Just Stop Killing Us!
Or how to spot a Cluster B(ike) Activist
Intro
Those who don’t cycle often like to state that cyclists run red lights, run stop signs, “come out of nowhere”, "hog traffic”, ride in the “middle of the road” and the like. And it’s because of these reasons, many will argue, that cyclists do not “deserve” all sorts of things from their own lanes on the roadways to respect in general.
On top of that those pesky cyclists want to take away parking and “car lanes.” Some folks who aren’t huge fans of bicycling such as
have tried to get to the bottom of much of this themselves to their credit.(The who “deserves” what discussion is for another time. Despite this being a blog about cycling, my perspective is likely to piss off more cyclists than motorists - especially the activist types who subscribe to the Platitude Vision. Principled Cyclists have largely learned to live and cooperate with motorists.)
Each road user likely has anecdote after anecdote of such a thing.
Some of these complaints are actually true, bicyclists, just like every other person who operates on the public road system breaks traffic laws.
Others lean towards not being as true. See Cycling Savvy’s FAQ: Why Do You Ride Like That .
We can quibble about this one time you were out driving and you saw this, or this one time you were out cycling and so-and-so did that. Save it for the comments section.
What I want to write here is something about a very special type of person whose both sorry to say an annoyance to all road users: The Cluster B(ike) Activist.
Superglued to Delusion
Of the many strange events to occur in the year 2022, one thing that stuck out was the odd protesting done by some of the more extreme of the Climate Change activists. This was spearheaded by a group called Just Stop Oil whose more popular or publicized protesting endeavors involved superglueing themselves to various items, whether that be roadways, or famous artworks.
Just Stop Oil’s movement is largely led by younger folks and ones who believe that the use of fossil fuels over the years have placed the planet’s climate on an apocalyptic trajectory. Many of these individuals believe that unless drastic measure are taken place which includes the complete stoppage of all use of fossil fuels, that their future will be at stake. At stake as in done.
Take it from this 24-year old activist in Britain, whose name, unfortunately is an anagram of “Use Oil.”
Author, environmental activist, and CA Gubernatorial Candidate
has spent a great deal of his time over the past few years covering what's turned into a narcissism-driven apocalyptic religion. He also sufficiently argued in his book San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities why modern progressives and their ideology, stemmed in large part in narcissism, are ruining that city and others. It’s a provocative title and thesis but nonetheless rings undeniably true. Many in California are still living in denial.So how the hell does this relate to cycling?
This same ideology, forms a large part of the Platitude-Driven Vision for bicycling advocacy too.
Biking Karen
Here’s an ambulance in the bike laneThere is a business they could park inThey could block the car laneThey could block the non-existent motorcycles park laneThey..I just past a big [inaudible] in the bike lane and two other cars and the Amazon Prime in the bike laneAnd I’m not even half a mile away from home on a rainy dayWhat the fuck…what the fuckGET OUT OF THE BIKE LANE.Pull in therePull in the motorcycle parkingYou’re KILLING USGet out of the bike laneYou’re on break, for what? GET OUTUnbelievableWell it’s not like there are any bikes except for meGo aheadOne four nine nine one nine fiveUnbelievableThey’re killing usThey’re killing us
Above is an attempt at creating a transcript to a video recently posted on Twitter by a Mz Stacey. The text attached to the tweet reads, “San Francisco wants to kill us” followed by tags of both the city’s fire department and Bay Wheels, the city’s bicycle share system.
Stacey was apparently cycling down the streets of SF, using bike lanes, or in some cases Class IV Bikeways (a distinction Platitude-Driven /Cluster Bike Activists fail to distinguish) when she encountered an ambulance in her way, parked in the bikeway. Instead of competently moving around it, she decided to make quite the scene.
The video itself is below. Please at least watch it to double-check the transcription.
(Edit: here’s an alternative link)
Legitimate cycling safety courses teach cyclists to always look ahead, as also taught in defensive driving courses, for any obstacle blocking their path. If one is encountered, the person is to slow down, and try to find a way around that. Fortunately that’s pretty easy to do. It involves this process called yielding, which consists of looking for other people in the path one wishes to move into, then moving there when safe and able to pass the obstacle.
The Platitude Vision leans heavily on bicyclists being elevated as victims with motorists being oppressors. When these oppressor motorists do nearly anything that so ever makes them even the feel the slightest bit uncomfortable, they panic as if they’re being murdered. They call it “traffic violence.” These cyclists, or “people who ride bicycles” as they’ll often inform us (apparently they’ve never looked up the definition of cyclist in the dictionary) are needing to be dependent on the State to provide special spaces for them to ride - often so-called “protected bike lanes.” But they also demand super strict enforcement of traffic laws to tame the oppressive motorists, but ironically most of them poo poo the very people who are actually supposed to enforce said laws.
