This column is written as a conversation between Byron the Bicyclist and Patty the Pedestrian.
Dear Byron the Bicyclist.
I see you told Maddie about the truck sticker you saw recently. It showed a family of stick people being run over by a 4x4. Below it: “Run you stick b@*tards.” But you didn’t say what you thought of it.
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Obviously, the truck owner thinks it is funny. I don’t. Why? Partly because I almost got run over last year at Proctor and 3rd Avenue North. The male driver of a small SUV in a hurry didn’t see me. The only reason I wasn’t hit is because I sprinted forward. The driver said: “Blind spot.”
Not long after, just one block south of there, I was almost run over by a car at the zebra crosswalk. The driver was only looking straight ahead, not for pedestrians.
That is just the latest two incidents of many over the 30 years I have walked this town.
So, I fail to see why advocating running over two children and their parents and calling them b@*tards is funny. In fact, it calls for violence!
“Just stick people,” this person might say? Well, I know many drivers who have stickers indicating their family members and sometimes their pets. Each stick person or pet represents someone dear to them. We need to respect that.
Advocating violence is simply wrong!
Sincerely, Patty the Pedestrian
Dear Patty.
When I saw the sticker, I was incredulous! Yet when I looked online, many vendors were selling them. Some stickers were labeled “Funny.”
We only need to look at London, Ontario two years ago to know where this can lead. A pickup truck driver deliberately ran over a family of five killing four of them.
Not funny.
Love your neighbour! All of them.
Signed, Byron the Bicyclist
Bert Groenenberg has been biking, walking and driving in Williams Lake for over 30 years.
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