Proposal for a distasteful sport.

[nickyboy]

One can only apologise to the serious cyclist.

@blazed shot himself in the foot with that final comment and if he's got any sense he'll retract it. His argument, up to that point, is correct. It's some tiny little website run by amateurs who thought it would be amusing to stir the pot a bit. Now of course it wasn't desperately funny. But the reaction here on CC says rather more about the persecution complex some seem to be suffering from than anything else.

Let it wash over you. It's such a tiny thing it's beneath you to get upset about it. I know it's the thin end of the wedge but really it's nothing

 

[Globalti]

The thing about humour is that if you have to put that sort of disclaimer on it you ought to know you've got it wrong.

And one person's "tongue-in-cheek" is far too often the victim's "bullying and incitement to hatred". It's possible to be funny about someone else without getting them pissed off.

Most intelligent people with a balanced outlook on life will have realised that the article was tongue-in-cheek. It's only the heads-up-arses militant wing of the cycling tribe who have taken offence.

 

[User33236]

Most intelligent people with a balanced outlook on life will have realised that the article was tongue-in-cheek. It's only the heads-up-arses militant wing of the cycling tribe who have taken offence.

All is takes though is just one individual to believe it in some way serious and act accordingly. That would be one to many.

Someone further up the thread wrote that the editor had been in two minds about posting it. Surely, as an editor or a low end product, that is the alarm bell going off telling you not to?

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Oi! Our boat is not smelly, damp, cold, gloomy or drab.

It is but you're in denial.

No we're not, we're in the canal.

Here all week...

 

[Markymark]

The point is that nobody thought it was anything serious. It was obviously tongue in cheek. However it feeds into the mindset of enough fukwits who see it as re-enforcing their opinion that a cyclist is fair game to threaten with a car. This sadly happens far too often including people on this forum and enough cyclists have been injured and died as a result.

 

[Dec66]

Most intelligent people with a balanced outlook on life will have realised that the article was tongue-in-cheek.

Evidently that excludes me, then, because it seems that I'm a moron because I don't get paid for riding my bike, Iike "serious cyclists" do?

 

[Drago]

I'm not a militant cyclist, shying away from cameras, confrontation, etc. I do, however, believe that any joke or piece of humour that makes fun of a situation - even an imaginary one - involving deliberately harming others is wrong, and written in a form of a pseudo-real article promoting a new pastime is even more wrong. It's no more acceptable than an article encouraging folk, no matter how joshingly, to plough down muslims and chuck them in the canal.

The authors belief that he can be as nasty as he likes, just so long as he qualifies it with an "I'm only joshing" tagline, is absurd. I will laugh my thruppenies off if a new pastime of sinking canalboats is jokingly promoted, some idiot takes it seriously, and he's the first victim. We can pat him on the back and tell him it's ok, it was only a joke.

 

[perplexed]

The Katie Hopkins of the Canal Scene

I so misread that...

 

[srw]

Please don't take this as advice, I did a lot of swimming in canals as a youngster and I can assure you standing on the bottom with head above water was just not possible even for the 6ft youths.

it depends on the canal.

The official classification is here:
https://mcanet.mcga.gov.uk/public/c4/cat-waters/categories.htm

The full list of waterways covered is here, and shows that many canals are category A - typically less than 1.5 metres (5 foot). Many will be significantly less - certainly the ones near us (Grand Union and arms) are.

 

[Dec66]

I so misread that...

And now I so need Mind Bleach...

 

[mybike]

Mind you, I don't think that allows for the 3 feet of soft mud you sink in to...

Think most of that ended up on my bike the other day.

 

[blazed]

Most intelligent people with a balanced outlook on life will have realised that the article was tongue-in-cheek. It's only the heads-up-arses militant wing of the cycling tribe who have taken offence.

Indeed.
There aren't many of those in this thread.

 

[ufkacbln]

Email reply

Article will be removed and they have taken on board comments, so similar articles will not be printed

 

[Markymark]

Apparently the editor has re read it, decided it was crap and removed it.

 

[Globalti]

The problem will always be distinguishing between cyclists who are muppets who happen to be riding bikes, mostly unlit, often dressed in black and often swerving around the streets daring a motorist to hit them, and cyclists who take their responsibility as road users seriously. The public generally don't know the difference.