[Closed] Melanie Philips Daily Mail article on cyclists today

Just what I was going to say.

Everyone just pretend she doesn't exist. That'll annoy her the most.

🙂

Now I'm curious. FS, one soul, slightly tarnished.

Rather than paste the link on here why not copy the article to here than their site gets one hit rather than hundreds.

[S]Better yet someone pop into a paper shop, photograph said article, and pop the image up, then they don't get any of the revenue...[/S]

you realize of course by starting this thread you've probably triggered more traffic to the DM website...

you just can't win.

EDIT: sorry, just realized it's click fodder and so probably won't be in their paper based comic...

A brief summary will do. Is it pro or anti cycling? Just another rant about the 'horrors' of seeing fat men in lycra?

A brief summary will do. Is it pro or anti cycling? Just another rant about the 'horrors' of seeing fat men in lycra?

I've not read it, but it's Melanie Phillips, so I'm assuming it's a borderline-insane, fact-light, attack on RLJers and lycralouts, written purely for the purposes of getting Twitter into a froth and so generating lots of ad revenue.

I've not read it, but it's Melanie Phillips, so I'm assuming it's a borderline-insane, fact-light, attack on RLJers and lycralouts, written purely for the purposes of getting Twitter into a froth and so generating lots of ad revenue.

Are you sure you've not read it? That was spot on 😀

Want to know why she's bitter? Go to google images. She's no looker.

lets play "Anti-cycling rant in the tabloid press" bingo!....

1 - they jump red lights
2 - they wear lycra
3 - they hold up traffic
4 - they shout at pedestrians
5 - they ride on the pavement
6 - they drop litter
7 - they ride in the countryside

am I winning?

"Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something hurtling towards me and sprang backwards just in time. A cyclist had jumped the red light and almost knocked me down as he sped across the junction."

Of course, this never happens.

Small number of a large number of cyclists are ****ing bastards shocker.

If anyone really wants to read it, there are screenshots here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/carltonreid/8239879657/

Quick time saver though, it conforms completely to the "I like cyclists but..." template:

http://aseasyasridingabike.wordpress.com/2012/09/25/the-terrible-journalists-guide-to-writing-an-article-about-bicycles/

Im sorry.

I had to go & read it.

Its a truly awful, lazy & deliberately inflammatory piece written by a sad old hack of a journo.

Im now going to go & give myself 50 lashes.. 🙁

😆

What a beautiful article!

[i][url= http://aseasyasridingabike.wordpress.com/2012/09/25/the-terrible-journalists-guide-to-writing-an-article-about-bicycles/ ]The terrible journalist’s guide to writing an article about bicycles[/url][/i] manifest. 🙂

Edit: Beaten to it by Mr Agreeable.

Anyone remember this news story from a few weeks back? Van driver in Cardiff deliberately aimed his vehicle at pedestrians, including mothers and children, killing one and seriously injuring ten others.

http://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/news/9999100.Cardiff_van_rampage_man_in_court/?ref=rss

In a day, this one psychopath caused as much injury and misery as all the cyclists in Britain do over the multiple years. However I don't recall any DM hacks leaping to point out the dangers of vans.

Daily Mail in irrational reactionary bullshit shocker!

I've got a van, don't blame me!!

Summary:

she was nearly knocked down by a cyclist jumping a red light.

therefore

[b][u]EVERY[/u][/b] cyclist is a menace, including riding the wrong way up one way streets, etc etc etc

yawn

Flatfish, luckily someone else was there to take the rap. 😉

I love that "journalists guide" article.

Attacking Melaine Phillips for being a narrow minded troll is just what she wants, even disargreeing with her views in a more rational way gives her the publicity she desires.

But highlighting how shoddy she is as a journalist has more clout, particularly at a time when shoody journlaism is getting a bit of a pasting at the hands of Levenson et al.

Does this make the Daily Wail a pro-van paper?

I was nearly knocked down by a woman with a pram once. They really should license pram pushers. They have no insurance and could scratch my car if I hit one.

Don't get me started on blind people with their white sticks.

Daily Mail et al = place where haters hate cyclists

STW = place that hates people who hate cyclists

And it ain't ever going to change, ever. For the evidence see the comments in best rated order.

