Change the World, Ride a Bike

This is the second post in a series on bike culture. Read about Troy Bike Rescue and community bike shops, or come back soon for more art, fire and girls on bikes!

tallbike by Redskynight

This is a tallbike.

they do get more fancy: Paul and James by doviende

It’s pretty basic, really: you weld one bike frame on top of another, lengthen the chain, climb up and ride. Want to try riding one? You might need to lean the bike against a wall so you can get up. After that, it’s not too hard… oh, but now that you’re up, there’s one more thing: no brakes. And good luck getting down.

Why a tallbike? Because it looks cool. Because you can see over cars when you ride in the street. Because it makes a statement. Because it’s a challenge. Because we can.

In recent years, tallbikes have become synonymous with bike culture—and bike culture has flourished in every city and country from New York to Namibia.

Cyclist v. Biker

Not that bicycles ever went out of style: they have always been, and will always be, cool. I learned that a very young age from my dad, a cycling buff and long-distance rider. Thanks to Dad, I’ve always had wheels and known what to do with them. And at 60, my pops is out there riding a hundred miles in a single day, just for the joy of it.

Cycle Oregon 2008 by bryanpearson

But even for Dad, cycling is a sport, a hobby, a pastime. That’s how it’s perceived in our culture these days: bikes are for fun and exercise, but cars are for getting around.

Which is why, if you use the word “cycling” around scruffy bike kids, you’ll receive a swift correction to the head. Cycling? Not a chance. We aren’t cyclists, we’re just bike riders.

What’s the difference? Well, cyclists have jerseys and aerodynamic helmets and $1000 bicycles. Riders have thrift-store clothes and bikes they bought for $10 or made with their own hands. Cyclists ride on weekends; riders go everywhere on two wheels. Cyclists are in it for the sport and health benefits; riders are more about the sociopolitical. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with cycling—in fact, it’s a great sport. It just doesn’t describe what bike kids do.

Critical Momentum

Truly, bike culture is more defined by what it does than by what it doesn’t. Bikers are involved in every facet of the American underground: from art to music to political protest to charity and community experimentation, wherever you seek out grassroots social change you’ll find bikes.

“We’re not blocking traffic. We ARE traffic.”
Critical Mass, Vancouver, June 2007 by ItzaFineDay

So where did the modern bike movement come from? Many would say it started with Critical Mass, that ongoing, decades-long celebration of bike culture. Critical Mass is a peaceful* protest against our car-centric world, a leadership-free international event that brings bikers together and gets them (and the automobile drivers they inconvenience) thinking about social change.

And why not? It’s tough to be a bike rider these days. Bicyclists are killed in the streets every day by careless drivers. In the city, bikers have to breathe dirty air and navigate unsafe intersections; in the suburbs, there are no bike lanes. And when forced to choose between cars and bikes, authorities nearly always side with the gas-guzzler. Critical Mass and other gatherings, while protected under the Constitution, are often interrupted by police (the old “you don’t have a permit to protest” bit).

video capture from Still We Ride, the movie

But still we ride, and why? Like I said before: because we can.

bike ambulance prototype in Namibia, by aaronforest

Of course, bicycles are a faultlessly logical choice for transportation. Bikes are free to ride, and they create no pollution. They don’t require freeways, consume no fossil fuels, last for decades, and you can fix ‘em yourself. In some underserved communities, bikes are the only means of transportation; even in America’s rich cities, bikes are equally available to the rich and the poor. Some ride because they choose to, and some because they have no other choice—but around the world, millions of people depend on bicycles.

Still, bikes in most areas are second-class vehicles, and their riders are second-class citizens. Which explains why they’re so beloved in the cultural underground. This is how bikes became associated with punk and anarchist culture.

Bike Clubs!

So back to the tallbikes.

You’ve been practicing with your tallbike, right? You know how to ride it now? Great, here’s a ten-foot PVC pole with a stuffed animal duct-taped to the end. Try to knock the other guy off his bike before he gets you. Ready? Go!

Tallbike Jousting by megulon5

That’s bike jousting—and this is is not my father’s bicycle club.

Black Label Bike Club is arguably the best-known bike club in America, with chapters in Minneapolis, New York, Reno, Austin and New Orleans. They’re a weird and fascinating mishmash of biker gang, artpunk collective, political movement and charitable organization. Their members are highly intelligent, extremely honorable, creative, foulmouthed, somewhat frightening punks who are no more afraid of social change than they are of shotgunning a beer and climbing on a tallbike to joust in a diaper and Mexican-wrestler mask (for example).

Free thought is the uniting force, and Black Label believe that free thought and freedom of expression are basic and unalienable rights—which is why, when they’re not jousting and making ends meet, they work with kids to teach them how to build and fix bikes. And Black Label aren’t alone: bike clubs from Chicago’s Rat Patrol to San Francisco’s Cyclecide to Seattle’s Dead Baby Bike Club are fiercely dedicated to expression both artistic and political. Most bike clubs are involved in community and charity work, despite the fact that they’re a bunch of broke artists and punks.

Old Bike Group, Bandung, West Java, Indonesia, by Ikhlasul Amal

Ultimately, groups like this will never reach the mainstream; however, their influence on popular culture is growing steadily as the world realizes the merit of their ideas. From the simple practice of riding a bike, to the ideas of sharing (even when you have nothing) and acting honorably (even when the world looks down on you), groups like Black Label are stirring up currents of change. And they are succeeding at passing on bike culture’s central tenet, the most important lesson we all need to learn: Do It Yourself.

Like that tallbike, do ya? It makes you look so cool, right? Want one of your very own?

Make it yourself. And then ride it.

The story isn’t over yet—in fact, it’s just about to get good. Come back soon for the fun stuff: the art, the mutated bikes, the circus shows, the burlesque biker girls!

In the meantime, there’s so much more. Watch B.I.K.E. and Still We Ride for close-up views of bike culture, mutation and activism.

* Critical Mass rides, like so many politically-oriented demonstrations, can and do become violent. Nonetheless, this is not their intent.