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Video of cyclist's revenge on sexist London van man goes viral

Did she go too far? Is it even real? The internet discusses, have your say too

A video of a female cyclist taking revenge on sexist men in a van has been widely shared. Much initial discussion centred on whether her response was proportional, but there were also questions over whether the video was real. The company that posted the video has since admitted that it appears to have been staged.

The video begins with the cyclist stopped at traffic lights at the junction of Goodge Street and Tottenham Court Road. A van has pulled up alongside her, but then steers towards her while the lights are on red.

At that point we start to hear that one of the occupants is addressing her.

"Alright, want my number?" he begins.

When she doesn’t, and shows her displeasure, he quickly moves onto suave bon mots such as "Oi! What charm school did you go to, eh? and "Shut up, you old dog. You on your period?"

Leaning out of his window, he twice tries to touch her and the increasingly irate cyclist at one point pushes the van’s wing mirror in – but it is the wing mirror on the opposite side that eventually comes in for more serious attention.

She gives the van’s occupants the finger as the driver pulls off, but then heads in the same direction and catches up with them on Chenies Street where they have pulled over.

She stops, tears off the driver’s side wing mirror with her bare hands and then rides away.

“That’s exactly what you deserve, you scum,” says the motorcyclist who has been behind the whole time, filming all of this with his helmet cam.

The video has been picked up by a number of newspapers and is being shared widely across social media.

Reactions have been strong. The most popular response on the Viral Thread post above was by Domenic Dimonte, who said: “The girl is 100% in the right and if you disagree you were probably in the truck.”

In contrast, David Murdoch offered: “Jail her!, criminal damage to property, just a couple of good old blokes about a job of work. along comes missy bossy boots and despite the guys being nice and joking with her she chases them and damages the van... I blame pc politics meself.”

Lexi Rae meanwhile was clear that she had no time for the man in the van. “THERE SHOULDN'T EVEN BE A QUESTION OF WHO WAS WRONG. Not only was he verbally harassing her, he put his hands on her more than once. FUCK that guy and fuck his mirror.”

Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.

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59 comments

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JohnnyRemo | 7 years ago
2 likes

Road CC need to take this down or change the text to make it clear the authenticity of the vid is questionable (before more posters make @rses of themselves...)

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MartyMcCann | 7 years ago
1 like

 

The Guardian seems to be coming more down on the side of it being staged:

 

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/feb/22/why-a-viral-video-o...

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JohnnyRemo | 7 years ago
1 like

Here's why promoting this fakenews just falls into the DailyFailers  hands. In today's comments (yes, I went there and boy do I feel dirty)  about this vid

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4248496/Dashcam-footage-captures...

"Look at that lunatic cyclist from yesterdays' article. She ripped a wing mirror of the van. This is what they're like. Clowns."

Others will use it to show cyclists will even go to staging events to make drivers look bad. Not good either way...

 

*EDIT* Article sub-headline changed to now question authenticity

 

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tritecommentbot | 7 years ago
3 likes

@Johnny

 

Makes zero difference. It's just another echo chamber.  People use information to confirm existing biases. 

 

To say that fake news has an effect on someone would be to suggest that people are generally intellectually honest. Very, very rare to find someone like that even among academia. Takes most people decades to change their mind on an issue, if ever. 

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tritecommentbot | 7 years ago
0 likes

@ davel, sure butterfly effect and all that. Hatred through this kind of reinforcement does in fact lead into action. 

At the same time - the world's trends are on powerfully set courses that none of us can escape from. Macro v micro view. If it wasn't this the trigger, there's something else the next day that'd tip them over, or the next day, or the next.

 

And the Heil and it's ilk make sure that a constant stream of this kind of propaganda is put out daily, year on year.

To me it's like the drug war. Forget about the street corner boys making a few quid on the side of it all. We need to shut down the guys at the top to elicit cultural change. Ie. Take down the Sun, Heil, DT etc. In fact, complete regulation of the media and what they can print.

Which we won't do - freedom of speech is the freedom of the press to spew hatred and control society's values.

