Latest / The Slippery Slope / Selective Outrage: Why 12 E‑Bike Deaths Matter More Than 1324 Road Fatalities

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Selective Outrage: Why 12 E‑Bike Deaths Matter More Than 1324 Road Fatalities · The Slippery Slope

• 0:01
  Well, you're listening to the Slippery Slope podcast.
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  I'm Jay Fallon. Obviously, today we're talking
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  about something that should make everyone, everyone, every
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  thinking Australian, I'll put it that way.
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  Every thinking Australian stop and ask a very simple question.
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  download. Why do 12 deaths matter more
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  than 1324? So 12 deaths.
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  Why do they matter more than 1324 deaths?
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  Because according to one opinion writer from the Courier Mail,
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  he's written that Queensland is facing an existential crisis.
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  An existential crisis. And this is because of the
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  government. The article is very sarcastic,
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  but he's talking about the government crackdown and he's in
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  support of the government crackdown on E bikes, E
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  scooters, all this, all this kind of thing.
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  So you know the this is the level of public discourse that
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  we're currently dealing with. The the argument that the argue
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  that the article is putting forward has a massive blind spot
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  in my opinion. The opinion piece is dripping
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  with sarcasm. It mocks anyone who questions
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  the government and it's motives on it's proposed E bike
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  crackdown. It mocks companies trying to
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  protect their business, it mocks people who rely on these
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  services and it leans heavily on these numbers. 12 deaths in
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  Queensland last year, 6300 injuries and 112% rise in E
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  mobility injuries since 2021. So now look, these these numbers
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  do matter. They do matter.
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  Every death matters, every injury matters.
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  But here's the problem. The outrage is selective, very
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  selective. The morality is selective.
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  The safety concern, you know, he shapes it as hey, this is for
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  the safety of the of everyone, general public, It's for your
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  safety. That's what we're doing this.
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  That's why the government's doing this.
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  The safety concern is selective because while while the author
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  is clutching his pearls over 12 deaths, Australia recorded 1324
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  Rd. deaths in the 12 months up to January 2025.
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  I'll repeat that 1324 Australians died on our roads in
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  one year and that was a 6% increase from the previous year
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  and their national fatality rate rose almost 4%.
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  And he's the kicker. The last time Australia,
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  Australia, the nation had fewer than 1000 Rd. deaths in a year.
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  Can you guess when that was the last time that happened Under
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  1000 it was 19341934, so 90 years ago.
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  So if 12 deaths justify sweeping bans and government crackdowns,
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  what do 1324 deaths justify? Where's?
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  Where's the call to ban cars? Where?
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  Where are the sarcastic opinion pieces about this?
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  Where is the moral panic? Where is the outrage?
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  It doesn't. It doesn't exist.
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  Why? Because this isn't about, it's
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  not about safety. This is about something else
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  entirely. So let's follow the money.
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  Let's talk about the fuel excise.
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  The Australian government made 15.71 billion with AB billion in
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  net fuel excise in 2023 to 2024, and over the next four years
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  that number is expected to rise to 67.6 billion.
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  Sixty 7.6 B billion. That's not pocket change and
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  it's not public safety. That's a revenue stream.
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  So let's be honest, cars kill over 1000 Australians every
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  year, but they also make the government billions.
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  E bikes, E scooters. They don't contribute to fuel
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  excise, they don't feed the tax machine, they disrupt existing
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  revenue streams. So suddenly they're a public
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  safety crisis. It's funny how that works, isn't
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  it? The hypocrisy, some would say.
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  The article mocks Lime and Neuron that, you know, these
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  small companies, whether they're that small or not, Who you can
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  argue about these companies because they're pushing back
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  against regulation, but every industry pushes back against
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  regulation. Every business fights for its
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  survival. Every sector lobbies government,
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  including the automotive industry.
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  Fuel. Fuel companies, oil companies,
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  transport unions. Yet only these companies are
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  framed as greedy. The the author in this opinion
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  piece frames Lyme and Neuron as being greedy, selfish or
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  dangerous. So why?
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  Because they're small enough to bully and they and they don't
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  contribute billions to government coffers.
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  It's selective outrage, selective morality, selective
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  enforcement. So we'll, we'll talk about a
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  layer that I don't think most people don't want to talk about.
