[twblalock]

It's sad to see this comment being dogpiled by trolls, including the standard and annoying responses like "wrong takeaway" or "bad take" or the sarcastic "how dare people do X", or the standard European city defense, or the most annoying type of response: rephrasing the original post to make a maliciously bad argument.

We don't live in should-land. We live in reality. Parents who live in reality need to protect their children from the dangers that exist in reality.

Parents who live in reality in the city of San Francisco know that it is a dangerous place to ride bikes. It is not ok to tell people to ignore those dangers because they should not exist, or to scold people for making those dangers known. It's also not ok to tell people that they are responsible for solving problems they did not create, and it is really not ok to equate warning people about danger with victim blaming.

sidfthec, you are right and you should not be getting this kind of response.

[jacquesm]

What would you propose they do instead? Stay at home? Use public transport? Also drive a car?

It isn't realistic to counter a biking accident with claims that people are sacrificing their kids and that they are idiots for biking, for some people there simply are no viable alternatives that they can afford, and so they take the risk. The blame should go to the drunk drivers and the idiots, not the cyclists.

[twblalock]

> It isn't realistic to counter a biking accident with claims that people are sacrificing their kids and that they are idiots for biking

Who said that?

Again, people seem to be reacting to something that was not said by anyone in this thread.

[jacquesm]

The OP in another comment.

[newaccount74]

Every time you take your kids to school by car, you risk killing other kids by hitting them with your car. Especially if you drive an SUV or a truck with small windows that makes it hard to see children close to your car.

Every parent who takes their kids to school by bike makes the city safer. The more people who leave their car at home, the fewer people in cars who kill pedestrians.

[mslate]

It is literally victim-blaming.

You are choosing to frame a reality where transiting by car is the only acceptable way to live. Many don’t bike by choice, they bike because of economic reality—especially as parents.

San Francisco is one of the most expensive cities on earth, and you must cover rent for cars in addition to yourself. If you want to discourage family formation then go ahead, make it prohibitively expensive to exist as a family in our cities.

[twblalock]

I don't run the world and neither does the OP. I don't even live in San Francisco. It's not our fault that things are this way, and it's really dumb to blame us for pointing out facts.

Is it now also victim-blaming to tell people to wear seat belts, or to look both ways before crossing the street? Telling people about danger is not a form of blaming.

People seem to be reacting to something the OP didn't actually write. Stop ascribing beliefs and motivations to people you don't know based on a few sentences of written text.

[mslate]

Thank you for admitting that you don’t live in San Francisco. The fact is you don’t know who this parent is. You have made the assumption that they are taking unacceptable risks. I don’t know your motivation, but your criticisms aren’t constructive.

[twblalock]

> The fact is you don’t know who this parent is. You have made the assumption that they are taking unacceptable risks.

What on earth are you talking about? Who the heck is the parent here? I am merely defending someone who is being dogpiled by trolls for the outrage of pointing out the fact that cycling in SF is dangerous. I am familiar with SF even though I don't live there, and I know that is the case.

[dang]

Could you please not perpetuate flamewars on HN, regardless of how wrong other people are or you feel they are? I understand the strong feelings on this topic—but posting like this is not what HN is for, and destroys what it is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

p.s. Re "pointing out the fact" — I'm really not sure how many facts have been pointed out about cycling in SF in this discussion (is there even data on this relative to other places?) as opposed to feelings and perceptions. But let's assume that you and sidfthec are 100% right on the facts, and the people arguing the other side are 0% right. That's still not sufficient for a good HN conversation. Being right is excellent, but not enough; it also matters how you interact with the people who are wrong, or who you feel are wrong.