Wednesday 26 August 2015

Cyclist Haters Boycott List?

This rather brought back to me the importance of logging the interactions we have with individuals and companies. How many times have we all watched as someone in their company van rained hate down on a cyclist? How often have we seen someone tweeting rancid abuse at cyclists from their company profile?
And within a couple of weeks, how many of these do we still remember?

I wonder, do need a simple repository for these incidents? Somewhere such are recorded, but where we give a right of reply to those who've been so unpleasant. It has to be matter-of-fact, simply logging what happened and giving the salient facts with appropriate links to media (video, tweets etc.) supporting the claim. 

My bottom line is that I don't want to trade with cyclist hating people. If someone thinks I deserve to be badly treated because of how I choose to travel, I don't want them to get my money. If someone employs others who endanger cyclists on the road, I don't want their company to benefit from my spending. I want them to have a chance to show contrition, and if I believe them I'll go back to spending there - but I want to know, an I want to have the option not to.

Many of us shop 'ethically' for food, clothing, energy, etc. I don't see that this is inherently very different to an other ethical choice.

The question is, how should this be done? Do I set up a new blog and record these incidents there when they happen? Has anyone got a better idea?

3 comments:

  1. Not sure if this would be workable (or even legal) as a simple boycott list, but I'd welcome the existence of a collected list of allegations made, arranged by company name, so I could make up my own mind on a case-by-case basis.

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  2. One problem is that the individual employee does not necessarily represent the entire company's position.
    You would need to give the company a right-to-reply, and evidence any action they had taken against the offender, or to improve all employees' attitudes.
    Sub-contracted temp drivers are another problem.

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  3. On a more positive note, I suspect some companies would soon emerge as 'frequent offenders', which could be worth knowing.

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