Would people prefer it if we turned off commenting on reports of fatalities?

No matter which news channel
No matter which news channel you switch on there is always stories of death, destruction and killings.

We dont need to discuss it at length on a cycling forum

Turn them off for fatalities?
Turn them off for fatalities? Yes please.

If there’s a need for
If there’s a need for reporting dangerous areas, perhaps a new forum area could be created for reporting these?

Where do you draw the
Where do you draw the line?
What about cases involving injuries that turn into fatalities later? What about obituaries of famous cyclists? What about any general post that digresses into discussion about a fatality? If berieved friends and family are going to look at this site, they’re probably going to come across other sites too, so they’re bound to see a wide range of opinion, regardless of what road.cc do.

My suggestion, and something that has been brought up time and time again, is to add a “dislike” button and a “report this post” button. It’s the commonest method used by forums to handle sensitive issues. It’s certainly the way the BBC handles their on-line forums.

SteveAustin wrote:I come on

SteveAustin wrote:

I come on here to read about bikes, riding bikes etc, i don’t come here to read obituaries of people who may have been riding a bike when they died.

Maybe the solution is to not report these all too frequently occurring sad deaths?

So don’t read them then. They’re quite easy to avoid should you wish to do so….

Leave them on – it allows
Leave them on – it allows people to ask questions about the road from people who might know it.

Step on trolls though. A comment box does not “invite argument” except from silly people.

Turn them off please, and
Turn them off please, and save the forum from getting clogged up with wild speculation and conspiracy theories.

I’ve read a large number of
I’ve read a large number of the comments here, and I also think turning it off would be most suitable.

People don’t need to chat about a road-death, let alone bicker, and least of all use it as a tasteless platform for point-scoring, which then only kicks up a storm and detracts from the issue itself. A comments box invited invites argument, and argument invites personal pride.

The only suitable reaction to a death on the roads is reflection, not a knee-jerk voicing of opinion. Reflection is best done served by solitude, not other people’s opinions.

As has been said, if someone has something they genuinely want to raise with others, there are plenty of outlets for that on the website. But turning the comments off would give a bit of a breather between internal reaction and external.

As for comments expressing remorse to the bereaved, if people genuinely wish to express their feelings to the loved ones of the deceased, then I feel it is too indirect to hope they stumble across the comments posted somewhere in a comments section on the internet under an anonymous username. It’s like writing a letter without sending it.

That’s what I think anyway; there are still many places on this website where people are free to speak, but I think it would be tasteful to move the conversation on issues of death a little further away from the source.