This, 1000x this.

Effective Advocacy is not a blind argument about who has the rights, but is a smart discourse on how to improve the situation for everyone involved. Jumping on here and calling someone an idiot for taking an serious risk that they had the 'right' to do just doesn't qualify as Smart Discourse.

FWIW, I struggle with the very issue here. My commute to work this time of year makes the use of 2 miles of MUP an iffy situation at best, but the road options are either VERY narrow with poor visibility, or wide enough (single lanes each direction, with 12-24 inch shoulders), but with a 55mph speed limit. Right now, it is dark on the way to the office in the morning, in a week, it will be dark on the way home. Either way, I have to make these same choices.

Part of me worries about those drivers, and I am lit up like a xmas tree ( I generally run with two 300 lumen rear facing red lights, and a single forward facing white at 750 lumens and significant reflective surface on my gear, complete with safety yellow reflective vest ). I see other cyclists on these roads with nothing but factor supplied reflectors riding at dawn and dusk all the time, but here is the thing. As a cyclist, I see them *because I am looking for them*. I do not think most non-cyclists actually process what they are seeing, and are then startled when they get close to a cyclist. Startled turns into anger, and we get cyclist hate.

As an advocate, part of my job is to help those drivers learn to process what they see sooner and safer. At the same time, I need to educate those other cyclists on mitigating the risks. Yes you have the right to that road. Yes, you have the right to that lane. Yes, in a car vs bike crash it probably won't be much comfort that you had those rights. So part of advocacy is not education, but prudently using your rights for education, while still protecting yourself when the situation warrants it.

And finally, I want every advocate to consider the following. In the US, we have given up massive civil liberties over the last 20 years in the name of protecting people from Drunk Drivers on behalf of a relatively small group of 'Concerned Citizens'. Why is that? because of an extremely effective, directed and SMART advocacy program that was spearheaded by MADD. They didn't bring change by getting out on the roads near bars and letting drunk drivers hit them. They put grisly pictures of children killed by drunk drivers in front of a huge number of people. They got up on every stage they could and beat their chests about how dangerous these menaces to our children were. They wrote, proposed and lobbied with every politician that they could to get laws enacted to put the fear of the law into the drivers.

IT took years, but they did it. A DUI can be a career killer. It can costs 10's of thousands of dollars. It acts as instant escalator in judging the severity of an accident. IT carries a social stigma that far outweighs other serious offenses.

Right or wrong, if you want to get serious about bicycle advocacy, there is your model.