You know those people that scream "get on the sidewalk!" or "get out of the road!"? You might say to yourself, it's just one driver and they must be pretty sad if they take the time to scream at cyclists in the street. Well, what if one of them had their own popular radio talk show? Then it changes from one man voicing his own (wrong) opinion to actively encouraging dangerous behavior by others. That crosses the line and could get people hurt.

[caption id="attachment_2758" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="How can you trust a man who forces his dog to wear such a hideous scarf?"][/caption]

One such person, who unfortunately has been given a very large megaphone in the form of his own radio show, is Dan Rea. Rea bills himself as "the voice of reason" but is actually a cyclist-hater, who says all sorts of ill-informed and incorrect things on his talk show about how bad cyclists are. Recently our Board President John Siemiatkoski called him up and tried to talk some sense into him.

Let's just say that this sort of corrective therapy takes more than one call, so John is going to be on Dan's show tonight. You can tell what the people at Rea's show think of cyclists as they have billed the show as:

9:00 John The Bike Guy: Dan Rea has a problem with bike riders. He brought up the subject on air and got a snippy response from a bike enthusiast named John. John is our guest tonight and the two go at it for real. Bike riders, this is your chance to be heard. Call Dan and support your guy John.

While on the one hand this is a blatant attempt to stir up controversy and get people to listen to his show (something we are unfortunately helping him do), on the other hand Rea has got it all wrong about cyclists. This is our chance to set him straight on the subject.

Give a listen tonight, check out the show's website for more details, and if you feel you have something to add to the conversation give a call. If you would like to buff up on your bike law before you call in see our bike law page, or head over to our Same Roads Same Rules website. If this sort of thing gets you steamed and you would like to support us in our ongoing efforts to make cycling better for everyone, you should join MassBike today. Nothing says I support cycling like becoming a MassBike member.