Do we have any hope that this slaughter will end, someday? That we could ride a bicycle on the roads without feeling like zombies, without leaving two lines of a testament before going out, without increasing our heart rate every time a car, a van, or a truck approaches from behind?

As much as we try to rationalize it, the real emergency in cycling isn't so much the crisis of champions, the lack of sponsors, the closure of teams and races. Better put: it's all of this, but all of this is the consequence of the primary cause, which is risk. Yes, pedaling for passion, for health, for hobby, for leisure, for competition, pedaling in any way has become too risky. From here, in a chain reaction: families no longer introduce their children to cycling, municipalities and prefectures no longer take responsibility for authorizing races, sponsors no longer have the motivation to invest money in an increasingly struggling discipline. The road code reform wants to make us believe that they care greatly about this danger, emphasizing every time that the meter and a half between vehicles and bikes has been passed, as if we didn't know that there has yet to be a traffic officer or agent present at the site of an overtaking, as if we didn't know that they still hit you from the front, head-on, as recently happened to the poor, dear, very dear Sara Piffer, not even twenty years old, mowed down by a guy during an overtaking. Sweetly, the girl's mother said: "Too much hurry, people have too much hurry". And this is true. But people, all of us, when driving, add a lot of other lethal weapons: distraction, lack of respect, the same driving incapacity, perhaps using licenses bought under the table from complacent driving schools.

All of this causes slaughter. And it matters little that the law of statistics is itself merciless, explaining that as the mass of practitioners increases, the number of deaths and injuries inevitably increases. We cannot resignedly accept this numerical rule. Just as we cannot accept the usual consolation of common evil, that is, the undeniable case history that involves the rest of the world. Something must be attempted. When it comes to safety, I send a resentful thought to those who solve it by forcing racing bikes to mount two little lights and a bell, because otherwise when they run you over, you can't even claim reasons. I send it to those who park on reserved bike lanes. To those who park on the side and open their doors without looking behind. To the e-commerce van drivers, the new ruthless killers, gripped by the frenzy of delivery, regularly with a cell phone in hand to follow Google Maps. To those who force cyclists to pedal on the last centimeter available on the right, where, however, there are terrifyingly deep drainage covers up to the ankle, one after another. To those in municipalities who continue unperturbed to wash their conscience with the infamous "cycle-pedestrian" lanes, where certainly no one can be hit by a truck, but where it becomes a continuous war with pensioners and their leashed dogs, moms with strollers, runners with their heads down, all convinced that the cyclist should go at walking pace, move over, maybe even get off. To those who chatter during election campaigns about green mobility, incentivizing bicycle use, school campaigns, only to then move on to tenders for new roads and roundabouts that categorically do not include bicycle lanes. And I think especially of those who hate cyclists, who (with some of our own faults) consider them bullies, arrogant, ignorant.

This is the broth we find ourselves swimming in, stubbornly wanting to pedal on the roads. A road network, but above all a cultural fabric, that does not want us and rejects us. That barely tolerates us. That applauds behind the scenes when Feltri writes and says they enjoy seeing a cyclist splattered like a cat, knowing that Feltri are many, very many, almost everyone. And so? And so we have a green future in words, but black in facts. The sooner we realize this, the sooner we'll get it over with. At the very least, we'll avoid a lot of useless and hypocritical chatter. The world is always running faster, always with its head down, the slowness and bulk of the bicycle are annoying. The world dreams of a radiant tomorrow with fewer cars and more bicycles, but without the nuisance of bicycles.