The Times Cycling Campaign

?

Fucking hipsters.

Those dudes in red were useless.

I mean, what's the point in them? They're carrying swords in an age of blasters, and they're protecting a guy who can use the force.

Those dudes in red were useless.

I mean, what's the point in them? They're carrying swords in an age of blasters, and they're protecting a guy who can use the force.

The Imperial Forces' equivalent of this guy.

I don't think so. I always assumed they were Darth's WAGs.

I don't think so. I always assumed they were Darth's WAGs.

Loving LFGSS styles. There aren't many places where you can go from the Times Cycling Campaign to Darth Vader's WAGs in a few short steps.

Those dudes in red were useless.

I mean, what's the point in them? They're carrying swords in an age of blasters, and they're protecting a guy who can use the force.

Firstly, ok, I'll admit they were pretty useless. But it looked good to have a posse in those days, everyone had them, Biggie, Tupac, all my mates.
Secondly, they're not "swords" you impudent rebel, they are Force Pikes : http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Force_pike

One of those turned up to 11 and stuck up your junta would make you wish you'd never committed whatever extremely petty mistake I was punishing you for.

Force pike vs blaster.

Seriously, you'd look more awesome walking around on your own. I mean... that's scary and intimidating right? A guy so powerful that he didn't need some dudes with puke sticks to protect him.

But then who's going to do the medial tasks? You've got to have a bunch of people to go to the bar, queue up at McDonald's, get on the phone to call centres etc...

I'm a busy man, and I have a back problem. The answer is delegation and staff, lots of staff.

In the middle of what?

Middle England.

Middle England.

I thought I'd wiped out all the fucking hobbits? Typical. It's so inconvenient when genocide goes bad.

The Emperor may be powerful but he's still brittle.

I'm a busy man, and I have a back problem. The answer is delegation and staff, lots of staff.

^This.

The answer is delegation and staff, lots of staff.

^This.

Nah, that's where it all started going wrong. Growing the Empire too quickly, taking on too many new staff without proper induction training or procedures (e.g Overlooking the memo to destroy all escape pods, even if there are no life forms on board).

This all results in a loss of focus from the organisational vision and priorities, becoming a self serving business unit, and ultimately leading to the demise of the organisation as shareholder confidence explodes along with the value of prized assets.

[gets coat]

I think that is some of the worst reasoning that I have ever heard.

No, it's you being soft if you think I'd blame the victims of bike theft for their loss.

I wish I had an expensive camera and/or japanese girlfriend

Blends in with? A bunch of fakengers wearing cycling caps and shoes with street wear ?
People can take their helmets and jackets off you know. And I think when they are off the bike, they do.

Unlike your skixie fiddlers who prance about with courier bags and silly caps even when they haven't been near a bike in months. I've been to east London, I know what I saw.

Gooooood. The hate is strong within yooou.

I think Balki could be easily turned to serve the dark side.

I think he already has been turned, if you know what I mean...

wink, wink.

I think Balki could be easily turned to serve the dark side.

You are Rupert Murdoch, and I claim my five pounds.

You are Rupert Murdoch, and I claim my five pounds.

Who's he, the mad one out the A-Team?

No, he's the one who had your Force hacked and leaked stuff to George Lucas.

Evans got The Times campaign badge to wear as part of our uniform, huh...

Listen, dimwits: blaming cyclists doesn’t help
Hugo Rifkind
.
.
Today's times 10 2012 12:01AM

