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To catch a thief

July 23, 2008 12:07

In the old west, a special kind of derision was reserved for horse thieves. A horse was not just another possession, and not even just another animal - to steal a man's cattle was to steal some small part of his livelihood; to steal his horse was to take away his means of transportation, the engine that drove his work, his very freedom. A woman might have developeded a relationship with her horse, as it became tame and learned to respond to her commands just so. Horses were not interchangeable and easily replaceable, and to be without a horse was to be left with virtually nothing.

Horse thieves were among the very lowest, mangiest, least-­tolerated kinds of criminals. When they were caught, they were hanged.

Not to draw a parallel between a hunk of metal and a living animal, but we hold a similar disregard for bike thieves. Those who ride bikes to navigate the city are performing all kinds of social goods - they pollute less than motorists or transit users, they ease gridlock, they pose no real threat to anyone else on the road and, in a way, they even ease the price of gas by lowering the total pool of demand. It isn't that all of them have chosen to be martyrs for the greater good - cyclists are also, very often, among the least affluent members of society, unable to afford to drive a car or hold a Metropass. Cyclists develop relationships with their bikes, tune them up and learn their quirks and - as we were reminded at the Toronto Cyclists Union's recent screening of the epic film Pee-wee's Big Adventure - become quite attached to them.

Theft of any kind is pretty despicable, but to take from those who often have so little, those who in their daily commuting or errand-running inflict so little burden on the rest of us - there must be a special circle of hell reserved for such scum.

(...)

- (feitletrun mín)