Biker Hit and Killed by Moron
Tragically, a cyclist was struck and killed by two numbskulls playing Windy City brand street style bumper cars on Diversey Avenue last month. The story can be found here (http://www.
Getting in the middle of a car accident is something that has almost happened to me a couple of times and is in my Top 3 Biking Fears. There is no way to prevent it, prepare for it, see it coming, or stop it, and it seems like the consequences would be extreme, as they were in this case. And not only was this an incident where a collision between cars inadvertently caused a cyclist’s death, the cause of the “accident” was a couple of road-raging hotheads using their vans as weapons to ram one another. People can yell and scream about how bikers are a menace to society, but I dare someone to use their bike as a battering ram. I’m thinking it would turn out poorly for everyone involved.
But besides highlighting the unforeseen dangers of urban cycling, like weapon-grade Aerostar vans, there is another issue here. Picking up the Redeye to read the story, I immediately noticed that they made the victim out to be less than an ideal gentleman. The author for some reason made sure to mention the cyclist’s previous drug use and the fact that he was unemployed. Here are some excerpts from the story since it isn’t online-
“…an easy going 32-year-old who’d been trying to turn his life around”
“Livingstone, who grew up in Logan Square, had struggled with drugs…”
“‘He was down on his luck,’ said his aunt…”
Now this raised an eyebrow for me, because back in September, a bike messenger in Toronto was struck and killed by a former Canadian attorney general, and after the story broke, the media began to subtly smear the victim by bringing up his rocky past, which included drug and alcohol use.
In this instance, not all papers are reporting the fact that the victim used drugs in the past. The Sun-Times reported the story with no mention of drug or alcohol use because uhhhh duhhhhh Redeye, they didn’t play any kind of factor in the accident.
So this leaves me the question of why the Redeye felt it was necessary to bring up totally irrelevant information of drug use. That aspect isn’t relevant to anything, and does nothing more than to cast a less than favorable light on the person that just had a terrible tragedy occur to them. Now, in a perfect world, I would be okay with brutally honest reporting. Make the person out for what they were, what happened to them, and be one hundred percent truthful. Unfortunately, none of that applies to 2009 America. The media creates narratives for the average person to grasp, and sloppy and biased reporting plays into pre-existing prejudices and common perceptions of the way people think the world is.
And that is where I am coming from in objecting to the Redeye, and their parent company, the Tribune, report of this incident. According to the mainstream mentality, cyclists don’t have the best reputation. In the suburbs I have been pulled over by the police just riding my bicycle a couple of blocks. Because out in the unenlightened boonies, people commonly think that anyone riding a bicycle for a form of transportation is either a criminal, too poor to afford a car, or an alcoholic that lost their license. Similarly, last year I visited a good friend while he was going to school in Puerto Rico. He had just set up the university’s first cycling club to encourage biking in an increasingly car-orientated culture. Unfortunately, he was having a hell of time convincing the locals to ride their bikes, because in Puerto Rico, popular opinion was that only destitute people and crack heads rode their bicycles. Down there in those humid, up in coming suburban sprawls, it was more respectable to gallop your horse around town than pedal to the bodega. Just back here at home, the common perceptions of things were getting in the way of progressive ideas.
But let’s not just point the finger at the media and start crying like little babies. Ask yourself, “What am I doing to help the image of cyclists?” Do you really care enough about cycling to make yourself an example to others, or do you just want to revel in the “rebellious” atmosphere, looking cool to freshman Columbia co-eds? How are you helping the cause? Are you destroying prejudices against messengers, or helping to proliferate them? Because the corporations would love nothing more than to keep using us as cheap and expendable labor, throwing us crumbs from their overflowing tables of profit margins. And by making cyclists, and to a further extent messengers, unsympathetic characters, the powers that be have an easier job perpetrating their exploitation of us. So like they say, if you can’t join them, beat ‘em, by being smarter, faster, stronger, and generally superior to the opposition.
Our sympathies go out to the loved ones of Mr. Livingston. An injury to one is an injury to all.
Written by BTB (Bottom Tax-Bracket)
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