 

 

 

(On the flip side, you can also argue that the video will do some good then - some van driver who acted this way watches it and feels shamed enough that he won't do it again. (There's always a floating minority). )

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Metaphor | 7 years ago
0 likes

Cool woman - respect.

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Greebo954 | 7 years ago
0 likes

It's fake

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psling replied to JohnnyRemo | 7 years ago
1 like

JohnnyRemo wrote:

Road CC need to take this down or change the text to make it clear the authenticity of the vid is questionable (before more posters make @rses of themselves...)

 

Like Brooksby says, whether fake or not it raises a pertinent issue that is worthy of discussion. I don't think posters making a relevant contribution to the topic are making @rses of themselves, whichever side of the debate they stand.

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davel replied to tritecommentbot | 7 years ago
0 likes

unconstituted wrote:

@Johnny

 

Makes zero difference. It's just another echo chamber.  People use information to confirm existing biases. 

 

To say that fake news has an effect on someone would be to suggest that people are generally intellectually honest. Very, very rare to find someone like that even among academia. Takes most people decades to change their mind on an issue, if ever. 

Might it be more grist to their mill, though, next time they pass a cyclist...? Might it reinforce their moton sense of entitlement or their prejudice of cyclists?

I get both points - just a tad concerned at the effect the likes of the Heil might have,  and find the echo chamber/fake news phenomena interesting. But I can't help thinking, when you look at some of the comments on their stories, that seeing evidence of other people thinking the same thing as them might embolden some of the little Hitlers.

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sithlord | 7 years ago
1 like

I have to say, looking at this a few times... It all seems a bit well "staged." I might be totally wrong but...

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pmanc | 7 years ago
0 likes

I've said it before, but I think it always helps to consider how intimidating and downright scary it can be to be harassed by drivers (either by their driving style or verbally, or even physically as happened here, grabbing at her).  The men in this video were at a massive advantage over the woman...

 - There were two (or three?) of them, safe in the cab of a large motorised vehicle.

 - She was on her own, in the relatively exposed position of sitting at a bike having to wait at the lights.

I absolutely think it's hard to predict how you might feel and act when the adrenaline - fight-or-flight kicks in.  That's not to say her subsequent actions were right or wrong, but I for one wouldn't judge her too harshly, and I'd struggle to feel sorry for the scumbags in the van.  They started this.

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Vili Er | 7 years ago
2 likes

Sorry, but as a few folk pointed out on your facebook post and in several other places that this footage has popped up on, this video is staged. But as the vast majorty of road.cc 'articles' are now just click bait a staged video made to gereate clicks/advertising revenue is quite apt for this place.

Can we not have the old road.cc back please? When it wasn't all about revenue and the reads were interesting.

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grayvelo | 7 years ago
1 like

I don't believe for a second that this is real. The van passenger's dialogue makes little sense without responses to some of his - admittedly awful - comments.

Looks staged, sounds staged, feels staged.

Don't doubt that this kind of crap happens on a daily basis though, regardless of whatever the publisher's point is.

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OldRidgeback | 7 years ago
0 likes

Let's face it, we all lose our tempers when someone behaves like a moron. The guys in the van got what they deserved. I'm sure they'd said plenty to her before the video clip starts. Well done to her and also well done to the bloke on the scooter for backing her up. The van driver was lucky she didn't shove that mirror down his throat, although that would've been assault.

It  doesn't look like it was staged to me.

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Yorkshire wallet | 7 years ago
0 likes

I hope this isn't fake but in this money for views world, the potential income of a viral video is worth more than a wing mirror.

Even if it was fake it wouldn't surprise me if it happened a lot anyway.

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EddyBerckx | 7 years ago
1 like

Respect to her!!! Took more balls than the van occupants had.

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Ush | 7 years ago
2 likes

My only regrets about this are that it was a mirror and not the pervy aggressors' heads.

With no exaggeration I honestly believe that people like the van's occupants should not be allowed out in public.

Thanks to the woman on the bike for drawing some sort of line in the sand.

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Rapha Nadal | 7 years ago
3 likes

This video is being licenced for £600 a time from the creators.  Donny Trump's favourite kind of news, move along please.

