MISFITS, FOLK DEVILS AND YOUTH CULTURE
“Out there in the cold distance/A wild cat did it growl/Two riders were approaching/And the wind begins to howl.”
(Bob Dylan).
“I’m just a shoot ‘em dead, brain-bell, jangler.”
(Rolling Stones).
It has been alleged that Bikers are just a bunch of oddities, physically and mentally. This is even the attitude of one or two motorcyclists and scooterists. But hang around any centre of community and you’ll spot the Dickensian characters. Those who some describe as misfits, often prefer to regard themselves as outside of the norm because they can think for themselves.
A good number of Bikers come from rather special if not irregular molds. Some are congenital - a peculiarity of stature, a prominent feature of passport mention-ability; and some are life’s battle-scars - a missing appendage, a disturbed gait or scarring. When you find your (odd) self a part of something like Bikerdom, it can get worse if you become deluded by inverse reactionary ideologies. But most people learn to manage or ignore their irregularities, even find a sense of pride in them. Some Bikers will play one-up-manship by baring their afflictions; saving the most gruesome until last. Within this is an acceptance of the self. You learn to be philosophical or go under.
The upside is that physical non-conformists are often noted for their big heartedness. Self acceptance soon develops into a warmer humanitarianism - above and beyond the norm. Physical affliction is often rudely associated with stupidity, but it is also analogous with increased IQ, if not talent verging on genius. Despite their physical conformity, those Bikers who are of sound mind and body still rank outside the norm because of their biking (ergo weirdo, ‘spas’ and ‘crip’) involvement ( I can use such words without persecution from the politically correct as they made be used to describe myself - and I find them funny, not hurtful. Anyone who is hurt by the truth has got other problems{see nutter}).
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There are also those who describe Bikers as losers, bums and under achievers. They refer to the social status of individuals who at least seem to be misfortunate. Besides the pseud contingency, it is the same confusion arising from the appearance of the stereotyped eccentric. Such accusers are so very normal, they cannot grasp any reason for not doing what they’re told. Whatever the case, being different can make you interested in different things.
A snarling, Satanic apparition is great fun to put forth. You don’t really think you’re the Devil; inside you are smiling. Yet from this we can understand something of those (riders) who take it too seriously, and become damaged. Some stew in an anger and loathing as befitting a hormonal condition during puberty. Trying to fit in can create a kind of schizophrenia. In order to get a decent job, certain codes have to be adhered to. You fry with embarrassment, and in the end, you have to let your inner feelings win or allow yourself to be destroyed. It just doesn’t have to be a megalomaniacal response.
Bikerdom is not a church for the lame, but it does show compassion and understanding - for the regularly proportioned as much as for degenerates like myself. Any anger that the unusual person might harbour can be washed away in the aggression of motorcycles. Once you get moving, nothing else matters, and you can begin to understand the slogan Fuck The World. It doesn’t mean you’re going to demolish it or anyone in it. You just don’t need it anymore. When a Biker is among other Bikers, each individual knows they’ll get no grief from their present company. Beyond sarcasm...and insult...
Once you have lived out on the edge, it becomes natural, yet so exciting, anything else is just tepid. I for one would not swap my earnest companions, my devoted partner, my lifestyle, my motorcycle, nor even my affliction, for a bleak, self-demeaning twilight governed by convention. It is the conformists who so obviously lack spirit, they have to strap themselves into life - rather than riding it.
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A folk devil is a person with a dodgy reputation, or an inverse folk hero; it depends on your view. It is linked to the ideology of alternative culture versus mass culture, that has always been around in different forms. Pirates and Vikings are among others whose lifestyles are associated with Bikers. In their own times, to those they represented, they were folk heroes. However, the authorities they upset branded them as folk devils, and this has come to include members of cultures that appear to be in opposition to the status quo.
In protecting lifestyles, humans become dual entities; loving is succeeded by ferocity. This creates a coarse yet often warm-hearted atmosphere. Even fantasy societies from outer space or future earth create the same feelings. The Klingons and the Borg in the TV series Star Trek, and the characters in the Mad Max movies, all blend brutality and lawlessness with humanity. It is rule-bending of a righteous nature. It is, since their first ructions with society, very Biker.
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To the outsider, the bonding between biking types had created an illusion of Masonic exclusivity, which lead to unfounded fear. It was these collectives of folk devils that became the focus of media sensationalism (whether they deserved it or not). Some Bikers have spelled their life-styles out in their own writings, but empirical scienceinsists on gathering measurable data to quantify its findings. If the quality of biking can be measured, it is probably in units of smile. I can hear scientific minds saying: You can’t just say that, there has to be proof. In the law-courts, scientific evidence can be over-turned as purely circumstantial and therefore not relevant, by witness accounts. As this book is sourced in witnesses’ accounts, let the honourable reader wear the wig.
For whatever reasons researchers have approached gangs or similar organisations, many have encountered the Apache silence. This has been named after the way Apache Indians react (or don’t react) to others who’ve insulted them, or in their eyes, acted disgracefully. People who don’t understand certain cultures can make fumbling approaches that are even disrespectful. The Apache silence says: “I wouldn’t intrude on your life. Kindly return the favour.”
