Environmentalism and parenting

[pegkerr]

I have friended the bikepirates community. It's been interesting: this is (I gather) a rather younger group--I feel like quite the old fart, being in my forties and all. I joined to pick up information about this bicycling thang, but there is an attitude vibe there, too, which can be a bit rough to take.

For example, someone made a post here advertising a new community, carfreepirates. Which is cool. One of the commenters, however, said something that sticks in my craw:

FYI - there used to be a non_drivers community, but it dissappeared for mysterious reasons.

I've joined up, since I'm car free and sometimes I need a little morale boost, since no one *with* a car, really gets it, even though they also don't understand how I can stay in such good shape and I'm not stressed out and road raged all the time.

I replied:

I HAVE to have a car since I have kids to transport, and there is no bus to where I need to go. I could hardly balance both of them (and their karate sparring gear) on my handlebars.

But I ride my bicycle to work.

For what it's worth, I wasn't the only person to challenge the original commenter. I feel as though I'm doing my part by starting to bicycle. But I've seen this before, this smug dismissal of my selfishness for driving a big car (I have an old jeep with 140,000+ miles). We all hear environmentalists railing against people who drive SUVs. Yes, I guess I'm defensive about it. And yet, really, with two kids that I'm taking four times a week to karate class (with huge duffel bags stuffed with sparring equipment) what else can I do?

I want to reduce my environmental footprint. But please consider: when you're a parent, and you have to get kids to activities and back and forth from day care, bussing usually doesn't work. And bicycling is not an option either.

Bottom line: Please don't assume I'm selfish because I drive a car. I drive a car because I'm a parent.

But I'm also an environmentalist because I'm a parent.

Edited to add: Today is a classic example. I drove today. Why? Because of the snow (argh)? No. Because Delia has a doctor's appointment. I have to leave work, drive to her school to pick her up, drive her to the doctor, and then get her home. This trip would be absolutely impossible by either mass transit or bicycle.

And *snerk* Someone has replied to the original poster (who headed the post with the tagline "Every car a murder, every bike a love affair"): "How do you think all those bike parts get to the shops? It's not magic, that's for sure."

Comments

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Meh, I wouldn't even bother replying to them. I stay off the car-free forum on bikeforums.net. I used to hang out on the advocacy and safety group, but they seem to be mainly there to preach. These people would be terribly disappointed if someone didn't challenge them. They're not going to be swayed from their opinion, and neither are you. You're just wasting your time and annoying the pig.

We're not going to save the planet in one miracle move, and the entire population isn't going to give up their cars. It's either going to happen by each person deciding what they can do, or it's not going to happen and we're all going to run off a cliff someday. You and I do what we've decided are reasonable measures for us to take, and we answer questions when people ask them. This plants seeds in people's heads and they can then make their own choices. I personally think that's much more effective than evangelism, which only ever works (no matter what you're selling) if someone's already searching for an answer before you come to them.

Devil's advocate: It's not too hard to see where some of the indignation comes from though; in some areas of the country, people treat cyclists quite badly. I've read stories of people actually trying to kill cyclists for no apparent reason other than the crazy cyclist seemed to think that they had a right to be on the road and delay a car by 2 or 3 seconds, so they needed killin'. Add the general road rage element in, and it's pretty easy for cyclists to start believing that just being in a car automatically makes anyone into an asshole. Heck, I've seen cyclists posting that THEY tend to become big jerks when they get in a car.

If you have questions about bike commuting, I'd recommend going to bikeforums.net and going to the commuting forum. The people there are quite helpful. Search the archives. Almost any conceivable question has been answered. They don't mind too much if you restate the question either. Most of us are just looking for something to do besides work. :)

I've seen people post questions about their route, and have both knowledgeable locals critique their route, and others use google maps to make suggestions.

There are often posts of "I had this bad experience in traffic, how do you think I should have handled it better?" that turn into useful discussions.