Why American drivers so often want to give you a lesson?

[Max_NYC]

I'm originally from Europe. Here in the US, too often, when you ride your bike and do something illegal yet not dangerous except for yourself maybe (am I putting the life of a truck driver in danger when I cross a double yellow line and pass him on a quiet country road?), drivers try to "retaliate" (yes, like they were first attacked) by doing something extremely dangerous to you.

Some people in this country really don't wait for the police to enforce the law, they also immediatly judge you as the worst criminal and condemn you to death penalty if necessary. (No witness on this quiet road, so who will ever know what really happened to this dead rider, uh?)
Just because I'm slightly outlaw sometimes (doing lane splitting in slow moving traffic, passing and crossing a double yellow line once in a while on a quiet road), some people in their cars/trucks not only try to scare me, they really try to kill me. I saved my life this weekend only because of a combination of luck and skills. Somebody wanted to give me a lesson and tried to make me go down (cutting me off, badly, really badly). What could I have done? Get into a fight as I did something illegal in the first place? Well instead I stopped on the side of the road to smoke a cigarette and calm me down.
I wonder what the police/justice would say in that kind of situation: you cross a double yellow line to pass a car (ok, illegal), some other decerebrate driver who saw the scene tries to make you go down in response. I call my move a moving violation (3, 4 points in NY state?), I call the decerebrate drivers' move an assassination attempt. Can one report that kind of road rage behavior to the police or they won't care, since I'm doing something illegal in the first place?

[7-1050]

***** em dude.
Don't worry about the idiots out there.
If I were bothered by every idiot I came across on a daily basis who almost killed me I'd be so stressed out I'd kill myself!

[Catenaccio]

We, they are all idiots at some point. However, your observations are sadly spot on.

[roadkill]

I can vouch for this. It happens quite frequently. Alot of people are ignorant.


Hows that saying go

Misery loves company?


Some people will try to kill, thats for sure. Jerk offs

[motorep]

Max, it's New York. New Yorkers are like that regardless of what they're doing- driving, walking, fishing, whatever. Yougottaproblemwidat?

former 10804

[w00ht]

On 2007-05-30 17:01, Max_NYC wrote:
I wonder what the police/justice would say in that kind of situation: you cross a double yellow line to pass a car (ok, illegal), some other decerebrate driver who saw the scene tries to make you go down in response. I call my move a moving violation (3, 4 points in NY state?), I call the decerebrate drivers' move an assassination attempt. Can one report that kind of road rage behavior to the police or they won't care, since I'm doing something illegal in the first place?

Two wrongs don't make a right.

You'd both be charged. He or she would be off to the magistrate for a bail hearing on an attempted murder / vehicular man slaughter charge while you were handed a summons to traffic court. Cops around here usually don't take kindly to anyone behaving badly on two or four wheels.

I have heard of riders wearing a bullet cam on their helmet and recording their rides and commutes to a small digital video recorder. I have been seriously considering this as a small insurance policy. That way if I get clipped by some retard who thinks its cool to risk a persons life then my family can sue thier insurance company for negligence. And with a video recording of the incedent then it's no longer he said / dead person said.

[boghopper04]

I've experienced that too. Not in New York either, but sunny Cape Cod. Although this place is full of NYers in the summer.
People seem to get pissed at you if you go along the inside when stuck in traffic at a light. I've had people yell at me.
Does it affect them that I am doing that?
Are they getting hurt? Being put in danger?
Even overtaking on a quiet road, but over a double yellow, people get pissed. Ive never had anyone try to kill me though.

[keystonejenks]

Most of the time they're just jealous because they're not riding. :-D

[Spooner]

Generally cagers are pretty ok with lane splitting bikes over here...ofcourse there'll be a couple of rotten dogs in the bunch trying to get in the way.
The most an*l cager I've ever passed in rush hour had his 'windown cleaner liquid thingy' angled out so that he could spray bikes as they passed by

[R-X]

Depends on the culture. A friend just returned from one of the busiest cities in the world: Tokyo. While there, he heard a horn only once. He was amazed at how polite the culture is in general. He reckons that cultures full of self-absorbed people with an unreasonable sense of self-importance tend to express more road rage.