I hate drivers. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate all of them, just a considerably larger proportion than I hate of the population as a whole.
And, like most cyclists, I drive myself, having been bullied into it by my then girlfriend who bought me lessons for my 27th birthday. But generally speaking I feel the same way about them as Rod Liddle feels about cyclists. Although I agree with Rod on almost all things, it would be weird and awkward if I agreed with him on everything, and this is the slither outside the bubble on the Venn diagram.
I don’t object to his characterisation of cyclists as angry, self-righteous ninnies, because I’m not opposed to generalisations as they’re quite necessary. For example, I would say about 5 per cent of drivers are reckless and dangerous, but that rises to about 40 per cent of white van men and a fifth of minicab drivers, which is a useful stereotype to have when you’re trying to avoid getting killed.
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