Will you ever admit that a motorcycle accident is your fault?

Will you ever admit that a motorcycle accident is your fault?

Will you ever admit that a motorcycle accident is your fault?

As we pilots usually do, I immediately thought of every obvious situation in which a pilot would be at fault. A left turn between lanes, I thought, or maybe some idiot in a parking lot looking at his phone. But as the story unfolded I began to question the narrative. A sudden slowdown in traffic had caused the motorcyclist to swerve and end up in oncoming traffic. In the end, what he said was technically true. However, I'm not sure that the person in the oncoming lane who suddenly faced a motorbike coming towards them is the bad guy.

There are a lot of details about this accident that I don't know, and at this point all I can do is hope that this guy is thoughtful enough to have learned a lesson from his accident. Then again, maybe what he needs is someone to ask him, “Are you sure it wasn't your fault?”

Let me tell you, sooner or later: I'm not above making mistakes. I've had to ask myself the same question in the past. I rear-ended an SUV on the highway a number of years ago, and because I hit my head pretty hard I don't really remember what happened. It would have been easy to tell people that there was nothing I could do – that the Range Rover jumped across lanes and left me nowhere to go – but the truth is, I don't know for sure.

A few years later, a colleague of mine braked to take a dirt detour and, swerving to avoid him, I ended up in a ditch. Of course, he should have signaled, or simply walked past and turned around. But if you're like me, you'll read my two anecdotes and think, "Uhh, looks like Zack is a tailgater." Yes, I'm inclined to agree, although it's not fun to have those conversations, either with other people or with myself.

We humans don't like to admit we're wrong. There is a lot of research to prove this, and probably evidence in your life. “Those crumbs on the floor? No, I'm not sure where they come from, and yes, I know food isn't allowed here." That's right, you get away with eating your sandwich on the train, avoid the embarrassment, and tell yourself it was the right choice because now your blood sugar has leveled out. Lying to the host likely produces only a small amount of cognitive dissonance – the psychological stress that occurs when you act on one of multiple contradictory beliefs in your head. However, telling yourself, along with your friends, that the person on the other end of your motorcycle accident was at fault is more dangerous than other little lies.

The main disadvantage is your knowledge and experience. Blaming someone else is one way to escape responsibility publicly, but the real harm is diverting your brain from learning a lesson in private. Admitting some fault will stimulate a dialogue in your motorcycle psyche to find a way to avoid it in the future; or at least it should.

This is one of the reasons why MotoGP riders love data. They don't have to feel guilty about crashing. All they want to know is how to avoid it next time by going the same speed or faster. In road riding, GP-level data usually doesn't help us, but the same passion for wanting to know what went wrong can still guide us. Striving to be diligent about awareness and safety while commuting is not as glorious as pole position. On the other hand, learning from mistakes can be just as crucial, if not more so.

We create our own narratives for a couple of reasons. First of all, it's the easy way out right now, and it feels right because we save ourselves some embarrassment. We are proud, as human beings; top of the food chain and we like our dignity. For motorcyclists, there is added pressure on the many narratives that already exist around the dangerousness of motorcycles. We're inclined to put a positive spin on any motorcycle accident, in part, because we don't want another bad story in the ecosystem of traffic folklore. I think it can come from a good place: we want people to see motorcycles the way we see them, as an experience that improves our lives. However, as Grandma always said: a lie is a lie, and it usually hurts more than one person.

Don't worry, there's good news here. First of all, you don't have to crash to recognize an error. Just the other day a Mustang convertible went too far off the edge of a yellow light and almost hit me. Yes, they ran a red, but their fault wouldn't have helped my leg be less broken. What helps is to ask how I can avoid that situation in the future. Think more about the intersection, the light pattern, and any other reason I didn't see the car until it was too late.

I try to apply this mentality everywhere I go. How do I know there isn't a van coming out of that alley? If there was a car stopped around this tricky right bend, would I be able to stop in time? I feel like this approach makes me more likely to avoid potential accidents, which is better than finding the car stalled, crashing, and telling everyone else there was nothing I could do.

The other silver lining is that people like honesty. For all the research illustrating why humans lie about making a mistake, there is the flip side, which is that people tend to see strength in admitting a mistake. It's easy to relate to, presumably because everyone is familiar with the feeling of that dissonance in cognition. And that means we can help ourselves more by being direct and honest about the dangers and mistakes of motorcycling. It's harder than propagating total innocence on the part of bikers, which is probably why it's the right thing to do.

Next time I'll try to have the sense to ask the guy with the broken wrist if he really thinks it was someone else's accident and not his.

Shipping times are approximately 7 working days , shipping is via negotiable express shipping.

Our international couriers may experience slight delays due to the current situation, in any case our assistance team will always be at your complete disposal for any eventuality

• EMAIL ➡️ Digitalnowinternational@gmail.com