{"id":414,"date":"2022-03-03T06:00:01","date_gmt":"2022-03-03T07:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/?p=414"},"modified":"2023-10-12T09:16:59","modified_gmt":"2023-10-12T09:16:59","slug":"the-man-challenging-anti-cycling-trolls-to-change-their-ways","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/2022\/03\/03\/the-man-challenging-anti-cycling-trolls-to-change-their-ways\/","title":{"rendered":"The man challenging anti-cycling trolls to change their ways"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

\u201cIf someone deletes their comment, that\u2019s success for me,\u201d says Andrew Tierney. \u201cHopefully, that person will think about what they\u2019re saying in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tierney, who goes by the name @cybergibbons<\/a> online, is part of a new breed of cycling activists. After noticing an increase in the amount of abuse and violent threats on social media directed at people who ride bikes, Tierney decided to take action. He started calling out the posters online, with the result that many deleted their comments or even their accounts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf someone says something racist [online], on the whole, people will challenge those views,\u201d he says. \u201cIt should be the same for threats made against cyclists; challenge those who make these statements.\u201d<\/p>\n

There has been a noticeable increase in virtual threats against cyclists since the Highway Code changes and clarifications<\/a> have been in the news, Tierney believes, and he has started responding to the most serious ones.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

\u201cIt was on TikTok that I suddenly thought: \u2018Wow, people think it\u2019s socially acceptable to make [comments about harming cyclists]\u2019,\u201d he says. \u201cA user made a comment about harming cyclists if they saw them adhering to one of the new Highway Code rules, and it got lots of likes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Getting such a post taken down can be difficult and slow when reported via the tech platforms, but can be easy and swift when contacting the user directly, Tierney says.<\/p>\n

He was shocked to discover that many of those making hateful comments use their real names. \u201cYou click on their profile picture, and it\u2019s their normal account; there\u2019s no hiding involved,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere can be videos of them with their kids, yet they\u2019re making a statement that they want to go out and harm someone, and they think that this is completely acceptable because it\u2019s a comment about cyclists. That genuinely shocked me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tierney has nearly 38,000 followers on Twitter and is a recent returnee to cycling. \u201cI got into cycling again during lockdown. I realised how cycling had changed; it\u2019s now a lot more popular than I remembered from my university days.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy and large, the cyclists I see on the roads follow the Highway Code, taking the lane where it\u2019s appropriate, for instance. But a lot of drivers seem to take issue with cyclists doing that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started noticing people casually posting on social media that they would run over cyclists next time they see any \u2018hogging the road\u2019, even when cyclists taking the lane are doing something that\u2019s completely legal and always has been. That blew my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Tierney believes poisoning the online well can have real-world effects. \u201cSomeone stating on social media, \u2018Let\u2019s run over cyclists\u2019 can make other people think it\u2019s acceptable to intimidate cyclists in real life,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the hate comments are supposed to be jokes, probably done for likes. But even if it is just a joke to the poster, people reading those comments might be encouraged to harm cyclists in real life.\u201d<\/p>\n

He wonders how many close overtakes \u2013 so-called punishment passes \u2013 are happening soon after reading online comments raging against people riding bikes.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of the most aggressive motorists might have been radicalised online. The belief that [motorists] have more right to be on the road than cyclists isn\u2019t hard to find.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many of those posting threat-to-life comments are professional drivers, says Tierney. \u201cThey post pictures of their truck or put their employer in their profile. It\u2019s shocking that someone who drives for a living jokes about killing cyclists and does so publicly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tierney\u2019s takedowns involve contacting those spouting the hate, including sending messages to professional drivers. \u201cI remind them that they\u2019re representing their company,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Offensive posts are often deleted after that contact, but if not, Tierney contacts the companies concerned. \u201cBusinesses should be made aware that their employees are threatening to harm people,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

He has no way of knowing if his emails to employers get results because the typical response is that the company is dealing with the complaint internally. Still, comment deletions are normal, and so are full account wipes, or the accounts are subsequently made private.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople seem to be surprised when you contact them after they\u2019ve made some hateful comment, but I tell them I\u2019m looking at things that have been said in public.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Tierney says he does not identify or dox people. \u201cThere\u2019s been a few accounts where I\u2019ve posted screenshots of the comments made, but I don\u2019t dox; I don\u2019t include the account holder\u2019s real name if they don\u2019t use it online; I don\u2019t think pile-ons help. I don\u2019t harass these people, or want them to be harassed by others,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to suppress people for having a different opinion; I\u2019ve only contacted people who\u2019ve made direct threats to harm. I\u2019ve gone on social media and found people who are saying: \u2018I\u2019m gonna keep a tally of how many cyclists I\u2019ve run over this year.\u2019 I filter down to people making the most serious comments and then ask them whether they really mean what they wrote. This has caused a lot of people to delete comments and caused others to delete their accounts.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Tierney says many of the most egregious abusers are easy to find making similar comments across multiple platforms.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s common to find that someone will be on Twitter, on Instagram, on TikTok, and on Facebook, using the same [social media] handle and making the same kind of hateful comments. It would be great if everybody challenged these comments when they see them,\u201d Tierney suggests, but he admits this is not for the fainthearted \u2013 few of the replies he receives are timorous.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a hardcore who feel like they\u2019re entitled to say they\u2019re going to harm and scare cyclists. I think what I do is a fairly effective way of challenging these people.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cIf someone deletes their comment, that\u2019s success for me,\u201d says Andrew Tierney. \u201cHopefully, that person will think about what they\u2019re saying in the future.\u201d Tierney, who goes by the name @cybergibbons online, is part of a new breed of cycling… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":416,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":417,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414\/revisions\/417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kevinfell.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}