What's the difference between regular old crime and a Bicycle Hate Crime?

Should have gotten the license number...darn it.

the cops badly botched the investigation of the january 10 bike beating. let's hope they manage to catch the stupid little fuckers this time.

A detailed description of the attackers would be most helpful. Were they black, perchance ?

When I had to deal, on a daily basis, with all the white-as-a-sheet fratboys fucking with bike riders back in Texas, I took to wearing a nice length of steel chain draped over my shoulder, with a big Master lock on it. Much handier weapon than a U-lock or knife, plus you can lock up the bike with it.

One of the funniest stories I ever heard come from a room-mate who did the same. One night this crew of nasty white jocks ran him right off of the road in a downpour. Nearly killed him. He caught up with them at a red light, and smacked their entire winshield in with the chain, drenching them in rain and glass. He couldn't stop laughing when he described the terrified expressions on their faces. He was also a pretty big guy, which is why he got away with this.

Now, if someone was shooting at your head with a pellet gun, you might stand a chance in court if you pulled out a (CHP licensed) real gun to scare them off. Maybe.

I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment of the letter to the Mercury this week by the gentleman who is also sick and tired of the hatred and violence directed at white bicyclists in NE, as are a growing number of us. If the police can not or will not protect us from these violent predators, we have no choice but to start standing up for ourselves.

Otherwise, they wil continue with this shit, over and over and over again, as there are obviously no consequences to this kind of behavior just yet.

I'd chase the bitches down!

I've hit punks with cans of creamed corn and someone got a glob of hummus in their lap.

That's portland-y! Y'all should strike back. With hummus.

dont worry they are gonna start an outreach program, thats gonna solve all the problems.

Here is an article about some "teens" that brutally raped, orally and anally, a young woman while forcing her bloodied, beaten husband to watch.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime_file/story/391355p-331943c.html

I found booking photos of the rapists from the DAs office:

http://www.co.suffolk.ny.us/da/press/2006/02_15_06.pdf

How much more time will go by before these predators move on from beating the shit out of bicyclists and shooting them with pellet guns, to better and more entertaining sport, emboldened by both the total lack of Police response and the passive attitudes of the cyclists themselves ?

Remember, nothing stops heartless, cowardly bullies in their tracks like people who refuse to be victims.

Not sure what that article has to do with this, and....

How do people "refuse to be victims" when they're being shot at with a BB gun?

well, hula, i idly took at look at handguns last night. they're pretty.

also, at a minimum, cyclists need to report this shit to the cops. the cops can't utterly fail to investigate something they don't exists.

I echo the last comment with a question - did NELZ report this to the police with pertinent info?

Also, NE 28th is NOT NOPO. That is Northeast.

Just read the article. I have a couple of questions:
Why is this being played off as a race issue? There are issues with Teens doing shitty things in other neighborhoods and it is written off as TEEN angst and stupidity. Why in North/NE is it suddenly race. Do you really believe that if you ask these kids why they are doing it they will answer - "well, all the whitey's are coming in, driving up house prices so my grandma can't live here anymore. Its that gentrification shit bitch!" No.
Second, why not take a more aggressive approach with a bike patrol? Community or group based patrols have been very affective in the past with our society. I personally wouldn't want to be chased down by a group of angry cyclists. If the cycling community got together and had roaming patrols, they could make a difference. Get medieval on their asses.

I mentioned race in the "Bike Beat" article not because I think this issue is about race (it's about many things), but because I was trying to give voice to something I assumed was on many people's minds.

Race has come up in every reference to these attacks since the first media report.

These attacks may not be about race, but I also don't think the conversation is real and honest if we don't mention it.

And I do think there is some resentment in the black community about gentrification...but whether that has to do with bikes and whites is hard to say.

Are bikes somehow symbolic of whites and gentrification to the black community? that'd be interesting to find out.

one thing's true, the bike community could be more diverse.

I think this is about neighborhood safety, vulnerability of cyclists, a need for cyclists to report everything to the police, a need for the police to take this seriously, a call for more community awareness, etc...

And dieselboi, do you really think escalating the violence is the answer? I don't. I don't want to live in a "medieval" neighborhood.

"Are bikes somehow symbolic of whites and gentrification to the black community? that'd be interesting to find out."

My gut reaction is, "yes!" But short of doing an empirical survey, all we have to go on is the price of designer bikes.

