Prejudice and Riders

It has been more than 50 years since the so-called Hollister incident that led to the Marlon Brando movie “Wild One”.  For those of you who don’t know what I am talking about, this was the movie that spread the image of motorcycle riders as “bad boys” who took over a small town.  From the style of motorcycle jacket (A Langlitz, no less), onward, this movie led to a whole group of misperceptions that have persisted ever since.  Truthfully, some riders thrive on feeding this legend, so we can’t just blame Hollywood and the press.

Currently, the two things most disliked about motorcycle riders are loud pipes, and discourteous lane splitting.  As the summer heats up, I am seeing plenty of both, and it isn’t pretty.  The riders who thrive on pissing everyone off are doing lasting damage to our pursuit.

I won’t go through all of the arguments on both sides of loud pipes, because I am not against loud pipes.  However, there are loud pipes, and there are LOUD PIPES.  Some of the pipes I am hearing lately are not the usual loud pipes we know and love, but are loud enough to be painful to anyone in the vicinity with good hearing.  We’re not talking about loud enough to drown out your radio or ipod, nor merely to preclude any conversation, but loud enough to damage hearing.  Not only are these riders hurting their own hearing (yes, they do wind up with hearing loss after a while – duh), but it is really an assault on anyone they pass on the road.

The other public relations nightmare are riders who do DISCOURTEOUS lane splitting.  I lane split, as we all do, but I have certain personal guidelines that I use.  I am NOT TALKING ABOUT NORMAL LANE SPLITTING.  Normal lane splitting does not endanger anyone, is legal, is often safer than not lane splitting, and we all agree that it is a good thing for riders.  No, I am ranting about not good riders who strafe cars and other motorcyclists alike, and require evasive action.  These riders don’t know what they are doing, and cause cars to move away from them or risk an accident.  I’m not even talking about lane splitting at more than twice the speed of traffic.  For example, one of these genius riders was unsteady at the speed he was riding.  Whether he was having trouble with the Botts dots or whatever, he simply lacked the minimal smooth riding ability required to lane split.  Another was slaloming through traffic, taking one car to the left, cutting in front (and forcing the car to hit the brakes to avoid him), then taking the next car to the right.

I subscribe to the theory that, if your riding is forcing other drivers to take evasive action, you are being a pest, and a bad rider.

Problem is, these riders are remembered with disdain for a long, long time.  No one seems to remember the rest of us, as we gently slide through traffic with little disturbance, and little to remember.