There are only so many more braindead, agenda-fueled smug remarks I can deal with at this point and I’ve lost all hope of changing most of these people. Just this evening I commented a one sentence defense of China’s foreign policy on reddit only to get every single one of my comments from the past week bombarded by a guy spamming Taiwan emojis and calling me a “CCP slave girl who should go to the Xinjiang rape camps”. It’s tiring
I’ve noticed that when people complain about systemic issues they come at it from an individual perspective. As in the problems they face aren’t because of the system we have now, but because of the individual’s decisions. For example: A guy I “know” was complaining about traffic and driving; angry at pedestrians wearing hoodies and headphones (not jay-walking), new driver stickers giving people excuses to be stupid (his words not mine), and just complaints like that. Instead of realizing that the way our city and streets are designed is incredibly anti-pedestrian and cyclist; instead of building infrastructure that is safe and accessible (also better public transit) our city accommodates personal motorized vehicles (e.g. adding more lanes, slip-lanes, turning right on red, the worst crosswalks, etc.). When accidents happen, the first thing people bring up is: well what was the non-driving person doing wrong?
Again, people believe that the problems they experience are personal choices rather than systemic issues that make life harder.
You must like the ‘not just bikes’ series on youtube.
I live in the Netherlands and one of the few remaining things that isn’t going down the drain here is our pro-cyclist, pro-pedestrian safety-first-by-design infrastructure.
I love Not Just Bikes!
It’s the only thing I miss since moving out of The Netherlands. Belgian cycling is just not the same.
I know what you mean, I know people who do this. The most common example is people blaming others for gambling or addiction without recognising the conditions that encourage or lead to those pitfalls.