Epidemic of Bike Stabbings in San Diego?

Suppose, during a lull in the nearly constant barrage of basketball madness, one were to Google "bike" and "stab" and the name of their hometown or city.  What are the chances that anything noteworthy would pop up?  A quintillion to one perhaps?  Well, if you live in or around San Diego, the odds would be something like 1:4, because the world's finest (and classiest) city has had no fewer than four bike related stabbings since last July.  I kid you not!

It all started last last July 23.  As reported by FOX News, an El Cajon man was stabbed in the stomach when he approached "an acquaintance" in the parking lot of a fast food restaurant to confront him over not having returned his bike.  Here's FOX's official, ominous, knife graphic that it appears to use for all stories on bike-related stabbings:

I suspect that the victim (who survived) demanded the bike, but was then told that he needed to ask nicely.  Confused, the victim probably tried saying "please," but was rebuffed with "not nice enough."  The next overture likely would have been "pretty please," to which the assailant may have said, "come on, man, you can do better than that."  At that point I'm dead sure that the victim must have swallowed his pride and said "pretty please with sugar on top," with the assailant, of course, then pulling out his knife, stabbing his friend in the gut and riding off on the "borrowed" bike.  That's pretty much how all of these encounters go.  Trust me, I'm an expert.

Then, a mere two months later, also reported by FOX, (and accompanied by the same, scary, knife image from above) a man was jumped by three attackers on Palm Avenue who were trying to steal his bike.  They were unsuccessful, but in the melee, they managed to stab the poor bike rider in the lower back.  He survived, but the bad guys got away.

Looks like bike stabbers took a little break for the holidays, but were back at it this very month when we have had not just one but TWO bike-related stabbings!

The first was on March 3 when a young man was stabbed on his bike after getting in an argument with another man on a trolley platform in National City.  As reported in the U-T, he tried chasing his attacker until he came to the realization that a stab wound could lead to serious complications, to include possible death.  A passing driver pulled over to help.  He helped the victim into his car, and, when the victim said he didn't think he was going to make it, the driver reportedly drove the victim to the victim's home.  That makes a whole bunch of sense.  You have a man who says he's bleeding to death in the front seat of your car and you just take him home to die?  People do some weird stuff in a crisis.  Anyway, when the victim got home, somebody there had the good sense to call an ambulance and, luckily, the young man survived.  

By the way, 10 News reported that the victim was on his way to Jack in the Box when the argument occurred.  What's the deal with fast food and bike stabbings anyway?  There must be a connection.

Finally, just this past Friday, News 10 reported that a struggle between two downtown homeless men resulted in one of them being stabbed in his "side torso area." 

He too, thankfully, survived.

Lessons Learned:

(1) The odds of being randomly stabbed by both acquaintances and strangers alike increase exponentially when riding a bike;

(2) Those same odds increase to greater than 100% when riding one's bike to a lower-tier fast-food restaurant (just don't do it people!);

(3) Bike riders are remarkably resilient.  Despite the best efforts of psychos wielding knives, all four of our recent victims lived to bike another day;

(4) People hate bikeists more than I ever suspected.  It's one thing to try and run us off the road or plow into us in your SUV's but stabbing is so personal!

Way Ahead:

I'm pretty sure our City Council will soon reach the only reasonable conclusion that can lead from this string of violence and resolve to ban bikes within the limits of San Diego.  No bikes = no bike stabbings, right?  Hey, it worked at Torrey Pines.  As previously reported in this very blog, after a century without any bike related deaths in the Park, the Rangers there decided that they could do better than zero by simply banning bikes from riding down the road that runs through the park (while still allowing cars).  No bikes = no bike related deaths, even though they hadn't had any bike-related deaths.  With some bonafide stabbings on our hands, I'm pretty sure that the City Council will have no choice.    Unless our bikeist Mayor and Police Chief ride in to the rescue, I'm afraid we're all doomed.  Guess I'd better start scouting out cities where an honest bike rider is free to get stabbed for no reason at all without government stepping in and spoiling all the fun . . .