The problem with these articles is that they reinforce the impression that the problems with cycle safety would disappear, if only cyclists cleaned up their act.

There's been one study to date which seriously attempted to examine the causes of cycle/car collisions and it found that bad behaviour wasn't anything like as much of a factor as expected.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/dec/15/cycling-bike-accidents-study

Yes but that is in the Guardian, have a guess how many Dail Wail readers will read that? Even if by chance they did it won't align with their world view and so will be dismissed.

Opps

Epically lazy writing. Must have had a deadline approaching.

There's a difference between an opinion (like a link-bait piece in the DM) and an evidence-based study, like the DFT one referred to in that report.

Most people in a position to make policies give more weight to the latter. Hence why we don't have capital punishment, sealed borders, mandatory helmets or number plates for bikes.

Class prejudice using cycling as an excuse!
She forgets Brad Wiggins grew up in a local authority flat in North London...

m.phillips@**** I think a few rational and well presented emails correcting her "facts" would help...

Cyclo fascist Mamils - I like that, a fair number of them on here, I wonder if I wrote and pointed out they're all football fans as well. 😀

Apparently even the documantary which is due on TV later this week includes commercial footage of messengers manically ripping about presented as 'normal London cycling'
I don't understand why some people have such an anti-cycling agenda. Surely the whole country can't listen to the Jeremies.
Hopefully it is merely another attempt by our [unregulated] media to generate sales.

[i]m.phillips@**** I think a few rational and well presented emails correcting her "facts" would help... [/i]
Nooooooo! You do understand how this sort of thing works don't you?

http://brackenworld.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/i-was-almost-knocked-down-and-other.html

wrecker - Member
Want to know why she's bitter? Go to google images. She's no looker.

🙄

Class prejudice using cycling as an excuse!
She forgets Brad Wiggins grew up in a local authority flat in North London...

What's class got to do with the price of fish?

I said it in one of the previous one of these threads, cycling is seen as a "Lefty" activity somehow, it's image being tied up with "eco-credentials" and the apparently un-self conscious wearing of "day-glo spandex" meaning that if you want a group to pick on, and your readership are broadly speaking right wing in their views, you can't go far wrong with people on bikes, they neatly embody all sorts of prejudices... Hence these articles make ideal click bait but have no real baring on any real debate.

Of course I still don't believe road cycling safety is or should be a political issue, in so much as it's not really a debatable concept; safer roads with fewer dead or injured cyclists would be a good thing, end of the debate, now how do we achieve such a Nirvana?

I think it's something more primal. Guilt.

Car drivers resent cyclists because they represent all the goodness they could be but choose not to be. We are better than them and they hate themselves for it 🙂

*goes to check "incitement to violence in UK law"......*

For anyone considering looking up the article on the DM website, let the immortal phrase of cyclegaz shake you back to your senses

[b]OOOOOOOOOOOIIIIIIIIIII! WHATAREYOUDOOOOOOOOOOOOOIIIIN?[/b]

"Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something hurtling towards me and sprang backwards just in time. A cyclist had jumped the red light and almost knocked me down as he sped across the junction."

Of course, this never happens.

Be fair, you're on your bike, you see Melanie Philips, just there in front of you, no body guards, walking out into the road, all vulnerable...

Could you honestly resist the urge to try and get her... could you? not sure I could...

She forgot to mention these two tragic incidents - 2 pedestrians killed by car drivers within a week:

[url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-20572799 ]Dead pedestrian hit by car #1[/url]

[url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-20552320 ]Dead pedestrian hit by car #2[/url]

do they have editorial meetings about these things?

"Right item 7, who's doing the the clickbait piece this week and which minority will you be bashing?.... Melanie, alright then, only been a couple weeks since the last cyclist one but yeah they're always good for a laugh go for it"

Read (the Flickr scan) up to [i]"Although I don't own a bicycle I enjoy... cycling".[/i] That made me frown so hard I couldn't see past my eyebrows.

I tried. But I couldn't summon any anger towards that [s]article[/s] crap at all.

3/10

I daren't read the comments though.

do they have editorial meetings about these things?

