Rise of cycle cams debated on This Morning

John Mitchell wrote:

We've reached an impasse. You claim to welcome more surveillance, more personal cameras, more naming and shaming in the interest of improving safety. I don't.

I for one hope you are the minority

themartincox - I'm not arguing that smaller crimes are insignificant. I don't doubt that a highly monitored road would be safer for users. My point is that we are sacrificing something fairly substantial to get it. When CCTV first came out there was a lot of dislike of them, it seems our society has now become accustomed to, and accepting of, them.

felixcat - I understand your point about the road being a kind of exceptional cirumstance, but I think it would be easy to make a similar case for all sorts of other places and activities. I don't think the road is really a unique case. Whilst I agree that there are way too many sloppy, careless, lazy and reckless road users, I really don't think the way to address it is for other users to film them. It's just such a negative impact on society for us to be always looking to report on others.

fluffykittenoftindalos - I think you are right about Sarah Vine, I didn't find her arguments compelling at all. I think she is being hypocritical. But that doesn't mean we should join her in the hypocrisy. The point is trying to step back from our emotions for a moment. Cycling is something that all of us here are attached to. And as impartially as we can deciding if this is a good direction to take. And knowing that if we condone the naming and shaming of road users then we are condoning it in all of our society too because I don't think you can justify this as a special case.

"even though I don't favour a general policy of putting bad drivers on youtube."

Then we have nothing to argue about.

Thanks for the link, I did read it even though just seeing HIS name makes my mouth taste like vomit. Still, it is interesting to hear his view, and particularly what he says about police interest in the footage. I'm not sure it really addresses my concerns though. All along I've said that I am uncomfortable with the idea of submitting footage of minor incidents to the police, and I am uncomfortable with naming and shaming under almost all circumstances. That the police welcome footage doesn't change this. The only part of the article which does address my point is that Vine (ugh) himself promotes their use (though not explicitly about putting footage on YouTube). So there is another voice on the side I disagree with. But that's all really.

"felixcat - I understand your point about the road being a kind of exceptional cirumstance, but I think it would be easy to make a similar case for all sorts of other places and activities. I don't think the road is really a unique case. "

In what other situation do citizens kill strangers? If there really were any other case where 2000 people a year were killed randomly by passers by there would be stringent measures to sort it out. Most years in Northern Island during the recent "Troubles" motorists killed twice as many people as terrorists. The result was internment without trial for terrorist suspects.
The road really is a unique case.
If I walked down the street with a gun (a bullet has a deal less kinetic energy than a car) and carelessly discharged it, do you think, that even if I killed no one, I would escape without penalty?
That driving is permitted and carrying a loaded gun is not, only means that drivers need more incentives to avoid injuring others.
Why don't you think that putting dangerous drivers in fear of having their stupidity or aggression pointed out would tend to make them more careful or less aggressive? I think it will.

felixcat wrote:

Why don't you think that putting dangerous drivers in fear of having their stupidity or aggression pointed out would tend to make them more careful or less aggressive? I think it will.

I didn't say this, in fact I've said a few times now that I think it would make all road users more careful.

Your loaded gun analogy isn't quite accurate, though I get what you are saying. The difference is that cars are considered useful and people drive them for a purpose, it is accepted that they will do that and it is allowed.

You talk about the number of deaths caused by road users and yes there are a lot. My point what that not everyone will see this as the special case that you do. For example obesity is a huge drain on the NHS and causes a much much larger number of deaths than traffic. Perhaps therefore it is OK to name and shame people who are deemed to be over-eating? Other people may focus on smoking in public, doing drugs in public, over-drinking, contributing to climate change, offending religions etc etc. Road deaths aren't going to be a special case in everybody's eyes. I'd suggest that it is our bias as cyclists that makes it seem like they are.

John Mitchell wrote:

For example obesity is a huge drain on the NHS and causes a much much larger number of deaths than traffic. Perhaps therefore it is OK to name and shame people who are deemed to be over-eating?

Are you saying that bad driving is a symptom of some underlying illness? Some sort of mental derangement, perhaps?

John Mitchell wrote:

You talk about the number of deaths caused by road users and yes there are a lot. My point what that not everyone will see this as the special case that you do. For example obesity is a huge drain on the NHS and causes a much much larger number of deaths than traffic. Perhaps therefore it is OK to name and shame people who are deemed to be over-eating? Other people may focus on smoking in public, doing drugs in public, over-drinking, contributing to climate change, offending religions etc etc. Road deaths aren't going to be a special case in everybody's eyes. I'd suggest that it is our bias as cyclists that makes it seem like they are.

A better analogy / comparison would be KSI's in the workplace.

Compare and contrast the establishment reaction to a person being killed by a works vehicle in the workplace and a person being killed by a works vehicle on the road between workplaces. Or even the case of a highway worker killed or seriously injured on a highway by any type of vehicle and indeed any other person killed or seriously injured on the same highway.

So yes, name and shame or sending the footage to the authorities to deal with can be considered a public spirited duty. It would appear that the name and shame part encourages the authorities to do something sometimes.

