Texas governor calls for removal of rainbow crosswalks, calling them a safety issue
https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/texas-governor-calls-removal-rainbow-crosswalks-calling-safety-issue-rcna236929Open linkView original on lemmy.world293
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It's an issue for the safety of his fragile worldview and values.
We should remove all safety and handicap ramps that lean to the left. For safety
His sycophants would carry him on a large palanquins and only the poor would suffer. It’s a shame you can’t make him suffer the fate of his disabled peers. These people will probably never be punished under their own rules unfortunately
America’s war on color continues.
Waiting for them to ban rainbows from kindergartens.
So there's this daycare down the street from me. It has had a rainbow colored access ramp for as long as I can remember.
It's now painted black.
It could be completely unrelated, but I highly doubt it.
Just like the famous Rolling Stones song. "I see a kindergarten access ramp and I want it painted black..."
If it had grip sand integrated into the paint it would make sense that it needed repainted, and getting one color of deck paint is cheaper, and black paint absorbs more sunlight so they need to salt less.
Still sucks, but it’s the same reason we can’t have cool cars anymore.
It did not have sand in the paint. It had the adhesive strips on top of the paint.
Well then fuck those fascists
I’d go even further: public money is perfectly justified in painting it exactly one color, the color chosen for visibility. Beautifying the street, Adding color, character, interest to the neighborhood was privately funded and that should continue to be encouraged
You should complain.
Or at least, the non-bigoted daycare parents should. A huge part of this problem is caused by a relatively few assholes going full Karen about their own fucking hangups and making them everyone else's problem. The solution is that decent people need to get EVEN LOUDER AND MORE PISSED OFF than they are, so that decision makers understand whose opinion actually matters here.
I just had a very similar conversation last night with some family and friends. There was a time when I would ignore shitty people's opinions.... After all, neither of us will change each other's minds. However, that's exactly how we got here. Those seemingly fringe, hurtful opinions now decide things for everyone. I'm not quiet any more.
So which is it, a safety issue, or a "political ideology" issue?
And since when has a group of people existing been a "political ideology"?
The existence of anyone not straight, white, wealthy and christian has always been political in the USA
This is so fucking priceless, it should be in a museum.
Please inform me which part of their culture they are "pushing" on everyone else, that way I can ask you why it's okay for the straights to do it, but nobody else gets to.
LGBTQ people exist. That's something you can never, ever change. So maybe get over it and stop saying that them existing in public is somehow negatively impacting anyone who isn't just a scared little bigot.
Lmao ban weather because rainbows make you gay
Again, yeah. Gay people are awesome.
Why is that bad?
And how does the crosswalk make you feel less freemt be straight?
I’ve been super straight my whole hole life, butt after reading your cumment I’m starting to have a staying desire for some meat in my mouth and I’ve been vegetarian for years! Now you got me bouncing on my bois d to this and I couldn’t have done it without you.
I’m gonna need you to look me in the eyes so I can finish.
Colored streets is all it takes huh? Then we’re truly at risk of a birth-pocalypse.
Wait are you implying Greg abbot thinks rainbows make people gay? Or you think rainbows make people gay? If we removed like a color or two would it not be gay? Like take out 3 colors at random and it becomes a national flag. But too many color = gay? Bending light is gay? I guess it ain’t straight cuz it’s bent.
Yeah, it's not the rainbow crosswalk that's making you feel attracted to people the same sex as you. That's something within you that makes you feel that way. And that's fine. If you want to repress those feelings that's a choice you make for yourself.
But we can't structure our society around some people's need to repress their gay feelings.
So you want politicians to do the thinking for you?
If the rainbow crosswalk makes you unsure of your sexuality, that's a you issue. Straight people don't have to make themselves straight, they just are. Straight men don't have to make themselves not want dick. And so long as seeing symbols is forcing culture, I never want to see a cross again, stop shoving your lifestyle down my throat
Hell yeah I do. Straight people suck.
So far Austin has sworn to comply and SAN ANTONIO has refused! Cant believe we lost Austin first!!
Want to add a + I visited San Antonio a few years back and it’s in my top 5 favorite cities now. Absolute gem.
Keep Austin Bland!
Time to paint the roads. Bring guns jic they get triggered and Sen thugs like they did in Florida
Good riddance, those rainbow crosswalks jumped me stole my wallet, and dressed me up as a woman 6 times last week.
Maybe you should have worn something less provocative. Rainbow crosswalks will be rainbow crosswalks, after all.