I can't help but wonder if the bike issue is as much about economics as race (which I admit are incredibly entangled). I lived in a predominately black city in the deep south and bikes were a main transportation method for the black community, but up here- biking has more of a yuppie recreation connotation to it.

I was attacked by a group of about 10 teens last weekend. I was riding down skidmore in broad sunlight, they walked out into the street as I passed and punched me in the back/arm/stomach and called me a fucking cunt as I rode by. Luckily I didn't crash and just kept going. So if a group of kids "wants to ask you a question" pedal like hell.

This is why I drive a car.

In general, anyone between the age of 13 and 21 is pretty shitty.

Jonathan,
I agree that escalating the violence is not the solution, but maybe bringing it to the forefront of a citywide discussion is. It there were stories of youths being chased by people on bikes, I think the mainstream media and the politicians and the police may perk up their ears.
What if this was an issue of ongoing gay-bashing? In our wonderful societies history, the mainstream usually has ignored such events until it was turned on its head. When gays in SFO started fighting back, it stared something.
Just a thought.

dieselboi,

just FYI, so far the Tribune, Mercury, Oregonian, KATU-tv and KGW-tv have all covered this issue.

And monday I am almost confirmed to be meeting with reps from the Mayor's office, the Police Bureau, etc... to talk about the issue.

people are taking notice.

but I agree with the fact that if the tables were turned in various ways (for instance, bikes chasing people, bikes chasing cars, whites yelling racial epithets and attacking blacks, etc...) the response might be even greater.

which brings up one of the bike communities big problems.

Because so many people think of us as whining trouble-makers who are always being (and needing to be) coddled by the city, we don't exactly get a lot of sympathy all the time.

Makes me miss the skinheads!

I've just posted more about this on BikePortland.

The police will never do a fucking thing... Do they ever? Take matters in your own hands and fuck little shits like this up!

It's not just happening in Portland:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lbhate3feb03,0,2245473.story?coll=la-home-headlines

hey dudes, this discussion got me thinking, and i came up with a plan. for too long, the bike community has been harassed, run off the road, and even killed by RITCH WHITE PEOPLE. so, once these vigilante patrols have showed all the brown people in nopo who’s in charge (or maybe we should just call them, “[seekers of] crimes of opportunity”) we need to teach these people to share the road by taking the fight to their neighborhoods. here’s what we’ll do: first, we’ll form squadrons of 8-10 vegan twenty-somethings on fixed gears. then we’ll cross the river and set up checkpoints on northwest 23rd and in the west hills. it’ll be off the chain!

OK, I don't make the news... just passing it on.

Here's a message sent to Shift by "Keisha" through the Shift "contact" page on the website. This by the way is the means of sending messages to Shift email contacts now, to hide the addresses from spammers:
http://www.shift2bikes.org/contacts/

"I read today about an incident involving the attack of two cyclists in NoPo. From what I read, IT SEEMS LIKE A GREAT IDEA TO TAKE CRITICAL MASS TO NOPO, I mean WHY NOT RUB IT IN THEIR FACES THAT THEIR HOOD HAS BEEN GENTRIFIED AND TAKEN OVER BY WHITE, LIBERAL HIPPIES. Yes, thats fucking brilliant. Have some FUCKING RESPECT. Not everyone in Portland is down with you self righteous, white bikers. Why dont you stick with your vegan restaurants, over priced homes, and coffee shops? People like you have done enough damage, not only to North/Northeast Portland but inner SE as well. As a person of color, youve insulted me and my neighborhood.
Go back to Reed or California or wherever the fuck you from until you learn some respect, you douchebags"

If I could communicate a message to all the angry black people of NE and N Portland, it would be that economic forces and not race are their main problem (with affordable housing and gentrification). Many people are moving from SE to NE and N Portlnad because they are priced out of their own neighborhoods, resulting from all the influx of people (of every race) who are moving to Portland because they're fleeing their own overpolluted, overpaved, overcrowded, poorly planned and lacking in local culture cities.

Also, before those neighborhoods were primarily "black" they were Irish / Polish, and before that the whole damn continent was the home of Native Americans.

