more cyclist-haters

The following letter was written to NOW Magazine this week, in response to this article about the death of a 31-year-old cyclist riding his bike home to help his daughters with their Halloween costumes, not 5 minutes from my home. I hope I am not giving any sort of credence to the letter by reprinting it, but I'm feeling a need for some sort of release.

Cyclists make good hood art despite your furry-headed sense of entitlement, city roads were not made for cyclists, but for a little invention we call the automobile. If you want to play with your bicycle, go to a park, ride along a bike path and ring your little bell. Have fun just leave the streets to people engaged in adult pursuits such as earning a living.
Bicycling Luddites at play in the 21st century are destined, nay begging, to become hood ornaments. Dingaling. Andrew Matheson Toronto

At first I felt angry, as in Andrew Matheson had better hope I never meet him in an alleyway or identify his car somehow. But the anger passed quickly as it usually does on the rare occasions when I feel personally threatened or insulted, especially once I realized there are many Andrew Mathesons and there's a good chance it's a pseudonym anyways. As I finish writing this note, I just feel that the most productive thing to do is ignore Andrew and his likes when they open their mouths or expose their ugly thoughts, and stay as far away as possible when they are behind the wheel of an automobile. You can't reason with them. One good thing to come out of this, at least, is that I immediately feel a little more solidarity and closeness with every other cyclist. Ride on.