Sometimes it is in response to small and predictable incidents that pennies drop. The most recent 'Shane Warne affair' was such an incident . A cyclist and motorist (Warne) claim the same space, get enraged. The cyclist's bike is damaged; the driver twitters about mug cyclists. It gets into print. People rally to support their cause. Happens all the time.
As a cyclist I own an interest. From my perspective, no matter who was right and wrong, the salient fact is that cyclists are more vulnerable than drivers. When they collide, cyclists and their bikes finish up needing repairs. That is a good reason why cyclists should no more irritate motorists than they would provoke unchained pit bulls.
At the time of the incident I was following the Leveson enquiry into the British press, and trying idly to identify what seemed to be the distinguishing qualities of political, economic and cultural commentary in the News Limited media.
Different newspapers, different writers, different topics, but they had something in common. In a blind test you would not be able to associate every News Limited column with the stable, but you would instantly recognize the provenance of many columns.
That led me to reflect more broadly on the quality of much public conversation in Australia, and to ask why it is so often confrontational and dismissive of other views.
The penny dropped when I read in one News Limited outlet a commentary on the Warne affair. It sided with Warne and motorists generally. It castigated cyclists as an unruly road hazard, and supported the call for licensing them. The tone was indignant, certain, magisterial and dismissive.
The perspective of the article and the qualities of the writing seemed to define the characteristic News Limited style of commentary. It instinctively sides with the stronger, wealthier and less vulnerable. They should be free to make and enjoy their wealth and to exercise their power without constraint. The weaker and more vulnerable should get out of the way and be prevented from interfering.
When conflict arises, the weaker are chastised. Unions, government ministers, Palestinians, greenies, occupiers, employees, Muslims, intellectuals, Indigenous and refugee activists and judges are treated with scorn when they challenge the freedom of the rich and powerful to do as they please.
Such a consistent house style spread across many media outlets suggests a culture in which attitudes are no longer consciously thought through but have become instinctual. A clash between a well-known driver and a cyclist will be perceived in a predictably partisan way.
But a culture in media organisations will persist only if it is reinforced by similar attitudes in the wider community. Writers need groupies whose attitudes they give voice to.
Certainly the relations between cyclists, drivers and pedestrians mirror the qualities I see as characteristic of News Limited commentary. Experiencing the world as a slow cyclist who shares the pavement with pedestrians and the road with cars, I am constantly struck by how common is the unkindness of strangers.
On shared footpaths both pedestrians and cyclists often barge through avoiding eye contact except for stare and glare, and show their frustration when having to give way. If you do slow down to call a pedestrian or a cyclist through, the response can be hostile. It is as if you have taken away a precedence that was theirs by entitlement and have returned it to them as gift.
The same is often true of encounters with cars. The assumption is that wealth and power convey rights that will be undermined by negotiation. It follows that if the weak wish to claim their space, they will need to be as bellicose as the strong.
Of course this is not the whole picture, any more than the columns I have described represent a full view of News Limited papers. Many pedestrians, cyclists and motorists relate to strangers as human beings and not simply as obstacles.
But the opposite is common enough to be the expected norm. This suggests that if we are to change the brutal conventions of public discourse, it will not be sufficient to draw attention to abuses and demand that politicians and journalists reform themselves. Journalists and politicians represent faithfully patterns of relationships between strangers.
As a society we may need to look again at such old fashioned ideals as noblesse oblige, respect, civility, courtesy and consideration. Although these outward virtues gained a bad name because they often masked and served an inner selfish ruthlessness, they may form the necessary conditions of civilised public discourse.
Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street.