{"id":250163187,"date":"2012-12-05T09:46:27","date_gmt":"2012-12-05T09:46:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=250163187"},"modified":"2012-12-05T09:46:27","modified_gmt":"2012-12-05T09:46:27","slug":"confronting-the-scofflaw-cyclist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=250163187","title":{"rendered":"CONFRONTING THE SCOFFLAW CYCLIST"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Rick Bernardi, J.D., Bicycle Law<br \/>\nYou\u2019ve probably seen \u201cthe comment.\u201d It goes something like this. A news article reports that a cyclist was injured, or maybe even killed. The cyclist was following the law. The driver was not. Maybe the driver was just being careless. Maybe the driver was deliberately targeting the cyclist for harassment, or worse.<br \/>\nIt doesn\u2019t matter, because \u201cthe comment\u201d always follows the same logic: \u201cWhen cyclists stop breaking the law\u2026\u201d Regardless of what actually happened, regardless of the fact that this particular cyclist was following the law and this particular driver was not, some aggrieved motorist feels obliged to point out that cyclists break the law.<br \/>\nThis is the myth of the scofflaw cyclist.<br \/>\nNow, let\u2019s talk about myths for a moment.<br \/>\nTypically, people will use the word \u201cmyth\u201d to mean a falsehood. That, however, is not an accurate meaning of \u201cmyth.\u201d A myth is actually a story that explains the world according to the perspective of the story-teller. Every culture, for example, has a myth about how the world was created, and how the people of that particular culture came to be in this world.<br \/>\nSo by \u201cmyth,\u201d I don\u2019t mean that it\u2019s falsehood that cyclists break the law. Of course it\u2019s true that some cyclists break the law. But it\u2019s also true that some cyclists obey the law. Some drivers break the law. Some drivers obey the law. Some pedestrians break the law. Some pedestrians obey the law.<br \/>\nThe truth is, motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians are all really just human beings getting around by different means, and all three groups break the law, each in their own way. Motorists speed. Cyclists run stop signs. Pedestrians jaywalk.<br \/>\nThe problem is, if somebody wants to explain why one of those groups\u2014cyclists, for example\u2014are a cultural outsider that should be discriminated against, the truth is too complex, too messy, to support that conclusion. So a myth, the myth that cyclists are scofflaws, explains why they are unworthy of protection, unworthy of justice, unworthy of compassion.<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\nRead the full article: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bicyclelaw.com\/blog\/index.cfm\/2012\/12\/5\/Confronting-the-Scofflaw-Cyclist\">https:\/\/www.bicyclelaw.com\/blog\/index.cfm\/2012\/12\/5\/Confronting-the-Scofflaw-Cyclist<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Rick Bernardi, J.D., Bicycle Law You\u2019ve probably seen \u201cthe comment.\u201d It goes something like this. A news article reports that a cyclist was injured, or maybe even killed. The cyclist was following the law. The driver was not. Maybe the driver was just being careless. Maybe the driver was deliberately targeting the cyclist for &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=250163187\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;CONFRONTING THE SCOFFLAW CYCLIST&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-250163187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biking-elsewhere"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250163187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=250163187"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250163187\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=250163187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=250163187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=250163187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}