will byers stan first human second
Discoholic 🪩
dirt enthusiast
noise dept.
d e v o n
hello vonnie
RMH
Sweet Seals For You, Always
Aqua Utopia｜海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
taylor price
One Nice Bug Per Day
Andulka
styofa doing anything
if i look back, i am lost
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
NASA
@theartofmadeline
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸
Kiana Khansmith
Xuebing Du
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@fixedbrokenthings
I'm back, and it turns out I still love bikes, particularly old fast ones. But after 6 months of travel, my life is going in a new direction. Now it's writing. And bikes. But mostly writing.
Still bikes, though. If you are in NZ and feel like letting me touch/ride your bike please do contact me.
On What I Hold Dear:
So far, my tumblr has been an outlet for one of my most dear hobbies, and by and large it's been something I like to keep separate from the rest of my university and professional life. It's partly been about what I love about bikes, and partly about what I hate. Above all that, I hold a clear idea about a sort of basic purity of pursuit in motorcycling A pleasure that comes from challenging yourself, from being propelled on an iron horse to wherever it is you want to be - nowhere, the next lap, the next corner, or simply a beautiful nothingness that comes when your mind is at peace. Pirsg called this zen, a peace of mind. Whatever you call it, and wherever you are headed, motorcycling can be something to get you to that point. It is equal part mortal combat with your undefined limits, and simple sensory pleasure - like a cup of coffee in the morning, or that fresh vitality you feel on a cool autumn day.
But this beauty is obscured beneath a terrible burden of machismo, of brutality, of violence, of primitive masculinity obsessed with validating itself. And yet the brightness shines through. Almost every motorcyclist will be able to tell you about this feeling; from the biggest, hairiest biker, to the most androgynous cold - filtered coffee drinking hipster. But still, motorcycling limits itself with this burden. This burden is a hangover of the post - war years, when motorcycling was at it's roughest. This rough fringe nature is epitomised by the rockers in the UK, by the 1%'ers in the US and here in Australia. To be sure, they espoused some of the simplest pleasures in motorcycling, pursuing speed and infamy in equal excess with the in-the-moment abandon that every motorcyclist knows. But already motorcycling was a masculine thing. Something for men - and then only a certain sort of man. A James Dean, a Michael Fonda, even a James Bond. A man who liked booze and Women.
Sports-bikes hold a special attraction for me, because they do not persist out of some sort of homage to another time where men ruled the roost in brutal fashion. Speed, speed, and more speed is all it is about. Sometimes sportsbikes are ugly (BMW 1989 K1000). Sometimes they are items of pure visual pleasure (Ducati 916). But always they go faster, and faster. Engineers in all over the world devote lifetimes to developing tools that turn ordinary men into a superheros, gorging them on acceleration that overwhelms unprepared senses evolved only for running pace. Full throttle on a big bike is probably best compared to intravenous drugs in it's intensity and immediacy. That is, until you acclimatise and want more.
This might sound like a cultural blank slate - but it is not. It's affiliation to it's ancestral variations means that it carried with it the seeds of machismo, of misogyny, of homophobia. Just like motorsport in general, motorcycling was and is populated by men, and this male - dominated nature has nurtured these archaic values. What's more, this history combines with it's basic nature to attract the sort of person who thinks a homosexual is a poof, and a woman belongs in a small hatchback.
