Cycle Bashing Daily Mail

[grellboy]

No dispute that the cyclist was in the wrong and all sympathy for the innocent victim, but do we really think this is balanced coverage? Do the (approx) 5 people a day killed by motor vehicles get the same coverage?

 

[welsh dragon]

Was the story written by the newspaper untrue? Did they tell any lies? Did they report what actually happened? I am sorry, but to be honest i havn't read anything from the above piece that sounds like cyclist bashing and if what happened was fact, then the cyclist IMHO deserved a far harsher punishment than the one he recieved.

 

[Moodyman]

Well, there is a reason why it is sometimes called the daily wail.

I wonder if the article would have the same prominence if the victim was a cleaner or similar.

 

[vickster]

Not sure what else is to be expected from the DM. I do hope that's not a picture of your own newspaper if so, it would help if you actually showed the whole article

 

[Cycleops]

Well, there is a reason why it is sometimes called the daily wail.

I wonder if the article would have the same prominence if the victim was a cleaner or similar.

If you believe the Mail are 'cyclist bashers' or are being unduly sensationalistic due the victims job it shouldn't make any difference should it?

 

[Drago]

Leaving aside the hysteria about the Daily Mail aside, the chap appears to have broken the law and left someone with a serious injury because of it. He's jolly lucky he got such a derisory punishment. Clearly the legal system isn't into cyclist bashing.

 

[grellboy]

Was the story written by the newspaper untrue? Did they tell any lies? Did they report what actually happened? I am sorry, but to be honest i havn't read anything from the above piece that sounds like cyclist bashing and if what happened was fact, then the cyclist IMHO deserved a far harsher punishment than the one he recieved.

My point was, do you think the story would have been given the same prominence if the perpetrator was in a motor vehicle?

 

[Pale Rider]

My point was, do you think the story would have been given the same prominence if the perpetrator was in a motor vehicle?

Car drivers injuring peds is more common, so possibly not.

It's the nature of news.

The story would have made even more than it did if the perpetrator was riding a unicycle.

 

[welsh dragon]

My point was, do you think the story would have been given the same prominence if the perpetrator was in a motor vehicle?

Probably. I have no reason to think otherwise. There was a story only yesterday about a minor football player who attacked a young woman driver after she hit his car in a car park.

The story was not kind about him at all and rightly so.

 

[NorthernDave]

My point was, do you think the story would have been given the same prominence if the perpetrator was in a motor vehicle?

Almost certainly not.

The unfortunate fact is that lots more pedestrians are injured by motor vehicles every day, to the point where it's not "news".
Someone getting injured by a cyclist is a rare event, prosecution of the cyclist even rarer, hence it becomes a story.*

It's the old maxim - dog bites man - no interest, man bites dog - front page news

* - I'm not saying any of this is right, it's just how large sections of the media work.

 

[Slick]

My point was, do you think the story would have been given the same prominence if the perpetrator was in a motor vehicle?

I can only agree with @welsh dragon. You see it often enough in paper headlines referring to individuals by their mode of transport. I think there is quite a bit of cycling bashing, but this isn't it.

 

[MontyVeda]

No... no cyclist bashing going on... the DM is always consistent in its reporting of such incidents.

Eg.
- White van man on the wrong side of the road crashes into three young cyclists is reported as "cyclists collide with a van"
- Cyclist crashes into pedestrian is reported as "cyclist crashes into a pedestrian"

...all very balanced

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Certainly got bias in there "Let off with a fine". Really? Sure that is not the view of the court. As above crash vs. collision.

 

[jarlrmai]

the bias is there, the tabloids and local papers are skilled at it.

Selection and omission of which stories get inches in the paper.
Vocabulary choice in the article.

Whether it's a "media conspiracy" or just a symptom of the general population being mostly not cyclists in is hard to say.

Car ads do make up a big percentage of the ads in our local paper though.