{"id":14777,"date":"2014-01-30T01:56:31","date_gmt":"2014-01-30T01:56:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diaryofanadi.co.uk\/?p=14777"},"modified":"2014-01-30T01:56:31","modified_gmt":"2014-01-30T01:56:31","slug":"asa-ruling-against-cycling-scotland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/?p=14777","title":{"rendered":"ASA Ruling Against Cycling Scotland"},"content":{"rendered":"

Note that Cycling Scotland appealed this ASA January 2014 decision and it has been overturned as of 25 June 2014.<\/p>\n

\n

I usually report on ASA adjudications against driving-related sites \u2013 notably, scam sites which dupe people into paying more money than they need to for their Theory and Practical tests, or those which make unreasonable claims about their franchises. But this one caught my eye this week.<\/p>\n

A TV advert advocating safer cycling \u2013 not aimed at cyclists, of course, but everyone else in the known universe \u2013 tried to make out that cyclists should be treated the same as horses. Apart from the gross insult to horses (which are far more intelligent), they featured a cyclist who wasn\u2019t wearing a helmet or any other safety gear, and who was riding right in the middle of the road. This was challenged by five complainants as irresponsible and harmful.<\/p>\n

Cycling Scotland made a number of weak defence arguments. The best was this:<\/p>\n

With regards to the cyclist\u2019s positioning, Cycling Scotland stated that given the width of the road featured in the advert, the cyclist was safer riding out past the parking area where they could be clearly visible to other road users. Furthermore, they informed the ASA that the shoot for the advert was supervised by one of their most experienced cycling instructors.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It doesn\u2019t say much for their instructors, does it? The ASA obviously thought so, too. It upheld the complaint and commented:<\/p>\n

\u2026we concluded the ad was socially irresponsible and likely to condone or encourage behaviour prejudicial to health and safety.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As an aside, today I witnessed three cyclists riding through red lights, one jumping on to the pavement and then back out again and holding up traffic as a result, another using the wrong lane in order to get to the front of the queue and then holding up traffic, and one who deliberately forced his way to the front of a narrow, coned lane in road works and pushed off hard at traffic lights within the lane \u2013 again for the sole purpose of holding up traffic.<\/p>\n

The word \u201cirresponsible\u201d is inappropriate. \u201cTotal arseholes\u201d would be far more accurate.<\/p>\n

EDIT:<\/strong> The BBC article perhaps gives a slightly more accessible summary<\/a>. Once again, the \u201ceditor\u2019s picks\u201d of reader comments is amusing.<\/p>\n

One prat writes:<\/p>\n

pootles magnet<\/strong>
\n29th January 2014 – 11:14 <\/cite><\/p>\n

Interesting how many people think it’s wrong for a cyclist to be positioned anywhere other than in the gutter of the road. A bicycle is a vehicle, just the same as a car, and there is no requirement for them to cycle in any particular part of the road. Being smaller and slower than a car does not give you fewer rights on the road.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This attracts 91 positive comments or \u201cthumbs up\u201d. You will, of course, bear in mind that no cyclist on the face of the earth considers themselves to be \u201ca vehicle, just the same as a car\u201d unless it suits them. Most of the time it doesn\u2019t, as they wobble up on either side and then get in the way, or jump on to pavements or pedestrian crossings to avoid red lights (or just jump red lights without any fancy stuff like that thrown in).<\/p>\n

Two somewhat more sensible posts attract lots of \u201cthumbs down\u201d:<\/p>\n

pharsical<\/strong>
\n29th January 2014 – 11:30 <\/cite><\/p>\n

If you ride a bike you should ware a helmet end of.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Pudwin<\/strong>
\n29th January 2014 – 11:02 <\/cite><\/p>\n

Helmets should be compulsory, a change in the law is required.
\nThis will protect the cyclist, in the same way as seat belts in cars are compulsory and protect the occupants.
\nRidiculous that there is even a debate on this.
\nWhy would a cyclist not wear a helmet?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The scores show clearly what the mentality of most cyclists is. Particularly given that Cycling Scotland has appealed<\/a> the decision and the ASA has given in to a re-review.<\/p>\n

I wonder how many other companies the ASA has ruled against would manage this feat? It\u2019s warped cycling politics taking over again. The ASA nearly gave the World a push in the right direction \u2013 yet it has apparently caved in and allowed Cycling Scotland to push the ASA wherever it wants it.<\/p>\n

\n

As I said at indicated in the edit at the start of this story, the ruling has been reversed. Be warned: cyclists’ general\u00a0unpleasantness extends far further than just being prats on the road.\u00a0They have political leverage as well, and can apparently prevent a clear example of poor cycling behaviour being described as such by anyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Note that Cycling Scotland appealed this ASA January 2014 decision and it has been overturned as of 25 June 2014. I usually report on ASA adjudications against driving-related sites \u2013 notably, scam sites which dupe people into paying more money than they need to for their Theory and Practical tests, or those which make unreasonable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[80,87,92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adi-related","category-news","category-transport"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14777\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diaryofanadi.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}