Introducing, the Hayabusa (first generation). The Hayabusa sits in a genre that is an offshoot of sportsbikes, which emerged during the late 1980s, and reached a peak at the turn of the millennium. Whereas sportsbikes are obsessed with speed in a rounded form, emphasising agility and managability as well, bikes like the Hayabusa set agenda clearly on terminal velocity, even if it meant sacrificing these other areas. And so, throughout the decade of the 90s, the top speeds climbed higher and higher. 270, 290, and finally, a claimed 330 km/h. This excess was curbed by a general agreement before kawasaki could answer with their ZX12, and so the Hayabusa stands in legend as the fastest road bike ever made. As such, it is a magnet for those that wish to use motorcycling as an appendage to their own sexual self image, and to project their own dusfunctional, agressive masculinity. Of course, people such as this ride other bikes as well, and the hayabusa holds appeal for anyone pursuing the pleasures of motorcycling. Moreover, these insecure motives are not always primary or even overt. But the Hayabusa stands as the clearest, most explicit example of the contamination of biking in the modern day. The first generation of the Hayabusa was designed in a windtunnel, creating a functional but perhaps less than pleasing aesthetic that was symbolic of it's purpose: total speed. The next generation was designed not for more speed (although this was certainly demanded by the marketing department), but to capitalise on the legendary reputation of it's predecessor. The purpose of the bike itself in terms of pure functionality was in question. Other bikes now made more power, and weighed less. Some sports-tourers could go just about as fast and were more comfortable. But the Hayabusa offered something that the others could not: Street cred. The New Hayabusa was made to be big, bold, and intimidating. Aerodynamics were not so much important as - and this is from the designer - emphasising the calf muscles of the rider (suggesting that he would be in shorts). It was all about telling everyone that you were a man, a real man, who's nerves of steel could ride this untameable beast of speed and agression. Adding more (unnecessary, unusable) power through turbos was and is common on bikes that would never leave the suburban streets. It became a tool of posturing, of conspicuous consumption. It was motorcycling's version of the drug dealer's golden AK-47. Now, every rider wishes to enjoy that absolute excess that comes from limitless, wholly redundant power. But in this case, the bike and the pursuits it encouraged are symbolic of the overall trend: towards motorcycling as a masculine, posturing pursuit like a peacock's feathers or a buck's antlers. To put it bluntly, they became the latest dick - extension in the endless dick measuring contest.
This, more than anything else is what incites my rage, this is what makes me so frustrated and depressed. That simple pleasure I spoke of at the beginning is subsumed to this culture of machismo, of misogyny, and of homophobia. This 'Hayabusa culture' is present in other areas to a lesser degree. Big, shiny chromed cruisers are another one. Pretty much any sportsbike or bike with a claim, whether visual or mechanical, to being big or fast is a platform for this sort of activity. Racing is an area that sits above, but not separate to this. While they care not about the image (if painting it purple and rainbow with ponies gave them 2 tenths a lap, then they would be selling sponsorship to My Little Pony tomorrow), they do contain this culture of homophobia, and misogyny. But there is no real reason for this. In an Asphalt and Rubber article, you can read the transcript of the riders when asked why they think there are no gay people in the sport. They are concerned with (predictably) going faster, and not much else. The reason the culture exists here is because of the insularity of the sport, not because of any latent motivations to gain status and sexual reputation. However, this seems likely to continue without active intervention. At the moment, the umbrella girls, the casual sexism, the antigay comments, and the sleazy acceptance of lesbianism in the paddock all contribute to giving an image that caters to the Hayabusa culture, and dissuades women, gay men, lesbians from joining the sport. If there is not a culture change, then motorcycling could find itself abandoned by all but those who give it this reputation. If it does change, then it could open up a world of pleasure and joy to whole new generations and demographics.
I want to be proud of my hobby, not ashamed as I am now.
Meet zorki, my soviet friend.
Me and my sister in Berlin
Madurodam!! Miniature holland.
So, I am in Europe! It is very fun for a plebeian Australian from the colonies...
Vale and Hayden on vacation...
The leap @ Cadwell.
Oh fuck a track marshal. Look normal.
Valentino Rossi vs. Cal Crutchlow vs. Álvaro Bautista, MotoGP race, Indianapolis 2013.
I am overwhelmed by the staggering range in the quality of myself, and of others. People can be perfect and then shatteringly callous. And I am by no means an exception to the rule.
I have another job! I do things for GetUp sometimes now (: In other news this weekend was really sad for some reasons. So I covered myself in grease and black paint spraying the 250 in the garage and then had a bath. Yeup.
Never stop riding
This is incredibly beautiful.
