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Airhead-
I avoid reading anything like that. Have to say in all my years motorcycling, the vast preponderance of my accidents have been entirely self inflicted. Being a twat has been a common theme. Fortunately only a tiny minority have involved other vehicles or exotic factors such as engines seizing mid corner.
Certainly don't think motorcycles are given the benefit of the doubt anymore than bicycles are though.
Jung
Well, as ever, the full picture is complex, and the debate will, of course, rage forever, but such crashes as you describe are far more likely when motorcyclists travel at higher speeds. The fault obviously lies with drivers. However, I believe that crashes at junctions, which are the main locations of road traffic collisions, form a smaller percentage for crashes involving motorcyclists than they do for crashes involving only other road users.
The key thing to understand about speed is always whether any given speed, even if it may appear low, is appropriate for the situation, and this is where motorcycle rider behaviour scores lowest of all road users, I'm afraid. Much of this behaviour is perfectly legal, by the way--most motorcycle crashes occur at legal speeds. However, they may still be inappropriate for the situation. I'm not attributing fault here, and I have little sympathy for SMIDSY-type excuses, but even if motorcyclists travel at perfectly legal speeds, there is still a greater likelihood of a collisions than if they had been driving cars at the same speed--because motorcycles are smaller and less easy to see, harder to control, etc. The SMIDSY problem is obviously a very similar problem as for people riding a bicycle, but with higher stakes.
The main problem is the high number of motorcyclist fatalities and serious injuries.
Some numbers in this report (which the above quote is from):
https://www.rospa.com/rospaweb/docs/advice-services/road-safety/motorcyclists/common-motorcycle-crash-causes.pdf
What surprised me was the alcohol thing. I've only ever known motorcyclists who were scrupulous about not drinking a drop of alcohol when they were out on their bikes.