Scotland's health tyrants should get on their bikes | Kevin McKenna
Not sure if he is serious?
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Cycling News
'Scotland's health tyrants' - guardian article
(13 posts)-
Posted 12 years ago #
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He hits the buzz words, insurance, highway code avoidance and funny clothes.
Comments are turned off just now but I suspect this is click bait.
Posted 12 years ago # -
It's his favourite subject. -
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If new pandas and old whales and spooky moons are the secular world's beatitudes, then urban cycling has become its prayer and meditation; in Scotland we don't build churches any more, only cycle lanes. To be a cyclist in lowland Scotland is to have reached the absolute zenith of the human condition. Thus we find ourselves in the middle of a campaign to presume guilt on the part of motorists in any road accidents involving cyclists. The proponents of this extraordinary nonsense tell us that, as cyclists can't kill you and cars do, then automotive vehicles must be presumed guilty in any incidents involving cyclists.
I feel moved to state here that I'm not averse to a wee pedal myself from time to time, but I feel that doing so in built-up areas is the height of irresponsibility and displays an arrogant and high-handed attitude to the concerns of other road-users. All that countryside with which we have been blessed in Scotland, all those hills and lochs – they have been put here for a reason. It's to provide a natural facility for people who insist on spending a disproportionate part of their lives running, cycling and climbing. Cities are for cars, buses and trains. They are where people go to work hard and drink seriously. There is ample room in the countryside for frivolous people who want to affect healthiness and happiness and sport ridiculous millinery and garish apparel.
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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/apr/28/stop-pampering-scottish-cyclists
Posted 12 years ago # -
As he profiles on Twitter
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Inexplicably, Kevin McKenna is paid to write for the Guardian. Here are a few selected quotes from recent articles to prove he's not a COMPLETE waste of space."
@KevinMcKennaSez
Posted 12 years ago # -
Think he might be claiming a highly ironic style? However, journalists who hide behind irony without tying themselves to any specific ideology are ultimately co-opted into the dominant hegemony, ie supporting roads for cars, despite not being averse to a wee pedal himself.
imperative that we don't come across as a bunch of Po faced cycle-atis (ref Tom Leonard - Po-faced literati)
We need to develop tactics of humour and ingenuity such as the Luther Blissett people employed in Milan, also liked SRD of this parish explaining in simple terms in the EEN how cycle lanes are great for shops, walkers, panhandlers, dog kidnappers and indeed everyone else
Posted 12 years ago # -
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Severin Carrell (@severincarrell)
29/09/2013 09:33
@SRDorman @magnatom a) I have no knowledge of or link to this; b) @KevinMcKennaSez is a spoof acc; c) it's an Observer piece"
Posted 12 years ago # -
Although Kevin appears not to like cycling, he boosts his eco-credentials through heroic levels of recycling:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/apr/28/stop-pampering-scottish-cyclists
Almost identical piece from April.
Posted 12 years ago # -
He thinks he's Michael Bywater or Christopher Hitchens but he's not.
Posted 12 years ago # -
It's all a bit old news isn't it? This came out in April before POP!
EDIT oh I see, he's just being eco friendly and recycling. Particularly tasteless on the weekend a cyclist is killed
Posted 12 years ago # -
Ah, I see he is executive editor of the Daily Mail in Scotland. Why the hell is he allowed to write for an almost respectable newspaper?
Posted 12 years ago # -
I really liked this comment, countering the 'If God had wanted Scotland to be a nation of cyclists, He'd have put the hills somewhere else':
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No mention of Kirkpatrick MacMillan, the Scottish blacksmith who invented the bicycle?* Seems odd that something like the bike would be invented in a country where it couldn't possibly be used.Scotland's got a pretty good record in cycling, articles like this are just willfully ignorant.
*I am aware of the counter claims, controversies etc
"""Posted 12 years ago # -
I think somebody's taken his only Strava KOM* off him and he's in a big strop.
*His garden, from behind the shed to the decking.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Couldn't help but sign in through FB and reply, for what it's worth.
My main point was that the Active Travel budget is just 0.154% of the Health Budget, so what on earth is he on about.
Oh, and the Junta / Tyrant invocation of Godwin's law on the 3rd word in the title.
He comes across as a grade-A, uninformed, opinionated aerosol who clearly has no idea what he's talking about in that piece. Which is a shame as I rather liked his pieces on inequitably of Scottish land ownership.
Posted 12 years ago #
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