People on bikes may be rude and may not follow the rules, but can’t be aggressive.
When a man with a .45 meets a man with a rifle, the man with a pistol will be a dead man.
Original stripe from the Onion: https://www.theonion.com/bum-rush-hour-1846606314
Cross-posted from: https://mastodon.uno/users/rivoluzioneurbanamobilita/statuses/113615912203015089
The point is, most aren’t. But the handful of assholes are the ones that stay in the mind. Just like with car drivers.
Being introspective, I wasn’t great, learning from the bike messenger sector who was adroit at aggressive driving downtown, but to be fair San Francisco has an intense, unkind traffic vibe (at least compared to Vacaville and Sacramento, when my then-girlfriend was driving from Vacaville and Sacramento to visit me every other week.
In my opinion, the best traffic community in SF was on Clement street in the commercial area (a blend of Chinese community and Russian community small businesses) in which everyone drove horribly but did so at five miles per hour, so I could be patient while a cluster sorted themselves out, and in the meantime find an opening to zip through.