Bicyclists and Drivers: a semantic argument against the bullshit

Few people like to openly admit they are bigots, but in a bike filled US city you can find a lot of people openly admitting to how much they hate bicyclists/drivers. You will here all sorts of generalized complaints about all of the group based on one or two interactions with them.

You will hear some people complain: bicyclists go through stop signs without stopping or they go through red lights or don't signal when they change lanes, and how that justifies driving aggressively around bikes. You will hear other people complain that cars always crowd them to the side of the road, or cut them off, or honk and yell to get out of the road and how that justifies ignoring traffic laws on a bike.

Most people who ride bikes also drive cars. In most major cities in the US, it is nearly impossible to get by and not to own both.The problem with that sort of broadly generalized bigotry and short sighted thinking only causes to further create us and them categories to lump large groups of people into. I'm not above that myself, but I feel like a lot of times people are trying to re-categorize people that already have a clear and justifiable label: inconsiderate assholes. They are assholes whether they're riding a bike or driving a car.

These are assholes on bikes.

This is an asshole who was driving a car.

The reason a person on a bike ignored the red light and cut off cross traffic isn't: because they ride a bike. The reason they did it is because they are an inconsiderate asshole . The reason that person in the car honked at the biker and crowded them to the side of the road isn't because they are driving a car. The reason is they are an inconsiderate assholes.

Everyone wants to use the roads and everyone wants to survive their trip without any life-ending accidents. If we remind ourselves that we are mostly the same, except for the occasional asshole, we can share the roads and show each other a little courtesy so we all get to our destinations safely. This is why I feel it's incredibly important to straighten out the semantics of this discourse. As with any social discourse, we should not use generalizing terms like bicyclist or driver for our gripes with specific assholes. Instead we are all people on bikes and in cars who all are dealing with assholes that want to ruin everyone else's good time.