The "right on red" seems to be a hack to address the fact that there are too many traffic lights. Indeed roundabouts would be better, those narrow Euro city centers are often faster. They also like their ridiculous 4-way stops instead of just yields. Right on red is indeed dangerous for cyclists, and when there's a bike lane, it is sometimes disallowed with a sign. Many drivers ignore them, and you always have to double check or risk getting creamed.
The "taking it too seriously" part is I think because biking in traffic here is an adrenaline rush. I do things here that I would never do at home, yet they are often the safer option. I sometimes bike into the third lane to make a left turn, I sometimes sneak a block on the sidewalk if it lets me use a safer crossing. Every single trip involves careful planning of your route. Often there is no bike lane, and you just have to share the road with traffic, while avoiding the swerving doors of parked cars.
Even worse is when they put a suicide bike lane between the first lane and the second/third lanes. The idea is that the first lane is a mix of parking, bus-stops and right hand turns. So you have all of those crossing through the bike lane, often cutting it short at the light, and hating you for being in their way.
The streets I rode on as a child to primary school were safer than the stuff being constructed here today. Pretty mind-blowing. They are slowly learning, but the entitlement from drivers (to whom 80-90% of the paved road is dedicated to) is insane.
To make it worse, pedestrians here just don't seem to understand cycling is a third mode, and they will obliviously wander into any bike lane even though there's literally a sign every 10 meters telling them to go onto the other path. A "shared bike/pedestrian path" is pretty much a shit show of people having 0 spatial awareness.
I think you're right about some cyclists in the US taking it WAAY to seriously. Because they're such a marginalized group, they define themselves by their difference. It's the American way :)
I'm not convinced right on red doesn't pose a dangerous situation, even if cars come to a full stop first. In a right on red scenario, the bicyclist always approaches from behind, in the blind spot of the mirror. I'm not saying the right on red policy should be abolished, just as I don't want roundabouts to be abolished in the Netherlands (I love those things). Just that, as a cyclist, it's primarily your duty to ensure cars have seen you. Let's hope that as cycling increases in the U.S., motorists become more aware of cyclists in the street.
As a pedestrian I disagree, because right-on-red means that I have to constantly keep scanning for vehicles that may not have been at the intersection when I started crossing.
The second aspect is that the drivers of the vehicles are invariably looking to their left for oncoming traffic, rather than to their right where cyclists and 'crunchy' pedestrians exist.
Are there Russia-level[1] dashcam ownership rates, by any chance? That would certainly happen if you had any such law in Britain, because many cyclists are infamously reckless.
[1]Sure most people have seen all the 'crazy Russian dashcam' videos, but if not, just have a search on Youtube. In Russia, everyone has a dashcam because otherwise, insurance will try to wriggle out of paying out in an accident, plus people like to jump in front of cars, get hit, then try to sue the driver.
* The speed limit in residential zones in the Netherlands is always 50 km/h (31 mph). This doesn't seem to be the case in the U.S.
* Bicyclists are considered full first-class participants in traffic on the road in the Netherlands.
* We have no policy of allowing turning-on-right here. It seems like a dangerous thing to have if bicyclists are involved in traffic. These new bike lanes might help with this.
* In accidents involving both a car and a bicyclist, the burden of proof always lies with the driver of the car, not the bicyclist.
* Our cities are way, way smaller and arranged completely differently. Everything I need in daily life is within a 3 mile radius of my house. Convenience stores, clothes shops, electronics stores, restaurants, etc. I've never been to the U.S, but I wonder if that's the case over there.
I think the biggest problem the U.S has is that car drivers and law enforcement don't give a shit about bicyclists.
It also seems to me that the people who bike in the U.S. take it way to seriously. I could very well be wrong on this; I'm not intimately familiar with bike culture in the U.S., but to me it seems you all ride extremely fancy bikes, work up a sweat on each ride and change clothes and shower every time you hop on or off a bike. That seems like a huge effort, and if I had to do it every time I took my bike, I'd probably just say "screw this, I'll take the car". In comparison, when I commute to work, I just get on my cheap $200 bike (not the cheapest category either) in my work clothes and slowly paddle to work. If there are hills, which we don't get much in the Netherlands of course, or if there are strong head-winds, which we do get a lot, I simply paddle slower. I could be completely mistaken of course, so please do point that out, but biking in the U.S. seems like a very tiring experience.
edit Some more differences:
* Round-abouts in the Netherlands are everywhere. Bikes and pedestrians have the right of way on these. Stop-light intersections are annoying and are easily avoided in the Netherlands.
* Nearly every city center (the shopping zones) is car-free in the Netherlands.
* The roads in our cities are layed out completely differently. There are usually a few main roads with heavy car traffic and lots of smaller side roads for destination-specific traffic. These side roads are much less crowded, and less car-friendly. That means cars generally stay on the "doorgaand verkeer" (passing-through traffic) roads. These generally have separate bike paths. This works because cars and bikes don't have to intermix all the time on those roads, unlike the grid-like road system in U.S. cities.