UPDATE: Mis-reportings of this incident wound up in both the kirotv.com news report linked below, and the Seattle TImes. Apparently, the douchebags reporting the news up there in Seattle are the same as everywhere else and, “have to get to work somehow” and so vilify the cyclists, to which I was caught, hook, line & sinker. Thanks to nirkromatt for linking up the first hand blog report in the comments, which clarifies the incident.
From: Ken
Subject: Mob of Bicyclists Injure Motorist In Seattle
A critical mass gone wrong, extremely wrong. This is really bad all around and from all angles. The sad thing is, is that I can only see things getting worse as more people pick up bikes to avoid the gas prices.
www.kirotv.com/news/16999930/detail.html
Good times:
The driver feared being assaulted and backed up, but bumped a biker and enraged the group. In response, some of the bikers smashed the windshield and rear window. He tried to drive away but hit another bicyclist.
I can’t say I think things will get worse in correlation to gas prices, but as far as Critical Mass behavior goes, anytime you get a horde together, whether it’s for cycling advocacy or not, all you end up with is a bunch of retardation:
The car stopped a block down and the bicyclists surrounded the car. One biker punched the driver through an open window and another used a knife to slash the tires.
I’ll guess that a lot of peeps are saying “hurray for the cyclists” here, but that’s complete bullshit (if this is how it went down), and maybe this is a surprise, but critical mass rides are stupid. Even though I see an undeniable need to have equal rights on the road, it doesn’t do anything for our advocacy when a bunch of monkey’s start a punch up just because they think they have some god-given right. That’s the same logic motorists who kill cyclists have and all the motorist in this altercation was trying to do, was pull out of a parking lot.
I’ll go along with the news report on this one and say that the critical Mass’er that were involved in the situation were absolutely in the wrong. Bicycles are no reason to support that kind of shit. If it were a cop who was hassling the Critical Mass, I could understand, but this shit reeks of stupid cycling-centric radicalism taken out on the wrong people.
Comments
26 Responses to “Mob Of Bicyclists Injure Motorist In Seattle”
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nikromatt on July 26th, 2008 9:33 pm
Here is another version what happened I just read.
http://arcanius.silverfir.net/blog/critical-mass-collision
elbowspeak on July 26th, 2008 9:48 pm
Check out the Seattle Stranger’s blog for much better (and accurate) coverage. The local po po and TV stations mangled this incident/story beyond recognition.
http://slog.thestranger.com/2008/07/i_literally_got_run_over
http://slog.thestranger.com/2008/07/another_eyewitness_weighs_in
http://slog.thestranger.com/2008/07/report_from_a_critical_mass_eyewitness
There are many more posts on this incident. Read up before you condemn this group. Critical Mass is dumb, but that doesn’t mean they done wrong.
Gnome on July 26th, 2008 9:59 pm
Ahem… I stand corrected in my ASSumtions. I’ve been to a few critical mass’ and I’ve always thought the mob mentality would prevail if/when confronted. From the blog post nikromatt links out to, I’m stoked even more to be a cyclist.
FUck Cars, and fuck kirotv.com news for mis-reporting events.
yahdancer on July 26th, 2008 10:17 pm
Critical Mass sucks. Imagine you are riding home from work on Friday night, looking forward to a long weekend with the kids and the family etc. and a bunch of cars block the bike lane and delay you for 30 minutes to and hour while they are out cruising. It would piss me off. Well, welocme to Critical Mass in Vancouver on the last holiday weekend - hey were not traffic we are a juvenile pain in the ass.
Gnome on July 26th, 2008 11:02 pm
@ elbowspeak: Thanks for the tip. Maybe next time you’ll have your shit together and sent in so I don’t have to look like a fucking idiot. And I hope someone gets mother fucking FIRED! over there at kirotv.com, the Seattle times and where ever else… Seattle might be as lame as PHX at this point.
bikesgonewild on July 26th, 2008 11:48 pm
…my dear ol’ long departed mom always used to say “two wrongs don’t make a right, bikesgonewild”…hmmm…ok, mom…
*** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***
…aggressive, harried driver…aggressive empowered cyclists…hmmm…
…stupid dangerous moves by the driver…stupid dangerous moves by the cyclists…hmmmm…
…driver uses his automobile as a weapon to impose his will & assert himself over cyclists, perhaps out of fear of being greatly outnumbered…hmmm…
…cyclist uses his u-lock as a weapon to impose the will of the “masses” to help them assert themselves, perhaps out of fear of being overwhelmed by the danger of the vehicle…hmmm…
*** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***
…rather than point a finger at who was ‘first‘ to be wrong, when clearly both parties acted in a provocative manner, i’ve gotta look at all the ill will & danger that’s been created…
…poor action on the part of the two initial parties, poor action on the part of the cops & media & further poor response & fomented anger by those who commented in the various newspapers, no matter which side they support…
…all in all, my mom was quite correct…“two wrongs don’t make a right”…gee whiz, imagine that…
Gnome on July 27th, 2008 12:02 am
Gee Whiz, imagine that.
