BIKE REVOLUTION!

I found this old zine laying around the house & thought it would be good to post so others could read it.

BIKE REVOLUTION! A MANIFESTO
from stinky grrrls. # 2


Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to us, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking people only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, and destroy all motor vehicles.

The automobile is a technological accident. for fuel it replaces oats with fossil fuels and in place of the byproducts of compostable shit and sweat it produces nasty CO-filled fumes. It continues to be manufactured increasingly further away form its owner by increasingly maltreated workers, in increasingly more complex forms that are increasingly impossible to fix by the average individual.
The automobile handcuffs its driver to oil companies that both reek discriminatory indiscriminate
havoc on human communities and the environment and monetarily support and hold the puppet strings of republicans, democrats, and dictarors.
The automobile is dangerous, deadly, ugly, and dictating control over our lives and communities. It is largely if not totally responsible for the phenomena of road rage, cell phones, billboard, ozone depletion, parking lots,fast food, and suburbia. While continuing to perpetuate the myth of man's domination of forces of nature, we in turn contine to suffer under the domination of the automobile, a machine we created. While promising us independence,the automobile keeps us locked alone in little metal boxes, in an almost infinite line of little metal boxes virtually handcuffed to the steering whell, to the gas pump, chewing on rainforest beef and leaving our oily criminal fingerprints everywhere.
But there are some and our numbers are growing who are demanding freedom, community, planetary health, and joy. We represent a Society for Cutting Up Motor vehicles. on bicycles we emerge from our home garages, schools parking lots, business hallways, alleyways, side streets. we are demanding a BIKE REVOLUTION !
the BIKE REVOLUTIN ! is first and foremost about a simple love of the bicycle, because in a simple bicycle there is so much to love. The way the wind hits your face as you ride, and your skin exchanges molecules with air. The way riding a bike invites your muscles to feel speed, distance, and the contours of the landscape. The way a bicycle lets you glide along to wherever you seek to go, yet leaves you free to stop an a moment's impulse and pull over and find the bird you hear singing, have a conersation with a neighbor, or take note of what's hanging out in the cracks of the sidewalk.
THE BICYCLE REVOLUTION ! is about simplisity. bicycles are simple. They'er like skeletons, just bones. but not dull, colorless bones, they'er red and shiny or rusty and worn and inviting us to give them motion, to make them ride. One can look at a bike and see how it works, or she can get on a bike and feel how it works. In this complex age, we need the beautiful simplicity bicycles have to offer.
The BIKE REVOLUTION ! is about equality. No one needs a permit or a license to ride a bike. There are adaptive devices such as training wheels to accommodate even the smallest pups.
The spirt of the bicycle is large enough to encompass tricycles, unicycles,skateboards, wheelchairs, and scooters. Bicycles are neither ableist nor ageist.
Bicycles do not require the use of fuel often drilled in land occupied by indigous peoples with little to no concern for their communities. A bicycle depends simply on the muscle of its rider, not on oil drilled by corporate dictators in lands of ethnic minorities. Bicycles are not racist.
A bicycle is about the cheapest form of transportation available, besides walking shoes . The mechanics of a bicycle are simple. Fixing and maintaining a bike does not require long training or expensive equipment. In the BIKE REVOLUTION ! the oldest, most simple bikes are venerated. coaster breaks and single gears reign supreme. The BIKE REVOLUTION ! is about comminity bikes free to anyone for the riding. Bicycles are not capitalist or classist.
The BIKE REVOLUTION ! is about community. it's about freeing people from their cars and reaquainting them with their neighborhoods, their communities the outdoors. It's about community bike rides and bike libraries. Its about taking back the streets of all amount of traffic in all neighborhoods at all times of the day and night.
The BIKE REVOLUTIN ! is about empowerment and independence. Its about empowering the individual to travel wherever he wants without a permit, license, or ID. Its about empowering the individual to travel unfettered by oppressive idustries or the creation of more pollution. Bicycles do not simultaneous perform miltiple functions mysterious to their riders. A rider is not dominated by his machine. The mechanics of a bicycle are simple enough to be understood by her muscles as bicycle and rider cooperate as one.
The BIKE REVOLUTION ! is about bikes. Taking all the bicycles that have been relegated to the realm of recreation and putting them into action. Its about finding all the bicycles hiding in basements and garages and putting them on the streets. It's about installing new bike racks instead of new parking lots. Its about making our streets and our public transportation bike friendly.
It's about recreating communities where bikes rarely have to hit the streets, because bike paths are so abundant. It's about recreating communities where bikes belong on the streets and the cars are in the way. It's about kids, accountants, administrators, lesbian avengers, hippies, freaks, republicans, punks, and anarchists getting on bicycles.
If you are not yet part of the BIKE REVOLUTION !, how will you know who we are? We are riders of bicycles riding down the middle of the lane that you have to drive behind at 10 miles an hour waiting 10 minutes to pass during rush hour. We are the ones walking around school, work or anywhere else with grease all over our right pant leg or our right pant leg rolled up. we are the kids that confuse parent, insurance companies, and the american economy by not growing up and buying cars. We are the ones stopping traffic completely when you're in a hurry as we ride in our critical masses in san francisco, minneapolis, austin, new york, columbus, D.C. st louis, tokyo, vancouver, and no telling where next. We are the ones who measure distance not it in in the time it takes to drive, but in the time it takes to ride, or in what our muscles know the distance to be. We are the ones who know we can wear a bike helmet and look sexy at the same time. We are the ones who have been riding bikes all our lives and the ones who just this morning decided to ride a bike to work. we are the weekend riders and the ones who ride everyday everwhere and still take leisurely rides on the weekends too. we are the ones riding with milk creates full of groceries, briefcases-turned-backpacks,stickers, flags, and bells. We are the ones caterwauling BIKE REVOLUTION ! everywhere you turn, inviting you to join, demanding that you notice, glad we've already found the
BIKE REVOLUTION!