Yes, name and shame can be considered a public spirited duty. But I think it's important to notice what we are sacrificing if we endorse this. Now perhaps you think the public good outweighs the increased surveillance, and that's fine, so long as you accept what the loss is. Personally I think it depends on what behaviour is being exposed, we're back to serious vs minor infringements. I think we can all probably agree that Jason Wells (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jpkv3w7-jPM) deserved recrimination because his behaviour was seriously bad. But what if a driver is reading a text whilst waiting at a light? Is that serious enough to justify the name and shame? I'm not saying it's OK to check texts, I'm just asking if it justifies this course of action. You can argue that it is in the public good to film and report it, but then I can argue that it is in the public good to name and shame people for off road bad behaviour. So the question still stands at where do we draw the line? Even accepting that the road is a dangerous place and there are a lot of deaths and people have great responsibility, I can't see that justifying people reporting every infringement, no matter how big or small.

sorry, double post due to youtube link originally being rejected.

John Mitchell wrote:

For example obesity is a huge drain on the NHS and causes a much much larger number of deaths than traffic. Perhaps therefore it is OK to name and shame people who are deemed to be over-eating? Other people may focus on smoking in public, doing drugs in public, over-drinking, contributing to climate change, offending religions etc etc.

In all honestly, I think your argument is getting worse rather than better!

Most of those are easily dispensed with, as they are not remotely comparable - damaging your own health is not the same as injuring or killing others. Its puzzling that you suggest it is.

You mention 'doing drugs in public' - what about _dealing_ drugs in public? That would be a closer analogy (though still not quite the same). Would it be completely wrong for someone to film such activity? Especially if the police were failing to do anything about it.

You mention 'offending religions' - people have been caught on camera racially abusing people in public places. Are you saying people should be allowed to go on abusing more vulnerable groups in secrecy? Surely you aren't condemning the people whose footage has revealed racist behaviour by US cops, for example?

The trouble with your argument, I'm now thinking, is that you are asking for a kind of unilateral disarmament only by the more vulnerable groups who only have the one 'weapon'. Why aren't you demanding shops stop using CCTV against shoplifters, say?

I'm not promoting helmet-cams, I don't think its a magic bullet (heh, that would be infrastructure). But I don't see the point joining in with a one-sided demand that the more vulnerable not try and hold the more powerful to account - especially while those with power are going to carry on filming and monitoring regardless.

FluffyKittenofTindalos wrote:

In all honestly, I think your argument is getting worse rather than better!

Most of those are easily dispensed with, as they are not remotely comparable - damaging your own health is not the same as injuring or killing others. Its puzzling that you suggest it is.

My point wasn't that I necessarily think they are equivalent, but rather that we shouldn't assign any special cases because whilst we are cyclists and road safety seems paramount to us, other people will have other priorities and create their own exceptions. If that's the route taken then of course there will be no exceptions as all cases will have their defenders.

Dealing drugs is clearly more serious than taking drugs, just as driving with no hands whilst eating and talking on the phone is more serious than checking a text at a light. It still faces the same question, if you record all four instances, which ones do you submit to the police and publish on YouTube? In my opinion the only defensible stances are to send in none, all four, or two (being the more serious offense in each case).

No I am not supporting racism, I think you knew that. You can insult religion without being racist. Some people take it extremely seriously. To them such an act warrants severe (lethal) consequences. Again I used the example to demonstrate that not all people will agree with you about creating a special case for road offenses.

I'm not trying to remove a tool from the most vulnerable. That wasn't ever my point. I am not saying cyclists shouldn't have cameras. I am saying that cyclists should be thoughtful about what footage they decide to make public.

This isn't "us vs them". It's not to do with those with power and those without power as you suggest. I'm not making a one-sided demand because this has nothing to do with police having cameras, or CCTV in shops. That's a whole different debate. This is about what is done with the footage captured.

John Mitchell wrote:

My point wasn't that I necessarily think they are equivalent, but rather that we shouldn't assign any special cases because whilst we are cyclists and road safety seems paramount to us, other people will have other priorities and create their own exceptions. If that's the route taken then of course there will be no exceptions as all cases will have their defenders.

Again, you are trying to claim an equivalence between, say, self-harmers cutting themselves and someone who goes round slashing strangers with a knife. Those are not in any possible way similar cases, so why are you insisting on equating them?

Someone might indeed think someone eating too much and risking their own health is a higher priority than someone potentially killing an innocent child via distracted driving, but they would be WRONG to have those priorities, so why do you ascribe so much importance to this point?

I don't agree with it - I disagree fundamentally with the idea that endangering yourself and endangering others are equivalent moral issues to be dealt with the same way - and you haven't explained why you think otherwise.

John Mitchell wrote:

Dealing drugs is clearly more serious than taking drugs, just as driving with no hands whilst eating and talking on the phone is more serious than checking a text at a light.

Again, I didn't get my point across - its not just 'more serious', the point is that it potentially harms _others_. That's a _qualitative_ difference, not a quantitative one. Whereas the examples you give about distracted driving are BOTH about potentially harming others. Not the same distinction at all.

John Mitchell wrote:

I am saying that cyclists should be thoughtful about what footage they decide to make public.