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tritecommentbot | 7 years ago
4 likes

Well that's the way everything is, though the fake viral films and the obvious tribal  propoganda - that stuff is only good for the echo chamber and reinforcement of ideas. If this does turn out to be a stunt, I bet something similar actually happened a number of times all over the world anyway, just wasn't captured on camera. 

 

The really problematic fake news has been going on since print media ever began and it's more subtle and insidious. Collating news that paints a worldview and pushing that out daily. That is what has led to the mess we have today. A slow cooking divisive campaign machine. The most 'respectable' papers today, NYT, Guardian etc - are all guilty of it. 

Very few journalists are actually out there fighting for the truth. Glen Greenwald is one of the few that I could name. He does some really good digging in security.

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lop | 7 years ago
6 likes

So the video is being touted and sold by a viral marketing firm, no one has been identified, no youtube chanel for biker, van has no company details etc multiple angles and all perfectly filmed just in time. No one has contacted the police to file a complaint etc

So many people are calling it out as fake on social media and it increasingly does look fake like lots of other "social experiment" videos created to highlight issues or "prank" videos all designed to create outrage, go viral and generate money.  

Fair enough road.cc putting it out without any investigation but real news media like the guardian and telegraph are just pushing it out no questions asked. I suspect it will be found to be generated content  aka fake over the next few days but by the it will have provoked the outrage, made the money and been forgotten but still just adding to the swirling bullshit of fake news and propoganda that devalues reality.

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Ush replied to lop | 7 years ago
1 like

lop wrote:

So the video is being touted and sold by a viral marketing firm, no one has been identified, no youtube chanel for biker, van has no company details etc multiple angles and all perfectly filmed just in time. No one has contacted the police to file a complaint etc

Interesting.  Thanks for pointing that out as a possibility.

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Vili Er replied to lop | 7 years ago
1 like

lop wrote:

So the video is being touted and sold by a viral marketing firm, no one has been identified, no youtube chanel for biker, van has no company details etc multiple angles and all perfectly filmed just in time. No one has contacted the police to file a complaint etc

So many people are calling it out as fake on social media and it increasingly does look fake like lots of other "social experiment" videos created to highlight issues or "prank" videos all designed to create outrage, go viral and generate money.  

Fair enough road.cc putting it out without any investigation but real news media like the guardian and telegraph are just pushing it out no questions asked. I suspect it will be found to be generated content  aka fake over the next few days but by the it will have provoked the outrage, made the money and been forgotten but still just adding to the swirling bullshit of fake news and propoganda that devalues reality.

 

Didn't see your post lop - you're on the money (excuse the pun).

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STiG911 | 7 years ago
3 likes

I've seen this a fair few times since yesterday evening and some of the utter morons trying to defend these pond scum by criticising her not wearing a helmet (really!), or that 'it was just a bit of banter' has been boiling my piss for hours.

I've no idea in what world that kind of lecherous 'banter' is acceptable, let alone pawing at a complete stranger for a Laugh. Christ's sake.

Far as I'm concerned they were lucky she didn't beat them to death with it.

Kudos to the motor bike rider too. Difficult to jump in and do anything but telling them they deserved it - Priceless.

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Rich_cb | 7 years ago
4 likes

This looks staged to me.

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TurboJoe | 7 years ago
0 likes

I would have been inclined to ask which 'Charm School' he (never) went to. Moron.

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atgni | 7 years ago
3 likes

Biker filming got that exactly right at the end.

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bendertherobot | 7 years ago
2 likes

#fakenews

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NorthEastJimmy | 7 years ago
7 likes

I find it shocking how many people just carry on walking by, even though it's completely obvious that she is being harrassed!  The general public need to wake up, grow a pair and stand up for each other.

Hope she has managed to get over the ordeal and hope nothing comes back to haunt her.

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daturaman | 7 years ago
2 likes

Absolutely disgraceful - she should be fined for not wearing a helmet.

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sithlord | 7 years ago
0 likes

 

Wow, fair enough.  Give her credit that took some doing and real courage.  

I would say she doesnt know it is being filmed if she did I reckon her response may have been different.

 

 

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