"Texans expect their taxpayer dollars to be used wisely," which apparently means removing already existing crosswalks and making new ones, for no other reason than the manbaby is afraid of rainbows.
dont forget about the state freezing over each year, people dying, and the govt not doing shit to negate this problem for next year.
If rainbow sidewalks were actually unsafe, the engineers would know it already (because that's their fucking job) and wouldn't need a goddamned politician to tell them.
That's 100% proof by itself (as if we needed any more) that Abbott is a bigot and a liar.
Fascists are anti intellectual after all.
Whatever happened to that "libertarian" way of thinking? Used to be that they wouldn't listen to no goddamn politician now every one of those gadsden flag touting fucks are on their knees awaiting their favorite politician to tell them to say "ah".
Actual libertarians support people like Bernie Sanders. (Yeah, he's big on social programs, but he's also bigger on civil liberties than most Democrats, let alone Republicans.)
The main stream libertarian voice and narrative was stolen in 2010 and alas we never really got them back, even in the time of tyranny. No one in power wanted us on the sidelines talking about the importance of balancing liberty and security through policy. Certainly not fiscal discipline, or accountable government. I’m appalled by the people I meet who call them selves libertarian. Most of who are just conservatives that started smoking weed after seeing Joe Rogan do it.
I thought that was the joke about Libertarians since...forever - "Republicans who smoke weed".
I mean they are a type who is attracted to the political ideals. Perhaps that type took over the party. Idk I hold a pretty rigid standard on who gets to call themselves libertarian. You gotta be ready to put your life down for someone else’s liberty. The dudes that volunteered to help Ukraine? Those are real libertarians. Putting your life and liberty at risk to defend the next man’s.
One of the corner stones of the libertarian movement was opposing global banking, and the surveillance state that bush set up. And then black president and then poof, we’re now the party of Sarah Palin?
Politics are more tribal than ideological. Most people just repeat the slogans of their political tribe without putting too much thought into it. So calling out hypocrisy does nothing, most of politics isn't really about having a consistent ideology.
They technically are unsafe. They screw with Seeing Eye Dogs. That being said, it's just as easy to hang Pride Flags at cross walks.
https://www.rnib.org.uk/news/multi-coloured-road-crossings-pose-a-threat-to-people-with-sight-loss-warn-charities/
You'll also have to train dogs to recognize both approaches because the starting color will be different.
I think this might be true. Do you know of any published studies on this?
I'll see if I can find a study, but advocates for the blind have talked about it.
Oh the colorblind seeing eye dogs? 🤔
The Texas governor is a safety issue
Hold him dkwn and paint rainbows on his face
Terrified of a rainbow.
I wish my town had a gay cross walk, so then there would be more gay people. Rainbows make people gay and gay people throw great parties and have nice communities. I need that shit in my town.
Be the gay you need. Once you get the gay it will spread and make more people get gay. Gay the fuck out of the place. Gay that mother fucking town up!
FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA GAY IS WHAT WELL BEE
What's a real "safety issue" is this nazi fucking regime.
Damn right they're a safety issue.
I was crossing one the other week. Boom. Gay. Just like that. Had to get a divorce and everything.
Sorry for your loss. I become gay but my partner became trans, so it still worked out.
Also, unmarked crosswalks are perfectly safe because drivers know pretty much every intersection has an implied crosswalk whether marked or not. This comment has been brought to you by the letter S and viewers like you.
You must have missed the post the other day, where some idiot texting ran over a girl in a crosswalk, then got out of his car to yell at her
Lol I'm sure this is about safety and not a guy trying to feed a bunch of haters red meat so they don't look at the death rates in texas hospitals
This is just embarrassing.
I kind of suspect that it's not safety driving his concern --- this isn't exactly something that would warrant state-level concern --- but I do think that it's a bad precedent to be modifying street markings for political reasons.
I doubt that this particular incident is likely all that risky, but if it becomes normalized to modify street markings, someone sooner or later is going to do something that they think is clever and really does muck up drivers.
This stuff goes both ways. If you have the left modifying street markings and it's let stand, it's not as if streets are some sort of left-exclusive forum. You can be pretty sure that if this sort of thing is let stand, then the right is going to do so too. I'm pretty confident that if someone started painting anti-LGBTQ markings on streets, plenty of people here would be pretty unhappy. I don't really want political discourse to wind up being who is willing to throw more graffiti down.
