It's official - Cyclists are screwed

[ColinOldnCranky]

Yep, the Motorists Accident Commission (South Oz's third party personal injury insurer AFAIK) has made a public announcement.

Cyclists are screwed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8lZT-L1ARo

(Why the hell can't I embed youtube lately? Any tips?)

[human909]

How to embed videos:
1. When in you tube click on share this video.
2. Copy and paste link into your post.
3. Highlight link and click 'shareyoutube'.




Regarding the video, yes it is appalling. It is little wonder change is glacial pace. This has been discussed previously.

[Mulger bill]

Yep, the Motorists Accident Commission (South Oz's third party personal injury insurer AFAIK) has made a public announcement.

Cyclists are screwed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8lZT-L1ARo

(Why the hell can't I embed youtube lately? Any tips?)

Scumbags failed to mention lighter, fitter and faster in peak hour traffic
Col, did you try the way I mentioned in an earlier thread?
Shaun

[lobstermash]

I thought this was the 'before' video of the series. The 'after' video shows two fit blokes on their bikes shunning the dumpy motorist girls...

[ColinOldnCranky]

Don't take it so personally guys. I posted it for it's chuckle value. It's funny, even if we have a different and worthy agenda that it grates against.

Especially I like the way that they are left standing at the lights, from which they then gingerely wobble away. Looking like the losers that the message is about.

[human909]

Don't take it so personally guys. I posted it for it's chuckle value. It's funny, even if we have a different and worthy agenda that it grates against.

Racist jokes can also be 'funny'. That doesn't stop them from perpetuating the harmful stereotype. The fact that this has come from a government road safety organisation is unforgivable.

[phineas]

Racist jokes can also be 'funny'. That doesn't stop them from perpetuating the harmful stereotype. The fact that this has come from a government road safety organisation is unforgivable.

I found the ad slightly amusing, but tend to agree with the above.... it pretty much sends the message to younger drivers that cycling should be the last resort, and is just uncool and daggy.



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[il padrone]

I saw a similar format news article today - use of the cyclist to indicate slow and backwards in nature. Page 24 in today's Age. An article about slower economic growth rates in China, including a data table headed "Slowing to a crawl?" with a photo of a cyclist on a Chinese-style roadster alongside.

The implicit bias and derogatory image is unspoken and unquestioned.

[ironhanglider]

Yang Liu did a nice series of pictograms of the differences between China and Germany in 2007

http://gut-jingli.cn/content/liu-yang.html

There is a nice one about the trend in China of the last 40 years from bikes to cars, yet in Germany the trend was the opposite. Certainly when I was there in 2006-8 in Beijing alone there were 1000 new cars being sold every day. Traffic was bad then but it would be worse now with 1.5 million more cars on the road.

Whilst I had a car then it was mainly used for travel out of the city. Most city trips we took were by foot, bike, train or taxi. Whilst there is a pretty strong cultural need to display wealth, the practicalities of driving will have to limit car use sooner or later.

I really liked my Chinese-style roadster which was capable of dinking comfortably with a strong rear rack. The rod-brakes and steel rims were not great for stopping however at low speed that wasn't much of an issue. It also had a great double ringer bell.



Back to the topic, it is a bad ad that I think perpetuates the 'subhuman' image of cyclists.

Cheers,

Cameron