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@Oliver Schick
Thank you. You'd be totally wrong to, though. When I first came to London, I didn't bring my bike--and I couldn't stand it after a very short while of taking public transport. For some reason, I'd imagined that I wouldn't cycle in London, at least not at first. When I eventually got my bike to London, the sense of freedom was completely overwhelming. It made London liveable for the first time.
Jumping lights used to be my default mode of approaching them. I thought that that was just a normal part of the freedom that I was entitled to on the bike. Mind you, this was in the days when footway cycling still had a much higher profile than red light jumping (there were far fewer sets of signals and All Green Pedestrian Phase junctions, where the offence is at its most visible, hadn't been introduced yet).
Years passed and I got involved in campaigning and actually started to learn about how traffic works, and that when people rant about law-breaking by cyclists, that actually gives them a great excuse not to cycle--after all, who wants to be a lowly law-breaker?
When people say that cyclists don't belong 'on the road', behind that, among other things, is a mixture of envy of the freedom of cycling and a fear that if they started to cycle, they would become just like the law-breakers whom they see. Now, obviously, drivers constantly violate traffic laws, as well, but they're not perceived to be in the minority--it's that combination of being a minority and committing highly visible transgressions that's a real stumbling-block to promoting cycling further.
But yes, I don't jump red lights now and haven't for years. I might do it in the middle of the night when there's no-one around, although I have stopped then, too, just to feel what it's like. Otherwise, there's absolutely no point. Set off early enough so you don't end up in a mad rush and enjoy your ride. I'm totally in favour of reducing the number of traffic signals in London and in changing the way signal phasing works in a lot of ways, but there's a lot of work on these things to do still before we can see significant improvements.