Most of the people in my social circle don’t ride a motorbike and haven’t taken a ride on one either.

As I come close to picking up my first bike, I get all sorts of discouragements

-) “You’ll Die”
-) “Disabled for life”
-) “They are soo dangerous”
-) Brother: “know of someone who had to have a hip bone replacement.” (or something along these lines)
-) “If somebody opens their car door on the street, your gonna die if you bump into it”,

and the best (yet the worst) of all was

-) “The good thing is that if you get into an accident, you won’t need to go to Rehab, cuz you’ll be dead”

-) .... and many more.

Then I get presented with the following articles and stats:

From CAA Website:
1) Motorcycles are the most dangerous type of motor vehicle to drive.[1] These vehicles are involved in fatal crashes at a rate of 35.0 per 100 million miles of travel, compared with a rate of 1.7 per 100 million miles of travel for passenger cars. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has reported increasing numbers of motorcycle deaths associated with alcohol-impaired driving in recent years, especially among persons aged => 40 years.
[2] To determine trends by age group in motorcycle fatalities overall and in those involving alcohol impairment, CDC analyzed data from the NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) for 1983, 1993, and 2003.
Some Statistics about riding:

http://www.caasco.com/insurance/auto-vehicle-insurance/tips-for-city-riding.jsp

Motorcycle Tips for City Riders | Insurance | CAA South Central Ontario
www.caasco.com
I plan to ride for fun and NOT to be a Street Racer and certainly not to be a stunt man. After hearing that many discouraging statements, I’m wondering if it’s really that bad and if people currently riding do feel it to be as dangerous.

My understanding is that most of the people get into an accident because somebody else didn’t check their blind spot or didn’t look carefully and the biker pays the cost of their negligence. On the other hand, if one is planning to race on the highway with friends, then the above statements are probably true. But that’s not my intention.

Please share some of your experiences about accidents that you know of or better yet seen.

Some tips on "what not do" would help as well.