The idea is to stop people being killed or injured. We’re talking about compassion here
]What is it with people who prefer cars to bikes, and why are they so angry? Don’t worry, this isn’t a column about Jeremy Clarkson. I understand why he’s angry. It’s because he’s not allowed to joke about having people taken out and shot any more, even when he does genuinely think this is what should happen to them and thus isn’t joking at all, and also because he’s reached the age of 51 without anybody telling him about bootcut jeans. But what about everybody else?
What about, for example, Sir Simon Jenkins? A former editor of this newspaper, and one of the best columnists in the business, he’s someone you only cautiously call wrong about things. He wrote a column about this newspaper’s cycling campaign the other day, though, and it was as if he was referring to a different one altogether. The Times thinks “that cycling in London is dangerous and getting more so”, he began, which was at least half-right. “And that the fault”, he continued, “lies with vehicle drivers.”
We said that? Really? Are you sure? I don’t think so. But Sir Simon was not alone in his interpretation. Support for The Times’s campaign has been overwhelming but not universal. Plenty of comments left by drivers have had the petulant, aggrieved tone of people being told off for something that they don’t think is their fault. Which would have been fair enough if they had been. But they hadn’t. Guys, chill. It’s not about you. There was even a piece in the paper last week about an HGV driver who killed a cyclist through no fault of his own, and didn’t believe he’d ever get over it. Harrowing stuff. So where are you seeing this blame, exactly?
There’s a strange, repressed fury here. “They jump red lights and don’t obey the Highway Code!” some people seem incapable of not shouting, whenever the subject of cyclist safety is raised. Oh fine, so we’ll just mow them down with trucks then, shall we? That seems a fair punishment. Isn’t that what you mean? Then what do you mean? Look, it’s not that I don’t think cyclists sin on the road. It’s just that I don’t see why it’s relevant. Personally I’m in favour of people not dying horribly on the road even if I’m not that fond of them. Woolly liberal that I am.
As I never tire of telling people, you can loathe the whole concept of bicycles, you can think all cyclists are stupid, selfish, Day-Glo bastards who shouldn’t be allowed on the road, and you still ought to be in favour of investment in cycle lanes. In fact, you ought to be more in favour than anybody else. You want them off the road? Well you’ll need somewhere else to put them, then, won’t you, dimwit? Then you can drive while texting and open your doors madly into traffic to your flinty heart’s content. Show me a motorist who is against dedicated cycling lanes and I’ll show you somebody so consumed by hate that their brain has stopped working.
But why? Why? I know some cyclists can be annoying in their own very special way. You could see that with the ludicrous response to Matthew Parris’s joke a few years ago that they should be decapitated with piano wire, as though inner-city yobs were going to find evil inspiration in the downpage musings of the op-ed page. I once wrote a column about cycling and other cyclists sent me actual hate mail after I admitted not cycling much in winter. Maybe it’s the constant fear, maybe it’s the erectile dysfunction; there’s a hardcore here who are no fun at all. They’re a tiny minority, though. They cannot be entirely responsible for the hate. Not all of it.
In general, cyclist behaviour simply isn’t that bad. In a way, it’s fascinating that so many feel the need to pretend it is. The cyclist qua cyclist, as a philosopher would say, represents something. In some minds they occupy a niche similar to vegetarians, or Liberal Democrats. Like people who don’t wear shoes, or have made-up food allergies, or are in Coldplay. You know the sort. It’s not what they do. It’s what they are.
Of course, most cyclists aren’t “cyclists”, just as most drivers aren’t Jeremy Clarkson. I’m as fond of abusive pigeon-holing as the next big-haired posho who has never had a proper job, but it shouldn’t get in the way of reason or compassion.
I don’t know Mary Bowers well. She’s the reporter who was knocked from her bike last year; you might have seen her on the front of the paper last week. We last spoke at Glastonbury, when she and her friend Kaya Burgess told me they didn’t want to come with me to see Suzanne Vega and went off to see Beyoncé instead. So I’m obviously aware she was capable of making mistakes. But when I read comments that responded to Kaya’s beautiful article about her accident by questioning whether she’d put herself in danger, I was even more stunned than I was furious.
What does it matter? What sort of person gives a damn? Why does somebody have to be to blame? I’ve had two cycling accidents in my eight years on London’s roads. Once I slammed stupidly into the back of a stationary taxi, once a taxi slammed stupidly into the back of a stationary me. Personally, I don’t feel I deserved three months in a coma for either. Nobody does. Sign up.

http://twitpic.com/8hz9uk

http://twitpic.com/8hz9uk

whilst I know nothing about the guy who wrote that letter I would like to be like him if ever I get to that age!