[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V83XKkVYZ-I[/video]

I often ride through that junction on my Brompton. I’m not a dick like the dick in his video though.

DICK!

Hat tip to BikeSnob.

Why bother wearing a helmet with the strap that loose?

Tosser, the guy filming should pushed him off.

In a way I feel sorry for people like that. I’ve known a few. They can’t see it’s their own behaviour that leads them into conflict and problems all the time. They just carry on crashing through life behaving like toddlers, from one crappy situation to another, totally unaware…

I love the way he’s obviously in such a hurry to get where he’s going that he jumps the red light, but then comes back to have a go because he was called an idiot (which he wasn’t as the guy said don’t be an idiot and not your an idiot) 🙄

The scary thing is that the bloke with the camera has got my voice. Very disconcerting.

Oh dear, my sympathies.

what a dick. hope he gets sideswiped by a truck

Both idiots if you ask me.

I know the law is black and white but you’re a lot less vulnerable when you’re moving and I actually think it wasn’t a particularly offensive move. However, he is def a dick to risk picking a fight like that.

He’s a knob and makes it harder for every sensible cyclist out there

I agree with this.

jambourgie – Member
Both idiots if you ask me.

+1
but the guy on the brompton needs a kicking, and I expect somebody will oblige.

crosshair – Member – Quote
I know the law is black and white but you’re a lot less vulnerable when you’re moving and I actually think it wasn’t a particularly offensive move. However, he is def a dick to risk picking a fight like that.

Being at the front of the traffic with other cyclists turning left is probably fairly safe, looks more like he just doesn’t care.
If you want respect on the road don’t brake the rules simple.

Why is the guy filming an idiot? He just ‘said what he saw’. A stoopid idiot getting drivers’ backs up by making up the rules to suit him.

Yes, it was probably a perfectly safe manoeuvre but if it had been a car doing the same no-one here would be calling the filming cyclist an idiot.

Why is the guy filming an idiot?

He forgot the basic rule, don’t argue with an idiot they will only drag you down to your level. Say your thing and ride off.

More importantly, what the **** does America have to do with it?

Rest of the world thinks it’s safe to turn on a red light. Just saying.

it was probably a perfectly safe manoeuvre but if it had been a car doing the same no-one here would be calling the filming cyclist an idiot.

But that’s because a car weighs about two tonnes. Christ, does it really need explaining?

The guy filming is an idiot because he’s calling a stranger (an idiot) an idiot. Arguing with the idiot, filming the idiot, and then posting a video of the idiot online and publicly calling him an idiot.

Rest of the world thinks it’s safe to turn on a red light. Just saying.

Tell that to the pedestrians.

The fundamental point is if you want to be treated as an equal on the roads, then you act like an equal.

Rest of the world thinks it’s safe to turn on a red light

But in America, you are supposed to come to a complete stop before turning right on red.

bencooper +1.

How can you possibly expect respect from other road users whilst blatantly ignoring the law? Most (non-cycling) car drivers don’t need much of an excuse to hate cyclists, and ploughing through a red light just adds fuel to the big, angry flames.

But that’s because a car weighs about two tonnes. Christ, does it really need explaining?

Doesn’t matter. If a car can’t jump a red light, neither can a cyclist, a horse or a bus. The law applies equally and in true British fashion, no-one likes a queue jumper. It annoys folk. It means that the next cyclist they see won’t be a human being; a dad, a son, a brother – they’ll be an effin’ red light jumping, queue-skipping bastard who doesn’t deserve to be passed safely.

Can you really not see this?! It’s not a massive leap of logic…

Yes, I do understand that argument. The last one that is, not the ‘obeying rules for the sake of it’ one.

I do feel it’s a valid point of view. But it still panders to driver stupidity. A bit like the ‘we should all ride submissively in the gutter lest it wind up some mouth-breather in a car’.

I certainly don’t agree with your ‘queue jumping’ argument. Do you not condone filtering either?

I agree that obeying rules blindly, purely for the sake of it is a bad idea – sometimes they need to be broken for the sake of safety, or because they are just plain silly.

But… have you never seen a road sign (whilst driving) telling you that the lanes merge into one in 500 yards? Then 300, then 200… And still, there is some cock overtaking almost into the line of cones, just to demonstrate the size of his penis, which is such a very large and important appendage?

That ^^^ is how drivers feel about cyclists who break the unwritten rules of polite and sensible road useage. And a Brompton is hardly the vehicle on which to make such a point. Because they’re ridiculous.

I speak as a cyclist and a driver, and am mostly pretty chilled out about British roads after experiencing the chaos of Kuala Lumpur’s roads.

Do you not condone filtering either?

Absolutely irrelevant. Filtering is legal. Jumping a red light is not.

In a way I feel sorry for people like that. I’ve known a few. They can’t see it’s their own behaviour that leads them into conflict and problems all the time.

Yup, if you call a complete stranger a ****ing idiot, it’s likely to cause conflict 😕

Would you do the same if you seen someone crossing the road without waiting for the green man?

Hmm, I do get your point. Maybe I’m just too chilled out and need to get MAD 🙂

If I’m driving, I don’t generally get too annoyed. If ‘some cock’ overtakes me because of something to do with his penis, well, whatever. I’m quite happy with my own.
As for lights, I always stop if I’m driving, but I don’t get annoyed if some guy on a bike goes through ahead of me (benefits of riding a bike eh?). If I’m on my bike, I always stop at pedestrian crossings, whether it’s safe to go through or not. I guess as some weird expression of respect to the pedestrian in general (only just realised that I do this). But that’s my choice. If I’m sat at an empty crossing on red and some guy rides straight through, that’s his choice. He’s made his own risk/moral assessment. I certainly wouldn’t shout ‘idiot’ at him 🙂
All other red lights I’ll generally go through if safe to do so.

