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Comment by shkkmo | Hacker News Reader

> just that the cartoonishly evil caricature of the driver's reasoning that OP dreamed up isn't accurate

"Cartoonishly evil"?!?

I'm pretty sure it is accurate for some subset of the driving population, which was the claim.

> Unfortunately, judging by the downvotes it seems like people are interpreting my opposition to OP's claim that "Some people apparently just can't stand to have anyone driving before them" as me arguing that it's fine for drivers to mow down cyclists to save 5s.

You didn't actually provide any evidence or argument to dispute that claim and completely ignored the key "risky" part of comment.

The way it reads is that you had your feelings hurt by having your bad behavior called out and felt a need to rationalize that behavior.

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>I'm pretty sure it is accurate for some subset of the driving population, which was the claim.

It might be true, but that's not the same as "accurate". Let's imagine the same thing but for cyclists:

"I saw a cyclist run a red light and I had to brake to avoid T-boning him. Apparently some cyclists hate motorists and want inconvenience them as much as possible."

I'm sure there's probably "some" radical cyclists that utterly despise motorists (think /r/fuckcars) and want to go out of their to inconvenience them, but only mentioning that as a possible reason for the behavior is at best an act of omission. There's probably some far more innocuous explanation out there, like that the cyclist thought the way was clear (because there were no cars in sight).

>You didn't actually provide any evidence or argument to dispute that claim and completely ignored the key "risky" part of comment.

It's totally fair game to criticize one aspect of a comment even if you agree with the point broadly. For instance, I might not like what facebook's privacy record, but still object to comments that claim that facebook is bad for privacy because it's surreptitiously listening on people's phones.

> It might be true, but that's not the same as "accurate". Let's imagine the same thing but for cyclists:

I don't understand the disctinction you are trying to draw here. The statement itself is both accurate and true? At best the implication might be slightly hyperbolic but definitely not a "cartoonishly evil caricature."

> There's probably some far more innocuous explanation out there, like that the cyclist thought the way was clear (because there were no cars in sight).

Except your explanation is also not innocuous. Not wanting to be behind a bicycle is non an excuse for dangerous passing and especially when you are approaching a red light. The fact that you think this is an acceptable reasoning for that behavior is why you're being called out and downvoted. None of your excuses for how this might cause a light cycle to trigger sooner make this acceptable behavior.

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