I was at the Critical Mass that evening. Three hours into the ride I came upon the scene in question just shy of Japan town. When I arrived there were a few woman shouting obscenities to the driver pounding on her hood ,taking pictures,etc. The driver was not doing anything and she was in shock from my point of view. Maximum amount of people when I was present was 6, no more no less. Cop approached on a motorcycle then i left the scene. I didn't know of the outcome until 3 days later when it hit the paper. I myself did not see anyone injured at the scene so I don't see why this happened. The B*^&$# on bikes who did this definitely don't represent myself or others by their actions, however, they do contradict what critical mass stands for, period. Road rage is road rage whether you are in a car or on a bike. I hope those responsible for this get punished to the fullest extent of the law. Next month if this kind of s*!7 goes down I will bringing my own form of frontier justice upon those who pull this kind of crap. This is not a joke but a promise. If those who are responsible for this are reading this just try me. I know what you look like!

jim-bob, you "hateful little monkey" (your tagline)...the meaning of my "Rock Hard ~ Ride Free" tagline is that it's an awesome song and does have a cool double-meaning for those into riding motorcycles and bicycles. Critical Mass does not have a beneficial effect on decent, taxpaying, law-abiding riders. Their actions cause people in cars to resent people on two wheels.

The last CM I attended was in SF in '96. Full of morons then, full of morons now.

I want you to read what you just wrote very, very carefully.

ahem ahem um the mom and daughter in front pics no joke they're real- not so loud they do have ears you know.

:lol:

please dont turn this thread into an argument over critical mass and "civil disobedience."

i was wondering if i'd have to point that out, or when someone else would catch it.

This is the whole story IMHO.... " Police said she might have inadvertently tapped one of the bicyclists' tires.

Bicyclists who witnessed the event countered that Ferrando had accelerated recklessly through a crowd of riders, hitting one and knocking him from his bike, then attempted to flee the scene before riders surrounded the vehicle. They complained that police didn't charge her with a crime."

The police certainly DO NOT like CM. So they are certainly going to look the other way if a car comes in and some fat women is aggressive towards the cyclists. This lady I believe acted aggressively and got what she had coming to her. She endangered her own kids and blamed it on the cyclists. She knocked someone from a bike and no one gives a ****e about it except the cyclists that saw it. It is this way most places.

In the end of all this media, the cyclists will lose and that is and has been the way for years and years. Even here people are siding with the dumb women that hit a cyclist. We are always at fault in the public eye and even here we are at fault.

I think the key part to this equation is not the politics or the road rage, but the psychology of a crowd. CM is a crowd and behaves differently that an assembly of individuals.
A little outdated, but Gustav le Bon had some interesting things to say about it.

(sorry about the nerdery, I'm doing schoolwork)

Crowd theory and how it relates here could be an awesome paper.

The "victim" obviously didnt care too much either since they didnt exchange information, didnt wait for the police, and stated they were fine before they took off. However, I do like how you are able to construct a whole chain of factual events based purely on your opinion.

I'm dying to hear how he explains that comment.

he quoted this article. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...NGFAP353S1.DTL

the one about the "victim" doing a hit and run and knocking the guy off his bike, then trying to get away before the other cm riders caught up. not based on opinion.

Wow, I honestly didnt even see those quotes (been awake 2 days). My point still stands that you cant argue no one cares when the original victim obviously didnt either. After seeing this video I wonder if they tried to stop her when they first saw the erratic driving and why/how did the biker leave after the accident.

this is for dustin (taken from Burd on FGG forum)
http://www.grinderbikes.com/mobgirls.jpg

i was kinda being sarcastic. i think everyone in the situation is at fault, on both sides. i was just mocking the womans passionate "there are chiiilldren in this car!!" monologue.

personally i try to stay as far away from cm as i can, but thats mostly cuz I dont really enjoy playing a 2 hour game of footdown

dudebro misspelled Capisce.

Every month, I enjoy CM for about 10 minutes (talk to people I haven't seen in a while) and then I get really depressed for the rest of it because there's always the car that tries swerving through everyone and taps someone and then the ride nearly splits in two as everyone swarms the car and starts yelling and hitting it. So yeah, that SF story happens every month here basically.

That story is soooo ****ing good. I got such an amazing mental image of a bunch of mad max style cyclists with swinging chains and battle axes chasing down a minivan filled with a family of trashy suburbanites.

That news piece is quite a joke. First, the one woman with glasses was there and she was way out of control from my point of view. Second, that woman with the neon yellow jacket wasn't even at the scene.Hmmm...Third, like I said from in my previous post there was no one hit or lying on the ground etc. At this point in time it looks like a bunch of D!(% Heads trying to save face after acting like animals. If that would have been me in that van surrounded by hooligans there would have definitely been people lying on the ground with tread marks. Don't f#(% with someones family, period!

I wonder if CrazyHorse is enjoying the free air time. You'd think SFBC would want to conduct their interview a little further from their offices in the Tenderloin, just for appearances.

i got 20 says those kids wouldn't have been so quick with the u-locks if it had been a man instead of a woman and two kids. chicken**** to wil out on a chick with kids - bottom line

looks like the van has tinted windows. i doubt the bikers had any idea

sorry adam, i'm not buying that. vans with smoked glass aren't full-on gangsta tints that you can't see through, and the law prevents windshields from being tinted at all.

whatever though - i feel like CM brings out the worst in everyone, drivers and cyclists. it's a confrontational thing, and tempers get heated, people do things they normally wouldn't. i really feel it's now totally counter-productive, sets cops against cyclists in general, pisses people off in general, and achieves absolutely nothing positive to offset that.

Isn't the A and S forum up there somewheres? (huge thread there already)

to say Critical Mass is a political event anymore is a pretty thin statement. it seems that a majority of participants could care less about any sort of political action or message, they are simply out to take back a bit of authority for all the times they've been threatened by a car.

The woman was obviously freaked out, swarmed by droves of cyclists @ 9pm? She was scared, she tried to leave the 'scene' because its obviously no place for a car. Cyclists swarm, they get bumped, and there's the excuse to exact 'revenge.' Its a shame that both parties are trying to spin themselves into victims.

Both should take responsibility, and we should all look forward to this happening again next month... I'll see you there!

i'm willing to bet that on the bike side, there was one escalator with a u-lock, a dozen angry people, and a few hundred people acting perfectly rational.

i'm also willing to bet that on the car side, there was one person driving in a threatening and possibly dangerous manner.

who's to say what any of us would have done in any of those shoes?

maybe, just maybe, those of us who weren't there can withhold the harsh judgement.

it's not harsh to say that this kind of publicity tars us all as cyclists. clearly no-one was hurt, whatever the nature of the "collision," and attacking a car with women and kids in it is lame. it doesn't help anyone advocating for cyclist rights, it reinforces the negative perception the cops have of cyclists, and if i get hit on my bike i want the cops who come to the scene to be supportive of my claims, not assuming i'm some kind of radical ne'er-do-well who got what was coming to him

hoard mentality is a hellofa drug.