Harrumph. In typical bloody STW fashion, everyone agrees whilst trying desperately to find a reason not to.

That said, I’d happily harangue a cyclist riding through a red light. We don’t have the privilege of deciding that because I’m on a bike, I can do exactly what I please. The rules of the road have developed through horses and carts, through to Hobby-horses, past Penny-Farthings, to motor cars and finally to modern bicycles.

I DO get annoyed if a cyclist nips through on a red light. Not because I can’t, in my car, but because the 14 cars behind me see the cyclist doing it and rev their engines in preparation to teach all cyclists a lesson.

No need to get MAD, just uphold the rules and rail at those who don’t – I reckon the guy in the OP was braver than 90% of those on here.

The really funny thing about the video is that the bloke on the Brompton gets upset about being called an idiot, and in order to complain about it he rides on the wrong side of the road back through the lights, thus proving the point.

Yeah but in the grand scheme of things, nothing’s really happened here. Did it really require being brave? It’s not like the guy in the OP is some kind of ‘have a go hero’ who’s just brought down a mugger. I’m not even sure why I’m debating this, I’m just always amazed at how utterly outraged people seem to get at each other over the littlest things.

I think this Youtube comment pretty much sums it up;

…starting to think that being a self-righteous prick has less to do with being in a car, and more just otherwise powerless peons being on a road with no immediate authority and rules they can throw at each other.? Both people itching to tell someone what for, fancy themselves in the right, and both think it’s a jolly good time calling each other names and arguing in the middle of traffic. Bravo.

Right, off to bed. Goodnight fckin idiots all.

😉

It’s the STW equivalent of a row in a kebab house.

Breaking the rules of the road is pretty cockish but I can’t help thinking calling strangers f@&£
Ing idiots and posting videos of it is even more so.

anyone riding a Brompton deserves a bloody thick ear…..imho 😀

IanW – Member
Breaking the rules of the road is pretty cockish but I can’t help thinking calling strangers f@&£
Ing idiots and posting videos of it is even more so.

He didn’t actually swear. He said don’t be an idiot very different.

He’s a knob and makes it harder for every sensible cyclist out there

If you want respect on the road don’t brake the rules simple.

OK, I’ll bite.
I don’t see why my safety should depend on that. The guy is a cock, yes. It’s a blatant charge straight through but he didn’t send grannies diving for cover, didn’t hospitalise a dozen kids.

I see hundreds of drivers breaking the law every day. RLJ, speeding, using handheld mobile phones, etc. No-one ever suggests that gives all drivers “a bad name”. No-one says that all pedestrians have “a bad name” just cos a few idiots walk across on red. Why is it so acceptable to be this angry and hateful of one entire group of road users simply because of a few idiots? (and don’t get me wrong, that was a properly cockish move).

In no other branch of society is this reaction tolerated. If I said that all black people “have a bad name” because I once saw a group of black people beat someone up, I’d be hauled up on race hate charges within minutes! (That’s a true example, it was in Brixton (just to complete the stereotype) and I’ve never run so fast in my life to get away from it all!).

I see the way of thinking that gets people to that point. I just think extrapolating the behaviour of one **** onto a group is an even worse thing to do.

User_removed- studies have shown that filling up a filtering lane results in all the traffic getting through faster with less congestion so the people going all the way to the end of the filter lane are the sensible ones. I bet you’re one of the arrogant knobs that block both lanes like a road warrior.

2am, on your way home from the airport, you get to a normally busy roundabout whose traffic lights are timed for peak traffic. Do you all sit at the now pointless set of red lights??? I know what I do.
What happened to cyclists dismounting and pushing their bikes through a red on the pavement too, or is being a Ped just too uncool these days 😀

Nobody died. Move along.

To be honest I wanted too see the light jumper smack the whiny voiced toss pot in the face. Both dickheads, just for different reasons.

what kind of sad to55 pot rides around on his bike, filming other cyclists, doing stuff wrong?
I would have ripped his camera off his head, and smashed it on the ground. nicely tho…….. 😀

Since we’ve moved on to filtering, I wrote this on my blog last night:

Filtering – the practice of passing a line of stationary traffic on your bike – is often advised as good practice and even officially encouraged with advanced stop lanes and other road markings. But is it?

This thought was brought on by an incident today – I was driving a bunch of frame parts to the powdercoaters so using my car. On a dual carriageway I passed a cyclist, courteously giving him a whole lane. A few hundred yards further on there was a red light. The cyclist approached, and with no other traffic on the road he passed my car and stopped in front. Then, when the light changed I had to pass him again.

No big deal? Yes. But annoying and discourteous. He gained nothing apart from one car length.

When I cycle, I rarely filter – it just seems rude to squeeze past cars which will just have to squeeze past me in a minute. We all, as cyclists, find it silly and annoying when a car squeezes past then gets stuck in the next traffic jam. But cyclists who filter through free-moving traffic do the same thing.

So am I saying one should never filter? No, of course not – one big joy of commuting by bike is that you’re free of traffic jams, able to move at your own pace. But more judgement is a good idea – don’t automatically squeeze to the front of a queue, if we want to be treated like traffic we should behave like it, and that includes being “fair”.