Pseuds Corner

Was aimed at the original piece as your post was near simultaneous but if the shoe fits...

Haw haw haw, this thread is excellent.

does mention the inhernet flaw of mass in that it turns freedom loving people into a big fucking mess that no-one likes.

Hegel put it succintcly in terms of dialectic.

First the thesis: the nodder bike
Secondly the antithesis: the road bike or the bmx
Finally the synthesis: the fixed wheel bike.

An alternative dialectic proposed by Marx viewed the thesis as the pedestrian stage, the antithesis, the motor car and the synthesis the bicycle. This latter view ingnored the subtle differences within the classes of cyclists and fell apart in internectine squabbles with Trotskyists who believed in the universal and perpetual revolution that is fixed wheel cycling (that is apart from the WRP who believed whatever they felt that other people didn't believe.)

I must say that is very good

He is a highly paid lawyer so you'd expect that level of literacy no?

Of course by journalist I meant journal-ist, rather than Journalist.

scratches head

"The Confusion of Balki"

A drama in five acts.

will that involve the great "shrike vs other birds" debate?

C'mon then guys, money where your mouth is - write me something on why this is bollocks...

No word limit, no time limits ever with citycycling - someone writes something I like, or that I think will provoke a bit of outrage, and I'll stick it in. Especially since it saves me having to write the whole fecking thing myself.

anth@citycycling.co.uk - haven't posted on here in aaaaaaages, saw the link to the thread on my hits stat thingy.

^ PM Balki.

C'mon then guys, money where your mouth is - write me something on why this is bollocks...

In brief, it's empty speculation, pure personal opinion, masquerading as fact. To say that one thing 'signifies' or 'demonstrates' another in this kind of writing gives the impression that something interesting about the world has been said, but the world doesn't come into it. If the author had gone out into the world and done a survey, or counted things, or taken pictures and analysed their content, it would be a different story. But they didn't.

In brief, it's empty speculation, pure personal opinion, masquerading as fact. To say that one thing 'signifies' or 'demonstrates' another in this kind of writing gives the impression that something interesting about the world has been said, but the world doesn't come into it. If the author had gone out into the world and done a survey, or counted things, or taken pictures and analysed their content, it would be a different story. But they didn't.

So who wants to? This is serious, not just trying to antagonise! If someone wants to set the record straight I'm more than happy to put something in the next issue...

So who wants to? This is serious, not just trying to antagonise! If someone wants to set the record straight I'm more than happy to put something in the next issue...

Who wants to go out and conduct a half-decent study of the critical mass phenomenon you mean? I'd love to, but I'd need a research grant or a trust fund first.

scratches head

When you finally get it, let me know 'cos I'm struggling too....

According to the myspace page linked from the end of the article, she's nineteen. A quick google reveals she's a media/comms undergrad.

To be fair, she has cojones to try to get something like this published. But quite clearly, she's read a lot of semiotics-inspired mumbo-jumbo and is well on the way to learning how to speak like one of those irritating advertising people who make a lot of multisyllabic noises without actually conveying any meaning whatsoever. And equally clearly, the bar for getting an article published in that magazine is very, very low.

If I were actually contemplating engaging with the article I might observe that she appears to be nostalgic for something that probably never existed - a popular revisionist trick used when people want to harken back to a purer society (which they define as excluding everyone they don't like). In popular culture it was amusingly satirised in the likes of Human Traffic, but it's also the same trick used by nationalist ideologues, from the relatively benign to the virulently fascist.

But that'd be giving far too much time to what is, after all, just a freshman brainfart.

fuck me people, there are only two words that describes riding a bike in london..
freedom, mobility.. anything else worth writing is pure wank.. IMHO..

According to the myspace page linked from the end of the article, she's nineteen. A quick google reveals she's a media/comms undergrad.

To be fair, she has cojones to try to get something like this published. But quite clearly, she's read a lot of semiotics-inspired mumbo-jumbo and is well on the way to learning how to speak like one of those irritating advertising people who make a lot of multisyllabic noises without actually conveying any meaning whatsoever. And equally clearly, the bar for getting an article published in that magazine is very, very low.

If I were actually contemplating engaging with the article I might observe that she appears to be nostalgic for something that probably never existed - a popular revisionist trick used when people want to harken back to a purer society (which they define as excluding everyone they don't like). In popular culture it was amusingly satirised in the likes of Human Traffic, but it's also the same trick used by nationalist ideologues, from the relatively benign to the virulently fascist.

But that'd be giving far too much time to what is, after all, just a freshman brainfart.

heee!! awww.. I feel a bit for her - she is only 19... it's more the fault of the editor here for slapping it on the site un..er, edited.

fuck me people, there are only two words that describes riding a bike in london..
freedom, mobility.. anything else worth writing is pure wank.. IMHO..

um... is "transport" too wanky?

Who wants to go out and conduct a half-decent study of the critical mass phenomenon you mean? I'd love to, but I'd need a research grant or a trust fund first.

Fair enough. How about something on just why the article is wrong?

And equally clearly, the bar for getting an article published in that magazine is very, very low.
.

Hell yeah, want to give it a go? ;)

anth, the essence of CM, as I have seen it (and this is a personal view), is that one cannot categorise participants as coming from any particular class, cause or inclination. Whether they ride penny farthings, bromptons, hybrids, shoppers or fixed wheel bikes, they are simply cyclists riding around London for an evening.

I have it on very good authority that, alongside the great and distinguished unwashed of the anarchist community, ride eminent City lawyers and traders. It is about what each rider wants it to be about. The only common feature is that they are cyclists. To write otherwise involves incorrect speculation.

Fair enough. How about something on just why the article is wrong?

The article doesn't really say anything that you can take seriously, as I set out earlier and as other people have pointed out, so it's not a matter of right or wrong. This isn't meant as an attack on you, or your young author, but on a this kind of writing.

oh so it's anth who's the injudicious editor...

oh so it's anth who's the injudicious editor...

Guilty as charged.

So how about something on what CM means for you, and how it's different for everyone else?

anth, why not get your young wannabe journalist write a piece using various comments made upon here. It might teach her about writing non pretentious tripe and might make her a better journalist.

anth, why not get your young wannabe journalist write a piece using various comments made upon here. It might teach her about writing non pretentious tripe and might make her a better journalist.

Hahahahaha! Ah well, can't blame a guy for trying. :D