In their empirical search for evidence, the researcher’s preconceptions can be damaging, if not just amusing. They reason that disguise is justifiable so that their subjects will open up and speak honestly. Specific questions are set to evaluate theories, but with due respect to scientific methodology, in answering those questions, the interviewees were not being given the opportunity to divulge other important truths. In a freer style, an American anthropological student called D. Wolfe decided to make his own investigations. He said he wanted to study the “Harleytribe”, and wished to understand the “emotions and mechanics” behind the outlaw Biker’s “subcultural alternative.”
He chose to create an insider-view, but he inveigled his way in under a deception. He wrote: “I customised my Norton, donned some biker clothing, and set off.” He apparently met members of the King’s Crew in Calgary, Canada, and said he: “Expressed an interest in hanging around.” He doesn’t describe their reaction, but admits it caused him some upset. As a result, he said that: “Outsiders, not even bikers, rush into a club.”
He acquired a Harley Davidson, and tried again. He sat in a bar watching a group called the Rebels, and said: “The loud thunder of heavy metal music...would make introductions difficult.” He added: “There were no individual faces, only a series of Rebel skull patches draped over leather jackets in a corner.”
Perhaps due to his previous experience, he was feeling some apprehension. However it was more likely to stem from how he was acquiring information. He went outside, wondering what to do, and was approached by someone called Wee Albert, who Wolfe says was: “Doing a security check on the Rebel iron.” They apparently: “Talked about motorcycles, riding in the wind, and the Harley tradition.” Wee Albert showed him some of their bikes, and ‘“Grunted approval at Wolfe’s Hog.” From then on, Wolfe was able to make what he called ‘border crossings’, to get into the club. He was in a totally different frame of mind to anyone who would have been keen to be in with the Rebels, or even just friendly. By describing his visits with the Rebels as border crossings, he underlined his duality. Producing truth from such a predicament is virtually impossible - whose truth would it be?
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As a Biker herself, UK student Deborah Chambers was able to rationalise the situation and her method of research. She followed a motorcycle gang in the 1970’s, and made a level and seemingly genuine analysis. Chambers boldly told them of her intentions, but was accepted regardless. Her prime intention was to regard their values and their position in relation to the dominant society. Another reason lay in her discovery that other research had concentrated on masculinity. Chambers decided to identify “The expression of gender roles within sexual power relations in the sphere of leisure for working class adolescents.”
The participant observer is bound to make mistakes because of the techniques used and because of the conventions that tied them. Academic studies did much to understand the problems of deviance and criminality, especially among youths. Yet this is partly how they came to misinterpret criminality as Biker culture per se. What Wolfe, Chambers (and others) had looked at, was gang culture - Wolfe looked at the Rebels, Chambers studied a group whom she renamed the Vikings. This, in turn, was often youth culture - Chambers actually refers to her subjects as “Adolescents.”
Concerning the fears researchers had expressed, someone called Howard Parker had stated that: “Your philosophy must be: ‘Better have your head kicked in today than next week.’ Unless you have really betrayed your subjects, you must ride your mistakes rather than retreat.” With respect to the position of these researchers, the incorrect identification of their subjects and the fear they shared had compounded the media and societal view of the biking stereotype; even among the nouveaux-intellects who claimed to be indifferent. Youth and gang cultures have made both positive and negative contributions to Biker culture, but have never been central to its existence. The societal, media and academic views of youth and gang culture had created a mask, behind which genuine Biker culture was still evolving. This is made clear by the fact that many organisations had used words like Club and Society in their names. They did not wish to be associated with those whose behaviour they disapproved of and who blackened their reputations. Yet these genuine riders’ organisations were not the straights. They were more akin to alternative culture - that is, in their case, the genuine biking continuum. It is also the reason why any trace of Biker culture seemed to evaporate prior to the 1940s - at the dawn of gang and youth culture.
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20th century society had made its own problems. Parents and authorities used repression to control crime and other unacceptable behaviour, but this then turned to subversion. Anyone who succeeds or escapes through negative means might use that method over and over if their situation seems inescapable. If such culture is tested by repression and survives, it can grow. If the authorities then regard it as a bigger problem, with further attempts at control (rather than understanding) the cycle is repeated - as per the regular clamp-downs on upsurgent youth sub-cultures. Within this, the authorities were often making the same mistakes as the sociologists et al, concerning Biker identity. Because the motorcycle is used by a greater cross-section of society, its supporters have so far been able to fend off some, but not all unnecessary impingements.
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Crime has its buzz, and there are people who indulge for that reason, however the essential basic is a last resort. It is alleged that theft and violence are survival instincts. Not mental aberrations, but digressions against the social norm, because the poverty trap is a desperate place. If the odds of survival are stacked against human effort, people will turn to cunning and other instincts. The way in which ordinary people will filch items from their work-place and abuse other privileges sets a precedent for such a negative disregard. The environment, social or physical, can affect a person’s behaviour. However, at the nub of all human consciousness is an ability to make decisions. Hiding behind the skirts of sympathetic social theorising is often just a cop-out for those who’ve abandoned their morals.
None of the above makes criminal behaviour any more acceptable. But it does put the deviant image into perspective - outside of the genuine Biker remit, which was and is purely eccentricity. Broader societal attitudes in latter years have debunked much of the Biker stereotype, and TV commercials even use tongue-in-cheek Biker characters to sell washing powder or banking. So some negativity toward Biker culture has eroded. It is however, still being tested.