We’re already living in a Big Brother state. We’ve got the eyes of the establishment on us seemingly endlessly, and it’s been the case for some years now. Up until fairly recently though, unless you were being really naughty, or you were on MI5’s list of most wanted, you didn’t have too much to worry about. When you’re not an international drugs trafficker or soviet spy, ‘the firm’ don’t tend to give you a second thought. And most of us have learnt to slow down whenever we see a ‘safety’ camera by the side of the road. Or a copper with a speed gun. Just to be ‘safe’. Oh, and to avoid getting a letter from the old bill. But times have changed thanks to every dick and their dog having a dash-cam.
We’re now living in a society where people are grassing each other up to the cops, just to show off the fact that they’ve got one. And it’s got to stop. I’m not against dash-cams or helmet-cams or whatever-you-want-to-call-them-cams. Especially when we live in a world where ‘liability’ and ‘litigation’ are the words on everyone’s lips the second something goes wrong. Having hard, video evidence is an invaluable tool when establishing exactly who is to blame. And that can only be a good thing. You’ll be entitled to a fat wad of cash in compo if a car pulls out on you, smashes your bike to smithereens and breaks your legs. As long as you weren’t at fault and it can be proven. Dash cam footage is perfect for that.
Unfortunately though, and increasingly, this isn’t what people are using their dash cams for. We’ve all seen busybody knobheads standing outside their houses with eBay special speed guns. They’ll spend all day trying to clock you at 31 in a 30 so that they can dob you in to police. The po-po might send you a letter but can’t even think about prosecuting you off the back of it; if that’s not wasting police time, I don’t know what is. But now, car drivers are sending their dash cam footage into the feds, on a special dash cam evidence upload portal thing, whenever they see anything on the road that they deem unsafe, illegal, or just a bit cuntish.
As if being watched by millions of CCTV and ANPR (Automatic Number Plate Recognition) cameras wasn’t bad enough. I feel so safe knowing my fellow road users are spying on me. Desperate to dobb me in to the old bill.
Now, that wouldn’t be such a problem if the dash cam footage was treat with the same irreverence as the village people’s speed camera shite. But it’s not. Sources close to 44Teeth (i.e. the internet) say that almost a third of these uploads have resulted in prosecution over the last few years. And with an average of about 1,000 videos being uploaded every month (in recent months), that’s a lot of summonses landing on a lot of doormats.
That said, there are a lot of instances of these videos leading to no prosecution at all. That leads me to believe that most of the time the people uploading them haven’t got a fucking clue. They’ve probably got out the wrong side of bed that morning. Either that or they’ve seen their stupid, miserable face in the mirror and it’s put them in a bad mood for the rest of the day. That’s why when they’ve seen someone do something they don’t like on the road, they’ve got all cunty about it.
I can just hear them screaming “I’ve got a dash cam, you know!” through the windscreen like a fucking idiot. In reality, that bike probably only overtook you because you were driving too slowly. And yes that car driver might have needed to do a bit of a last minute lane change, but he didn’t hit you, did he? He was probably fucking miles away. Just because he’s got better spatial awareness than you, doesn’t make him a bad driver; you could probably learn a bit from him.
Oh, and another thing, Mr Dash Cam Knobhead, as much as it might upset you, there’s nothing illegal about filtering. It’s only dangerous when pricks like YOU decide to drift into the gap to try and stop us doing it. Your jealousy is understandable; it might take you ten times as long to get to work, but it’s not my fault you’re sat in your car in gridlocked traffic, is it? No. So don’t cut me up. Don’t shout at me through the window. And don’t point at your stupid dash cam at me. Because I, nor anyone else on a motorbike, could give a flying fuck.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could all just get on with our lives without worrying about who is going to dob us in for going a couple of miles an hour over the speed limit, or the odd wheelie from time to time? Let’s not use our dash cams to spy on each other. Let’s not rush to inform the authorities of any minor motoring misdemeanour. Does it really make you sleep any better at night? I don’t think so. Leave your dash cam rolling by all means; if you’re ever involved in an accident you might be glad of it. But for fuck’s sake don’t be a vigilante. That’s seriously, seriously uncool.
35 responses
Amen brother
Has the time come to remove number plates before every ride??? oooh sorry officer it must have fallen off, i think the fine is 30£ max
Nicely put!
…but, but if you cam’d the cager cutting you up when filtering, it might stop him doing it again!
Yep, dickheads
Yep. To the point where I am very often checking first to see if the car I am going to pass in a “not so legal way” as a dashcam… There are lot of people with a sad life out there.
Same as Fabsic, always try and look first
anti bikers = wannabe filth.