See how the race thing has turned to bite liberals in the firm, non-polluting bicycling, spandexed ass?
Woe to the first of you who dares to fight back against a black attacking you! You'll be spun as a hate criminal so fast your helmeted head will spin. Without solid, fearless witness and/or videotape to back your story of self-defense, what will the perps say? "She rode by and called us niggers and spit on us! Can yall blame us fo goin' crazy yo??" Then you'll be sputtering like a Republican, "What! I would never...I...I...some of my best friends..." confirming to everyone that you did indeed do what you never did. What's the alternative? Call a black a liar? A lying black?? That's even worse than your first thought crime!
Every black that gets into trouble knows to do this by reflex. (Like the LaCrosse player thing in NC last year. Even a drunken stripper knows to cry "lynching.")
So, you live by the race card, you get your ass beat off a bicycle by the race card.
What it's coming to is that absent air-tight proof of a black criminal's malice, they're gonna skate.
What's the solution?
Part 1: Stop talking "people of race/class" and start talking "people of intent." And this won't be easy for you liberals. It's all you think about, race and sexual orientation.
In this case, "people intent on attacking bikers." It's a mouthful, but as long as there's never a reference to "black" or any race, we can all concentrate on the law. (Since being of a certain race is becoming defacto above the law.)
Just as in negotiation you must never be the first to mention a price, never mention race in your proposals for solutions or you'll lose. You propose a law like automatic six month sentence for anyone interfering with the lawful ride of a cyclist. If activists try to argue this will put more young black men behind bars, you say, "This isn't about young black men, it's about people intent on attacking bikers!"
Step 2: let "law-abiding" replace "community-minded" as your highest aim for society. After all, being sensitive to a community of people who like to attack bikers would mean condoning such attacks, no?
Step 3: Having done the first two, look around and realize you're now a conservative. Ewww! Awful, isn't it? Damn you can ride unmolested, though...

Really, though, nothing needs to be done. Ghetto folk of all race (black white or brown) are going to be taxed/priced out of NoPo and everywhere else in the city proper. It's an economic certainty. Most of them are only where they are still because they're living in their grandmomma's crib. As old folk die or flee rising costs and taxes, "gentrification" will drive every last ghettoid out. When that happens, attacks like this will be far and few between indeed.
Maybe a good 10 years aways still.
Be patient and try to survive, meantime.

ouch!!! That last comment was pure eveel.

I live in deep southeast, where a lot of poor folk live. Like the rest of portland, it is mostly white (including, it seems, a booming Russian community), but there are also Mexicans, Asians, and, increasingly, blacks. And methheads of every ethnicity!!!

I ride a bike because it's cheaper than a car or a bus pass. I also think it's better for the environment and for my health (aside from inhaling extra car fumes) and all that, but the bottom line is I can't afford a car, or at least I'd rather not make the sacrifices that would allow me to own one.

Plenty of people out here, of all colors, are out on bikes or taking the bus. I suspect it is because they also can't afford cars.

Before the articles and reports on these attacks, I had never considered biking to be symbolic of affluence, unless the biker in question is one of those fanatics in gortex on a $2000 mountain or horizontally aligned bike (not that I'm judging! If I was biking for any length of time or distance with regularity, I'm sure proper equipment would be well worth the expense in the long run).

Nor had I considered it an activity only white people engage in. My gut instinct tells me that at least some black people in the NE like to ride bicycles.

Did every person attacked present a picture of affluence? Everyone's account of them seems to indicate they were younger, hipster types, not yuppies. A funky, fully restored retro schwinn and taste in retro clothing and body piercings and tattoos does require a certain amount of money, but I don't generally consider these kids rich, even if some of them are here on mommy and daddy's money, going to school and generally set for life. I know plenty more are just living the ghetto fabulous life like other povs (poor people), working at a cafe without any prospects for the future. There are poor people of every ethnicity that spend way too much (given their means) on clothes, drugs, booze, what have you. This is no judgement on my part. In a lot of ways, I think it's perfectly understandable that men and women, of every economic background, with shitty jobs and lives, relies on some kind of drug or anesthesia like clothing and music consumption to ignore the screaming bleakness of their lives.

I think it's more of a culture clash than either a racial or economic one. I used to work at Lloyd Center and take classes at the PCC on Killingsworth (biking to and from, of course). The areas I spent time in and biked through definitely had more of an aggressive, gangster vibe, but NOT BECAUSE THERE WERE MORE BLACK PEOPLE. There were a lot of pissy white people too. And people just minding there own business. But compared to the SE, more people gave me that "I'm capable of violence" feel, black, white or other.

These chic hipsters represent a wussier culture that has slowly penetrated into this street rule setting. They are weak, and to people who operate on violence, people perceived as weak or soft or idealistic are always a target.