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  It's I think deeper issues lie within this a society that
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  pretends to care about safety and yet it ignores the biggest
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  causes of death in a society. That's that that society has
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  lost its moral compass. Matthew 2920, Sorry, 23 verse 24
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  says Jesus says you strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
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  He's just talking about the hypocrisy, the hypocrisy of the
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  people there that were in front of him.
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  You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
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  That's exactly what's happening here.
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  We obsess over the small things, the convenient thing, the
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  political, politically useful thing, and we ignore the
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  massive, uncomfortable, expensive truth over 1000 deaths
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  every year in vehicular crashes. I won't even get into the number
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  of deaths caused by, you know, abortions because you can't talk
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  about that. I mean, that's a, that's a
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  woman's choice. No one talks about that death
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  toll. No selective outrage.
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  We ignore massive, uncomfortable truths.
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  Remember, Isaiah warned us. Isaiah 520.
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  Woe to those who call evil good, good, evil.
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  You can't talk about the abortion rate.
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  You can't talk about the amount of children who were killed in
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  the womb calling good evil and evil good.
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  When safety becomes a political tool instead of a moral
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  responsibility, when outrage becomes selective, when
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  compassion becomes conditional, we're not dealing with the
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  safety issue anymore. We're dealing with a spiritual
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  issue. This is where Australia's at.
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  At the moment. I believe we we cannot think
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  logically. Australia operates as a whole.
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  Just a generalization here. Our politicians and their vast
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  population, I think operates with a reprobate mind.
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  A mind that does not think with clarity.
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  A mind that thinks with less quality cannot think properly.
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  So here's the real question. OK, if 12 deaths justify a
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  crackdown, what do 1324 deaths justify?
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  And why is no one asking this? Maybe because the answer costs
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  too much. Maybe.
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  Maybe because the government doesn't want to lose billions in
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  fuel excise. Maybe because it's easier to
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  bully small companies than confront the real problems I had
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  experienced when I was in general Judy's policing in Far
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  North. I went to several accidents and
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  I also pulled up quite a few people driving vehicles that are
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  the gotten into accidents or they were driving dangerously.
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  The amount of times that people were driving on the wrong side
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  of the road and it was always the same type of person.
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  It was always a a visitor from a foreign country.
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  Some were Asian visitors, some were European visitors.
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  Vast majority of them were very young.
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  They were the back backpacker kind of person.
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  This is how I describe them. But they had all gotten their
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  license. The vast majority of the young
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  people had just gotten their licenses in their home country
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  that come to Australia. And you know what you have to do
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  to drive, to be able to drive legally in Australia, all you
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  have to do is show that you got your license.
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  They don't ask any questions about how long, what your
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  driving experience is and can you actually drive?
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  Probably. Can you, you know, do you
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  actually read English? Can you see, can you understand
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  the road signs? All they want to know is can you
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  pay us enough money and we'll allow you, we'll give you a
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  license so you can drive on our roads.
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  That's all I care about. The amount of times that I saw
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  people in in the the backpacker style vans, travelling vans
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  going round a roundabout the wrong way, causing, you know,
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  being an endanger, causing possible danger, a dangerous
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  situation to other drivers and to themselves.
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  Yet the government's all good with that.
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  As long as you can pay the money.
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  As long as you come here, you pay enough money.
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  Well, then we'll allow you to drive on our roads and we won't
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  question it. We won't worry about it.
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  We don't have to look at it when those people then get into car
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  accidents and cause fatalities, cause injuries, cause expenses
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  to our hospital systems because you know, they have to be, they
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  have to be insured. But we won't worry about the
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  other Australians on the road who you know then are taken to
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  hospital as well. But as long as you can pay the
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  money, it's all good. That's what I'm saying. 12
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  deaths justify a crackdown. But shouldn't 1324 deaths also
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  also justify some kind of crackdown?
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  But no one's asking this because the government is making too
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  much money. The answer costs too much.
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  The government doesn't want to lose billions in fuel excise.
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  Excise and it's easy to to bully these small companies then
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  confronts the real problem. Or maybe, just maybe, we we
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  become a society that values convenience more than
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  consistency, revenue more than responsibility and comfort more
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  than truth. Maybe, as always, this is just
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  my opinion. I'm just giving my opinion.
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  He gave his opinion. I'm Jay Fallon, as always, thank
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  you for listening to the Slippery Slope podcast.
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  They just feel. The desire