Photo Credit: thurswell.com

At some point, we won’t be able to ride motorcycles on public roadways.  It won’t be because of fossil fuel availability, EPA regulations, or an inability to afford insurance.  It won’t even be due to some far-in-the-future law that outlaws bikes.  Our grandchildren, if not our children, are going to look at motorcyclists the way we look at racists and bigots.  If they ride, they certainly won’t make it common knowledge to their coworkers and acquaintances, because motorcycling is increasingly becoming the domain of selfish, stupid, and delusional assholes.   Motorcycling and motorcyclists will be done soon, and the government won’t have to do it.  It will be because we will eventually become targets for a world and motoring public that is tired of our collective bad behavior. 

When I say “our,” I don’t actually mean “you, the reader, and me, the writer;” if you’re read STC, you’re probably way more into trackdays and racing than street riding.  Furthermore, if you DO ride on the street, it’s probably on a bike with lights, mirrors, and legal registration.  You may occasionally wick it up while on some curvy backroads, but you generally keep a low profile while in town. . .if you live in town at all. 

The problem is that, to the general public, you and I are no different from this guy:

Photo by instagram account @atlbikelife

If you haven’t already seen this in your city, you mostly likely soon will.  In Atlanta, it’s becoming a popular thing to do on Sunday afternoons.  Huge groups ride through side streets, parks, and now downtown on Peachtree. 

It’s already a huge problem in cities like New York, Philly, and especially Baltimore.  “No Chase” laws and regulations mean that the police are more or less powerless to stop them.   The only real weapon the law has against these riders is to impound the vehicles. . .if they can find them. 

Photo Credit: LiveLink

It's also hard to think about a large group of motorcyclists riding through city streets without incidents such as last year's attack on a family in an SUV. No matter what circumstances led to the attack, or who was completely/partly to blame, it was and is a black eye for the sport. If these "rides" go unchecked for long, this is an unavoidable result.

I recently read a solid article by Max Blau of Creative Loafing Atlanta about Atlanta’s “urban biking scene,” specifically the organization, ATL Bike Life. Credit to Max for being as unbiased as possible when writing what is essentially the dumbest shit I’ve ever seen from anyone who would call themselves a motorcyclist.  I’ve never met him, but, if he managed to record those quotes without rolling his eyes, he’s a better man and writer than I.  If he somehow bit his tongue instead of saying, “Are you fucking serious?” to these idiots, he must be a saint.

Photo Credit: Jorge Sigala/CLATL.com

The most disturbing thing about the article is not that guys ride dirtbikes and ATVs on the street.  It’s that they somehow rationalize their stupid, illegal behavior by saying that it keeps them from doing other illegal stuff.  As if I could get pulled over for speeding and tell the officer, “Yeah, I was doing 87 in a 50, but it keeps me from robbing and killing people.” 

It’s just stupid.

Speaking of stupid...

That’s the 75/85 Connector in Atlanta, the largest interstate artery in the city.  And that’s a pair of douchebags doing wheelies on dirtbikes that shouldn’t be on any street, much less an interstate.

If we’re being honest, I don’t care what these guys do as long as they don’t hurt anyone.  I don’t even mind traffic slowing down; I live in Atlanta, and it’s part of the deal.  With that being said, these riders, if they aren’t curtailed, will almost certainly hurt someone.  It may be a traffic accident with a car, a pedestrian, or –in the worst possible case- a kid playing near the street.

It’s going to happen because, unless there are consequences, their numbers and egos will continue to grow.  If you continually get away with stupid, selfish behavior, why would you change?

The end result?  You’re going to be at a gas station, filling up your bike – and it doesn’t matter if it’s a BMW R1200GS, a DR650, or an R6 -, and some dude in a truck or suburban mom in a minivan is going to ask you why you/we ride like assholes all the time.  Your neighbors are going to judge you because you ride, no matter if you’re a weekend trackday guy or commute on a cruiser.  Not because you act or look like these assholes, but because, thanks to the our media-consumption habits, that’s the only kind of motorcycling with which they will be familiar.  If you only see motorcyclists endangering the public and taunting police, you will assume that all motorcyclists do is endanger the public and taunt the police.

Photo by instagram account @atlbikelife

I really want to end this article on a positive note, but I don’t know that I can.  Motorcycles and riding are a huge part of my life, and I know that I’m going to spend an even larger amount of my life explaining to people that, when I ride, it’s not doing bullshit wheelies on city streets or blocking traffic on Peachtree.

-Ed