The Hippocratic Poser By Lee Foote #173220
CAN YOU SAY “ROLLING CLICHÉ?” Choose your image—here are a few from which to pick: Scene 1. A glistening, four-year-old BMW R 1200 GS with 1600 miles on the odometer and full knobbies is parked in front of a Starbucks coffee bar. The rider takes his frappuccino iced because his yellow Roadcrafter suit is warmish on this barista stool. He spends a lot of time peering over the cover of his off-road motorcycle magazine to see who has noticed him. Finally a scooter rider com- ments, and he bores them to tears by extolling his bike’s published capabili- ties while deriding “lesser” models in the lot. Scene 2. Straight pipe staccato
pummels your eardrums as a goateed Harley rider gasses his Fatbob 1200 past your car window. The colors on his ratty jean vest gleam as he races back to his real estate office to change for a sales meeting. He writes letters to repeal helmet laws each Indepen- dence Day as his act of freedom. Scene 3. Four street bikes, a Ducati
991, Suzuki GSX-R1000, Honda CBR1000RR and a Yamaha R1 take turns lifting wheelies and screaming between stoplights. All the riders wear full race leathers that match their bikes, full face helmets and syn- thetic riding boots over their calves. Full marks for gear. None of their tire wear lines are closer than one inch from their semi-slick tire edges. They flip off slower drivers between stoplights. Scene 4. The six-cylinder Gold-
wing GL1800 with matching trailer gets 2-3 hours of washing, waxing and polishing per week and at least half that much riding time. Wife, hus- band and gear top 700 lbs. The bike,
16 BMW OWNERS NEWS September 2015
another 900. Together, they outweigh a Miata. He plays his 100-watt sound system in town, blaring ABBA and Carpenters tunes and sometimes parks in the handi- capped stall, justifying this by insisting he has keep his beloved bike safe near the storefront. Scene 5. The competition pipes on the
KTM 510 convert this potent dirt bike into a maniacal, tire-lifting torque monster. A quick dig through the natural area and across the stream is the early morning shortcut to the gravel pit riding area. She can’t help roosting gravel and mud in the streambed, and the neighborhood coffee hour quietude is shattered by the thumper’s ratting. These are stereotypical scenarios, but
haven’t we all seen some of them? Have you wondered just what in the hell is going through the riders’ minds? Well, at least the minds of all of them except for those whose riding style resembles our own. Those, we kind of know about. Fess up; we are all pos- ers to some degree. Do you recall that won- derful feeling of rolling up to an open air café, the hot bike engine sort of popping and clunking as it cooled down? Pulling off our helmets and pushing down our helmet hair, we give the admiring patrons our best “Yo, toss me a beer, would ya” look as we swagger in to get some grub. In our imagi- nations, a fit and well-tanned member of the opposite sex will coyly invite us to his/ her table. There he or she will sit enrap- tured, listening to our tales of riding the 100 miles of deep gravel and river crossings to civilization, then drifting the twisty tarmac up to this very eating establishment for a bite. It is a choice moment, akin to easing into a hot tub on a cold night. Unfortu- nately, this fantasy exists largely in our minds; we all play act a bit. The stereotypical uniforms we wear
(leathers, rally jackets, chaps, dirt bike boots, colors, etc.) and the matching bikes
we ride tend to set some public expecta- tions—not quite rules of engagement—but others partly know how we want to be seen based on our accoutrements. There is some comfort in erasing the doubt or uncertainty about what others will say and how we will respond. The script is just clearer that way. Less Game of Thrones and more Everybody Loves Raymond. We don’t have to think or create an identity while striking our care- fully crafted individualistic pose. Funny contradiction that, using a common and often repeated riding uniform to make a statement about individuality. Further- more, there is a beautiful moment of role confusion—what psychologists call cogni- tive dissonance—when a gnarly rider removes a helmet to reveal a beautiful raven-haired woman, an 80-year old dis- tance rider, or a one-armed biker. Does… not…compute…reset! There is no harm in any of these impres-
sions and playing with some images. Sure, it is play-acting, but the trappings of what we wear or ride hurts no one and may demys- tify our stance to strangers. Our ACTIONS, however, are sometimes not so harmless. Each of the opening five scenarios had at least one offensive action embedded to help the clichés cross the line of propriety as the rider types acted to cement their image/ action/persona. Most riders don’t stoop to those depths. These offensive and destruc- tive actions carry our recreational posing across a line. Hippocrates was an ancient Greek who
might have had something to say about motorcyclist behavior. We often paraphrase his famous Hippocratic Oath of “First, do no harm.” This pithy warning should be one of our litmus tests for the decorum we adopt in riding. As we offend a single non- motorcyclist, we taint all other riders. We do harm. There are some other broad rider guide- lines such as “Be safe” and “ATGATT,” too.
the club
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140