PC nonsense, sexual discrimination and other daftness 

You may have heard that the latest draft of the Highway Code is supposed to be removing the word accident and substituting it with the word collision, crash or incident.  This has been described by some commentators as “another example of political correctness gone mad”, but is it?  At first I thought that this was the case, but on reflection I now find myself agreeing with the proposed change.

The word “accident” implies something unavoidable, something excusable or something which just happens.  Collision is a much better word which assigns an element of responsibility, accountability and perhaps even a lack of skill.  It’s a good call in my view.

Moving from political correctness to sexual discrimination, I was initially troubled the “ladies only” run recently organised by SAM.  This is without doubt a clear example of sexual discrimination as men are excluded.  But so what?  It’s pragmatic as it provides an opportunity for the ladies to develop their riding skills in a testosterone-free environment.  I guess that it also provides an opportunity for them to go shopping, talk about flower arranging and their favourite recipes.

On the principle that sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, how about a boys only run?  This could have both merit and appeal.  The lads would be free to comment fulsomely on the excellent fit of the lady pillion’s leathers, there would be few constraints on vocabulary and political correctness could be suspended entirely.  Just as with the ladies-only run, a good time would no doubt be had by all.  It’s sounding more and more appealing.

The point of this column is that we, as a society, are sometimes too quick to apply labels – particularly in the pc and discrimination area.  There can be no better example of this than the pickle Big Brother got into.  The discrimination label was daftly applied because people did not think about what was really going on.  That Big Brother episode was undignified and deplorable, but it was actually bullying rather than discrimination.xx So what does all this have to do with biking?  Well I don’t really know to be honest, but I do feel an awful lot better for SAM having so generously allowed me this opportunity to be grumpy.

 Disclaimer:  Grumpy Old Biker is a periodic column written for the SAM newsletter. 
It is highly unlikely that the views expressed here are in any way representative of the IAM or SAM.