I don't 100% disagree with that - personally I wouldn't go for shaming individuals. But I'm not going to tell others what to do when they witness something that could potentially endanger them, especially if they've personally had experience of the police doing nothing when given evidence of such behaviour.

And it kind-of is 'them and us', to some degree. There are always power struggles between different groups, that's life. On the road those in heavy armoured metal boxes have more power (they also have quite a bit politically speaking as well)

If I see somebody smoking weed in public then that is potentially damaging my health through second hand smoke. That's also true of seeing someone in public smoking a cigarette. The question is how much it affects my health, how much does it increase my chances of dying? The same argument is true of somebody sat at a red light reading a text message. Somebody doing drugs in public could be seen by children or impressionable adults, it could increase their chance of taking the drugs so it's not just self-harming as you put it.

If that sounds abstract I apologise. I'm not arguing that those cases would necessarily significantly increase the likelihood of death to others but those examples (and I'm sure you can imagine many other ones, probably better than these) are not strictly self-harming. When we talk about a driver sat in traffic eating cereal, yes she is increasing the chances of a cyclist death around her, but by how much? At the lower end of traffic offenses we are talking about very small probability jumps, the same way we're talking about small probability jumps when somebody is smoking a cigarette in public.

To group all traffic offenses together as "potentially killing an innocent child through distracted driving" is massively misleading. Different offenses cause different probability jumps. Some offenses lead to significant jumps and naming and shaming these drivers is justified in my opinion. Other offenses have negligible impact and to name and shame them is totally unnecessary and out of proportion (note that when the footage is also released to the police the action of posting the video to youtube with face and number plate visible is much harder to justify as being a public service).

Not all driving offenses are equal. To post videos of minor infringements is a needless erosion of our society.

FluffyKittenofTindalos wrote:

And it kind-of is 'them and us', to some degree. There are always power struggles between different groups, that's life. On the road those in heavy armoured metal boxes have more power (they also have quite a bit politically speaking as well)

Bringing up the "us vs them" argument clouds the water. It invites biases. And in this case it strays away from the point.

John Mitchell wrote:

Perhaps therefore it is OK to name and shame people who are deemed to be over-eating? Other people may focus on smoking in public, doing drugs in public, over-drinking, contributing to climate change, offending religions etc etc. Road deaths aren't going to be a special case in everybody's eyes. I'd suggest that it is our bias as cyclists that makes it seem like they are.

Those over eating are not killing others. Overeating and the drain on nhs is equivalent to driving at all. Not to driving dangerously. Since the health effects on the population and the fact that inactivity (driving rather than active transport) is as important to health as being overweight. But in fact there is more stigma in society for being morbidly obese than for using a phone while driving.

John Mitchell wrote:

We've reached an impasse. You claim to welcome more surveillance, more personal cameras, more naming and shaming in the interest of improving safety. I don't.

Its just the hypocritical inconsistency of it though.

You get the likes of Sarah Vine or Nick Ferrari coming on like Cockney gangsters or drug-dealing hoodie youths complaining about "grassing people up" when you just know they'd be the first to complain about a failure to report stuff to the police if it were about the misdeeds of people more plebian or less white than themselves.

Exactly, you hit the nail on the head and that is my concern too. I've been trying to make the point that some people in here would object to it if they or their friends were filmed and shamed for daily misdeeds, and yet when it comes to car drivers the same people are defending it because it is legal to do so, or because the car driver deserves it, or because it is going to definitely save a life or any other justification. But the problem is that the justifications are being created after the decision is made. I hope that I am not being inconsistent. I don't like the idea of that society and therefore I also don't support the naming and shaming of car drivers for relatively minor offences.

@John Mitchell

I do partly get where you are coming from, with regard to the wider issue of getting used to living in the camera-festooned goldfish bowl that is the modern world.

But, for heaven's sake, Sarah Vine writes frequently for the Daily Mail - how often has that publication featured an article attempting to shame someone, whether an obscure nobody or a celeb, for failing to meet the approval of their curtain-twitcher readership? At least half the paper is made up of such stuff!

Vine is _absolutely_ a part of that part of the media, and that general class, who relentlessly tut-tut and attempt to shame others (did her husband ever say anything about the issue of CCTV in the schools he was in charge of, by the way?).

It seems she just thinks it should be a one-way street (with no contraflow cycle lane!).

All these recent complaints about 'cycling vigilantes' seem to fall into that hypocritical category. The wider issue of 'cameras everywhere' is, unfortunately, probably a lost cause, but its not what this is about anyway.

crikey wrote:

It's not about being a vigilante...

crikey wrote:

Catch them.
Shame them.

People have fallen for the idea that they exist and they are therefore entitled to do as they wish unless they are caught at it. Catching, naming and shaming is an antidote to this.

What you said here IS about being a vigilante. Nobody here is defending the woman for eating cereal, this isn't about defending her. It's about whether "catching, naming and shaming" is the right thing to do.

Earlier on people were criticising the linked TV programme for using the term "vigilante", but I certainly think it applies to the ethos conveyed in some of these later comments. I guess we fundamentally disagree on that, I would hate to live in one, it seems some people here welcome it.