It should be possible to find plenty of places in Austin that are okay with putting up signs or murals --- things that aren't street markings --- that are pro-LGBT messages. That avoids the whole issue that they're arguing over.
kagis
https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2025/08/inclusive-church-turns-hateful-graffiti-into-pride-mural-we-make-beautiful-things-out-of-the-dust/
I really think that this is a better approach if one wants to put out a message.
EDIT: Also, on purely-pragmatic grounds, I suspect that the road surface is probably about the most wear-heavy place to paint something. Like, paint something on a wall, and it doesn't have vehicle tires tearing it up and requiring frequent repainting to look decent.
EDIT2: You can even see a mural on a building about ten feet behind the rainbow crosswalk in the article's picture. Which one looks in better condition to you, the crosswalk or the mural?
I think something people might be missing here with painting the crosswalk is that paint can make the crosswalk much more visible. Streets murals, and crosswalk paint can cause drivers to slow down. Going further paint can be used to create an optical narrowing effect which causes drivers to subconsciously be more cautious and thus slow down. Slower speeds makes streets safer which directly saves lives. It's not just political, it's proven - Look up daylighting and optical narrowing.
In general agree, the small counterpoint is that it makes the surface slicker -- so long stretches is bad. Within the crosswalk should be fine, I just wouldn't make a 40ft painted stretch in front of the crossing, you know? Sudden change in grip is bad.
(This is anecdotal, I assume it's feasible to make a sufficiently grippy paint, it's just something I notice when driving)
Pretty long reach there guy don’t fall over!!
Long reach to what? What exactly are you arguing?
You apparently caught my vibe in your edit, they make all kinds of paint.
Your vibe is "reads really far into things without actually explaining what they think is going on"
Does my post not acknowledge, in the plainly written text, that there's likely other varieties that are appropriate?
So I ask again, what argument are you trying to make, emphasis on the trying?
“Texas governor” “rainbow walk way” it’s a fucking stretch to even begin to consider this mandate came from a safety concern and not a culture war concern. It’s a further stretch to then hypothesize on the consistency and texture of the dried paint. Trying to validate this as a realistic safety concern in a state that regularly cooks/freezes residents to death is comical and horrible.
Look. I don't disagree on the safety thing. We chose white reflective lines for high contrast and visibility for what it is. We don't paint our stop signs brown or green, and we don't wear blue high-vis vests.
The crosswalk is a bad thing to colour up. I like what the Iceland solution was:
Anyway, here I've gone and agreed with a Republican and suggested safety markings should be consistent, so get with the downvoting.
Edit: I love the new math where I can agree with a time a republican was accidentally sensible while celebrating AN ENTIRE RAINBOW ROAD painted by people in one of the best countries in the world, and I'm fielding downvotes. Don't ever change, redd-uh, Lemmy.
I'm going to downvote you but only because you didn't even glance at the article.
The pictured approach is clearly one in which the safety markings remain visible and contrast sufficiently with the bright rainbow colors.
Something someone did in Iceland isn't relevant. Maybe in their culture it's considered polite to mow down pedestrians, there's no way to know.
You definitely can wear blue high vis vests. I have them in orange, yellow, blue ,green, pink, red and white.
The crosswalk in the photo has reflective white paint intact, and according to standard. Do you think sidewalk chalk is bad for safety too? Should we ban kids from using sidewalk chalk? Should we just ban color combinations and outdoor art?
Why?
Seems like a waste of time. Rainbow not rainbow, whatever.
What is the agenda?
Public spaces often have art and interest that reflects the community.
No issue here it adds color to a downtown area like many other art forms.
Really? Do you actually believe that? When you see art of a whale do you think they want you to be a whale?
Or maybe is it that gay people exist and some art they might say oh look we are represented because we live in this community might be ok?
And if you are a kid, you see a rainbow. And if you are an adult you also can just see a rainbow. That is up to you.
People are left handed. People are right handed. People vary in skin tone and eye color. Nothing changes that. Nothing makes people gay. Just had to say it because you sound pretty ignorant.
What is it about then? Some colorful street art reflecting a healthy community, or your ignorance?
Genuine question. Did you decide to be straight?
Ah. So your entire argument is based on debunked right-wing talking points.
1/10 trolling... or, $deity forbid this is a legit thing you think... in which case, go look at like ANY actual science around this subject in the past couple of decades.
You know, I don't normally do this, but hell, vindication is nice:
Studies show rainbow crosswalks are slower and safer.