More negativity about motorcycling in the "News"

[PitterB4]

While I'm a believer in organ donation and think that not wearing a helmet on a motorcycle is stupid, this guy is a major a-hole!  

From the AMA's website:

Detroit columnist says injured motorcyclists shouldn’t be given medical treatment

Here we go again.

Columnist Brian Dickerson, in yesterday’s edition of the Detroit Free Press, is the latest to call for motorcyclists to be de-facto organ donors. What’s worse, he suggests that injured motorcyclists not be given medical treatment at all.

In writing about the pending repeal of Michigan’s mandatory helmet law, Dickerson says, “If only lawmakers had thought to add a requirement that all helmet-less cyclists agree to donate their organs. And why not require donorcyclists to sign papers declining extraordinary lifesaving measures, so that deserving organ recipients aren't kept waiting unnecessarily?”

Dickerson doesn’t stop there. He lumps motorcyclists in with “champions of the right to die,” including shameless and insulting references to Jack Kevorkian and Terri Schiavo.

We’ve seen this sort of hysterical, uninformed opinion before, of course. Last September, Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg  characterized riders as organ donors in a column headlined "Hop on a motorcycle, fill out your donor card” -- and your e-mails to Mr. Steinberg prompted him to admit in a later column that he wrote without knowing the facts. Earlier, the AMA joined motorcyclists nationwide in defeating actual legislative proposals in New Mexico and California that would’ve required motorcyclists to be organ donors.

But by suggesting that injured motorcyclists be left to die, Dickerson has set an all-time low -- and the AMA has told him so. If you’d like to let him know how you feel, you can reach him at dicker@freepress.com.

[Landry]

. . . another idiot with a keyboard.  

So, what about anyone that works with electricity, hazardous chemicals, anyone that drives, plays with knives, puts their fingers in their mouths, carries a weapon, lives near an industrial facility, climbs a mountain, hang glides, swims, bungee jumps, or flies on a plane?  Those things are dangerous, and the participant understands the risks involved.

Do we deny everyone emergency health care?

[scooter trash]

Not to mention our brave men and women that give their lives to keep our  (and his) way of life free. The flight line of an aircraft carrier is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Should they also be organ donors? I guess not because they wear helmets. What a butthead.
He's probably the jerk talking on his cell phone that just caused the truck to swerve causing a 12-car pileup. But that's ok.

BAN CELL PHONES WHILE DRIVING and leave our helmet choices to us who ride !!!

[banditone1250s]

Well I did my part and send him an e-mail and just ripped his ass. It must have pissed him off too because I got an immediate response from him. He can write articles like that  and then have the nerve to tell me to look up the word "satire" in he dictionary. Isn't that ironic of him. This guy is just plain ignorant and I hope that the AMA takes him out of is job and straight to hell...Banditone1250s.....

[SteelD]

I wonder if Brian Dickerson is a smoker...

With a name like his, I'm surprised nobody has called him 'dick-head' but maybe that's an expression not widely known/used on the US side of the big pond.

[ZenMan]

I wonder if Brian Dickerson is a smoker...

With a name like his, I'm surprised nobody has called him 'dick-head' but maybe that's an expression not widely known/used on the US side of the big pond.

Oh it is, D, but give us some credit for not immediately sinking to the obvious, huh?  

[Carl_T]

For good or ill, I sent him this.



Heard you wrote that motorcyclists should be forced into organ donation, not be treated for injuries, and left to die.

 

As a 61 year old, accident free, healthy motorcyclist of 45 years, your uninformed, inhumane, and seriously repulsive attitude revolts me. That someone of your Barbaric mean spirited prejudices is given a high profile public forum to spread your aggressive hate, is upsetting. The last thing we as safe motorcyclists need is a cavalier attitude and mind set towards our safety from the other motorists that we SHARE the public road with. Those motorists do indeed pose a danger to us any time they drive in a careless fashion within our proximity. Your column did nothing to further the cause of safe motorcycle use and  even potentially set up a more dangerous traffic climate for them by fueling uninformed prejudice.

 

A King size award of deep shame to you sir. Keep your murderous inclinations and fantasies out of the public forum. Above all refrain from acting them out on the road please. They are seriously disturbing.

[Barbarian]

I went looking for the original column, but couldn't find it (probably because it's two years old).

His most recent driving related piece is about the Vatican's Ten Commandments of the road.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=COL04