Boothy for president? I’d vote for him. Only today did I suffer the slings and arrows of a pissed off driver in a vw something or other. I filtered at a set of temporary traffic lights, and slotted in very nicely thankyou, inbetween the dude in the vw and the car in front. The vw driver must have been on his phone, ‘cos the gap was huge. Mr vw driver didn’t like that though – drove for the next 3 miles 2.9mm off my rear tyre, probably arming his dash cam all the while.I hope he got me ragging it past the traffic leaving his fat ass in the dust – I’d like to have the video for myself. But seriously, folks dobbing other folks in .. its just not British.
He would get busted for tail gating.
Pull up to him at the next red, point at your helmet and say something like “I’ve got you on camera, pal. Don’t tailgate me” Even without a camera I find it works every time.
Bloody scary when pricks are riding that close to you, especially with our engine breaking and wanting to just blip it down gears not needing the brakes all the time.
I use the old fashioned method that’s proven to work.insurance. 5o % of incidents are the other persons fault so it evens out
I fricking hate the things, I find myself looking through peoples cars to see if I can see one before I overtake….
I teach CBT on the weekends. Good little side job and nice to help teach the kids to be safe etc.
A bit of advice I always give them “Before you overtake a car, look through the back window to the windscreen for a dashcam, if its a Honda Jazz, Skoda Yeti or another tiny old person car, be very careful”
Spot on. The hi-viz POLITE brigade now has dash cams to play pretend cop too.
Oooh those “polite notice” hi Vis vests make my piss boil
One more reason to have flip plates an’ velcro.
Or none at all.
Think its a £100 fine. But no points. Probably worth it for the potential ass fucking by the law
Ain’t going to happen,too many woke wanjers arned with them now, however, renember its their evidence and not the police so if you feel the need for court, they have to present their evidence themselves.
Well said that man totally agree the world is full of KARENS
We used to carry marbles in our LH side jacket pocket. When some AH did something (your word) “cunty” , we would pass them and drop a hand full on the road in front of their car. Marbles are great because they bounce, right thru the rad of aircon condensor. Worked Great ! These days better have an auto flip-up license plate on your bike tho’
Its the people with so many dash cams, sat nav, phone all over the windscreen they can’t see anyway!
100% agree with this.
Dash cams have their pros and cons and I personally would never have one but I would however fit on to my misses car or bike so I could kill any cunt that caused her to crash lol.
But on a serious note, a couple of years back my old man died in a bike accident and the dashcam footage from the car behind was invaluable writing off any blame towards him or anybody else which was great. It also helped us as a family understand what happened and not go on with our lives constantly wondering what happened.
This however is a rare case of a dash cam being using positively…. All the other losers sticking their noses up the popo’s arses dobbing people in for random crap that nothing can be done about can go take a run and jump.
Peace and love
Live on a small Island and its rife over here. they have FB groups and all sorts just posting 10-second clips of someone going over the white line a touch or not indicating to turn or doing a U-turn at a set of lights when not supposed to.
I mean, yeah alright give them a honk and tell them to indicate next time or something but tagging the actual police in these stupid little videos trying to rally their FB tribe to berate someone on the internet.
Its a joke.
Just old people (who have had their fun in life) who are now just old kretins wanting the quiet life and no one to ever have any fun ever again.
Great article. The passive aggressive morons that try to take their shit lives out on everybody can go fuck themselves!
That applies to us bikers too though, there’s too many YouTube videos of bikers screaming into cars and pointing at helmet cams because a car driver made a mistake and caused them some minor inconvenience.
Is it really that hard to not be a cunt?
On a side note, Boothy is a great addition to the 44teeth team. Can’t wait for the 1st BBB menage a trois!
where can i get an auto flip up number plate, what a great idea, if by some off chance a police officer could be arse to pull you over, flip it up, rest off the time leave it down, genius.
Agreed. Dash cams are great when they are used for a the right reasons. But what ever happned to snitches get stitches.
In the immortal words of Roy Trenneman; “People. What a bunch of bastards.”
Well said!
Suggestion so solve problem. Find a bunch of videos with no issues on them then let’s upload them at mass with fake credentials so they realise open link takes to much time and resources.
Agree with this. Those with dash cams should definitely have a driving holiday in Austria with them, which if caught, would get them the sort of fines the Swiss dish out for going 20 mph over the limit.
According to the legal guy in your videos, GoPro footage has only actually ever helped in one or two of the insurance cases that his firm has ever been involved with, so it is virtually pointless from a self protection point of view, and only good for this trend of tittle tattling.
back in the day when roadside speed camera were out people used to flash their lights to warn you. now maybe 1 in 20 cars warn you….people are ass holes!!!!!!!
You’ve hit the nail on the head !!
2 can play that cam for the helmet cammers. If someone deliberately blocks you or wont let you through when filtering then thats straight up careless and inconsiderate driving. Send the high and mighty cagers some pain by playing their game.