Wine Dog on July 27th, 2008 5:50 am
We had a very similar incident in SF about a year ago. Critical Mass started out as a good thing but as of late there’s a bunch of thugs spoiling for a fight that have joined the ride. (I’m not speaking of the original coalition, they even admit they have a problem) Those clowns make things worse for every one of us out there. The news fucked up the SF incident too. Driver blows it, thugs attack, news sensationalizes, life gets more dangerous for the rest of us.
dentext on July 27th, 2008 9:11 am
Uhmm. Why can’t we all get along?
CM mostly started out as a social experiment….some guy had noticed how bike traffic in china crossed large unmarked intersections.
As much sociology as bike-nerd-ism.
There is no CM home-office, executive, or anything beyond a ride once a month. The rest is all humans being cool or being dicks, as is our collective nature.
Lloyds of London was a group of people who met for coffee over a period of time, and became over centuries at once Dicks and Cool..(what else can you say about the biggest insurance co?)
Individuals acting collectivly…who knows? CM could turn out to be the mafia of the next century, or yet another bike curiosity. (& DC could become a literary institution..heh)
If you stick it up on a scoreboard, home vs visitors, cyclists have to maul a lot of motorists to get back in the came…our side is getting it’s butt kicked.
CM is now a social institution seemingly riding on thin air, and cares fuckall what we think about it.
pirata on July 27th, 2008 9:56 am
Seems like critical mass has had more of a negative impact than positive, at least as far as promoting cycling goes.
Does it get attention? Is it positive attention? Blocking traffic and pissing people off is probably never going to get people to consider the merits of cycling/alternative transportation. Just comes off as a large group being discourteous assholes.
I think that we, as collective cyclists, are on the defensive to begin with and it doesn’t take much to stoke the fires of the anti-cyclist types when a cyclist does fuck up.
From what I have seen (limitedly) of the CM crowd, it seems to draw a lot of the anti-establishment, Che Guevara t-shirt wearing, wannabe non-conformist types who are more interested in trying to be radical than supporting a cycling cause, want to cuss out the police for hassling a biker because they ran a stoplight. That makes sense.
Courtesy is such a simple thing yet we seem to be getting too selfish to exercise it when even slightly inconvenient. And this means motorists AND cyclists. I think we cyclists have done a lot to shoot ourselves in the collective feet.
enough from my shitty soapbox.
solidjack on July 27th, 2008 10:09 am
Just saw the CNN version of this. All blame was on the cyclist. The interviews were all with people talking about how the cyclist inconvenienced them.
Not good. Not good at all. I realize the events of this are two different sides but the version out on the airwaves is all bad for cyclists.
GrantB on July 27th, 2008 11:19 am
There has to be a better way to mobilize big numbers of riders to ride in ways that educate car people about how not to kill us.
John on July 27th, 2008 11:31 am
Critical Mass isn’t helping matters where I live, unless there’s something beneficial about a disorganized mob of idiots on bikes going out of their way to piss people off that I’ve missed.
lopo on July 27th, 2008 11:35 am
The best way to mobilize big numbers would probably be to start at the root. Go to city council meetings. Try to get people motivated to build better bike trails and establish better routes. CM is a good idea as long as people are obeying laws just like cars do/should. We are not going to get anywhere by use of CM though. The only way to help make things safer would be to start in your local government. Maybe instead of a CM ride. Organize everyone at the coffee shop before a local town meeting and ride there. Take part in the process instead of shun it.
dentext on July 27th, 2008 12:52 pm
crazy idealists
Mikey on July 27th, 2008 2:49 pm
My opinion is that “critical mass” rides do more harm than good for cycling advocacy. I am inclined to agree with the commenters who bemoan the presence of an element who just wants to create a bad scene, and who don’t really give a fuck about cycling advocacy. I don’t care to have fuckwads like that “represent” me.
Mikey
Anon on July 27th, 2008 9:51 pm
The Seattle Times released a much more even article today. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008075512_reading27.html The big problem with earlier reports is that they’re quoting Jamieson from the Seattle Police Department.
sumadis on July 27th, 2008 10:11 pm
bottom line is, CNN sez cyclists at fault. you can preach specifics and nit pick details about what ‘really happened’ all you want, ain’t nobody in mainstream America is gonna listen or care. and that’s the crux. get a bunch of non-conformists together in a hippie city, mob-psych 101 gives’m the extra strength they need to take on something status quo - like a car, or ‘the man’ - and let the pundit feeding frenzy begin. do you really think we stand a chance of rational dialog against editorialized infotainment? I think not. heck a few weeks ago, even good ol’ liberal NPR got all high and mighty about ‘riding on sidewalks’ as the solution to LA cyclists being on the wrong end of the fender. get real. critical mass ain’t helpin’ change the way folks think. all respect to the folks who were injured in this situation up in Sea-Tac, but it’s not shocking at all that the group-think actions against the motorist would be played back against the cyclists in the court of American living rooms.
