 at 6:17 pm
re free speech: no one is trying to censor these hatemongers in appropriate forums. Facebook has a published policy that does not allow advocating violence, which this page CLEARLY does. Facebook has endorsed the page as ok. Meanwhile, they removed a page that was created by Georgia citizens trying to rally support for a bill to allow local communities to decide whether or not to allow Sunday alcohol sales. REMOVED a group that was expressing disatisfaction with a LAW and trying to get it changed by rallying votors who were affected. While they ALLOW this hate group to spread their hopes of killing us. They want to kill fathers, mothers, children, brothers, sisters. Cyclists are tryinhg to be healthy, happy, environmentally conscious… and get persecuted by small minded lazy gas guzzling polluters.
February 12th, 2010 at 6:44 pm
We have a long way to go to convince people that Cycling is a safe environment for all. These kinds of comments are bullies who have gained a bit of power. Too often the only response is to turn the other cheek or run. We can not stoop to their level of intolerance rather we must understand that they are left out of a very good thing. I imagine that somewhere along the way they lost the privlidge to ride a bycicle. Too bad
February 13th, 2010 at 9:05 am
Friends, can you maybe asssit me? A friend of mine is thinking about getting themselves a new cbr 1000 as their first bike! They have never rode much of anything else before! I said this is definitely not a very good idea for the first one, but they are adamant! What do you think, is this ok and would u then just recommend good training lessons?
February 23rd, 2010 at 11:50 am
Marla,
The CBR 1000 is a motorcycle, and no I would not recommend it for a first-timer.
However, as this is a bicylclist’s league, I recommend you head over to
http://www.beginnerbikers.org/
for better and more thorough information on the topic of starting off in motorcycling.
February 24th, 2010 at 11:40 pm
The most effective method of neutralizing hatred, anger, and so forth is the way of flowing with it. To oppose directly is to strengthen that which is opposed and is the way those who do not utilize strategy and objective consideration.
“Enemies must never see you in direct motion, such as coming at them. Enemies must never make sense of your actions.” -Sun Tzu, The Art of War
“Never attack the enemy when his back is against a barrier of retreat. He will fight with desperation and inflict serious damage if he sees no way out.” –Sun Tzu, The Art of War.
Ignorance and hatred source from a lack of discipline, which is often accompanied by such weaknesses as the expression of negative emotions, arrogance, pride, aimless competitiveness, and so forth. Such weakness must be met where it is and understood to be overcome. To confront it with common tactics of aggression is senseless.
Those who express such foolishness must have such foolishness demonstrated to them, in such a way that their ego has an avenue for escape. If the ego must be compromised in order to see the situation clearly, those who already demonstrate behavior such as we have seen, are too weak to choose any option but the defense of their ego. All people can rationalize anything in a way that makes sense to them, to justify anything.
“A foolish man was raving at a donkey. It took no notice. A wiser man who was watching said: “Idiot! The donkey will never learn your language – better that you should observe silence and instead master the tongue of the donkey.” –Sufi Tale
“The most impressive victory is the one where no force is used.” -Sun Tzu, The Art of war
“Patient with both friends and enemies, you are in accord with the way things are.”–Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3sPGxurY-w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liToCbwEGmM
July 6th, 2011 at 9:28 pm
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