Have You Experienced A Hate Crime On Your Bike?

What do lynching, gay-bashing, rape and child molestation have in common?

The perpetrators of these crimes see their victims as less human than themselves.  That is one reason why lynchings and attacks against LGBT people are classified as hate crimes:  Seeing someone as less human than one's self is, to my mind, a pretty good working definition of "hate".  For that reason, I would also classify rape,child molestation and domestic violence in the same way.

And acts of aggression by motor vehicles against cyclists.

Now, I have long felt this way.  But now a study from Australia could give lawmakers good reason to classify motorists who deliberately run cyclists off the road in the same category as those who harass or assault immigrants.




Researchers from Queensland University of Technology, Monash University and the University of Melbourne studied 442 people in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.  

The subjects were first asked whether or not they were cyclists.  Then they were shown one of two images:  one showing the evolution of ape to human, or another showing stages of evolution from a cockroach to human.  That second image was designed, according to Alexa Debosc (the study's lead author) because some cyclists reported slurs in which they were compared to mosquitoes, cockroaches or other insects.  The images were given to the subjects at random.



Perhaps not surprisingly, a far greater percentage of non-cyclists than cyclists rated cyclists as not fully human.  Moreover, non-cyclists were much more likely to put cyclists on the ape or insect (depending on which image they were shown) end of the "spectrum" rather than somewhere in the middle.  Whether the subjects were shown the ape-human or insect-human images, the percentages of subjects who saw cyclists as less than fully human was just about the same.

Perhaps even less surprisingly, non-cyclists were far more likely to engage in harassment of cyclists (e.g., shouting or making rude gestures at us) as well as acts of direct aggression such as throwing an object, driving too close or using a car to deliberately block or cut off a cyclist.

In their report, the researchers acknowledge some inherent biases, as young, high-income males were over-represented at least in comparison to their proportion in the overall Australian population.  It's a lot easier for those with wealth or other kinds of privilege to dehumanize those who lack them:  That is why, for example, members of racial minorities and immigrants are so stigmatized.  

That acknowledgment, however, allows the researchers to draw the parallel I've made between the dehumanization of cyclists by motorists and of minority groups, such as Mexicans and blacks in the US or Arabs and Aborigines in Australia.  That is a very important point because, as the researchers point out, it isn't enough simply to "encourage positive attitudes" in order to curb aggression. (Too many diversity programs, trainings and policies do just that or, worse, try to bully, coerce or intimidate people into such attitudes.)  A better course of action, the researchers say, is to put a human face on cyclists:  Just as prejudice against, say, Muslims or gays results from other people seeing them as monolithic, hostility against cyclists comes from motorists seeing us as lycra-clad law-flouting machines that whiz by them.  

And reducing prejudice, and the resulting aggression, against cyclists or other groups of people could also halt a self-fufilling prophecy.  People who are dehumanized and, as a result, experience prejudice and hostility too often feel resentment and even hate against those who dehumanize them. (I plead guilty to that!)  That, in turn, causes victims to act aggressively, sometimes in collective ways, which helps to reinforce the attitudes of their dehumanizers.  In brief, victims of hate crimes sometimes hate back.  

Of course, one of the reasons why the hated hate the haters is that the haters' crimes are too often punished lightly, if at all because they are not treated as hate crimes.  I can hardly think of a better example than the driver who injures or kills a cyclist by running him or her off the road and gets off scot-free.

Call Me Paranoid, But....

You get pulled over, whether you're cycling or driving, even though you're within the speed limit and aren't violating any other laws.  Or a sales clerk follows you around a department store when you don't have any of the store's merchandise on you.  Or you don't get a promotion or raise given to someone who is, or seems, no better or worse an employee than you.  Or, worse, you're summoned into the HR office at your workplace to defend yourself against questionable or simply false allegations.

After such experiences, you might wonder, "Why me?"  If you are a member of a group of people who lives under suspicion--say, you are a young black male or someone who is, or merely "looks", Muslim or Middle Eastern--or merely someone who looks like you're "not from around here", you can't help but to think that your appearance or identity might have something to do with it.  And, in the workplace situations I've described, you can't help but to believe--too often, with justification (Trust me, I've been in such situations!) that someone in your organization "has it in for you" just because of who you are.