Seoul Brother on July 28th, 2008 3:42 am
There is a similar group to CM in NYC for inline skaters that zips through the city in large groups on Wednesday Nights. I used to skate with them, but I stopped because the better part of the regulars are pompous bastards. Life is too fucking short to surround yourself with assclowns no matter their preferred method of transportation.
I don’t give a dry fuck if you’re on a cellphone or performing a bris while on a bike, skates, or a board - if you’re so self-absorbed that you’re a pain in the ass to others, I hope you get called on it, and I’d be happier than Larry Flynt in a chicken coop to see you do a face plant. If I have to move more than 2 asshairs out of my way because you’re wandering while you finish off that snarky email on your blackberry, I will do my damnedest to make sure that everyone within earshot will know what I think of you, and if I’m lucky, I will plow through you.
As angry as all that sounds, all I ask is that other people treat me with as much respect as I would treat them. I have great sympathy for bike messengers as well as anybody who is willing to play in traffic not just because they have to, but because they love it. People often see bike messengers as reckless speed junkies with little regard for public safety, but how much of the business world would be fucked up if bike messengers obeyed traffic laws to the letter?
And under any context, if you are willing to use anything as a weapon, be goddamned sure you are willing to finish the fight. If not, then think about how good food tastes when you chew it instead of getting it through a drip.
elbowspeak on July 28th, 2008 1:21 pm
Here’s a roundup, including an interview with eyewitnesses, a guy who got run over, the driver of the vehicle and the status of the arrested cyclists. Enjoy, kids!
http://slog.thestranger.com/2008/07/critical_mass_roundup
bikesgonewild on July 28th, 2008 2:34 pm
…just to give you a taste of the “sound” minds weighing in on this issue up in seattle, here is a direct quote from the comments section of an online source called “the stranger”…
…“Cars are nothing more than modern day gas chambers and Critical Mass are the Jews being forced inside to die a horrible death.
Thus, the bicyclists were well within their rights to beat the driver to death as he was a Nazi.”…
…nice to know that sane & sensible opinions are being formed by our fellow brother & sister cyclists in the “great northwest”…ok, ok, this is perhaps a tad extreme but i thought it worth noting…
…hopefully saner minds will prevail…
Seoul Brother on July 28th, 2008 5:09 pm
So I guess that a “Warriors 2″ movie would have to be in Seattle then?
Mikey on July 28th, 2008 7:03 pm
elbowspeak–
Interesting link, pure “Stranger” all the way. It’s pretty funny when a wackjob gay singles paper gets it more truthily that the “mainstream media.”
It all boils down to this: asshole A, meet asshole B. It sounds like there was bad acting enough to go around. The SPD should have arrested everyone. Advice to cyclists: keep your helmet on. Alleged perps sometimes fall down and bruise their faces while riding up the elevator in the King County building to the jail. Know what I mean?
Mikey
Mikey
Ryan on July 28th, 2008 7:12 pm
Fuck CM.
They show up once a month, to do what?
Fucking nothing.
I have never seen this very vocal group do anything more then ride around illegally and act completely justified in doing it with a total list of pompous bullshit.
frank accardo on August 3rd, 2008 9:19 am
I’m a bicyclist, and I must admit that the fault almost always falls on the motorists when it comes to traffic altercations. I cannot begin to count how many times I have been cut off in traffic. These idiots are coming from behind me and then turn in front of me. How can they not see me? I recently had a chance to confront a motorist that cut me off as I was riding on the right shoulder going with traffic and I nearly smashed into the passenger side of his car. I followed him to his house and once he exited the car I asked him why he cut me off. At first he said he wasn’t aware he did that, as I was about to accept that explanation and ride off he then said that he used his turn signal so that made things okay. I told him that when you come up from behind, how am I supposed to see you signal? He then apologised and I was going to wish him a good weekend and ride away. Then he adds that he had the right turn lane and that I should have stopped. I then reminded him that the road was not a turn lane and that he cut me off and that he should, by law, treat bicycles like other vehicles and that you wouldn’t dare do what you did with a car. He apologised again and again I was going to ride way, but then he comes back with the excuse that had he stopped to let me go ahead then other people would have smashed into him. I then said that I guess it’s better for you to kill a cyclist then to let that happen, and I road away as he was trying to mumble another utterly stupid excuse.
You see, motorist do what they do because they think they can just drive away from any responsibility. I didn’t let this one get away, and now you see the mind set of a motorist. He simply cut me off because he could, and he didn’t give a damn. I’m glad his neighbors were out and his teenage son was listening to the exchange.
Dees on August 9th, 2008 11:57 pm
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