As if the transcript and video wasn’t enough to highlight that with zero doubt, this person is a deranged, grotesque narcissist.
(It’s also ironic that Stacey makes the same complaints that her apparent sworn enemy make. That is the panic some motorists exhibit when they encounter a bicyclist in the middle of the lane and are paralyzed as to what to do. )
Perhaps a few additional tweets of hers will serve as a truckload (people-powered by unicorn farts or renewable energy of course) of cherries on top.
Stacey is a Cluster B(ike) Activist.
Yes, it takes after Cluster B, as in the type of personality disorder.
According the the DSM, there are several different personality disorders which fall under Cluster B:
Narcisisstic Personality Disorder
Antisocial Personality Disorder
Borderline Personality Disorder
Histrionic Personality Disorders
Under just Narcisisstic Personality Disorder traits to define the disorder per
citing the DSM are:Grandiosity with expectations of superior treatment from other people
Fixated on fantasies of power, success, intelligence, attractiveness, etc.
Self-perception of being unique, superior, and associated with high-status people and institutions
Needing continual admiration from others
Sense of entitlement to special treatment and to obedience from others
Exploitative of others to achieve personal gain
Unwilling to empathize with the feelings, wishes, and needs of other people
Intensely envious of others, and the belief that others are equally envious of them
Pompous and arrogant demeanor
We’re not supposed to diagnose you might say.
I say, bullshit.
And so does
and the viewers of his weekly show, Disaffected Podcast.These people are often abusers anyways. They key to stoping abuse is to draw boundaries and stop them from abusing you.
See the similarities between the Just Stop Oil protesters and Stacey?
Another similarity is hypocrisy.
Just what exactly is the superglue the Just Stop Oil protestors used made from? I’ll give you a hint: It’s also not vegan either.
And just why exactly does Stacey’s username contain the word, “driver?”
This is only scratching the surface of the Platitude Vision. A vision which makes things worse for all road users while wasting your hard-earned taxpayer dollars.
Welcome to 2023 - the year Normal People, regardless of how they travel our public roadways, will be equipped with the tools to win over this nasty sliver of bike activists.
Stay tuned for more.
Preachy badvocates ignore a lot
as they go about their self righteous
fear mongering ways.
But one fact glares, at least to me:
The tsunami of ebikes
descending on us proves that
if you remove all that nasty exercise
from bicycling,
Americans will ride.
All the infra,
all the scare mongering, and
all the tax $s wasted by the
Advocacy Industrial Complex
totally failed to increase
bicycle use for decades.
Max 2% Mode Share.
Infra didn't increase it,
didn't do shit for bicycling
but make it more hazardous.
NACTO failed.
CAlBike failed.
The LAB failed.
But cheap Chinese crap
dumped on our shores
put more butts on bike seats
than all of them combined.
Forget Mommy and Daddy
not letting little Johnny ride his
bicycle on the street.
Forget that they won't ride
themselves cause
"there's no safe place to ride."
Bicycle corrals at middle schools
are filled again-- with Ebikes.
Johnny will ride. All over town.
IF the little beggar
doesn't have to pedal.
Like his parents, Johnny is
fat and lazy. He (maybe not so
secretly) hates exercise.
He learned that from Mom and Dad.
And now they've discovered that
if Johnny wants to ride his ass off
Mom doesn't have to drive him.
To his friends house. The skate park.
The beach. Or to school.
Which means Mon can sleep in
or get to work with one less worry.
Except one: Johnny may be
terrorizing people on the sidewalks.
May be poppin' wheelies
through red lights.
May be riding barefoot
and helmetless all over town.
And that "E-bike"
they bought him on line,
without assembly,
without instructions,
without consumer warnings,
or even honest description of what it
actually is....
"Well, cool ebike you got there kid.
Does your Mom know it's a Motorcycle?"
Now suddenly, Surprise!
The bike biz cares about
Education.
The people's expressed entitlement of autos in the public domain is the major problem. These people always forget that the only thing that gives them preference is money and "potential collateral damage".
Here is a hierarchy of the publics' transportational proiorities, if fair access is the goal:
1) Support the vulnerable! Allow those citizens that need to use mobility vehicles to be able to use them along with;
2) increased pedestrian access; reduce pedestrian restrictions;
3) public Transit;
4) bicycles_ nonmotorised > motorized. It is the electric motor that is the new drug.
5) legitimate business vehicles - trades, delivery etc.
6) the personal automobile.
I live in Canada. The list is absolutely reversed.
Every conscious, functioning and physically capable that demands electric assist for their non-discretionary travel is technically handicapped! The electric motor is the new drug.
I tell the teenagers riding their e-bikes that when they ask me why I don't use electric assist on my bike. is that I am not disabled". Even on greater than 10% hills!