Like many individuals I begin my morning by consuming espresso and taking within the day’s headlines. (Although not like many individuals I additionally begin my morning with a picket salad bowl stuffed with Froot Loops and almond milk, served to me by a helper monkey named “Vito II,” in honor of his predecessor.) One of many headlines was from a kind of publications that claims it’s solely factor standing between us and an autocratic dystopia:
When the army is deployed to quell overwhelmingly peaceable protest, when elected officers of the opposing occasion are arrested or handcuffed, when scholar activists are jailed and deported, and when a variety of civic establishments – non-profits, legislation corporations, universities, information shops, the humanities, the civil service, scientists – are focused and penalized by the federal authorities, it’s laborious to keep away from the conclusion that our core freedoms are disappearing earlier than our eyes – and democracy itself is slipping away.
As a blogger I make use of an analogous advertising and marketing tactic, in that I prefer to continuously stoke paranoia and concern about an all-electronic battery-powered carbon biking future, all while presenting myself as some kind of freedom fighter as a result of I endorse metal bikes with friction shifters:
That is considerably disingenuous on my half since not solely have I been using this monstrosity for like a 12 months now, however we’re unlikely to exhaust the provision of metal frames, rim brakes, and mechanical drivetrains anytime quickly, although I’ll say I do have much more religion in the way forward for democracy than I do in the way forward for bicycles.
Anyway, as for the aforementioned media outlet, they’re defending democracy with important tales equivalent to this one:
He used to really feel that train was “like being a hamster on a wheel,” however now that he’s truly a hamster on a wheel he feels in a different way:
I used to really feel train was a waste of time, like being a hamster on a wheel, spinning and doing little or no. However the advantages of constant train have been fairly superb for me. It has helped me to achieve a stage of health the place I really feel much less anxious about going to the gymnasium, however I additionally reap the psychological well being advantages of sticking to a routine and having fun with the aches days after I push myself somewhat tougher than earlier than (a masochistic hangover from my rugby days).
In fact I’m glad to see that he has discovered a type of train that works for him. As cyclists, we are likely to take train as a right, since our favourite exercise additionally occurs to be not solely a type of train but additionally a mode of transportation, and we’re extraordinarily lucky in that regard. Most individuals should drive themselves to train, or else combine it into their ordinary routine by spinning in entrance of the TV, or strolling on a treadmill at a standing desk, or any variety of methods people within the post-industrial age have managed to kind of trick themselves into health now that they don’t should work the land or flee from saber-tooth tigers, dinosaurs, fire-breathing dragons, and different massive predators:
Appears to me the latest health pattern can be to easily cohabitate with a man-eating predator, making each waking second of your life a battle to outlive. Now that’ll maintain you lean and nimble–and make for excellent TikToks!
However as cyclists we don’t have this drawback. No one has to chase us, and we don’t should persuade ourselves to train. If we’ve received any free time in any respect we instantly hop on our bikes, whether or not we now have to go someplace or not–and if we don’t we simply experience to nowhere, which isn’t actually all that a lot completely different than sitting there and watching TV. A few of us additionally take delight in the truth that we’re doing one thing wholesome, or not burning gasoline, or not taking on a lot of area on the roadway, and generally that delight boils even boils over into smugness–although if we’re sincere many people would in all probability maintain using even when it was demonstrably dangerous for each our well being and the setting. This greater than anything might be the actual distinction between individuals who experience bikes and cyclists: some folks actually do experience primarily for train or as a result of it’s sensible or as a result of they’re attempting to make the world a greater place, however a bicycle owner is principally only a junkie whose behavior is barely barely much less debilitating.
So whereas as a bicycle owner I can’t assist some man frittering away on a spin bike in entrance of the TV and suppose to myself, “Hey, you’re midway there, now simply put some goddamn wheels on that factor and get exterior!,” I do know that’s actually simply the junkie in me speaking. Actually you could possibly make a powerful argument that he’s the rational one, and you actually can’t blame regular non-junkies for desirous to do all their cycling-based workout routines inside. Actually folks exaggerate the hazards of biking, however when issues go unsuitable they’ll go actually unsuitable:
Although one of many victims wasn’t even on a motorbike in any respect, she was simply sitting on a bench:
Police say two ladies had been in a stolen blue Chevy, rushing off the Manhattan Bridge. The 23-year-old driver misplaced management, jumped the curb and hit and killed each victims earlier than slamming into an unoccupied police van.
The ladies tried taking off, however had been caught close by. They’re being detained whereas they’re within the hospital.
In the meantime, the motive force had already been charged for an unlicensed hit-and-run and was freed with out bail:
The troubled 23-year-old girl accused in Saturday’s hit-run that killed two folks in Chinatown had been charged in one other horror crash simply three months in the past and freed with out bail, data present.
The suspect, recognized by sources as Autumn Donna Ascencio Romero, was charged with leaving the scene of an accident and driving with out a license within the April 13 Brooklyn crash, which reportedly left a 22-year-old pedestrian with accidents together with to her face and neck.
Luckily when the Mamdani administration is available in folks with out licenses will now not drive recklessly and whereas intoxicated in New York Metropolis since they’ll have entry to free bus rides. And within the unlikely occasion somebody does nonetheless select to interrupt the legislation, the deliberate Division of Neighborhood Security will have the ability to refer it to the Workplace for Ending Gender Based mostly Violence:
Drawback solved.
In fact, based mostly on a few of the information protection it additionally seems like the motive force was mentally sick, during which case the Workplace of Neighborhood Psychological Well being would deal with it–which does sound good, besides that we have already got one, and the place had been they?
Welcome to the New York Metropolis Division of Well being and Psychological Hygiene.
With an annual finances of $1.6 billion and greater than 7,000 workers all through the 5 boroughs, we’re one of many largest public well being businesses on the earth. We’re additionally the nation’s oldest municipal public well being company, with over two centuries of management within the area.
This looks as if having each a Gravel Model Supervisor and a Gravel Product Supervisor, however a minimum of while you’re sitting on a park bench and a mentally sick driver is rushing in the direction of you in a stolen Chevy you possibly can ponder this in your last moments:
We acknowledge that historic and up to date injustices in authorities, well being care, and different establishments have deepened mistrust and contributed to particular person and collective trauma, whereas exacerbating inequities throughout well being circumstances.
We acknowledge that Black, Latino, Indigenous, and all folks of shade proceed to expertise and resist the day by day influence and actuality of years of disinvestment, racism, biased remedy, and oppression.
I understand the above could also be unduly cynical, however at a sure level you possibly can’t assist noticing the one factor that actually adjustments so far as how the town handles this kind of factor is the language during which they select to decorate it.
Talking of catastrophe placing with out warning, within the feedback to a latest publish (sorry, I’m too lazy to search for when and the place) somebody talked about the hazard of falling bushes, and in the direction of the top of my experience yesterday a tree bough got here crashing down in entrance of me:
This isn’t the primary time I’ve skilled this, and in reality not too way back after doing a little bike upkeep I used to be taking somewhat shakedown experience across the neighborhood after I was clobbered by a reasonably sizeable department that simply missed my head and hit me within the shoulder.
Some might level out that that is but another excuse to put on a helmet whereas biking, although by that logic it’s simply as compelling cause to put on a helmet whereas strolling, and I don’t see anybody doing that.
Finally we’re all simply sitting on our personal little benches, come what might.
