A 5-year-old wearing a bright red jacket cycles steadily along a wet London street in the half-light of a gray November day. His dad rides right behind him. A car approaches but doesn’t stop to let the child pass. “Are you not going to stop? What are you doing?” the father yells. Instead, the car passes the child at very close range — and then speeds off. 

Known in the British cycling community as a “punishment pass,” this type of threat is an occupational hazard for anyone pedaling on two wheels in the U.K. 

A video of this particular punishment pass ignited a fiery controversy online in early November. Some people were enraged the child had been threatened. But many others were just as angry at the 5-year-old and his father. 

The video garnered millions of views and soon became the top story on the Daily Mail website — one of the most-visited news sites in the world. It unleashed a wave of hatred, with thousands blaming the boy’s father for “horrific parenting” and risking his son’s life by letting him out on the road.