Defending the Faith--NWD, ROAM. BENDER.LACONDEGUY etc

PB Forum :: Freeride & Slopestyle
Defending the Faith--NWD, ROAM. BENDER.LACONDEGUY etc
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flag limited60
Posted: Dec 24, 2007 at 12:58 Quote
Our last build day got a bit philosophic. As a group of 30+ year old guys who have been riding longer than most kids we see have even been living...we got on the topic of defending the faith .

Defending the faith means defending to the death the weekly biking trend, the rider du jour, the perennial movements of the sport or any other temporary nuance of the sport.

We spoke of the kids who will jump on the proverbial grenade for a guy like Josh Bender, or die on the proverbial hill for NWD movies. We spoke of the kids who have picked up the sport, been a part of it for 2 seasons and formed a complete identity around it. They see "the new" as "the enduring" rather than just another limb that has been built beneath the body of the broader sport.

We wondered why there are so few people willing to be constructively critical of the facet of the sport to which they belong....or why, it seems, the irrational conclusion has bee drawn that to be critical of a facet is to be critical of the person who belongs in this facet.

Why are there so many blind defenders of the faith? Why do defenders of the faith turn on those who defend the sport but remain skeptical or critical of both the faith and the broader sport? There are no shortages of examples of defenders of the faith in these fora but why is it they exist in such vast numbers?
flag pbuser102331
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 2:41 Quote
im in your age range and you lost me on that one.

do you mean they are defending it no matter what even though there are flaws,explain it better.
flag bevan25
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 11:44 Quote
well, I'd say it has to do mostly with kids wanting to belong to a clique, or some elite group of somethings. They find the easiest way to do that in the biking world is to act so attached to something or someone, like bender or the nwd films, that they feel they are actualy a part of some cooler-than-thou club. Thus, if someone from another club criticizes theirs, they get really upset.
flag emubritish
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 17:00 Quote
i will admit i am no where near as old as you, and have only been riding seriously for 3 years, but i dont tend to jump on the big bandwagons, i go with what i like... i love freeride, i would argue that single pivot bikes are the way to go, that 1.5 single crowns offer the best of both worlds, and that tubeless is the best thing to happen to tires/tubes since the pneumatic bicycle tire itself.

I work at a shop, and one guy has a blkmarkt completely built up in the nicest spec ive ever seen, white everything, diety bars, stem, cranks... but hes a better dj'er than me not because of his bike, but because he has the time to go and build his own jumps on private land and jump them all day long. i would argue that he has sacrificed several better parts for those that are "cool" now, in a few years, white will be out once people realized how it stains and looks terrible, and i will still have my bright blue astrix union, looking just as good as the day i bought it.
flag dirtjump-derek
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 20:07 Quote
What exactly do you mean, I got lost about 2/3 of the way through, I think I know what your talking about for the most part, but not enough to elaborate.
flag carnell
O+
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 20:08 Quote
I know where you are coming from. I started riding in what was probably the height of mtb popularity in Vancouver in the late 90's i was 10 at the time and i lived and died by the sport, and as such would defend every and all aspects of it to the grave! But i have grown older learned more and more less lessened my bond with the sport. I find myself more critical of the aspects and open to changes in it.

What i'm trying to say is kids are kids and it takes time to be wise, most will quit riding before the become wisebut those who really understand the sport will get it...sooner or later.
flag zaidmac
Posted: Dec 27, 2007 at 21:09 Quote
There are a lot of people who like to geek out about mountain biking. But I like to be creative and just ride my bike anywhere I know who your taking about but I think they just have so much fun riding bikes they pretend they are even when there not which gets old to me.
flag scaliwag
Posted: Dec 28, 2007 at 12:10 Quote
As far as I can tell, this happens in every subculture, be it biking or skateboarding or punk rock or hip hop. When you're new to something, all you know is the latest trend, so you identify and defend, while people who have been around a while get a little defensive because they don't like change or can't make the change, or they just like to see the bigger picture. I am a bit older and I've been on both ends, and...yeah. It's an interesting phenom.
flag crs-one
Posted: Dec 28, 2007 at 17:19 Quote
one thing you have to remember - eventually one of these trends will outlast the rest of mtbing, for example g-funk is nowhere to be seen these days, but used to be a huge part of hip-hop. maybe 'slopestyle' will eventually be shifted in meaning to encompass what used to just be freeride, and all the bottlerocket fanboys will be proven right.

i personally got into mtb as the 2six stallions enjoyed the height of their popularity, so naturally tsage's bullshit influenced me a lot, and i still stand by most of it.

i'm another one of those lazy-ass street/dj riders, but upon reflection, i've got my own theories about mtb, what 'pure' mtb is. the way i see this whole issue, as clifford argued, its not the conclusion you arrive at, it's how you arrive at that conclusion.
flag carnell
O+
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 5:44 Quote
where is t sage these days?
flag crs-one
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 11:34 Quote
rampage14 wrote:
where is t sage these days?


on pinkbike, actually.


his new blog honestly sucks in comparison to 2sixstallions.com, but there you go
flag alinelover
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 12:24 Quote
bevan25 wrote:
well, I'd say it has to do mostly with kids wanting to belong to a clique, or some elite group of somethings. They find the easiest way to do that in the biking world is to act so attached to something or someone, like bender or the nwd films, that they feel they are actualy a part of some cooler-than-thou club. Thus, if someone from another club criticizes theirs, they get really upset.

im 13 and id wouldnt use the word clique. for me its the desire to be a part of something that most people dont understand, and is considered extreme. it is fun to be a part of something that is somewhat a revolution. us "kids" are always looking for new ways to be considered "radicals." any freerider that has reasonable skill has been asked "why? why risk all that?" its because the personality of that particular kid wants to do something that not a lot of other people do. biking is unique to any other sport in the world. even other adrenaline junkie sports. ill admit it, i do see the guys in movies, not so much nwd as i do in the collective films, and say wow, "those guys are awesome. thats life i want" i cant help it. thats just the way i am. and then we do thing to try to be like those guys, such as riding. it makes us feel like we are a part of what those guys are leading. oh, and riding is way more fun and kick ass than anything on the planet Big Grin Pirate
flag bevan25
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 13:18 Quote
alinelover, what i mean is not that its bad to want to be part of something cool, or to look up to better riders, but when kids become really defensive of a certain part of the culture that they are attached to, and start slamming the other parts, we have this problem.
flag alinelover
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 13:32 Quote
i know how that goes. our city is really against us mtbers. ive told them before make a place for us to ride and we will stop going into ur "private forests" to build.
flag kendall07
Posted: Dec 29, 2007 at 14:11 Quote
I think i know what you mean.

I'm 16 and have only been riding properly for around 2 and a half years. The first thing i saw in the mtb world was downhill, and i knew instantly that DH was the type of riding i wanted to do.

I loved downhill and still do, but i used to only be interested in DH. I would look at dirtjumpers and think that what they did was just plain boring. I'd see XC and think they were all just pussy's. DH was all there was, I'd watch all the downhill parts in movies and just skip everything else, or watch it and say how shite it was.

But now i see just how good all types of riding are. Dirtjumping is not boring at all, infact i just bought myself a hardtail for exactly that purpose. I have a huge amount of respect for XCers now, after trying my local XC route on my stinky....bad move.

I've probably gone way off track and rambled on about something completely unrelated to this thread but oh well
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