That's such a willfully stupid response. Compare these:
Bike:Compact:SUV to pelletgun:handgun:rifle
Morever, did you read the first thing that I said? "Before I get all the hate I have to say of course cyclists should obey the laws." Thank you for adding NOTHING to the conversation except for demonstrating the whacked out stupidity that is the core problem here.
Your kind argues that we have to obey the same laws as motorists while forcing us into the gutter. "Separate but equal?"
Bike:Compact:SUV to pelletgun:handgun:rifle
Like I said, a bicycle is very capable of severely injuring or killing a pedestrian, which is why I group it together with automobiles. I'm not familiar with how powerful pellet guns are, so I don't know how that analogy applies. I suspect they are at least capable of causing severe eye injury, and I would encourage the exact same precautionary behavior with pellet guns as with handguns and rifles (trigger discipline, don't point at people, etc.).
I guess I'm a little confused by what point you're trying to make. If your preface was intended to invalidate everything you wrote after it, then it's my mistake for trying to do the same.
A pellet could injure someone and damage an eye. What if a bullet hit the same spot? Those are very different outcomes. Conceivably a pellet could kill someone if was a David vs Goliath one in a million shot. Reckless endangerment takes into account the threat level created by the offender. Why not traffic laws? The threat level sort of tops out when you're a squishy human getting hit by a vehicle. Compact vs SUV don't matter much unless you want to get all Rorschach about the splatter pattern. Dead is dead.
That said, I've spent much of my life in cities crowded with bikes and pedestrians and the difference between a bike and a car, pretty much any kind of car, is huge.
There's the weight difference, but also the completely different posture, ability to see around you, ability to stop or even just drop your bike and jump off. Bikes are much easier to steer, as well as smaller in 'surface area' that can hit another person.
I've gone on daily commutes where I'd ride at relatively high speeds right through the tourist-infested center of Amsterdam, and while I'd not do that anymore (wiser and older), accidents were incredibly rare, despite the fact that most tourists don't understand the concept of a 'bike lane'.
In my opinion the average city biker is much more like a pedestrian than like a car driver. Obviously that doesn't mean bikers shouldn't respect the road, but putting bikers in the same category as drivers seems a bit silly to me.
(that said, high-speed cyclists are quite a bit more dangerous. but around here they usually avoid heavy-traffic areas. could be different for the US maybe)
In my opinion the key attribute isn't the size, weight, or speed, but rather simply the path being used. To me, the key distinction of pedestrians is that they have their own "road," with very different rules and specific rules to handle encounters with the other type of road. Bicycles, on the other hand, use the same road as automobiles (and usually the same lanes), with only slightly different rules than automobiles.
It's not difficult to drive, ride, or walk safely. Just do it and stop whining.
I believe that we all share this earth and we should all act safely and responsibly. Yes, cars kill far more easily than bikes, but bikes can seriously injure or kill as well. Cars swerving out of the way of bikes also kill, which could have easily been the result of your encounter, had the SUV been swerving to avoid a bike.
You shouldn't be forced off the road. Pedestrians shouldn't step blindly into the road. Cars shouldn't drive erratically in populated areas. Bike can seriously injur or kill people, so just act responsibly.
Stop whining is not helpful advice. It means shut up.
Wow. Late night rant, perhaps I should have run as the Republican candidate for POTUS.
In this instance, stop whining is not advice, it's in response to people thinking that for their own narcissistic reasons, it's okay to jeapordize the safety of others. That includes the cars that park in bike lanes as well as the bicyclists who blow through stop signs.
Are cops killing black people morally equivalent to motorist road rage and lack of consideration? Of course not.
Caveat aside, I'm constantly amazed that this argument gets brought up over and over again.
Traffic laws exist to ensure public safety. So let's cut the bike/car bullshit about the laws being equal for both.
Let's take a simple offense like running a stop sign at 15 km/hr and suppose that a pedestrian gets hit. What's the difference between a car doing this and a bicycle? Both the bike and the car are going 4 m/s. But there's a huge difference between getting hit by a car that's 1500 kg plus passengers versus an 80 kg person plus a 9 kg bike. Simple thought experiment, you've just been hit by something. What outcome would be more favorable? Would you rather have a Honda Civic on your spleen or some asshat bike courier named Jack? Two tonnes versus nine kilograms?
The crime may be the same, but the outcome is far different. I've seen a van run a red light and the cyclist traveling orthogonally ride right into the side of it going 45 km/hour. Not pretty.