"Right item 7, who's doing the the clickbait piece this week and which minority will you be bashing?.... Melanie, alright then, only been a couple weeks since the last cyclist one but yeah they're always good for a laugh go for it"

Good question, and is the online click-bait crap taken as seriously as the printed output by all concerned? Writers, Editors, the PCC?

Did the Levenson inquiry & report extend as far as looking at the publishing of un-researched, inflamatory toss online rather than just that in a "Proper" paper?

I'm just reading the comments 😯

What people say on the internet should always be taken with a pinch/bag of salt, i'd love to actually meet some of these people.

Edit: I only too 5 separate comments to get me annoyed. Their views are just so wrong it's not even funny!

Their views are just so wrong it's not even funny!

Good thing they all live on the Costa Del Sol then. 😉

The comments are hilarious!

Another poor article in the Independent at the weekend (possibly even worse because it was written by a cyclist). You can find it via Google if you are really desperate.
Much as it pains me to give any credit to the heart of darkness, News International, the Times campaign for safer cycling actually seems to be a sustained and serious pro-cycling effort. Interestingly, one of the driving forces behind this was the death of a Times journalist in a cycling incident; i.e. people could identify with the victim. Melanie Philips and the Daily Hate can only peddle their lazy click baiting while there is still a significant division between cyclists and non-cyclists in this country, and cyclists can be portrayed as the dangerous minority "others" (like immigrants, gypsies, etc). Once you get to critical mass (like Holland) you won't get away with this any more, because your readership will all know partners, children, friends and relatives who cycle, or will cycle themselvers.

The comments are hilarious!

You reading the article = Daily Mail's business model.

[url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01p7q2l ]bbc1 Wed @ 9 war on our roads[/url]

Have to hold my hand up to nearly squashing a cyclist whilst driving through Stockport last Mon 🙄
I had already overtaken him a few times as we crawled through the traffic. Not being familiar with the roads I was busy concentrating on the traffic, where I was going and looking for signposts and it was chucking it down and getting darker. The guy on the bike was dressed in black, no lights and had a black polly bag clamped to the bars with his right hand!! Being aware that he would be passing me again as I stopped at a set of traffic lights I was looking in my door mirror for him coming up on my inside. There was a white van on my right and as you can imagine I got a bit of a fright as th e guy appeared in the corner of my eye between us just as the lights changed to green 😳
Anyway he got away with that manoeuvre ❗
At the next set of lights he proceeded down my inside and promptly rode through the red lights nearly rear ending a bus which he obviously didn't see stopping as he avoided the car coming at him from his right........

Melanie Philips has views that differ from mine on many issues.

Cyclists are a fairly small minority in the UK, that's all there is to it. Other minorities also suffer at the hands of bigots and the ignorant majority, often in a more serious way.

The Daily Mail sells almost 2 million papers daily -Even though that's not a large portion of the population, that is a lot of ignorant people filled with hate (for whatever the target is that day), fears for their health and fears for their safety from criminals after breakfast.

Only The Sun sells more.

Many, many people around the world apparently also view their "news"/royals/slightly famous people in bikinis website.

Like it or not, their output reaches a lot of people. At least it's not the Express.

Casting an eye over the front pages of the tabloids in the newsagents does make me question the minds of the general population.

I just dont bother with these any more, apparently there was a similar 'article' in the express last week which I also didn't read. Its amazing how people on bikes being mildly irritating causes national outrage but the woeful driving standards on display everywhere you go is barely worthy of a comment. The country's full of morons.

m.phillips@**** I think a few rational and well presented emails correcting her "facts" would help...

I suspect signing her up for some stuff would help more - or if not, it would at least be more satisfying.

I suspect signing her up for some stuff would help more

Good idea. I've bought her a subscription to Singletrack.

That'll learn her.

Car drivers resent cyclists because they represent all the goodness they could be but choose not to be. We are better than them and they hate themselves for it

No they don't don't....they hate cyclists because they get in the f*****g way!

Surely there must be car drivers who ride bikes? (apart from me?)

No they don't don't....they hate cyclists because they [b]think that they[/b] get in the f*****g way! [b]but they don't really[/b]

Fixed that for you. You've confused "slows them down down briefly between queues of traffic" and "makes an actual difference to their overall journey time".