It's easy to feel the things I've described in the previous paragraph if you are cycling, particularly in some place where there aren't many adult cyclists or where people are, for whatever reasons, hostile to cyclists.  Or, worse, if you encounter some traffic cop on a motorcycle who has nothing better to do and, being on a bike, you are an easier target in his quest to make his ticket quota for that month.

Lately, other cyclists and I have felt a similar kind of unease--some might call it paranoia.  Within the past week or so, a number of localities have passed, or merely discussed, ordinances that have no other purpose than to harass, or simply discourage, cyclists.  And it's hard not to wonder whether the inauguration of Trump has something to do with it:  Could velophobic legislators and law enforcement officials feel empowered by the Bike Hater-in-Chief in much the same way xenophobes and bigots have felt emboldened to carry out acts of hate?

I want to thank dear reader Coline--who lives in Scotland, no less!--for pointing out two of the latest pieces of legislative lunacy.

The first comes from the state of Montana, where there is a draft bill that, if passed, would ban cyclists from riding on two-lane country roads that lack shoulders. Now, I have never been to Montana, but the article Coline sent me corroborates what I've heard from people who've been to The Treasure State:  most of the state's roads--and, basically, all of the roads outside of the towns (aside from the Interstates)--fit that description.  What that means, of course, is that cycling would be off-limits in much of the state.

What sort of message does that send to some fourteen- or fifteen-year-old in a state that is already automobile-centric?  If that kid can't get from one town or another--let alone ride for fun--he or she is likely to say, "To hell with it; I'll have my license soon!"  And, of course, such a ban would deter folks who might have considered a vacation there.  Personally, I wouldn't want to take a trip somewhere if I couldn't ride--unless I were going, say, to climb a mountain or hike a glacier.

Roads like this could soon be off-limits to cyclists in Montana.

The bill also contains another stipulation that would discourage riding:  Cyclists always have to ride single-file, no matter how large their group or how wide the road.  Hmm...Isn't discouraging social interaction among people of a group, or in a particular situation (such a workplace), the easiest way to "divide and conquer"?  That, of course, is what tyrants have always done to exert power over people they want to subjugate.  (Why do you think the slave-merchants brought people from different African clans and tribes aboard their ships?  Those captives didn't speak each other's languages and therefore were kept in a captivity even more pernicious than the chains that bound them.)

Will Montana's new motto be "Where Cycling Died"? 

The second authoritarian absurdity to which Coline alerted me comes from California.  Actually, it falls best into the category of nanny-state nonsense.  While Montana's bill is not yet up for a vote, the ridiculous regulation I'm about to describe became law in the Golden State on the first day of this year.  

Section 27400 of the California Vehicle Code prohibits a person from wearing "a headset covering, earplugs in or earphones covering , resting on or inserted in both ears" while cycling.  It calls for a fine of $178 for a violation.

Now, I want to say that I never ride with any sort of listening device in my ears.  When I'm riding in traffic, I want to be as alert as I can be to traffic and other parts of my surroundings.  When I'm riding in a more bucolic area, I prefer to listen to ambient sounds such as tides and wind or, if there are no such sounds, to simply enjoy the silence.  If I am riding with other cyclists, I cannot interact with them if my ears are plugged and Metallica or whatever is blaring in them.


That said, I can think of no reason to outlaw ear peices or headphones for cyclists.  As the article I've linked explains, if the practice poses any danger, it's only to the cyclists themselves.  Also, as the article points out, there are clusters of cyclists who wear devices while riding. They include urban areas where people are riding to work, doing errands or taking their kids to the park.  They also include college campuses.  Such places are easy targets for police officers who are over-zealous or simply see an easy target.  I don't think it's a stretch to say that the law, like those against loitering (which can be interpreted in all sorts of ways) targets people who have little wealth and power.  In other words, it's a law after Trump's own heart!