What My Bike Has Taught Me About White Privilege - great blog post

[bhikkhu]

16. Keep in mind, a bike is not a car

on a bike you can stop or turn on a dime, you have a much better awareness of traffic and surroundings, and its hard for a biker to do anything stupid enough to harm other people. On the other hand, cars are half-blind, take a long time to bring their heft to a stop or turn, and have enough force mow down a whole crowd or to kill at will.

Technically, we all are bound by the same laws, but everyone knows the laws are there to keep people safe from the big dumb cars, and to keep the big dumb cars safe from each other.

As a cyclist I follow and respect the laws for the most part, and most of the choices I make that lead to not following the laws (jumping onto the sidewalk on occasion, crossing streets where its safest, etc) come out of long experience of what's the safest action in any given situation. I do stop at red lights, and it annoys me when other riders don't, but I slow rather than stop at stop signs, as do the vast majority of car drivers (here at least).